More News From Nowhere

Jens Lekman and Victor Sjoberg at FF

2008-12-02T11:23:00.013+09:00

Here's a little clip (and a few photos) from one of the amazing shows Sweden's Jens Lekman did in Seoul with his music partner Victor Sjoberg. Since We Need Surgery are buddies with John Norton who promoted the show I got to hang out with Jens and Victor a bunch and show them around Seoul and Surgery got open both nights - a real honor. Sightseeing, browsing the music market, lots of good dining, late nights in clubs with champagne and whiskey on the house - and of course great music. (then there was the emergency room at 3 a.m. when Victor got a sliver of glass in his hand.)

Caught just a few minutes of video of this song from the side of the stage at FF on the last night. Jens and Victor are very charming, smart and funny guys - great entertainers and conversationalists. Check them out if they ever swing through your town.

(I forgot the photographer said to scowl in the band photo)

Check out Jens' tunes here.

[Photo by Woogie Timo Jung]

[Photo by Woogie Timo Jung]

[Photo by Woogie Timo Jung]

Here's one very low quality Surgery vid...

Surgery on my Birthday

2008-06-11T00:00:00.003+09:00

Some pix from a show on my birthday....

Surgery at Hard Rock Cafe

2008-06-10T23:51:00.004+09:00

We played Hard Rock Cafe Seoul a few weeks ago. We thought it was one of our worst performances ever but they called and asked us back the next day and buddy Simon took some shots that made it look like a decent show.

Discount English Slogans and Copywriting!

2008-05-26T00:47:00.005+09:00

These are some recent additions to my collection of English slogans and ads from around Seoul...

Yes, nothing turns on the ladies better than "Dude Aromatherapy" after shave lotion.

Can't think of anything funny to say about this one...

What better way to teach the kids the many uses of the letter "X" (The Korean says "Christmas Tree".

"Yes, kids, the X and P arose as the uppercase forms of the Greek letters χ and ρ), used in ancient abbreviations for Χριστος (Greek for "Christ"), and are still widely seen in many Eastern Orthodox icons depicting Jesus Christ. The labarum, an amalgamation of the two Greek letters rendered as ☧, is a symbol often used to represent Christ in Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Christian Churches. Now on to Y..... Y is for "ymo" which means "on the contrary"

Is that a euphemism for something Italian men have?

We no longer need surgery.. We ARE surgery!

WNS Photos

2008-04-25T10:50:00.005+09:00

Some photos by friend and photographer Chris Callaghan from recent We Need Surgery shows.

Music and stuff

2008-03-24T23:56:00.011+09:00

In addition to surgery, been doing a little bit of drumming for hire recently. First for Mark Baker's CD release party. Mark's from Ireland and plays a cool Celtic-country-folk blend that sounds a bit like Dylan, Waits if they'd come from the Emerald Isle. Great CD even though I'm not on it.

Also played with a bunch of Korea's finest expat acoustic instrument musicians in an incarnation of the International Goat Breeders. (Yvon, Seth, Garren, Gifford, Mississippi Dave) This was another Irish flavoured session as it was a late St. Patrick's day parade in honor of a Marine's promotion. Photographer William "Bill" George shot some fine photos. Here's a link to his blog, which is worth a visit to see his other pics and read his musings on photography.

Surgery is getting offers for more shows than we can play these days. Already booking shows two months away and got a sweet half page photo and write up in the Korea Herald ("the most talked about expat band in Seoul.. and for good reason"). Two CDs are in the works. The long overdue album of classic Surgery songs and an album of brand new tunes.

Above are some shots from recent shows and goofy promo stuff...

New Photo Gallery Site

2008-02-21T19:49:00.002+09:00

I am moving all of my photographs to a new photo host. Hopefully this will be the final gallery site that I have to try. Click HERE to check it out. It is currently undergoing updating so most of my photos are not up yet.

R.I.P. Namdaemun

2008-02-12T22:45:00.000+09:00

On a really sad note... some maniacal old man burned down Namdaemun Gate (aka Soongnaemun), the historical entrance to the city of Seoul. He was pissed at the Seoul government for not paying him enough money to relocate him so they could develop his land. This was Korea's number one most important historical artifact, and was about 700 years old. I have made hundreds of drives by it on my scooter on gorgeous spring and fall days just to see the gate and surrounding cityscapes and mountains off in the distance. Now it's gone. Here are some photos I got from a Naver photo gallery. My apologies to the photographers. I am not claiming credit for them. Just showing off the grand gate. Heartbreaking for Koreans.....

Butlers in Korea, Finally

2008-02-12T17:52:00.001+09:00

Well, it took me 12 years to get some Butler family to visit me in Korea but I finally pulled it off. The downside is that it wasn't in time for Dad to make it. On the bright side.. Seoul is probably hella more tourist friendly than it was 12 years ago (or 5 for that matter) so it turned out to be a great trip. My mother Virginia, and sisters Alice and Jill and I had a wicked time checking out just about every corner of Seoul, amazing Korean food, some mountains and islands around Seoul and even down to my Korean "hometown" Gwangju. Check out the link to the pics below for a glimpse of what we saw and ate. Apologies to family for taking so many months to post something here. I haven't had a free minute for this blog since then..

Family Trip

More funny English signs

2008-02-11T12:11:00.000+09:00

Luxury talking??? Some kid of hostess bar I presume. "Toxic" brand shampoo. For those tired of being politically correct. And, well, it's not English but it's funny.

Masters Program in Thailand

2008-02-05T14:03:00.000+09:00

Despite the lack of photos to prove it, there was some actual studying going on in Chiang Mai for two weeks in January. But there was plenty of time to explore.... The photos are mostly from the southern beach town of Hua Hin, near where the royal family has a seaside palace, and Chiang Mai where I was studying, and one weekend trip to Doi Inthanon national park where sometime travel bud and MA classmate Stephen and I stumbled into a small Hmong village that was kicking off its weekend long Lunar New Year festival. The village chief's son Yee offered his home when he found out we had no place arranged. A long night of beer, festivities, and introduction to Hmong culture ensued (including being dressed up in Hmong Sundy-go-to-meetin' clothes). And a beautiful morning kicked off with an amazing breakfast spread made by Yee's wife.

I forgot to get photos of the exterior of my hotel, The Prince, in Chiang Mai but there are a few from the interior... while no 4 star, it did have a landscaped pool and jacuzzi and is filled with Asian antiques (not the pool). A very old but classy place for about $15 per night.

Enjoy the pics...

