I used the opportunity of Thanksgiving to escape to Seychelles for a week’s vacation. I prefer to save up years’ worth of credit card loyalty points in order to spend them on vacation excursions to places that I wouldn’t normally visit. The timing worked well to coincide with Thanksgiving and direct flights from Johannesburg, South Africa. The stay was spread across two Seychelles islands: Mahe and Prasiln – I ended up visiting a third island, Curieuse Island on a day excursion with a tour company. Curieuse is home to hundreds of wild giant tortoises which I had a lot of fun photographing and petting. Additional fun discoveries included the Coco de mer, or double coconut which is endemic to the island of Praslin. Owing to its protected status and relative obscurity, it is forbidden to take these coconuts from Seychelles. Another delightful discovery were the giant golden orb weaver spiders that are very common throughout the islands. They grow to the size of a human hand and the silk they produce is as strong as any spider. Fascinating to see so many, everywhere. In the Seychelles there is a wonderful, accessible mix of beaches where you can relax and swim, […]
Read More
Like Gabarone, Durban was a destination that I was curious to visit. I had already been to Cape Town and Johannesburg, so South Africa’s third-largest city seemed like the logical next destination. I made it a two-week reconnaissance trip, always curious and excited to scout a new destination. My apartment was in a convenient location on Florida Street – a hip restaurant lined with bars and restaurants. In the same building on the ground floor was a biltong store where I got in the habit of eating 400 grams of freshly-cut biltong each day after my gym session. And what a gym I found there in Durban — Cambell’s Gym. Replete with bodybuilding posters from the 1980s, and equipment from the 1950s, as well as large, very strong men, Campbell’s Gym, became my favorite place to spend my time in Durban. I never really made it to Durban’s beaches. I visited once in order to eat lunch, but I preferred taking my camera and wandering around different neighborhoods I found myself in, stopping to have a coffee, seeing a monkey in a tree — that sort of tourism. A highlight from my time in Durban was the annual Bonsai show […]
Read More
From Johannesburg, I flew to Gabarone (“Gabs”), the capital city of Botswana to meet up with a new friend, Thabi, whom I had met through a classmate of mine when I was on campus at UC Berkeley earlier in April. Thabi is a serial; entrepreneur living and working in Gabarone. I stayed in a small one-bedroom apartment on the outskirts of town and had a rental car to get me from place to place, which was necessary because Uber and taxis aren’t really a thing around Gabarone. I found a nearby gym a 7-minute drive from where I was staying called Jack’s Gym, and though I don’t have photos, working out there each morning for a week was one of the highlights owing to old-school equipment and really strong men repping double my squat max without breaking a sweat. Work was slow during my visit so I managed to explore some sites around Gabarone including Mokolodi Game Reserve where I saw a cheetah and a family of white rhinoceros during a 90-minute excursion riding in a four-wheel truck. It wasn’t exactly a safari, but it reminded me of the safaris I did in Sri Lanka a couple of years ago. […]
Read More
The first time I was in South Africa was five years ago when I spent six weeks in Cape Town. I really enjoyed my time there — South African culture is different and exciting compared to the American culture I grew up in. The history of apartheid, the continued economic segregation between rich and poor post-apartheid, and the geography, languages, food, and culture of intermingled people from different parts of Africa make it an excellent place for someone like me to learn new things and understand different perspectives. While I had been staying in Capetown I was surprised to hear locals tell me that they preferred Johannesburg to Capetown. If you have been following my travels you might know that this is how new destinations are enqueued – recommendations, referrals, and references from organic sources. So I stayed in Johannesburg for two weeks, picking two different neighborhoods to get different perspectives of the city. It would be a reconnaissance trip to see if Joburg had the potential to become a regular destination or at least a regular pass-through en route to others. The first neighborhood I stayed in was Maboneng. It is an artsy, edgy, industrial warehouse district with coffee […]
Read More
