"Now you look me with your scorn//and you//eat up all my corn//we got to chase those crazy//oh chase those crazy//we got to chase those crazy bald-heads outta town." -Bob Marley

In Singapore, they call westerners "ang mo," which means "red-hair," or "red-beard." You can add the word "kui," to make it "red-haired devil," the word "kow" to make it "red-haired monkey." In Canton, we are "gweilo," roughly, "ghost man." In Thailand, they call us "falangset," which means guava, but only because the French brought them guavas. Originally, it was the Thai attempt to say français. In Vietnam, we are "taybalo," literally, "western backpack."

We are called different things in different places, but rarely is it meant kindly.

I thought I was tired of being laughed at, but let's face it, it's funny to see someone wildly out of context, not abiding local rules and customs that simply go without saying if you grew up there. More disquieting is that stare. The stare that tells you that you're not welcome, that you don't belong. That without question and without context, they simply don't like you. Because of who you are and what you stand for. It's deeper than appearance, although that's the tip-off, it's about an utter rejection of everything you believe. Of everything you do.



(Da Nang to Hanoi hard-sleep air-con train-ticket. Note that ours are "foreigner" tickets. I think they're more expensive.)

This isn't unique to Asia, but it's pretty fucking new to me. Sure, people are assholes in Chicago, people are exclusionary in San Francisco, like they're all stuck in goddamn high school - but this is something else entirely. It's not universal to Asia either. I've met some very warm people who actually want to know a sliver of your story, but even then there's a wall. A tall imposing barrier that blocks access to what they really are thinking when they see you. It's a stare so wrought with emotion it makes me want to jump the language barrier and see what it is that has made them so pissed at me. At us. To somehow chip away at that wall.




While sleeping on the train last night, I found myself dreaming again. We were riding a boat and Alfie got off. I shouted that we were leaving but he didn't react or just didn't hear me. When he realized, it was too late. He wasn't that concerned. I think he grabbed a water taxi and caught up with us. I woke up saying, "Hey, Alfie," out loud but unconscious. He thought it was funny, but said I sounded stressed. I think it ended pretty well.



(Ok, now lean against the wall and shit into this hole while rattling around on a forty year-old Vietnamese train. No worries.)

Hanoi is my favorite city so far. It's big but not too crazy, with a very strong presence of people on a similar journey. We're getting good tips. This should get very interesting soon. Or maybe it already has.

We got raided by the police twice tonight. First at the cafe where we were sipping dark coffee with sweet milk, then at the bar late at night. I guess you can't operate a business after midnight, especially if liquor is involved. It was very surreal. Our second escape found us squatting between a couple motorbikes with some self-professed pick-pockets, who pointed to the shirtless tattooed Chinese man eating noodles across the street and made a pantomime of shooting us for our money. Uh, whattup Vietnamese-Chinese mafia.

My first apology. Hopefully my last. Sorry Uncle David and Aunt George. I know you are devotees of this project and this might make you hate me. I love animals, I do. But I also eat them. I know you aren't supremacist vegans and I love that, but this gets a little rough. Stop reading unless you can't help yourselves.



(Second apology, sorry Grover...)

I'm not all that proud of this, but I ate dog tonight. It required full submission to the fact that the distinction between eating a pig and eating a dog is utterly cultural and situational. Pigs are more clever than dogs. They also share more genetics with humans. That's not the issue. They're not quite as adorable, but surely that's not it either. Cows are absolutely gorgeous. It's a fundamental but arbitrary line that we have drawn in the sand. This is for eating. This is your furry friend. It had already been killed and butchered and prepared and someone else ordered it, but after some goading, I took a big bite and ate it.

All this being said, it may have made me a vegetarian.

For anyone who isn't petrified, read on - drink with me of this slowly disappearing culinary experience. It was a little stringy, deep fried with a spicy soy dipping sauce. I didn't have my camera, but if I'd put a plate of it in front of you and said it was fried pork (and you liked fried pork...) you would have eaten it and asked why it was a little darker than it should have been. Ugh, I hate myself, it was delicious. Considering all the shady Chinese food I've eaten - let's face it - it was potentially not my first time around the block.

I also had some Szechuan tofu that was the best I've ever had. So, it like, balances out, right?

More adventures of a fucking taybalo blogger-photographer - next time on Birds & Thirds.

Location:Hanoi, Vietnam

"Rusted brandy in a diamond glass//everything is made from dreams//time is made from honey slow and sweet//only the fools know what it means." -Tom Waits

How one of the roughest nights of my trip turned into one of the best mornings of my life.

I fell asleep at 2am and woke up at four, covered with mosquitoes and red bites. The fans and aircon had both switched off so it was sweltering hot and a late night swim in the ocean had salted all the water out of me. I was so thirsty I couldn't speak. Trying to not wake up my mates, I went to the bathroom to brave the tap water. But alas, this too had been shut off.

I walked out of the room - we're staying at a pretty interesting little beach hostel called Hoa's place - and made my way to the dirt road that adjoins the dormitories. I saw a fire burning across the road and walked towards it. A man waved me over and I squatted with him for a minute by the fire. I said, or croaked, "Water?" He opened his cooler, handed me a big ice-cold bottle and charged me about 30 cents. I drank nearly the whole thing and thanked him profusely.