[Click on the picture of the spinning top below. Inside Picasa you can adjust the photo viewing size - large is best for scanning the thumbs- or you can click on the slide show function for easiest viewing. Note: I have reduced the size of the photos and added a copyright because I was getting about 700 downloads a month and had no way of preventing my photos from being used commercially (hey, you never know.. They may not be as enjoyable but just trying to protect them... Don't you love the sexy town names in Thailand? Hot. Thong. With names like that it's bound to be fun.]

Thailand 2008

Spring Scream Fest in Taiwan

2007-04-10T01:05:00.000+09:00

Just got back from playing a music festival in Taiwan with SunRadio/We Need Surgery.
Check out my account, the slide show, the Taipei Times blurb and video of one tune - Dress Like a Lion, below.

........................................................................

Sunradio (and kindof /We Need Surgery) had a wicked weekend at the Spring Scream Festival at Kentington Resort in southern Taiwan. The thing started off slow, with gloomy weather and not so big crowds. But everybody there was very determined to have a good time.

Thursday: Miso, Brandon and Michelle flew and had a hella long trip. When we got off the plane we had a three hour bus ride, then another two hour bus ride, then a 2 hour taxi ride. Finally got to the fest about 3 or 4 a.m.

Friday: The next drizzly morning was downright depressing. The food vendors and music didn't start til way after we woke up but we got to hang out and drink beer in the rain with Jason and Kori, the very talented pop duo/couple Mates of State.

Then we hit the beach road at Kenting and met up with Joel and Carl, buds from Korea. Spent the day checking out the Taiwanese spending a holiday weekend cruising the strip, ate lots and drank an ocean of local beer. Tried to make Carl's DJing gig that night but got too tired had to head back to the fest for some music. The band of the weekend was Atash from Austin, TX. This international band was fronted by a big grey haired Iranian shaman (if there could be such a thing) that everyone in the crowd either wanted to sleep with or hug. Their drummers were among the best in the world and the guitar player's hands were made of rubber. Check these guys out if possible.

Jon, Lindsay and SunRadio merchandiser ground crew extraordinaire Jason flew in, went through basically the same commute, got in late Friday and proceeded to party down at the all night jam set up in the cabin behind ours. Seems like that was legendary party that went on well after the sun came up. Most of us were too tired and missed it.

Saturday: Another dreary day and almost low spirits were cheered up by the Arcade Fire-like The Dolittles, an expat band from Taipei. More rain and then we caught a few minutes of the awesome Mates of State. What a great voice on Kori and tasty drum playing by Jason. Check them out on myspace. It will surely please your ears. But we had to leave after about 3 songs to get to our stage down the hill for our set.

We started with a small crowd but it kept growing as we played and we just kept getting higher and higher of the crowd's energy. Jason got them all up on the front of the little two level stage with us and it turned into and intimate club gig with people-trains crusing the stage, a Dolittle dancing behind Miso and someone putting a cowboy hat on him. We threw in a few We Need Surgery songs for good measure. Someone even told us we had one of the tightest sets of the weekend.

Buzzing from a fun set, we set out to party the rest of the night away. Some of us caught Atash again for the most crowded, high energy show of the whole weekend. The place went off. Then it was off to bed for a few hours of zzzz's (except for Jason) and a 5 hour taxi ride to the Taipei airport the next morning for a noon flight.

Taipei Times Story

Slideshow:

Video

Peek inside our studio...

2007-03-30T14:38:00.000+09:00

Here's a little slide show showing some interior shots of our SunRadio/We Need Surgery studio about 5 minutes walking from my apt. It's even got a garage!

We set it up as a full service practice pad and recording facility and rent it out to other Seoul bands too. You can hear some of the tunes we recorded there on our myspaces (over in the links).

I threw in some live shots too and a few from a local food stall. They are not in our studio.

A couple of good reasons to teach at a uni in Korea....

2007-03-02T13:16:00.000+09:00

Saint Petersburg, Russia

I spent an amazing Christmas in Saint Petersburg, Russia with Anastasia and her mother Nina. Besides getting fat on mouthwatering homecooked Russian meals (homemade jams, berry spreads, wines, soups!) I got to explore one of Europe's most beautiful cities, home to some of the world's awe inspiring architecture, poetry, literature, ballet....

The only downside was the shellshock I experienced from days and days of 24-hour holiday fireworks (so powerful I think they were actual weapons left over from the German assault on the city)and fear of attack by nationalist skinheads or infamous Russian mafia trading women, drugs and cash during cafe gunfight rub offs. I even woke up in the middle of one night screaming "Help Me! Help me!". Looking back, I'd say that only the fireworks were the real threat. The risk of a nationalist attack on a blond-haired blue-eyed foreigner was probably pretty slim (but was instilled in my brain by an over-protective and worried Anastasia and her family), the mafia image is probably just a remnant of media coverage of the pre-Putin Russia which did have a bit more of the wild west criminality than current Russia. And since I've never worked for a governemnt agency, I figure I was safe from Polonium poisoning by former KGB agents..

As far as weather.. it wasn't as bad I expected after hearing a million times "Oooh.. you're going to Russia in the winter!?" Might be partly due to globally warmer weather this year and I wasn't there in the coldest part of the winter anyway. The biggest weather problem was that within a day or two of a snow it usually warmed up enough to mean a day of sloshing through coal black sludge to get anywhere.

Thailand

After that crazy first show I had to go home and pack and get to the airport for a flight to Thailand. After a few nights in Bangkok I went down to the chilled out little island of Ko Samet with classmate Steve and our friend from Seoul Darren. Besides developing a killer cough, getting several infected bug bites and ripping off a toenail, this was not place to hang out. Even though it's one of the closest islands to Bangkok I was surprised by how quiet and unpopulated most of the beaches were here.

There were no real signs in Bangkok of the military coup that overthrew the PM back in December (was it?) but the military jets roared overhead daily in Chiang Mai to flex a little muscle because the northern farming provinces are said to be very loyal to the deposed PM. I noticed frequent boardings of buses by the military to check everyone's i.d.s. I was surprised that the "police state" seemed to be more in effect in Thailand than Burma where even though my bus was stopped often at military checkpoits, they never boarded the bus or asked to look at me. In fairness to the Thai military, they were all smiles and thank you's when they came to the foreigners on a bus.

Then it was off to Chiang Mai for two weeks of intensive study with a couple of professors from my school in California, APU. This has turned out to be a great program for me. The professors are very knowledgable in the field of linguistics and language acquisition and super passionate about teaching as well, so it kind of rubs off. Studied a little sociolinguistics and language acquisition research. I don't think there could be a better place to study than Chiang Mai... a relatively small Thai city in the northern mountains. Perfect weather (dry and warm but not scorching), Thai food, great scenery, $5 an hour massages, exotic markets... Check out the food slides! The food has to be seen and eaten to be believed. Chiang Mai sausage rocks.

