January 2012
1 post
October 2011
1 post
September 2011
4 posts
Fluctuations
I was at my bank today; there was a short line.
There was just one lady in front of me, an Asian lady who was trying to exchange pounds for yuan.
It was obvious she was a little irritated.
She asked the teller, “Why it change?
Yesterday, I get two hunat poun of yuan.
Today I only get hunat eighty?
Why it change?”
The teller shrugged his shoulders and said,...
“Why don’t you have a Texan accent?”
- Most common question asked to me while living in London
August 2011
1 post
Living in London
After one of the most stressful weeks of flat hunting in London I finally found a place. It’s ridiculously expensive but I hope it’s worth it. You can find me near the Gloucester Road tube stop in Kensington.
July 2011
3 posts
June 2011
2 posts
WatchSmarter Contact Lenses. Sweet!
April 2011
3 posts
March 2011
1 post
It’s almost 6am here in New York. Christian and I are at the Hilton near Central Park. I can’t sleep but I can hear the guy in the next room sneezing uncontrollably in the most hilarious way. Wish I could record it.
February 2011
3 posts
“I never sleep on planes for fear of being incepted.”
– Jack Donaghy, 30 Rock
December 2010
2 posts
Fugu, the deadly poisonous pufferfish
Sometimes I wonder if I am turning this into a food blog, but hey, I love food. In Japan I wanted to try fugu, and mama obliged. We found a busy restaurant hidden in a basement underneath Kabukicho, the famous red light district in Tokyo. I like that the chefs left enough poison in the fish to give you a numb feeling after eating some fugu.
Started off with some sashimi fugu, fugu salad, and...
November 2010
9 posts
Thanksgiving in Tokyo, Part II
Tokyo is famous for having many themed restaurants. We thought going to one of these was an appropriate choice for dinner. We made reservations for Ninja Akasaka. You guess what the theme is. It wasn’t the easiest restaurant to find, since the entrance is pretty nondescript.
But once we found it, the show began. The hostess summons your ninja waiter and he appears instantly. He then...
Thanksgiving in Tokyo, Part I
Last year I spent my Thanksgiving in Shanghai. This year it was in Tokyo. Mom met me there for the occasion, and we did things a little differently. After a couple days in Tokyo by myself, mom flew in on Wednesday night and went to sleep after a quick stroll around Shinjuku. We woke up around 4:30am and went to Tsukiji Fish Market, the world’s largest fish market. If it swims in the ocean,...
Right now I am sipping an espresso in the Executive Lounge of the Tokyo Hilton on the 38th floor, overlooking Shinjuku and a boulevard lined with trees brilliantly colored with shades of oranges, yellows, reds and greens with a snow-capped Mt Fuji in the background. I’d post a picture of it on here but a picture would simply not do this justice.
WatchChairman Mao think capitalist foreign invader is fat and lazy. To make sure we are not like foreign devil we must have mandatory exercising for all employee at restaurant.
New Album I’m Happy With: The Arcade Fire “The Suburbs”
New Album I’m Not Happy With: Sufjan Stevens “The Age of Adz”
Disguised man nabbed on overseas flight →
Something is wrong with me. I usually have a million thoughts running through my head throughout the day. Most of them stem from people watching and the just overall weirdness of living in China. But lately the majority of my thoughts have been all about the same thing. Robbing people. I don’t know why, but everywhere I go and every person I see I just think of how I could rob them.
...
October 2010
2 posts
6 tags
Nanjing Selling Live Crabs Via Vending Machines →
I can’t make this stuff up.
Visiting Home
I just got back from visiting home back in the States. I haven’t been home in over a year, so that resulted in an odd but nostalgic feeling. I was able to witness a very good friend of mine marry a wonderful woman, as well as my cousin (who is like a brother to me) do the same. Although I was there for two weeks I wasn’t able to do everything I wanted to do. I couldn’t see...
September 2010
2 posts
3 tags
WatchRipping the beating heart out of a live snake in Vietnam…and Barron eating it.
August 2010
13 posts
“Dancing in the Moonlight” -...
Living in China I’ve learned you have to be aggressive with everything. If there’s a 5 inch gap between you and the person in front of you while in the queue, you better fill that gap or someone will slip in there and cut in front of you. Elbows and boxing people out basketball style are perfectly normal defenses against this. I’m used to it. But what really annoys me is going to...
3 tags
6 tags
Snake Village
Just a short drive outside Hanoi in Vietnam and you will find a small collection of restaurants that specialize in one thing - snakes. I’m not a big fan of snakes, and even thinking of eating them grosses me out, but I wanted to try this at least once. Barron and I hopped in a cab with an Irish couple and an Englishman from our hostel, all three around our age, and set forth to the snake...
Vietnamese Hookers
Don’t leave you alone. It’s in the afternoon, and Barron and I are relaxing on the beach in Mui Ne, Vietnam. Walking along the beach is a Vietnamese girl in her late 20s, and she stops about 20 feet away and stares at us for a minute. She then approaches us, sits down, and starts talking. We answer the ever-present first question with “We’re from America,” and after a...
7 tags
5 tags
WatchHere’s Barron going crazy and demolishing an entire mountain with an RPG in Cambodia.
Yesterday
Barron and I rode motorbikes around Vang Vieng, Laos in the morning. Took in some great scenery of the karst landscape around. For lunch we met up with a group of other travelers at an Irish pub and then rented some tubes so we could float the river. Not wanting to lose anything in the river, I just took the essentials - plastic bag with money, swimming trousers, tank top, shoes and sunglasses....
July 2010
6 posts