So, now I'm awake, it's four in the morning, and I don't tend to go back to sleep. I only like to wake up once a day. It's jarring enough as it is. I had a flash of someone saying yesterday they wanted to catch at least one sunrise, and that it had sounded like a pretty solid plan. I snuck back into the room, grabbed my camera and walked the 100 meters to the beach.

I was not alone.






I had no idea that I was joining a local ritual of taking in the sunrise with a morning swim in the shadow of Marble Mountain, but so I was. At first, one or two, then in groups, alone, on foot, on bicycles, on motorbikes. Boys and girls, young and the old, the rowdy and serene, in boxers or bathing suits or wrapped in towels. Some had soap already scrubbed into their hair. A lot of them found it somewhere between very amusing and not really acceptable that I was there. But this is an opinion that I have decided to ignore, soundly.
















I shot for maybe an hour as the sun turned from a blue suggestion to blazing orange and red. Already hot, even as a sliver in the horizon. Then, as the locals packed up and headed in, I did too - back to Hoa's for a morning tea and to write this for you, my loves.

Yesterday, in the evening, a man outside our Hoi An hostel was preparing an altar with incense and carvings, sheets of fake printed money and a string of shot glasses filled halfway with a clear liquor. I asked him gently, "For your gods or your ancestors?"

"Yes," he replied.

Location:Vietnam

"I am just a boy working in a record store//yes I moved to San Francisco just to see what I could be//I am a loser-geek, crazy with an evil streak//yes I do believe there is a violent thing inside of me." -Everclear

Vietnam, Vietnam, Vietnam. I didn't realize how much the clusterfuck of Saigon was getting to me until I left. This trip has been pretty city-heavy, but I like that. I love cities, and it's so perplexing to land in these dense populations and find yourself immediately lost in neon and traffic.







(People do crazy shit while scooting! The first I call "Text and Scoot," the second I call "Dog, Lady, Dog, Lady, Scoot.")

My sister tells me that 16 years ago, before Vietnam lifted the trade embargo, it was quite a raw place with little "Western" influence. This is no longer the case.




(New brand. Barnacled Nescafe! Delicious!)

Even here, where I sit, a one hour flight north of Saigon and an hour drive south from Danang. Hoi An, a tiny beach town, and they sell coca-cola and Oreos and American cigarettes, there are droves of Japanese motorbikes, German cars and restaurants with menus in English. American pool halls and French chess cafes. It's fun to creep out of the backpacker district and go to spots where there aren't any tourists. You get some funny looks and one restaurant we tried to patronize had chairs that I literally could not fit into.

It's easy to get lost. Shit, I get lost in San Francisco. But it feels like it's harder than ever to lose yourself. Maybe we aren't looking hard enough. Maybe we'll have better luck farther north.





Until then, it's a nice enough town, though moderately despoiled by tourism. But whose fault is that? Actually, maybe the best beach I've ever hit. The ocean is like a hot-tub, the sand is smooth and the whole place is relatively clean. Compared to Pattaya and Bali, it's a hospital.





Even the communism is kinda clean here. There are trucks that roam around with loudspeaker propaganda, but other than that, nothing wildly overt. I gather it's a bit more like socialism these days, but they sure do love their Uncle Ho. His face is everywhere you turn.

I like the Vietnamese people. They're hustlers like the Thai, but it's more laid back. Both genuinely want to get to know the fools they're grifting.

My head hurts. It's late. Going to Danang tomorrow and then Ha Noi the day after - potentially by train. A bit cheaper than the flight, but the train takes 20 hours. Hope I can fall asleep now.

Location:Hoi An, Vietnam

"Walk on your tiptoes don't try No Doz//Better stay away from those that carry around a fire hose//Keep a clean nose watch the plain clothes// You don't need a weather man to know which way the wind blows." -Bob Dylan

I met some truly fucked up people tonight - and I mean that in the best way I can imagine.

First, was a bulky murderer from Cape Town, who told me to get the fuck out of Vietnam. He was hammered, granted, but he looked at me square in the eyes and said, "you'll lose every dollar you brought, you won't be able to afford a ticket home, you'll shrivel up here and they'll take everything from you." But then I turned on a bit of Bob Dylan at the bar and he said he loved me. That we were buddies now. That I was gonna be fine and make it big somehow. Big drunk dudes are too easy to please.

About that time, a Chinese girl with a name that sounded suspiciously like "kangaroo" bit my arm so hard I have a welt. I don't think I deserved it, but I probably did.

Traveling is partly about experiencing local culture, drinking it like rusty well water, and partly about seeing how good things really are for you. Maybe it is partly to see how much better those same things could be if you gave them half a chance - but it is at least as much about the other people from around the world that have decided to do the same thing as you. Set forth. See the world. Figure some things out along the way.





I've met a lot of fascinating people, but tonight takes the cake. What is it about Vietnam that has wrapped up so many people? For me, a vague ache, tempered by a generation gap - guilt and rage and fear and self-loathing. For what we, America, have done here. For what we, America, have done again and again and again. Not to say that the Vietcong were angels - certainly there were atrocities on both sides, and now we've both decided to forget different portions of the story.