A one day tour of the Golden Triangle corner, made up of the meeting borders of Thailand, Burma and Laos, and an area made famous as a trading zone for opium and other black market goods for these three countries and China, took us into the reclusive Burma for about 30 minutes. This was enough of a tease for me to make me plan a 3 day trip into Burma after my classes were finished.

Burma

Burma, the former British colony now known as Myanmar, is one of the world's most closed off countries, similar to North Korea. The government is extremely repressive and travel there has been very inconvenient for decades. It seems they are in need of hard cash for their failed economy so they are making it easier for tourists to get in and spend money these days. I found the border control people very friendly and helpful to white foreigners. We had a separate visa office from the throngs of Thais and other Asians who pass back and forth every day to trade in the little border town. When I was leaving the country, I had some money to spend in the market so I asked an immigration official to hold one of my bulky bags (filled with $3 blankets) for a while, and he did. That might have gotten me thrown in prison a few years ago.

I also remember looking at the clock on the wall of the visa office on our first trip into the town on the tour. It was 30 minutes behind my watch so I loudly announced to Steve and Darren.. don't look at his clock, it's wrong.." Fortunately he didn't take it as an insult and throw me in jail for insulting the junta but politely informed us that Maynmar's time is 30 minutes different from Thai time. First time I had heard of 30 minute incriments in time zones.

Not too long ago, the Burmese government required that foreigners buy $1,000 (I think) worth of vouchers that had to be spent in the country and couldn't be refunded. That's a lot of money for the average traveler to spend in a country where a beer cost less than a dollar and the policy was controversial because most of that money went to the military junta government, not to the people who really needed it. That was reduced to $200 a few years back and now has been completely eliminated so the only money of mine that went to the government was $10 for the visa and maybe a bit of my bus and taxi rides which were arranged by the visa office. But otherwise I could spend as little or as much as I wanted and the hard cash went straight to the hands of inn owners and shopkeepers.

I did give up my passport for the entire trip and a temporary pass was held by my drivers and hotel so that I could never stray too far off. That was about the limit to my control as far as I could tell.

There was a plan for me and my classmate Steve to possibly teach English to refugees from the ethnic Karin people next year. Their people have been raped , murdered and kidnapped by the Burmese government for years and the lucky ones have escaped into a refugee camp in Thailand or beyond. My school works with a missionary relief agency in the camp and I could possibly work there for 3 weeks for an amazing experience and get some credits out of the way as well. But alas, it looks like that might not work out. I'll keep you posted.

Burma was wild. In just three days I saw more to write about than 3 weeks in Thailand. here I'll just put some of the more interesting details in bullet points (without the bullets):

From Tachileik, the little busy trading town on the Thai border I took a public bus up to KengTung, and ancient trading town in the Golden Triangle. In fact, it was the center of triangle trade if I'm not mistaken. The bus ride there followed a gorgeous river for about 5 hours. At one point the road had collapsed in a flood. The road was split in two like an earthquake had opened it up. Just enough room for the bus and out the window was straight down into the river, in some places it looked to be about 100 feet down. Scary as hell.

Funny sign (on a road toll booth): Tollgate Construction Company, LTD. Think about it.

Little bit scary sign (in English): "The Tatmadaw shall never betray national causes" Not sure but I htink Tatmadaw means military or soldier.

Other cool sights(and sounds) on the road..

Beautiful women bathing in the river.
Men spearfishing in the river.
A pig being slaughtered in a creek.
A supermodelesque woman feeding pigs by the road.
Bamboo stalks cut in half and connected to make irrigation pipes half a mile long.
The bus driver played 3 hours of wetsern boy bands and George Michael.
I saw two men looking at a motorcycle that had broken in half while being ridden (presumably very slowly). Our bus driver and his partner burst out laughing at the sight but no one else on the bus seemed to notice.

Kengtung was straight out of National Geographic. It was like a micro-global viallgeBuyers and sellers from several ethnic hilltribe groups decended on the market every morning at about 6 am. The market swarmed with people, mostly women, in their ethnic costumes, and though they all sounded the same to me, experience tells me there were probably several if not more language being spoken. Ancient old grannies would carry loads that I could barely lift (I know because I helped on get the load onto he back) on their backs, but with most of the load borne by a strap around the bottom of the load and held on the woman's forehead. Unbelievable.

The women seemed to most of the hard labor. I saw road contruction crews made up entirely of beautiful young 20-somethings that could easily be the most popular girls on campus if they were to attend an American university. See the photo of the gorgeous smiling young woman loading freshy baked bricks.

One of my most special memories in all my travels was on the hilltop Buddhist wat (temple) looking out over the misty mountains and a far away giant and golden Buddha at sundown. The temperature was perfect, a slight breeze on my skin, wind chimes tinkling, flowers iin blossom everywhere, and the smell of incense.

I returned to the wat after dinner, about 8 p.m. and it was deserted except for a boy monk, who looked a bit scared, as he ran around the main hall interior closing all the shutters for the night. he probably heard my moving outside and thought I was a ghost. Thais and I suppose Burmese as well are very superstitious and take ghosts very seriously. Imaging being about 12 years old and having to go into your church's empty sanctuary at night and turn off all the lights and close the windows.

Earlier at the wat, I saw all the boy monks gathered around a computer screen inside the main hall. A young Burmese man saw me looking in and told me to follow him in. it turned out to be a Czech woman showing the kids her documentary about the town and its hilltribe people. She talked me into buying one, at a scandalous cost of $30 considering it had no packaging or even label on it (I discovered after agreeing to buy it). But it's quite beautifully done and make sure I show it to you when I see you next.

I walked through the town's dark woodsmoke-filled streets at night on the way to a find a beer. Almost all power was off by nightfall except for the occasional generator. Since all doors and windows were open to let in the cool night breeze, I could see in every home and shop. It was like a city during war time or a severe snowstorm back home. It was all faces aglow by candlelight, the people usually sitting in a circle in their dens. One women woked in her CD shop, just a single tall candle lighting her face, counter and her CDs.

In one candlelit room I saw a man sitting alone smoking the biggest blue bong I've ever seen. Not sure what was in it.

Some groups of kids played simple games in front of their homes. They made circles and laughed and giggled as they played patty cake like games. it really looked just like a summer night back in Cahaba Heights.