After Croatia, I spend three days on the naturist (naked) island, Île du Levant for three days. Afterward, after a road trip through Bourgogne, Baune, and Dijon (highlight: I ate an entire bottle of dijon mustard — delicious — using a gas station sandwich) I settled into Reims, France, the capital of the Champagne region of France. I was supposed to stay 10 days before heading to Paris, but I ended up extending my stay on account of a heavy work schedule, an ugly sinus cold, and the happy, healthy routine I fell into in Reims. I worked from my Airbnb rental apartment that had the best city view of any I’ve had so far: a view of the cathedral and a beautiful fountain with a golden, valkyrie-looking woman on top. My gym had an oyster stand out in front of it and I made a habit of visiting each day after exercising. A local boulangerie owned and operated by a very sweet woman and her daughters captivated me — my daily breakfast order came to be “duex crossaints s’il vous plaît” as well as the only French that I spoke. Nevertheless,, the locals were gracious and made it a […]
Read More
I’ve been traveling to Split so often, and documenting my visits here each time, that this will be the last time I write a website entry about it; what was once an exciting international destination feels unremarkable after many years of habitual visitation. This was the first time I was able to visit Split during the summer since the pandemic. Being unable to swim in the sea during the past few years has been really, truly difficult. I’m sure it must sound odd that plunging in the Dalmatian sea is a sort of ritualistic, self-baptism that I need to do from time to time. As I am enveloped in the dark water, I feel immediately purged and restored. That initial two-second chill after submersion (the heat escaping my body) is whatever dreadful spirit has accumulated within me, dissipating into nothingness. Being unable to release that from my soul had forced me to carry that extra weight inside me for too long. This time around my friends David and Marketa invited me to accompany them to the islands of Brač and later to Hvar (follow those links to see photos for each), during their customary island adventures. They also fed me […]
Read More
My friend David from business school told me that I should come to visit his hometown, St. John’s Newfoundland at the height of the summer season during the six-day George Street festival. George Street is in the central part of St. John’s and houses around fifty bars, restaurants, and pubs. During the summer festival, all the venues are open, without the regular cover charges, and attendees can roam freely between them and the outside live music shows throughout the night. Before I met David, I couldn’t even point to Newfoundland on a map, let alone have an expectation of what it was like. So of course I came for a visit — unknown destinations are my favorite, and those with a local friend who wants to show you around, are the best. David’s high school friend Glen (who now lives in Toronto) was visiting David during the George Street festival too, and the three of us made a good team for bar-hopping at night. I must admit that I was the first one to bow out each night – being unable to match their partying energy until 4 am each morning. The history of St. John’s and Newfoundland is fascinating. […]
Read More
I spent three days exploring Toronto on my way to Newfoundland. I caught a Blue Jays game, visited Tim Horton’s for the first time, saw my friend Jamie Bishara, went to the Hockey Hall of fame, and managed to still get some work done. Even though Toronto is a big city, it felt like a small town — never crowded, and the people walking downtown outnumbered the cars. I’m skeptical that the winters “aren’t that cold,” and I do not understand why the hockey team, “The Maple Leafs” isn’t called “The Maple Leaves,” or why the (former) Queen of England is on the Canadian currency, nor why Canada pays the British Royal family over fifty million dollars each year. I suppose there is still more to be learned about Canada!
Read More
I spent three months back in Bogotá for the first time since the winter of 2020, before the Covid-19 pandemic. I chose Bogotá during the worst (weather) time of year — it usually rains and days pass without seeing the sun. Most people hate this weather, but I feel cozy and focused here. I spent each day working from within a WeWork co-working space, spreading time between my job, classes (Spanish and business school), etc. Having spent time here over the past six years, Bogotá feels less like a foreign destination and more like a routine resting place. I kept it fresh by hiking a 5,000-meter volcano, and that helped to focus my morning training regimen each day. Alongside weekend hikes to Monserrate the cardio grind wasn’t so miserable as it would have been chained to the treadmill. My Spanish continues to steadily improve, however spreading my focus among so many goals over the past years has slowed my progress (in all of them). I’m fine with that; I prefer steady, incremental improvements compared to alternatives. Sleepy, rainy Bogotá is the perfect place to grow.
Read More