I talked at length to a punk from near Munich. He's heading home on Sunday. He sat and told his story, which was my story, to the point of nearly crying with each other. He was a troubled teenager, he sat all day and watched the perfect people on tv. He wondered for a long long time, 'What is wrong with me, what is wrong with me, what is wrong with me? Where is this perfect love? Where is my boundless happiness? Where is my god?'

He said, "I watch the people go to work. They live for the weekends, live for the pub, live for the quick and easy lay." This wise man, twenty years old, had already seen that this is simply bullshit. That for him, this is a life that leads nowhere good. So, he said, "I'm fucking off."

The last month, he explained, has been effortless. Before, he'd been crippled by this knowledge - that the world he lived in was vastly artifice. He couldn't smoke a joint, couldn't drink a beer, couldn't talk to anyone for fear that this artifice would dissolve. Perhaps a deeper fear, that he could be stranded in the endless flight of insanity. Or darker yet - that he already was. We've both seen doctors about these fears. They don't know any more than we do.

But here, he says, he found peace in a life lived minute to minute. He met new people, drank some beers without fear or guilt. He forgot the time, forgot the date, forgot his fucking schoolwork and his nine to five.

I asked him, do you believe in god? He shook his head, no. Then you agree it's a short time we live here? He nodded, yes. And it's already partly gone. Again, a nod. Then, do we spend it beholden to an ideal that makes no sense to us? Maybe you'll go home and things will be ok. Maybe you'll go home and you'll need to move away. Who knows? More importantly, right now, who fucking cares? If it needs to be done, it will be done. If not, what's the use of torturing yourself?

This kid lit up and I did too. Because as I said it I truly believed it. And because I needed to hear it at least as much as he did.

There were other stories today, but they were dwarfed by this small moment of clarity with this fine German who likes De La Soul and Motörhead, who will figure it all out if he finds a bit of patience - if he accepts the understanding that the life "they" live is fine for them, but it would kill him or me. It sounds like the easy way out, but it's not. It's just not. Maybe I'll learn these things too.





Goodbye Ho Chi Minh/Saigon. Tomorrow we press further north. Perhaps the tone will settle down again - and yet maybe not.

Who knows? For now, who fucking cares?

Auf wiedersein.

Location:Saigon, Vietnam

"And with every body that I find//And with every claymore that they mine//I won’t forget who I’m looking for." -The Mars Volta

Tips and Tricks

These are things that have been explained to me over the years that will keep you safe and healthy while travelling, but they really come into solid focus when you're out there, in the shit, with the shits, far from the place you're accustomed to.

1. Protect your feet.

You can buy new shoes, but not new feet. I developed a couple nasty blisters early on that have since calloused over. I dodged a bullet. If they had popped, I might have been a day or two off my feet and that would have been a damn shame. I wouldn't give up a single day I've had so far. Thanks for the warning, Dinah.

Supplies for feet - some blister shit, anti-fungal cream, plenty of clean socks, comfy shoes and a pair of decent sandals for when the shoes become excruciating.

2. Watch the water.

Even swimming can be a calculated risk, but drinking from the tap is like playing craps. No pun intended. Fortunately, bottled water is in the 50 cents per liter range, so there's no excuse but laziness. Don't brush your teeth with the tap, don't eat watery fruits or vegetables (especially if they still have their skin), and watch for soups and street food. The oil can be tainted. Alfie says in China some vendors skim it from the sewers after it  separates from human feces. How good are you at craps? This varies place to place and I gather it's getting better all the time. Ask a local you trust and then trust no one. Basically, expect to have the shits for a while unless you happen to have a very sturdy tummy.

Preventative measures - as I've mentioned, drink some yogurt daily. From what I hear, you can also take acidophilus for a few months before you take a trip somewhere crazy. That's only if you want to get hardcore. Do it how you wanna - just culture up!

3. Watch your back.

Asia is actually pretty safe for the most part, at least as far as violence goes, but be aware the same way you would anywhere. Theft can  be an issue depending on a number of factors, but the biggest factor is just simply your attention to detail and awareness of your surroundings. You know that hopelessly lost tourist you see walking down Michigan Avenue, somehow looking at a map, through his camera viewfinder, and staring in awe at the buildings at the same time? That's you, motherfucker. You're the patsy, you're the pigeon - welcome to Asia, you're the idiot.

Avoid - looking lost, looking rich, looking stupid and looking aimless. These are slightly tougher than they sound.

4. Don't forget to bring a towel.

Douglas Adams was right (if you thought it was South Park, go read Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and you're welcome). Be the droog who knows where his towel is. Also, don't forget to bring some toilet paper. It's available everywhere, but it's not "provided" everywhere. If you don't mind using the butt-hose, it's all good, but if you prefer the wipe to the spray then just tuck some away. Duct tape, a flashlight, a good book and a decent camera. Don't over-pack. You'll hate yourself. ABSOLUTELY don't bring a bag you can't carry-on. Makes things so much simpler - especially if you need to go through customs.

5. Don't over-plan.

6. Don't under-plan.

7. When in doubt, become Canadian.

8. Eat and eat recklessly. It's probably tasty.

9. Drink, but drink cautiously. It might be risky.

10. Sleep, sleep, sleep.

11. Wake up and do something you sleepy dick, you're on a trip, not a vacation.

(I found a computer to use, but no way to upload photos right now, DEAL WITH IT!)