The downside to the power limits was my very dimly lit hotel room and taking bird baths with big buckets of scalding water in the morning.

I hired a wonderfully kind and gentle young scooter driver to take me up into some Akka and Lahu hill tribe villges one day. His name was Josua, and I forgot to ask but I am sure it was a Christian name. he told me he was Christian and I was surprised to see that all of the ethnic villages had woodedn crosses stuck in the dirt at their entrances. Hard to imagine considering these people's primitive and remote lives and their ancient animist backgrounds.

Josua turned out to be an English and math tutor despite the fact that I couldn't understand a word he said in English. As we sat in headman's house of one village drinking tea, he translated what the headman's son was saying. "The Akka people here no drug," it sounded like. Shit, he thiks I want to buy drugs or something. I'm in trouble. Much later I figured out he was trying to say "no dress" meaning, in this village they didn't wear the traditional dress.

At one point I thought I might have been taking too many pictures... something the Burmese government doesn't like too much. One villager came in wearing slightly militarisctic looking green khakis. He asked a lot of questions about my through Josua, never once smiling or making me feel welcome like the rest of the villagers. never did figure out where he was going with it but he seemed to be chastising Josua a bit. Perhaps for riding me around with permission.

On the way back to town we happened to go by Josua's house so he took me in to meet his sweet mom and brother and show me where he teaches. The living room had its own giant chalkboard. He then told me his father was a military officer so I knew I had nothing to worry about. He was my friend and he was making some good money off of me ($5 for the afternoon I think) so his dad would probably have given me the VIP treatment.

At our last village stop, Josua asked me something in English but for the life of me i couldn't get it. "Sapisfi". Somehow I eventally figured it out. He wanted to know if I was "satisfied". I told him I was most certainly. then he wanted me to teach him how to pronounce the word. I think the closest he got was something like "sapisfy".. his original version.

I also saw and old iron in front of a seamstress's shop. It was filled with burning coals. Did we have those back home in days of yore?

On the way back to the Thai border I decided to take a taxi as it was only a couple of dollars more than the bus ride. It would be a little faster too and I could get the driver to stop and let me take photos of the river, which I hoped to come back and paddle one day, and the road where it had fallen into the river.

I had my innkeeper explain this to the driver but he said, oh, there willbe more people in the taxi. Turned out to be a man and his infant grandson, two Buddhist monks (one of obvious power as everyone who saw him from Kengtung to Tachileik bowed deeply to him). We all piled into the tiny car and hit the road for the 4 hour bumpy ride. At one point the driver stopped and motioned for me to get out. I was confused as no oe else seemed to me moving to get out. I tried to ask why, thinking they were tired of me and wanted to dump me. He motioned for me to take some photos. I looked around and saw absolutely nothing of interest but it slowly dawned on me that he thought he was doing me a favor. So I took a few shots of some people drinking a coke and off we went. A few seconds later I patted him on the shoulder saying "ce zu beh" to thank him for his kindness. He thought I wanted him to stop so I could take a picture so he slammed on the breaks and the car engine stalled. Eventually we got through all the awkward moments and everybody was very buddy buddy.

There were only a handfull of vehicles on this long road. Almost every person we passed stopped anything they were doig and watched us come and go. On one long steep grade up, there were about 10 stalled trucks and buses - almost every other car on the road aside from us. Buses and minivans, jam packed with monks and hilltribe traders, stuck with overheated engines on a hot steamy afternoon in the tropics. Knocking on wood, we made it all the way with no incident and without getting washed away in the one ford we made where a bridge had washed away. The water came midway up the door. The flood that cause the bridge and sections of the road to wash away must have been epic.

I got back into Thailand too late for the last bus to Chiang Mai so I had to stay one more night in the little border town. One parting memory for this little excursion was when I decided that night to get a Thai massage for about $4 and hour. As I lay there on the floor having my muscles kneaded, a mentally hadi-capped, mute stuck his head into my room and squealed something angrily at me before walking down the hall and returning one more time to do it again. Very surreal.

The best food I ate, and I recommend everyone make it the next time you cook out: Fresh okra, bathed in peper paste and grilled next to your steaks. Damn. So simple.
And next time you have a BBQ, grill a fish.. not just the fillet,.. I mean the whole thing. It cost $1 in Burma and was amazing.

I definitely plan to get into Burma again one of these days, and spend more time exploring. being so isolated, it has to have to wonderous natural scenery rarely seen by western eyes. That is if the government hasn't clear cut it all, which it is known they are on their way to doing.

Anyway, back to work for another semester next Tuesday. It'll be a grueling 12 hours a week of class time Tue. thru Thurs. (see original question above)

Some band stuff

2006-12-19T21:33:00.000+09:00

Since I didn't get much in the mail to y'all for Christmas I wanted to put together a little journal, a slideshow and some links that show what I've been up to. It's quite a rambler so you might need a few sittings...

Last weekend SunRadio had two crazy concerts on Saturday night in different places and it turned into a bit of a magical night. It was our guitarist Adam's last show with the band and his birthday to boot. The first heavy snow of the winter started falling and we didn't go on till 3 a.m. Check out some footage of the last show. Warning: It's unedited, a bit noisy and requires parental discretion. The first video (a bit of Stay Dead) is short and contains mostly yours truly. The second one (Easy For Me) is a long, newer rambling kind of tune with a great intro by Seoul's empresario Dave Hat.

If you make to the ad at the end of these videos click on it for a sec. Our bud Don who shot all of this stuff gets paid a few pennies if you do. It's his only payment for working hard for all the Seoul bands.

If you want to see the whole show in various videos go to Revver.com and search SunRadio. The show is divided up into about 6 videos. If you don't like foul language, skip it.

If you don't have time for the vids right now, check out this little magazine article about us in RokOn Magazine, a local music mag. for foreigners. It's an Adobe file so wait for it then scroll down to page 7. I'll send some hardcopies too, pretty soon. The cool guy on page 8 is wearing one of our tee-shirts too....

Check out the afore-mentioned Chester Story and the Glory link and listen to all their original songs. These guys are an amazing "country" hillbilly rock band and were even better when I played with them. (wink wink) Check out these Chester videos.

This first one is from the Flow Festival in Korea last summer when I was playing with them and the second one is from a show two weeks ago when we got the original line up together for one last time before they head of for a summer tour of Australia.

On this second video from the Aura show two weeks ago I recommend letting it load and drag it to 8:46 minutes into the video. It starts going off about there.

