"Life is Short and the World is Wide"
"I haven't been everywhere, but it's on my list." - Susan Sontag BrittBisk
"Life is short and the world is wide" so we better make the best of it. I support doing what makes your heart happy while helping to make other people's hearts happier. For me, that means exploring the world and taking chances, investing myself in the places and activities that fascinate and thrill me.
While travelling I learn, share and help as I go. I supported my adventures through all sorts of work: cooking, bartending, teaching English, writing, personal assistanting...at last count I've worked in twenty-five different professions. My passions for culture, language, food, writing and photography are all fully satisfied through travel.
After living in Canada and Australia, I moved to Laos in Jan 2008 because I'd been there for three weeks prior and fell in love with the place. I got a job managing a bar and volunteer work teaching English. It was the best community I've ever lived in. I learned everything about Lao food by watching and eating. In July of that year, I embarked on what I thought would be a short trip with my partner; we ended up riding 1500 miles by bicycle through Thailand and Malaysia to Singapore. We had no training and no guidebook, only a map. It was an awesome adventure. We ate every type of food off the streets and I fell deeply in love with SE Asian food. After running out of money before we could reach Indonesia, we ended up in Southwest Australia, working as chefs because we'd heard work there was plentiful and paid well. We worked really hard and we saved up a lot of money.
These blogs tell stories about my adventures. I am now back in the US, living in Denver, starting my own business doing what I found through my travels and many professions to love the most, cooking, while making money to help others worldwide.
You can check out more photos at: http://picasaweb.google.com/brittany.bisk. You can purchase photos at the Designcenters gallery in Worcester, MA, http://www.designcenters.com/t-shows.aspx.aspx .
I welcome all comments and questions at brittbisk@hotmail.com.
Happy, happy days!
"If there's anything half as much fun as being alive I'd like to know what it is."
Travel Blog Posts
November 28th 2010
Original Post: My friend Bounchan asked me for help last July. He's seventeen and he's been a novice monk at a local temple for four years, since he was thirteen. He's a skinny, tall kid with an angelic face and a sweet, lovely personality. He told me he has something called, niu maak khai lang, which after some research, I found out means "kidney stones". He's had constant pain for a year now. He can't eat spicy or sour foods, which comprise about 90% of Lao foods. The doctor said he needed surgery to remove the stones but they don't offer that surgery at the rudimentary Chinese Hospital in town. Kidney stones are very common in Laos, I discovered through research (asking every local and foreigner I knew), as they can be a product of drinking ... read more
September 30th 2010
Thank you for following my blog for the last year. It's been a pleasure for me to share my experiences and wonderful to hear your thoughts and stories in return. Two months ago, I decided to leave Laos for a number of reasons, and to pursue a cooking career in the United States. Leave it to say, I just needed a change and was ready for an new challenge, aside from being really ready to pursue a career professionally. I miss Laos dearly, but I know it was the right decision for me and I love my new life cooking in the Western Unites States. I will use much of what I learned about food in Laos and SE Asia: cooking styles, ingredients, dishes, to shape my future business plans. But my first step is to ... read more
Ken's Community Reading Room Project
Published: September 2nd 2010Asia » Laos » West » Luang Prabang
September 2nd 2010
I first met Ken three years ago, when he was a novice monk at a temple in Luang Prabang. He became like a little brother to me. The kid's got a heart of gold. One time, my friend and I gave him money to buy textbooks. He gave the money to his father to build a toilet because his family had been sharing one with neighboring families and he knew his father needed the money more. He had to share textbooks that whole semester. He comes from a family who would give you the left shoe off their foot, like most Lao, even if that was their only pair of shoes. One time I took him to visit his village and his family insisted on holding a feast and a baci, a Buddhist/Animist religious ceremony, upon ... read more
Major Differences between Life in the US and Laos
Published: August 25th 2010North America » United States » Massachusetts
August 25th 2010
Arriving back in the US from Laos, I experienced no jet lag but I did feel a lot of cultural dislocation and discomfort. It’s a big change going from that culture to this one. You see the US differently after living outside of it. In the US, people who live in the countryside like to live in their own space, set apart from others, with their own big yards around their big homes. In the Lao countryside, people live In small houses, surrounded by other houses, filled with family, friends and neighbors. They all help each other out, it wouldn’t be fun for them to live set off from all the others. Living together makes life easier but also more enjoyable. Americans all talk about wanting their own space, and dream of big yards, but why ... read more
Flying Direct from 1987 to 2010
Published: August 25th 2010Asia » Thailand » Central Thailand » Bangkok
August 15th 2010
About three weeks ago, I flew back to the US after seven months in Luang Prabang, Laos. I did experience a bit of culture shock coming back from this poor SE Asian country, beginning with Laos’ neighbor, Thailand. Parts of Thailand are still as undeveloped as most of Laos, but other parts are fully modern. My fourteen hour layover in Bangkok enroute to home was exciting and exhausting. Bangkok, after seven months in Laos, comes at a bit of a shock. If you think of Thailand as an undeveloped country, like Laos, you’re completely wrong. Bangkok is loud, crowded, dirty and beautiful. My flight from Laos arrived at 10 AM and my flight for the US didn’t depart until midnight so I had some time to spend. Luckily, it’s easy to check luggage at a security ... read more
Who Sends You Money to Live On Each Month?