Gonna go eat.

"In the chainsaw city//like a tired caballero//you've got to swing like christmas//when you're hanging with the whores." -Jerry Joseph

I was asked about the difference between traveling alone and traveling with people, it's taken me some time to put my finger on it.





Apart from the obvious, I'm around people I know and I wasn't before, there's something about the way the days flow. There's something a lot more exhausting about making every decision yourself, as if you can leech energy from buddies. There's more pressure to get out and do something, which is great. It's just easier to go out and face it when you've got that buffer, when you've got a reference point to home that strolls with you down the street, that acts as a shield from the worst parts of feeling lost.

On the other hand, it also shields you from some of the best parts of being lost. At times I miss the solitude of solo travel. The relative self-sufficiency. All the things that make it more difficult also make it on the whole a little more rewarding psychologically. But how much introspection can you really put yourself through without going batshit? This trip is partly to figure things out, but partly an attempt to truly unwind after a long period of servitude to myself and anyone who expect things of me. The first is, at times, harder with friends around, the second is much easier. Of course this is all filtered through my own experiences in this one situation, as well as my own particular intricacies as a human being. The case could be quite jumbled or downright reversed in a different set of circumstances.

It's a funny group.





MKH (a.k.a. Alfie) has been a buddy and a rock to me since we formed our punk band together - early on in high school in Chicago. When I emailed him six months ago, it had been months since I'd seen him, before that it had been years. We hadn't fallen out of touch, but the occasional call or Idiotbook message doesn't really prepare you for six weeks in near constant company. Still, I didn't hesitate for a second to propose this trip. It didn't seem like he really hesitated to accept. He's been working long days for the past year in the lab at the Duke Singapore campus doing neuroscience research that I couldn't really explain with a gun to my head, but the snippets I understand are riveting. He's really fallen out of love with it and I can understand why. The stakes are high. All this research comes at a cost. To your life (social and otherwise) and to the monkeys and other animals that are haphazardly butchered and tortured to prove theories about the brain that in the end, only a handful take note of. He's figuring some things out on this trip too. It's a total privilege to get to know him again, and it's a good balance, since he's the only person I know of my age whose views of American policy makes me seem like a flag-waver. We work well together. The two pronged attack is the secret to haggling, by the way. One acts overeager, the other tries to drag the one away, starts to succeed and BAM. You just bought something crappy for like a dollar less than you would have...it's pretty dramatic in a very conflicting way. But if you don't know you're being grifted it makes it hard to haggle.




(Bangkok)

J-Shizzle (a.k.a. Murda Murda, a.k.a. Brawn, a.k.a. The Brooklyn Beast) has been a close friend for just as long, having just finished up a stint at Pratt, an art school in Brooklyn, and found a job working in an artist's studio. Just trying to shake down the apple for a dollar and its gold teeth - a noble cause. All three of us have been friends for 10+ years, but just the three of us together for this time felt like a crapshoot. Haven't spent this much time before and certainly not much time for years. Since Alfie was in Mass and Brawn was in NYC, they've actually spent more time together in the past six years than I have with either of them, but I digress. Brawn can be a pretty dark dude, his art is much more insightfully depraved than mine - I mean that in the best way - and overall he is the exactly the kind of person you want to add into the mix if you are two curmudgeonly writers (indeed Alfie, if I am then you are) in one of the strangest places on Earth.

Ah, Pattaya, our first grift.





So we got duped. This really nice guy in Bangkok talked to us for a bit while we waited out a mid-day downpour, then told us some exciting news! It was a holiday! The government was paying for all taxi's gasoline and he could get us a killer deal on a tour of the city. Our plans had just been screwed by the rain so we quickly accepted. What a nice guy!





He talked our tuk-tuk driver (three wheeled motorcycle carriage) down to a ridiculous price and the driver started taking us around. First we went to laughing Buddha, a temple that was free (they always start with something free to disarm you) and a little underwhelming. Brawn and Alfie got me a suit for my birthday (yes, a birthday suit), at a place where they custom tailor them. Extra extra baller. Finally, we got dropped at a travel agency to get some information about planning our next step. What a nightmare. We got duped. Not too bad, but we got duped. Cost us an extra fifty dollars a head over the next six days, but we got transport to the beach, a couple rooms and our flight booked from BKK to Ho Chi Minh City in five days - in the south of Vietnam. Then we'll work our way north by train to get to the north by the end of August - meeting some other companions in Ha Noi on the 1st of the new month.





But this is no ordinary beach town. This is the goddamn sex-tourism capital of Asia. I've seen some people in Pattaya so far that would make you cringe; the thousand yard stare, pressed khakis, horn-rimmed glasses and a general aura about them that says, "I'm here to do horrible things to an innocent." It's beyond horrifying, but there are also some elderly foreigners that are married to locals in what appear to be healthy and "normal" relationships - if you'll pardon the imaginary concept of normality. When it gets right down to it, this whole prostitution game is happening. Everywhere. I'm not a huge fan of the concept, but I'm trying to be realistic. Maybe I'm being fatalistic.