SunRadio Article in ROKON Magazine

2006-12-19T00:42:00.000+09:00

SunRadio got a pretty good write-up in ROKON, a new English language music magazine in Korea. Didn't make the cover dammit (this time). Check page 7.

A little Christmas mood to my Buddhist looking apt...

2006-12-15T00:08:00.000+09:00

I always get a nice Christmas care package from my mother and try to get a little Christmas vibe going. Here's this year's attempt:

Other Pictures from Korea and the World

2006-10-22T20:04:00.000+09:00

Get Your Own! View Slideshow

Chester Story & the Glory News

2006-08-28T22:55:00.000+09:00

Not much news to tell about my stint with Chester Story except that it was a blast and I'm not sure if we'll work together again. I was gone all summer so a new drummer sat in for a few shows and when I got back some of the others guys took off for a while.

But we laid down some great tunes that I think will live on forever. Check them out at the Chester Story myspace and be sure to click on the video too.

SunRadio News & Shows

2006-08-14T11:49:00.000+09:00

SunRadio is still trudging along. (Make that 'cranking out lots of new songs in the past couple of practices') Two month vacations and trips to grad school aren't very conducive to recording CD's and playing shows but we haven't given up yet. Bass player Gary is vacationing in SE Asia and we're teaching newest member Adam the songs so he can add a second guitar. We have a new song up on our Myspace. We actually wrote it and recorded it in about one hour so it's not super polished but I think it's pretty damn good. It's called Going To War but no, it's not political. Two pretty big shows coming up in September too. Check it all out here:

SunRadio Myspace

in other music news.. thanks to the Pentaport Festival I was able to see the Strokes, Placebo and Black Eyed Peas here in Korea last month. I missed Franz Ferdinand and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. The Strokes rocked. The Peas shined for a song or two and Placebo bored.

July in California

2006-08-13T21:43:00.000+09:00

Kicked off another summer in the wonderful but wacky state of California. Was welcomed by stark naked men celebrating gay pride weekend in the streets of San Francisco as my airport shuttle sat stuck in traffic for an hour. I didn't realize that really anything goes in this city.

(If I hadn't told Derek and Daniella that I was arriving at 9 p.m. instead of a.m. could have avoided that little welcoming....Oops) So, I figured I might as well check out the party and document some of it with my cam, hence the couple of somewhat risque pics in my California Cities gallery.

Great time as always with Derek and Dani in my favorite city on a fault line. Congrats on their marriage.

An awesome time in Coloma, CA (home of the discovery of gold and the start of the great gold rush) with my sister, mom, aunt and uncle Jan and Gene, and all of Alice's friends. Great food, wine, olive oil, BBQ's, hiking, kayaking and rafting the American River, Hooverville mixed berry pie, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale...

Then it was time to head to L.A. to start working on my MA in TESOL at APU so we dropped mom off at Sacramento airport and I rented a car and headed for the Pacific Coast Highway and spent the next couple of days checking out its amazing beaches, cliffs, vistas and wildlife. These may be my favorite pictures yet. Before I got to the coast I stopped in a Walmart or Target to pick up Neil Young's cd Living With War. If this CD doesn't break your heart, nothing will. You can tell this guy loves his country (his second one anyway) as much as anybody but he's sick off this crap. Anyway, this was a great soundtrack for a road trip through California. Hippie freak flag flying rock n' roll activism by one of the founding fathers in the place where it all started.... and damn good songs at that. If you don't buy the album, at least check out this heartbreaking video Families.

Note: A road trip through California is like riding through the songs in your album collection. I recognized names of highways, roads, streets, areas... Ventura, Santa Monica, Mullholland, Sunset, Route 66, Laurel Canyon, San Jose, Cucomanga.. to name a few. (My university campus actually lies right along about a mile of Route 66)

Arrived in L.A. to a free pad and tours of the beaches and nightlife compliments of Juan, a fellow teacher here in Korea and native Los Angelite. Couldn't have gotten any better til I hooked up with Wes who also offered his grandparents' home in the Valley and his dad's apartment in North Hollywood for me to crash in and a family car to use for the two weeks I was in L.A. Major props to Juan and Wes.

Wish they all could be....

The next two weeks was a mix of studying for my masters in Teaching English as a Second Language at Azusa Pacific University about 20 minutes from downtown L.A. and doing L.A. kind of things: Dodger's games, watching girls at Santa Monica and Venice Beaches, eating great ethnic food and lots and lots of Mexican, hitting the hip night scenes of Hollywood, Koreatown, Chinatown, Echo Park, and generally just sweating my hiney off.

School was very cool and I'm looking forward to the next two and a half years of the program. It's "field based" which means I'll be going back to L.A. for two more July's (what a bummer) and studying in Chiang Mai Thailand for the next two January's (boo hoo). In between, I'll be doing lots and lots of research, writing reports and of course teaching English at Hongik University in Seoul.

Luckily my buddy Stephen whom I met in Korea years ago is doing the program with me so hopefully we'll keep each other motivated. And some of my classmates are a blast to hang out with, especially Serge, the future president of Russia or jailed tycoon, not sure which.

Wrapped up the time in L.A. with one of my oldest and best buds from Korea, Jordan, and his gorgeous wife Kazuko and their awesome kids Rio and Aria with a BBQ in their swanky UCLA couples housing, with its little courtyard patio looking something like a mini U.N. with all the multinational students. Look for Dr. Jordan just about anywhere in the future... teaching comparative literature at a top university, or if that gets boring for him maybe just putting out a couple of rap CD's for kicks but then again maybe he'll rather just be hobnobbing with Hollywood stars who want one of his screenplays.

That brings us back to Korea where the average tempurature has been in the upper 90's since I got back. My thermometer at home has even been over 100. Not much fun since I'm working 6 days a week at an English camp for kids and it's too hot to even take them outside to play. Looks like it's time to watch An Inconvenient Truth and find out what's going on.....

Click here to see my California galleries

Flow Festival 2006

2006-05-11T10:29:00.000+09:00

This June I'll be drumming for SunRadio and for Chester Story and the Glory (the country project) at the 2nd FLOW Festival in Korea, a 3-day music festival with Korea's tops rock bands and a bunch of DJ's. Supposedly Korea's answer to Glastonberry or Bonnaroo.

Check out the festival site.... and click on "artist line up". You'll see us there. The really cool thing is that I'll be playing with CSG immediately after the SunRadio set. That means I'll have about 20 minutes to rush offf stage, slip into my cowboy duds, and then take the stage again. How rock n roll.

