Travel Blog Posts
October 28th 2009
***The information provided in this travel blog are the views, ideas, and opinions of the author and not the U.S. State Department nor the English Language Fellow Program.*** Last Saturday I organized a speech competition for the English Access Microscholarship students in Gharm, Tajikistan. I thought I would still be teaching in Gharm at the time, but, as it turned out I could no longer live in Gharm and returned to Dushanbe. I did, however, return for the speech competition to show the director of English Access what a speech competition is and give ideas on how to run it. The students and teachers were excited to have native English speakers as judges. It was me and one of my American friends who works for an NGO in Gharm who were the judges. Gharm is an ... read more
October 11th 2009
This first video shows the treacherous road to Garm, Tajikistan from Dushanbe. It's literally 4 hours of freaking hell on a dusty, rocky, narrow, windy road. The scenery, however, is quite beautiful, but it's difficult to look at when you are in a taxi with a crazy driver who is weaving all over the road trying to avoid pot holes, cows, and sheep. I actually had callouses on my hand from holding onto the "oh shit" handle! One has to leave from Dushanbe at 6 a.m. to go to Garm and there is NO sleep on this road. It's eyes open all the way. The second video is of us being gridlocked by sheep coming down from the mountains. I was told that villages send roughly 1,000 sheep into the mountains in the spring and in ... read more
July 11th 2009
My trip to see the Terracotta Warriors in Xi'an was one of the highlights of my time in China, after Tiger Leaping Gorge (Yu Long Shu Shan) and The Great Wall. On the the eastside of the Xi'an train station you can catch a bus that takes you the 7 km to the Terracotta Warrior Site and it costs 7 RMB. The problem is it's kind of a hassle to find the bus and the area around the train station is dodgy...I mean really dodgy. Or you can book a tour with through your hotel or hostel for about 160 RMB and be picked up and dropped off at the hotel/hostel...hassle free. ... read more
February 8th 2009
Enjoyed taking random photos of people in the street. The people are what make the place!... read more
February 8th 2009
When I started my vacation I knew that I had approximately three weeks to travel around China. The route was from Wuxi to Guilin/Yangshuo (in Guanxi Province), then to Kunming, Dali, Lijiang, and Tiger Leaping Gorge (all in Yunnan Province). TLG was the last stop on the trip, but it was the place I was the most excited about getting to. My friend and I arranged a mini bus to take us from Lijiang to Qiaotao (2 1/2 hours, 50 RMB each) to begin the hike to Tiger Leaping Gorge. When we arrived at the ticket gate we were greeted by a very enthusiastic Australian woman named Margo who owns the Gorged Tiger Cafe and a guesthouse. She gave us a map, a place to store our excess bags, the use of a very Chinese bathroom, ... read more
February 7th 2009
My trip to Guilin and Yangshuo proved to be just the vacation I needed. I flew to Guilin from Wuxi and stayed in the Guilin Riverside Hotel. The room was HUGE but the bathroom was like a Cracker Jack box and the water was only luke warm. Guilin was an 'alright' Chinese city with a night market and the Li River running through it, but Yangshuo was the better of the two cities. Yangshuo is much smaller, but somehow it had much more air pollution than Guilin. My friend and I rented bikes in Yangshuo and rode to Moonhill and the Banyan tree one day and then to a town called Fuli and...I forget the name of the other town...Xing Ping(?). I just remember it was like 27 km one way. Fuli was a hell hole ... read more
January 11th 2009
The best times I had in Egypt were in Luxor. The people there were so kind and much different than the Egyptians in Alexandria and Cairo. The people's lives depend on tourism, and of course there were annoying touts, but they were humorous and quite good at telling jokes in English. Some of the touts didn't like it when I spoke Arabic to them because they want to all tourists to be ignorant foreigners who don't know any better. However, when I was bargaining and told touts that I lived in Alexandria (which I did) they loved it, they spoke Arabic with me, and gave me good deals! When I was riding the camel at the pyramids I could see the pyramids and desert to my right, and the slums of Cairo with chickens and goats ... read more
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