You can make it illegal, make them criminals, make them slaves to a pimp for protection, let the pimp string them out on cocaine or meth or heroin so all their money goes right back to him - or you could do away with this absurd pretense that you can fight a war against it and structure the system for safety and good treatment all around. This isn't a great life for someone, but in some instances it's a better option than others. It's conflicting. It's complicated. There are a thousand valid reasons not to do this, but I think there are ten thousand reasons we should. It's like waging a war against drugs. It's like waging a war on terror. As David Cross says it's like waging a war on jealousy. It's not a war you're not gonna win. Shit, the government could even tax it all and let the so-called criminals help dig us out of our economic disaster. But it won't happen any time soon. Alfie says we're still too puritanical - and fucking how - we're also too greedy, too fat, too egotistical, narcissistic, imperialistic, unrealistic, transgressive, conservative, liberal and FUCKED. My current wish is that we can take the inevitable nosedive with a hint of grace and dignity - with a minimum of chaos. Fat chance.





Otherwise it's a relatively nice beach with some hilarious things to see (uh, late night boat drop-off drug deal? Hilarious). A good way to get completely out of yourself and just unwind. Motorcycle drawn food carts churn out good soup noodles. Alfie has been driving me around on the back of his scooter cause I'm too shaken up to drive shit like that anymore. I went ass over forehead off an ATV several years back and now it's all I can imagine when I drive something like it. Such a thin line we love to walk. (Edit: I rented a scooter and it's awesome).

We finally made it to see some Muay Thai Kickboxing. It was mostly, and I shit you not, kids between six and eight beating the shit out of each other with Pattaya locals screaming, gesticulating, and waving baht around in a complex dance of wagering.

Anyways, not my favorite stop on the trip, but not bad at all. Stoked to take off tomorrow and see Vietnam.






You walk here.

Bye.

Location:Pattaya, Thailand

"I was gambling in Havana//I took a little risk//Send lawyers guns and money//Dad get me out of this" -Warren Zevon

This is for my parents on my birthday. For both of you. Even if I dreamt of only the one.




(Half Moon Bay, California)

I turned 24 at midnight after a long and hot day wandering street markets in Bangkok. Something ate me the night before (Hogan says, they're not bedbugs, but they live in the bed and bite you - great) so I had little pinpricks of sharp pain in my back and the sensation of tiny things crawling on me all day. I sat in the lounge with a few new friends and had a cheers. They're good folks, but it was odd and touching to be at a table of relative strangers when the clock struck twelve. My new friend from Germany reminded me or I wouldn't have noticed.

When I finally slept I dreamt in vivid color, by far the most realistic dream I've ever had. It lasted, or so it felt, from the moment my eyes fluttered closed to this morning when I woke up with them wet with tears. I had to come down and play with the lodge's two month old puppy to rebalance and remind myself where I was. That there was still good. That little had changed. I need to share it.

But first, you need to understand.

If my last entry was all you'd ever heard about my father, it would be a discredit to the greatest man I know. I wrote that for the people who know him and know me well enough to know all that I'm about to say. As I didn't apologize for yesterday, I'm still learning to tell the whole story. I can still only capture a small slice.

If you don't know him, if you don't know me, I'd die and kill for him. And he would for me. It's just something I know with certainty. The way I know algebra and cosmology (he taught me the both of them - and me with my number problems, not bad Pops). Nowhere have I found a match for his dedication and drive, his humility and creativity, his insight and curiosity. Without him I wouldn't be here. Neither Thailand nor alive. On a bad day that's a conflicting thing, but when it all comes together, when the world opens up, how can I thank him (them!) enough times and with enough resolve? As with all fathers and I salute them all. Blessings to those who can stick it out. Curses to those who leave. Blessings again to those who don't have the chance to do either. I find myself talking about him while I'm here or anywhere. Telling stories about him, or just as often, telling his stories. When I speak, I sometimes hear his words and his voice sputter out, but I don't pretend to be half the man he is. Maybe a quarter. In flashes, a third.

My dream was a bit like the movie The Hangover - where drunken idiots lose a night to a blackout and have to rebuild from the pieces - meets the movie Excess Baggage, where rich, spoiled, pretty-girl Alicia Silverstone (spoiler alert: I'm Alicia) gets kidnapped and falls in "Patty Hearst" with the gruff but truly lovable Benicio del Torro. Leave it to me to dream two shitty light hearted comedies into one dark introspective film of sweeping emotional repercussion.

I was on a great journey in Thailand with two friends (weird!) the same two I'm with here (weird!). I had too much to drink and fell asleep (weird!). When I woke, I wasn't in the same hotel I'd fallen asleep in. As though I'd woken and sleepwalked there. The lads were fucking with me and wouldn't tell me what had happened. They just kept laughing and saying cryptic things. It was a nice place. Palatial, even. I couldn't figure out why we were there.

The environment had changed. Out the window, I saw yellow sand sweeping to the horizon in every direction. I went down the hall to the bathroom, because like the hostel I'm in now, it had only grimy, red-brick and shared bathrooms, even in the presidential suite. On my way back I heard a commotion. When I looked out the window again, the building was being swarmed by armed men with black masks and black uniforms. I found two dead security guards and tried to pull a gun off one of their hips. It was a dinky taser, but I hid around the corner and waited for them to come. When I came face to face with one of the invaders, I held it to his head and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. Well, something happened. He laughed and smacked me with the butt of his assault rifle. I swam in darkness. When I awoke I was still asleep. I'd been kidnapped for ransom.