Spring in Korea 2006

2006-04-12T16:14:00.000+09:00

Seems like every six months or so I find some new medium for sharing photos and ramblings on the net. As a result, I have got so many blogs, spaces, and shots I can hardly keep up with them all and I know my faithful readers are having a hard time. So, now I will try to consolidate into fewer addresses.

I will probably try to use this as my home base for photography and ramblings once again.

Photos will now be divided into a GALLERY, which is where I will try to be artsy fartsy and where I will put my best travel photos, and ARCHIVES, where I will put everything - travel, sports, music, and friends and family -related pictures to share with everyone.

Hope this makes it simple for everyone, including me. Click on one of the links below to see what this all means. (Some of these photos will actually be in a photogrphy exhibit in June that I am doing with about 12 other expats here in Seoul. )

GALLERY

ARCHIVES

In other news, while SunRadio has been on a break due to Miso's wedding and Matty venturing into other music, I have been sitting in on drums with Matty in a country/bluegrass project called Chester Story and the Glory. There is some serious songwriting and playing in this little ensemble of bass, guitars, drums, banjo and other assorted instruments. I have one CD of the show at the Grand Old Opry that I hope to get to some friends one of these days. (That's the Opry on Seoul's infamous hooker hill, not the one in Tennessee.)

Korea news: The annual yellow dust storms that wash over Korea are here, blown in from China's Gobi Desert. They cover the country for a total of about 25 days a year. The dust is fullof all kinds of nasty toxins, heavy metals, and other dangerous particles picked up from China's industry. Last weekend saw the worst storm in four years. Check out this satellite photo from a few years ago.

Thank God I was in the southern provinces for the weekend for the Wang In and Gi Festivals and the dust didn't reach there. FYI, Wang In was a scholar back before Jesus himself walked the earth. He supposedly exported Korean culture from the Baekjae kingdom to Japan, saving them from their heathen ways. He may have also sired part of the Japanese royal line. The Gi festival was celebrating energy or life force that supposedly is very positive and strong at Wolchul Mountain where we were, hence Wang In's amazing intellectual prowess. There were lots of whacky new age booths set up with everything from telepathy, ESP, aroma therapy, L-Rods, whatever the hell that is... But the free massages and aroma therapy were nice. And the festivals are a big draw just for the amazing number of Japanese cherry trees in blossom.

A highlite for me was staying at a friend of a friend's home near a green tea farm at the foot of the mountain.

Here's the latest addition to my Funny English photos. Click to see more.

A Confederacy of Dunces**

2005-09-06T01:15:00.000+09:00

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses… Oh, wait. We have enough of our own in New Orleans and Mississippi….

Life is pretty good here in Seoul. I’m sitting at a red plastic table on a busy tree-lined street outside a women’s university front gate having a whole fried chicken and two draft beers...to myself. The weather is unbeatable. A typhoon is on its way from the Pacific so the usual smog and haze has been blown away, probably somewhere out over the Yellow Sea making it yellower. The clouds have not yet arrived and it’s about 10 to 15 degrees cooler than last week’s swelter. The wind is picking up making it feel like fall has fell even though it's just the storm on the way. But back in the U.S., just a couple of hours from my hometown of Mobile, Alabama, people are dead, dying, starving, dehydrated, sick, dirty, homeless and hopeless.

Life is good here but this is still South Korea, where making fun of the nation’s safety standards is a favorite pastime for many North Americans, including myself at times. Collapsed bridges and department stores, fires in the subway or kindergartens, and one of the world’s worst traffic-related death rates are easy to scoff at when you come from the United States of AMERICA, the world’s supposed most powerful and developed nation. Those days seem to be increasingly distant. Now it's the U.S. government that is pitiable when the rest of the world looks at how we take care of our own.

Not that we haven’t been laughed at from abroad in recent years. There was plenty of that when we invaded Iraq to fight terrorism, I mean WMD.. uh, I mean to spread democracy.. er, I meant to depose an evil dictator, oh wait, I mean because terrorists are gathering on Iraqi soil so we have to stay. Hopefully Americans will care enough about the government’s pathetic response to this disaster on the Gulf Coast to finally demand some accountability. The disgrace of going to war under false pretenses wasn’t quite enough for some. When faced with the prospects of losing a little popularity in the rest of the world during the invasion of Iraq, more than a few Bush supporters told me they didn’t give a damn what the rest of the world thought. We have to look out for our own, they said. Well, here was a chance to do just that and look how well we did. (When I say "we," I don't mean the thousands of people who have opened their homes and checkbooks and hearts to the Katrina refugees. They are heroes. I'm talking about the official agencies that responded five days too late.)

Is it important what the rest of the world thinks about us? Many people don't think so, but consider my humble opinion: If the U.S. is going to promote it's ideology around the world, and take action to change it according to our ideals -i.e. wage wars in foreign lands, install democracies, etc - then shouldn't we be able to stand as a shining example of what's right to the world? When we tell the rest of the world we know what's right for them, as we often do, then I think it is important what they think... People of the world are losing their faith in us and if we want to be a moral guide for the world we have to earn their faith back. If we are really doing what's right, most of the world will stand behind us. Can't their opinions sometimes serve as a barometer that tells us when maybe we are doing something for the wrong reason? Or is the U.S. never wrong?

Maybe you still don’t care what the rest of the world is saying about us, but take a look at a few things being said by people in southeast Asia, which just nine months ago suffered a catastrophic tsunami during which relief efforts even on remote beaches and islands kicked off much faster than what we saw after Katrina. If this doesn’t make you ashamed of the U.S. government, nothing will. (These quotes and reprints come from the International Herald Tribune/New York Times, Sept. 5)

“America sends troops to try and maintain order in distant places, but it seems to have difficulty to do it in their own back yard,” said one journalist in tsunami stricken Indonesia. What a polite understatement.

“It’s so heartbreaking to see how helpless America has become. You’re not strong anymore. You can’t even save your own countrymen, and there you are out trying to control the rest of the world,” said one Philippine government official. “Why are people so hungry? The first thing you do is feed them.”

“Americans seem to have this attitude that they are invincible and nothing bad can happen to them,” said a college dean in Thailand. I haven’t even seen what the Europeans are saying yet but I cringe to imagine how scathing that will be. The quotes above are spoken in the usual diplomatic politeness that you will always find in Asians.

In any case, the college dean was right. We Americans – Bush mainly – must think ourselves invincible. “I don’t think anyone anticipated the breach of the levies,” Bush told Dianne Sawyer. He should have talked to my ex-girlfriend’s father, a retired tugboat captain who plied the waters of the gulf coast and the Mississippi River. He mentioned this exact disaster scenario to her over 20 years ago because he knew what could happen if those levees broke by force of nature or terrorism.