Published: August 25th 2010Asia » Laos » West » Luang Prabang
August 1st 2010
One day, a Lao friend worked up the nerve to ask, "Who sends you money to live on each month?'' She knew I hadn’t had a job for months, yet she’d seen me continue to spend money. She was nervous to ask this question, but finally did, through another Lao friend that speaks English. Was it my father, working at home, who was sending me money to live on? I felt embarrassed that she thought someone else was supporting me. I told her that I’d worked a lot and saved money before I came here, and that money I’d saved lasted me a long time here, because things cost less in Laos. She was shocked. I no longer felt embarrassed. I felt sad. If this sweet, hardworking woman saved money her entire life, she’d never save ... read more
Oh No! If I Marry a Foreigner Will I Have to Eat Foreigner Food?
Published: July 11th 2010Asia » Laos » West » Luang Prabang
July 11th 2010
Every month, I have to renew my visa for another month, at the Immigration Office, at a cost of $2 per day, for a total of $60. After two renewals, I have to leave the country, and re-enter with a new visa, at a cost of $36. One month I went to the Immigration Office and was told there was a $2 charge for the processing, so I’d have to pay $62. Suspiciously, I said, really? It’s always only $60. The officer said, OK, you don’t have to pay this time. But next time you do. OK, I said. The following month, I came in and was asked to pay $62 again. This time he insisted. But when I gave him a $100 bill, and he gave me back two $20 bills from his wallet, I ... read more
July 11th 2010
I haven't written in awhile because I've been busy working again! I finally found temporary work with a wonderful Luang Prabang company, OckPopTok, (www.ockpoptok.com) which works with local weavers to sustain the 1200 year old Lao art of silk weaving, creating gorgeous silk scarfs and wall hangings and teaching Westerners about Lao weaving. This company has two shops downtown and a weaving center where many of their weavers work, 1 ½ miles from the town center. I get to work at this lovely place, on the banks of the Mekong, in a lush tropical garden, managing and promoting the center. Here we welcome tourists to come for free tours, to see our silk worms, to see how silk is made, to watch the silk being dyed and to watch the weavers weave that silk in to ... read more
June 13th 2010
In Laos, young people are expected to get married. Many young people get married just because they are pressured to, not necessarily because they feel they’ve found some right person. And as soon as a couple is married, they are expected to start trying to conceive. A childless couple is looked at as an oddity, as defective. There is little excuse not to have children. Lao people think it’s bizarre that foreigners in their twenties and thirties are often unmarried and childless. How could you not want to get married and have children? For men, it’s really no big thing, as marriage does not mean fidelity. Married men are almost expected to have a regular girlfriend on the side. A "mia-noy", meaning "little-wife" is a commonly heard word around here, referring to a married man's girlfriend. ... read more
June 12th 2010
One night I played tennis and immediately afterwards found myself incredibly exhausted. So tired I couldn't keep my head up at dinner. I was resting it on the table while I ate. I assumed this was just normal from the exercise in the heat. But I awoke around 1 AM in the morning, unable to sleep. I fell back asleep, only to wake up a few more times. About the fifth time I awoke, I realized something was wrong. I was hot. Really hot. And I felt ill. That feeling like when you have the flu and you just feel sick in the head and the body. I took my temperature and it was 102.6. I can’t remember the last time I’d had a temperature that high. I realized I must be fairly sick. I took ... read more
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