The man running the show turned out to be a reasonable enough guy. Clever, dedicated and he needed the money for something I couldn't identify, but it felt like something more important than I could do with it. Still, a harsh creature. Shouting at me and prodding me on at gunpoint.

We wound up in a dark train tunnel underground, walking the tracks from station to station. The Boss was getting agitated. Things weren't going to plan. It was all taking too long.

He grabbed at the ceiling and a hatch opened, the size of an old television screen. Beyond the opening it was wide enough to pass through, but I was suffering crippling claustrophobia. A ladder rolled out where the hatch opened and the Boss seemed to say, "Well. Climb or die."

I tried to explain I couldn't fit, I just couldn't. It was too small, I'm too afraid, but he pulled out his gun. I fell to my knees and begged, why are you doing this, what do you want from me, why are we here?

A train passed by and I bellowed at the passengers for help. They saw, they heard, they looked shocked. I knew they'd try, but I also knew it was too late.

As the last car rattled past, I realized someone was on the other side of the tracks, pacing and wringing his hands. He was in faded blue jeans, a lightweight maroon t-shirt, white sneakers and a silly straw hat like a middle-aged woman would wear in Cancun. Of course Pops had come.

He didn't say a word to the Boss, he talked to me. He said it was alright and the rest was jumbled by the haze of the dream but I felt love and tenderness and understanding sweeping over me, consuming and calming me. He threw something and I caught it. I shouted, another train rocketed past, and it all went black again.

The haze cleared and I was in a dingy bar with my companions somewhere strange. They were unfazed. Either nothing had happened or years had passed and the fear and confusion had melted away. Something jabbed at my leg through my pocket with an odd and cold sharpness. I stood and walked to the window and pulled out the artifact - a tiny laughing Buddha, cast in brass. The weight was off and I turned him over to reveal the cavity inside. There was a very small tube of paper tucked into his gut. When I pulled it out, it was two Thai banknotes, a twenty and a fifty, green and blue, shimmering with color and crisp, though I had just unfurled them from their confines.

When I flipped them, my fathers unmistakable script. I'll see it clearly forever.

On the green it said:

"Boy,
I'll miss your drum."

On the blue:

"You are gorgeous."

The second was signed with the chicken-scratch autograph we share.

I knew, somehow he'd traded lives with me. His for mine. I wouldn't have asked for it. My mouth said, "so it goes," but I collapsed onto my knees again and wept spasmodically. I woke up in Bangkok on my stiff mattress, both hands swollen with blood and dead asleep, still weeping.

Pops, you teach me so much. I'm in your debt. I hope you get half as much joy from the teaching as I get from learning. I can already hear you saying I teach you too. You dearest of dear shills, you.

Mom, you taught me when I was very young to write down and cherish my dreams - when I was nine, the water moccasin and his fatal bite - the first color dream I remember, excepting the orca nightmare that made me sleep in your bed for a week when I was five. My world would be a shoddier place for the lack of you. Or should I say, I'm a much better man for having you around.

You're both around every corner on this trip, you're both down every alley. You're both in every dream. You're both in every scorching bowl of soup noodles. I love you. I love you. Truly, I love you.





Yer boy,
-Isaac

Location:Bangkok, Thailand

"Happiness consists in realizing it is all a great strange dream." -Jack Kerouac

At 4pm I sat down in the lounge of our hostel in Bangkok and the sky erupted. An immense thunderstorm. Standing water in the streets. A thick grey sky dulling the light and falsifying dusk - fat wet drops that almost hurt when you're out under them.

We're not roughing it here. There's aircon and a western toilet and wi-fi, but still a big jump from Singapore.





This trip continues to pulverize me with each passing moment. It's such a shift in so many ways. So much good I confuse with bad and bad I conflate with good. My anger, I won't pretend that it has melted, but I don't feel this sting of rage I'm always battling. San Francisco has become such a brutal place for me to exist. Here, away, I'm so happy to be anywhere. To be somewhere new. It doesn't hurt that my responsibilities are different here, but writing and shooting photography staves off the boredom I've grown to loathe and the shifting landscape makes me feel more at home than I have since I left Chicago the first time, almost six years ago. Even though I "do" less, I do it better and with greater enjoyment. I've quit the tv, quit a few other unsavory habits that consumed me and now here I am. Sitting, writing and listening to the rain instead of re-watching episodes of trailer park boys. I do miss the boys though.

My birthday is on Friday. I'm going to be 24. A year ago, I would have told you my 24th birthday would be dinner with the family and a quiet night in. We're going to go to see Muay Thai kickboxing matches at the local stadium and out for a couple drinks somewhere seedy. The morning after we're jumping ship again and heading to the beach.





So far, in Thailand, we've checked into our spot walked around and eaten a bowl of soup noodles to which I added some of the ground chili paste from the tub on the table. In the states I would have added more, but as it is I can still feel it scorching on my lips and chin where I slurped a bundle of noodles without delicacy. I've discovered little kefir drinks they sell everywhere. If you come here, drink them everyday. Helps with the spicy and keeps your gut nice and cultured and if I need anything, it's a bit more culture.