Not that we expect Bush to ever mutter anything even remotely linked to reality. To reprint an excerpt from the Maureen Dowd article in the same paper: “Michael Brown, the blithering idiot in charge of (FEMA) – a job he trained for by running something called the Arabian Horse Association – admitted he didn’t know until Thursday that there were 15,000 desperate, dehydrated, hungry, angry, dying victims of Katrina in the New Orleans Convention Center. America’s tone-deaf president hailed him in Mobile, Alabama, on Friday ”Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job.”

Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff had this to say about federal response to the disaster: “Really exceptional.” He also said on NPR that he didn’t know about the refugees in the convention center even though there had been reports about them on news programs for at least one day. (From the Frank Rich article)

New Orleans has long been one of my, if not the, favorite American cities and even though most Koreans don't know it, the city's culture and history is present in their lives daily . If you could ask any student from any of my classes in Korea in the last 5 years, I guarantee that they would tell you that at some point or another I gave them a lecture on the music they love, and how just about all of it – hip hop, rap, rock, blues or jazz and more, could trace its roots back to New Orleans (and beyond of course to the slave trade routes in the Caribbean and on back to Africa.) They'll also probably tell you that I bore them to death with a lecture about New Orleans culinary traditions. There's a Popeyes on every corner here and Cajun chicken salad on just about every bar menu in Korea but no one has any idea what the word "cajun" means (nor will they ever if they rely on Popeyes or the local version of cajun chicken salad, which resembled sweet and sour pork the last time I tried it).

(Check out Anne Rice’s poignant editorial in the same papers about what’s lost if we lose New Orleans)

The desperate faces that I see over and over on the Internet are the faces born of that rich cultural heritage. They’re mostly black, but I’m guessing they also include an equally unfair number of mulattos, Cajuns, and Creoles. Too bad this is the thanks they get from our country. Sure, they’re not the only ones who suffered but they certainly suffered the most. The lack of white faces in the news reports hasn’t gone unnoticed in Asia either.

I decided tonight that it’s time to reread one of my favorite books of all times, A Confederacy of Dunces. It’ll be one of my little ways of keeping the spirit of New Orleans and her voodoo brew of race and culture alive, if only in my mind over here in Korea. This time though I’ll be thinking about the real confederacy of dunces, the one in Washington D.C.

** For anyone who thought the reference to confederacy has anything to do with the American south, my intention is to use the word in the context of its original meaning: a league or compact for mutual support or common action My comments are no reflection on the south or American people, as some of you have implied was your (mis)understanding. I am talking about the confederacy of elected officials who have spread our resources so thin around the world that we can't respond to a disaster at home. What happens if another major hurricane hits this summer, or another terrorist attack, or an earthquake wreaks havok on that other city I love so much, San Francisco? And if you read the word "conspiracy" between the lines somewhere in there, go back and read the whole thing again then show me where you saw it.

SunRadio News

2005-04-10T01:02:00.000+09:00

If you're checking in to this blog you'll notice that I've only been bloggin' once in a blue moon. Mostly due to laziness, partly due to the band. Check out the band's blog (link on the right) to see what we've been up to.

Cold As Hell

2004-12-21T23:53:00.000+09:00

It freezing here in Korea so I am starting to dream of all the steamy tropical places I've been and want to go. In case you were wondering where that is I signed up with world66.com to create a map of my travels. Have a look.

World travels: http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=KRUSBSMXUKJPLAMYTHVN

The Leaves They Are A Changin'

2004-10-06T21:55:00.000+09:00

here in Korea... they start up in the mountains of the northern provinces and work their way to Seoul and then further down south. Whether by design or not I don't know but a majority of trees in Seoul are Ginko trees (known as eunhaeng namu here) and they will turn a beautiful bright yellow in the weeks to come. The streets and sidewalks will be carpeted in yellow satin and old men and women will defy the cops and use rakes to knock down the small ginko fruit from the trees and roast them over charcoal for a late autumn snack.

Out in the country side the rice paddies are already turning a vivid toasty and warm yellow that is a pleasure to gaze upon. Up in the mountains and hills it will be the bright red and oranges of oaks and maples and the stands of swooshy double-colored leaves of the white barked aspens that remind me of Colorado.

Hopefully the leaves will change colors in Washintgon in a few weeks too.

Hmm... it looks like my last post here was sometime in May. Not sure if that means nothing has happened of interest to me since then or I ran out of things to say. Doubt either is true. It's partly due to traveling. Went to the States... San Francisco for the 4th or July with good friend Derek and my sister, Denver for Portuguese food with Molly, and Birmingham for quality time with mom, sister and old friends. Then off to an English camp for a few weeks. Then back to Seoul and my girlfriend Young Hee (who had just gotten back Greece where she was an assistant on a documentary which almost didn't air because the host, a former Miss Korea got busted for fooling around with a married man) and then spent almost ever minute of every day with her since.

Last week brought Chuseok, a sort of Korean Thanksgiving, and a nice little 11 day vacation for me. That called for a final official kayaking trip for our club up in the Taebaek Mtn. range. But that never quite got off the ground due to a little side excursion.

A few years ago I was heading to the river on a country bus, riding by myself when a long-haired Vietnam veteran looking guy named Song spoke to me at a rest stop on the highway. In our brief chat he told me a little bit about how he came to live in an old cabin up in the mountains (in a national park). He drew me a map and invited me to come any old time, as long as didn't mind hiking a while and sleeping in a traditional Korean house with no electricity and bathing in cold water. Months later, after a failed attempt to find his place on a cold rainy November day (with the afore-mentioned San Fran Derek, my French violin maker friend Marc, and long-time Candian friend in Korea Simon) I promised myself I wouldn't leave Korea until I found Song and his cabin.

After telling the story to my Korean kayaking buddies Annie and Gi Sun, they agreed with me that we should blow off kayaking for the day and try to track down Song's house again. And thus began part two of the search for Song. TBC

May 21 Diary - Rain, Laos Mountain Coffee & Music

2004-05-21T00:52:00.000+09:00

Rain The whole time I was working on this stuff tonight the rain was pounding down on my 5th floor apartment. One of the reasons I like this place is that it's on the top floor of the building and part of the roof over the kitchen and bathroom is aluminum. The sound of the rain gives it that mountain cabin or farm shed-in-the-rain feeling. I don't know anybody else in Seoul who has that.