On the late night tip, we went and wandered Khao San Road, the "backpacker destination," where ladyboys make kissy faces as you pass and the men make hushed offers for ping pong shows and boom boom massage and other depravity. I even got offered another job, this time as an extra on a Thai soap opera (I'm not kidding). Not, this time, because I have an English degree, but because I'm American, overweight and wear a mustache. His words and now mine (I'm NOT kidding). Instead, we sat and had a Singha and a hookah (a hook-AH, don't confuse them) in the company of a Thai Rhasta, I think his name was Ka, who pinched at the mouth of his Bob Marley tattoo and mimed sprinkling it over the bowl of the hookah. We laughed, he laughed.





I thought I was a hermit and I may well be. But for today and tomorrow at least, I'm a nomad. It feels just right. It feels selfish and amazing. I'd like to help people someday and how can I even pretend to help people if I can't help myself.

My dad says I'm writing like Jack Kerouac, whose quote I had to look up and whose name I couldn't spell without Wikipedia. My dad's a shill. Don't trust him when he talks about his spawn. Trust him most of the rest of the time. Besides, I was going for Thompson, but I can't find where the Samoan hid the salt shaker and the screamers. Jack also said, "the only truth is music," so he can't be all bad. Pops always knows just what to say to make me feel like he's lying to me, but he just really believes it. It's awesome. That confidence is hard to find in yourself and it's good to have fans, even sweet bald biased ones, so long as you have a callous dick of an editor. Which I don't. There would be, I'm sure, thick red lines through much of what I've written.





For now, this is my place and I'm trying hard to be honest. I apologize for nothing, but I don't always write what I mean, even when I mean what I write. I learned something important when someone I'd met didn't take kindly to something I've said here. Not everyone appreciates it when you allow yourself to make mistakes. Not everyone has the luxury to intentionally make mistakes. I see that clearer now. I doubt that person will be back to read this, but I thank him. I hope this isn't too cryptic for the rest of y'all. Point is, this is my thing. You have yours. Not everyone likes your shit either. Deal with it or go away. No worries.

Carbon once and carbon once again. I believe, from what I've seen, that this time right now is all I get. Everyday I remind myself this is the reason to live and dream, not the reason to fear. I try to not begrudge the faithful, in fact, I respect most of the words as they were written and on my low days I envy the people who can submit to them - but I just don't see it. I don't think I ever will. Try and convince me if you must, but don't beat yourself up over it. That dog won't seem to hunt. He may be a Buddhist.





Sometimes, I wish I wasn't afraid of death (sometimes I say I'm not) but when the plane pitches in a cloudbank I grip the armrest and my stomach rolls. The same feeling when the train tipped in Peru. The same feeling when the ATV tossed me into the ditch. The same feeling when the roller coast clicks over the top or takes a hairpin. Mouth say one thing, brain say another. I'm not done yet.




(This photo taken by Brooklyn's finest - Jisho Roche-Adachi)

A large lizard just fucking destroyed a cockroach that was trying to scuttle out of the rain and into the hostel. I feel well protected. I feel well.

Location:Bangkok, Thailand

"Walkin' kinda funny lord I believe I'm fixing to die//Well I don't mind dying but I hate to leave my children crying" -Bob Dylan

Now no one can say I never got a tattoo on Arab Street in Singapore.





I've wanted this for a long time. It's my survivalist packing list. If you have all this, the rest falls into place. No better time to remember it than here and now.

Tomorrow we leave for Bangkok, but today was one more day of wandering and street food. Oh my god. Prawn doughnut. Insanity.





People are strange strange strange here. It's infectious. Really excited to get back off the grid a bit. Cities are cities, but I know this game too well. Everybody speaks English, signage is in English, and apparently I speak English because I'm not nearly confused enough. The fact that there are prostitution malls is a little confusing, but that's old news now. Time to get out of here before they find out I've been spitting. Big nasty loogs. Everywhere.

Really not sure what the wi-fi situation will be like for a while, I'll be shooting, I'll be writing, I'll throw up posts as often as I can. Such a pleasure to have a place to share with you fine people. Jacob, you would love this place.




(Birds, thirds, what the fuck else do you want from me)

Mind your W's everybody. The shit can hit anytime. Not if. When.

Location:Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

"I’ve always wanted//To eat glass with you again//But I never knew how//How to talk without//Walls dropping on the eve//The nest they made couldn’t break you//Along the fallen//Scowled a fence of beaks//But the temple is scathing//Through your veins they were scaling//Through an ice pick of abscess reckoning...And when Miranda sang//Everyone turned away//Used to the noose they obey" -The Mars Volta

The airport code for Singapore is SIN. This couldn't be more appropriate. What a place to be alive.





Las Vegas times a thousand. Las Vegas if it drank blood when it thirsted.

It costs a hundred thousand dollars to buy the right to own a car - then you can't have a car older than a certain year. They charge sliding tolls as you drive through certain places to control the flow of traffic during the day. The public transportation is immaculate and you can set your watch to it - for the ninety percent who can't afford this system. There are only a hundred cars for every thousand people and yet there are one and a half cell phones for each person. Compare to all of the US where we have close to five hundred cars per thousand people and only .9 cell phones per person. There's no welfare, but there is an amazing workfare program. Homelessness is not an issue.




(Guardian of the Buddha)

The streets are clean, the food is fantastic and the women are incredibly beautiful. There isn't much crime. All this thanks to incredibly harsh punishments and immigration restrictions I can't describe with any word besides eugenic. Phrenological eugenics. Yes. Truly. They import smart and attractive people and export dolts. Yes. Truly.





("Don't you love it when the 'losers' came up and all you get is a limp handshake and a half smile?")

It's not a rumor. It's very real. You want to stay out of trouble here.

When your punishment is a caning, they take you in a room and perform a thorough psychological evaluation. They sanitize the area. They tell you what they're going to do - then they do it. A series of blistering smacks across your ass. They tend to the wound they've made, evaluate your psyche again then they release you. If they make you pass out with the first blow, they put you in a holding cell until you're awake before finishing the job.

Major fines for minor transgressions, capital punishment for major ones. Scary in the abstract and HOW COULD I NOT UNDERSTAND THAT THIS REALLY HAPPENS TO PEOPLE?

A friend of a friend of a friend (every horrible story starts this way, it's not nearly as detached as it sounds) offered drugs to someone in a bar in Singapore. The person happened to be a cop.

The next day was the trial and they hurled the book. The day after was the appeal and it fell on deaf ears. Within the week was the execution. He was hanged for his crime.

Guys, he was 23. He was my age. This happened. This fucking happened a month ago and I'm sobbing for him now as I write this. I never knew him and I never will.

My friend said, "did you hear what happened to Dan?"




(Her shirt reads, "BAH, HUM, BUG.")

There are reports of a truck in China. It cruises around and picks up dissidents. By the time the next offender is picked up, the previous has been killed. Without checking the stats (there really aren't any to be trusted) I'm told 120,000 Chinese citizens are executed each year. Clinical efficiency.

Singapore is owned and operated, for the vast majority, by a corporation. It's a capitalist thought experiment. It's actually China's thought experiment. What works, they employ there. What flops, they leave to rest here on the southern tip of Malaysia.

This brought us to a conversation about American military policy, wherein I brought people up to date on the American Army death squads. The civilian murderers. The fucking finger-collectors. People don't really talk about these things here.





Before you get so fired-up and shocked. We execute innocents too. We absolutely do. We kill people who don't deserve to die. We call it something different and we get surprised when they don't say thank-you. Our tax dollars are complicity. You are a murderer. I am a murderer.





Singapore is America eighty years ago. Vibrant. Dedicated. Hopped-up. Governed by the stocks, the tar and feather, the dawn execution.

A wild place to walk behind someone who can open doors. A place you want to have your wits about you. We skipped the fifty dollar cover at the Marina Bay Sands hotel, bar & casino (the place with the famous swimming pool) because a guy knows a guy who has a couple billion dollars. So, no worries I guess. More than Hollywood or anywhere in the states, this is how things work here. Status, status, status. Makes my stomach roll and my blood boil or is that still the Bali Belly? Water-borne treachery. Subali's revenge.

I haven't seen even a fragment of the city yet, but I fucking hate to love it here too.

I was trying to jio this char bor, but she said "Auntie don't play play, one."

Location:Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

"Join a//punk band//shave your head and get a tattoo//you don't need talent just the attitude" -NoFx

This is the first in an ongoing series that I'm going to call, "different things are different."

I love writing music on shitty mornings. This morning was shitty, but I had no guitar to play. Without a fiddle, I've taken to whistling and singing and coming up with little tunes. This morning I came up with something I wanted to share...I think it could rock pretty hard.

Try to follow to the tune of the "hot pocket" jingle.


"When life is kinda shitty//Sweet lord what should you do?//The coffee is so gritty//It's like a rainstorm when you poo...."




"Oh - Rice Bubbles//That's what the fuck you should do."

Location:Sanur

"The odds are//astronomically against us//only a moronic genius//would fight a losing battle//against the super-ego//when giving in is so damn comforting...and so we go...on with our lives...we know the truth...but prefer lies...lies are simple...simple is bliss...why go against tradition when we can....admit defeat...live in decline...be the victim of our own design..." -NoFx

Here, everything burns.

They burn their trash, because there's very little collection. Plastic, wood, paper, coconut shells, it all goes up into an acrid smoke that careens through the streets.

They burn their fields, to purge them, to cleanse them, to prime them for a fresh harvest.





They burn the forests, to keep them healthy. But the fire I saw today was just from the heat. It was hard to tell the mountain mist from the smoke that billowed.



They burn their dead, but only if they have enough money to do it justice. Otherwise they bury you in a shallow grave until they can afford to dig up the bones and set them ablaze. I was stuck behind a cremation traffic-jam for an hour today. I went up to see what was happening and found a big excited party. When the elderly die, they celebrate a good life and the release from suffering. I've often had the sneaking suspicion that we do it backwards. When I die (if I die) this is what I want. A big party. A lavish procession to the song "No More Mr. Nice Guy." Everybody gets jiggy-jig.



I'm going to leave Indonesia tomorrow. It's sweet and bitter. Adrift again. Off to meet the lads in Singapore. I might be back to Bali.

Location:Between Amed & Sanur