I had a similar sensation in Kwangju when I lived in a very old traditional house. It had sliding wooden latticed windows and doors covered with rice paper. It was all dark wood and traditional paper on the inside. When I lit some candles and had a little knotty bonzai tree sitting in the window I felt like a 19th century Asian poet in his hideaway. I had to go outside under my little private covered patio to get to the shower which was just a red brick stall with a rickety little green wooden door. The rain thumping on the plastic ceiling put me at ease in that house too. And when I showered, since I was basically outside, it was like taking a camping shower everyday - except the water came out hard and hot without exception.

The only bad thing about the place was that the two little squat toilets were in an outhouse around the corner by the landlord's half of the house and I had to share them with him, his wife and his two daughters. Since it was a little awkward walking by their front door every time I needed to use the john, I usually just made use of the drain in the shower when the bladder needed attention. I only used their toilet for the more serious stuff.

Outside sliding wooden door was the patio furniture - a 100 pound swiveling barber chair with a foot rest. I swear it was just as comfortable as a Lazee Boy. I'd found it left with the garbage in front of a barber shop.

Coffee I got into the freshly ground Laos coffee beans today for the first time since I got back from my trip. That stuff is out of this world.... thick, black, strong, chocolatey, nutty. The best I've ever made at home.

Music I started playing drums at the open mic night a few weeks ago and for a few weeks have pretty much been the house drummer for anybody who needed one. The club is the Big Electric Cat, a mostly foreigner hangout but some Korean musicians and music fans are usually there too. But there aren't a whole lot of foreign drummers in Korea. I used to play there weekly with the Back Alley Blues Band but we all parted ways last summer and the leader Pat started a new blues band.

So this time around I hooked up with a few guys who are playing exactly what I have been waiting for - all original alternative songs - written by the amazing Mika, a Candian Czech guy. If some A&R guy doesn't find him, it's going to be a talent waste of epic proportions. Think Ryan Adams (not Bryan), Oasis, Blur... And I'm far from being a professional drummer but every time we get on the stage there is definitely some magic going on. We got asked to play our first real weekend show tonight (tomorrow since I haven't slept to day yet) though we haven't ever really practiced together. Just jammed at open mic night. It should be sloppy considering, but somehow we seem to mesh.

Vietnam Now (Travel)

2004-05-03T14:26:00.000+09:00

The main point of this post is to share an encounter I had on the way to Vietnam last winter but I want to go there by way of recommending an interesting new book first. I haven't even gotten past the 3rd chapter but it inspired me to start trying to share more of my experiences traveling throughout Southeast Asia. The book is Vietnam Now by David Lamb. If you want an entertaining and informative peek into an amazing country that most of us know nothing about other than that the U.S. fought a long ugly war there, pick it up.

In the first few chapters you’ll learn what I’ve told lots of folks about the Vietnamese today. Despite the fact that the U.S. killed 3 million Vietnamese while bombing Vietnam and Laos back into the dark ages and then isolated the country into a cycle of poverty for years, they are now - just 30 years after the end of the war - probably the warmest, gentlest and most gracious hosts an American traveler could find in the world.

Reasons Lamb gives are intriguing: Ho Chi Min, the founder of the Vietnamese communist movement and leader of their fight for independence, preached that the enemy was not the American people but the American government. Imagine that coming from America’s present enemies like Bin Laden. Another: The war was just another war and blip on the country’s history of 2,500 years. He gives other reasons but you can buy the book for those. For a few examples of how I was the lucky recipient of this Vietnamese hospitality, read on.

On my last trip to Hanoi last February I traveled alone on a crowded plane full of mostly Vietnamese students and workers who live in Korea and were on the way back home for the Lunar New Year, Tet in Vietnam and Seolnal in Korea. Every square inch of available space was packed with electronics, food and other gifts for families back home during the biggest holiday of the year.

A few minutes into the flight, a small man(Bao) sitting next to me could hardly contain his excitement. His face was beaming, and he glanced around the plane at me, out the window, forward to the three Vietnamese men in front of us. He introduced himself and told me he’d been studying some sort of engineering in Korea and hadn’t been home for over a year. His knees were crammed up to his chest because his feet were sitting on top of some Korean home appliance that wouldn’t fit under the seat.

After he insisted that the men in front of us took our picture together (with his brand new Samsung digital camera) he told me he and his fiancé happened to own a hotel in downtown Hanoi and that he would love for me to stay there. Since I wasn’t meeting friends until a few days later I gave it some thought but in fact I was a little worried. Even though I knew all about Vietnamese hospitality from my trip there years earlier I was a little worried that I was being hustled, either into a dingy hotel which would be hard to get out of once I committed to looking at it, or worse. He’d been so chatty so much with the guys in front of us even though he’d told me he didn’t know them. I thought maybe they were in on something together. In certain countries in the region, my suspicions could be very justified.

I remember being a little pissed off when the men asked me to move so they could all take a picture together and then one of them motioned me to just move over to the cramped seat with the box in the floor for the rest of the flight. Weeks later I realized it was just an innocent request that made perfect sense to a Vietnamese man. On several bus rides in Vietnam and Laos, we were crammed in 6 or 7 to a row, people sitting on cargo that had been stowed in the aisles, climbing in and out of the windows at rest stops, one breast feeding hill tribe mother falling asleep with her head on my shoulder.

As we approached Hanoi, most of the passengers had noses glued to the windows to catch a glimpse of their homeland, chattering and grinning. I figured I almost had no way out of the invitation but I would just go through customs and baggage claim and as far as I could to play things out and see what would happen. The offer for a free ride into town made it even harder to turn down. It was when I stepped into the lobby and saw Bao’s beautiful young fiancé with a huge bouquet of flowers, and his handsome little brother and cousin that I relaxed. A driver for their hotel was waiting in a spacious van out in the parking lot and I have to say that I experienced my most hassle free and hospitable arrival in any country ever, that day.

During the 45 minute drive, Bao's cousin practiced his English with me while Bao struggled to keep his hands, eyes and mind off of his fiance and be a gracious host at the same time. They set me up in a gorgeous room in a French-colonial hotel in the center of Hanoi’s charming and bustling Old Quarter that looks like New Orleans if Asians were throwing Mardi Gras instead of drunk Americans. My balcony overlooked the street that ran about 2 blocks to Hoan Kiem Lake where that night’s New Years fireworks and festivities would be centered. When I checked out the next morning, to go meet my friends and stay in a cheaper hotel with the group coming in from Seoul to play Ultimate, Bao wasn’t around but his girlfriend charged me 12$, a pretty high rate for the average backpacker staying in Hanoi. But I gladly paid because the room was spacious, spotless, charming and convenient, and I hated to check out.