Prologue

  Bangkok, Thailand
Saturday, May 10, 2008

10 May

Background:

To paraphrase Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, this past year has been my "an(n)us horriblis", or "bad (ass) year"! Actually, up until August of 2007, everything was going splendidly. The stock market was up nicely for the year up to that point, which allowed me to take THREE major trips in the first seven months of the year - to New Zealand, Taiwan and Southern Africa. I had even declared 2007 to be my "Year of Travel", vowing to spend my entire year's income on traveling. Little did I know that the entire year's income - which had already been spent - would soon totally vanish - along with most of the rest of my net worth!

As soon as I got back from Africa in August, 2007 (earlier than originally planned - as usual), the stock market remained stubbornly resistant to going down (I was hoping it would go down so I could buy lower), so I loaded up on Walmart stock. From the moment I bought it, it started tanking, wiping out all of my gains year-to-date - and then some. I should add that, had I not returned from Africa earlier than planned, I would not have bought the stock - as I no longer buy and sell stocks while I am traveling due to the lack of computer security at public internet cafes. (Ironically, I used to be able to, but computer criminals have progressed much more rapidly that computer security has.) So this was an unfortunate case of the early abandonment of a trip costing enormously more than staying on the trip would have cost. I think this was life's way of punishing me for not carrying out my trips as planned.

At the same time, in what appeared to be a turnaround in my fortunes, I almost immediately landed a seemingly very attractive job in Abu Dhabi, UAE. The job started in late August and I was looking forward to a challenging assignment that could also help me to recoup my stock market losses. Well, it wasn't to be. By mid-September, after only two weeks on the job, I was already on a plane on my way back to Bangkok - with my tail between my legs. (Figuratively speaking, of course, as I don't actually have a tail.) Even worse than losing the job - and the whopping income that went with it - was losing the sixteen year relationship with the friend who got me the job. By quitting on him like that, I disappointed him greatly. I am very sorry for that and I still hope that he will someday forgive me. But I am just not very good at being on the receiving end of bossal abuse. (I was the only subordinate of my immediate boss, and he seemed to take visible pleasure in causing me pain. I think there is a word for people like that.)

Meanwhile, back home in Bangkok, I was scrambling to make back my stock market losses. I thought that the quickest way to make my money back would be to sell my Walmart (at what turned out to be its low point!) and buy a more volatile stock - with the expectation that the stock's volatility would manifest itself on the upside. Boy did that ever turn out to be a mistake! Instead of making back my losses, I compounded them - dramatically - almost irrecoverably. At my low point, I had lost about two thirds of my investable net worth! Things were looking so desperate that I had completely written off the hope of making another trip - for at least three years and perhaps even forever. In the meantime, during this entire plunge in the stock market, Walmart went on to be one of the few stocks that never went down - and to this day it continues to make new highs - just as I had predicted it would. Unfortunately, it is doing so without me. In fact, it's doing so precisely because I no longer own it - just to constantly remind me of my mistake.

So, to make a long story short (if it's not already too late), and to come to the point of this narrative, in the last three months, I was able to make back my entire losses - and then some - to the point where I can feel comfortable about taking a trip again. Hence, this trip - and the accompanying report.

The timing of this trip was influenced by my need to renew my annual Thai visa. It seems that every year, this procedure comes at just the time to interfere with my travel plans. Anyway, I'll go to the Immigration Bureau this Monday and see if I can jump through all of the hoops again. (As a note, the Thai immigration authorities have a habit of changing the rules every year - and usually not in my favor. One would almost get the feeling that they don't want us long nosed foreign devils here.)

Regarding the trip itself:

I have decided to go to Africa again, for a number of reasons: First of all, I enjoyed my last trip there much more than I had expected. Secondly, I feel the need to fill in some holes that I left last year as the result of my early abandonment of that trip. And finally, I was able to find a reasonably priced air ticket - in addition to a couple of fairly priced tours for certain segments of my trip.

Overview of Itinerary:

In summary, here is what I plan to do on this trip: I'll start by flying from Bangkok to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania with Qatar Airways via Doha, Qatar. Unfortunately, both coming and going, I will have extraordinarily long layovers in Doha: Eight hours on the way there and twelve hours on the way back. A bit of research, however, has revealed that upstairs at the Doha Airport, there is a so-called "Quiet Room" for the express purpose of providing transiting passengers with a cool, dark place to pass the time in semi-horizontal comfort during long layovers. There is also a lounge, the "Oryx", where people can sit, eat, drink, read, be merry, etc., in comfort for US$30 for six hours. I just might avail myself of that lounge during my 12 hour layover on my return home. (Actually there is a flight to Bangkok departing just 40 minutes after I am scheduled to arrive in Doha on my way home. Given, however, that airlines are rarely on schedule, and given that 40 minutes is such a short time to make a connection, I didn't think that it was worth booking that next flight. What I'll do instead is when I arrive in Doha, if we are on time, I'll check to see if I can get on that immediately connecting flight - thereby saving myself a 12-hour wait at the airport.) However, just to save myself the disappointment, I'll assume that I won't be able to make it - and I'll be happy if I can.

You might well ask why I chose Qatar Airways if their schedule is so inconvenient. Well, they are the only airline that flies to both Dar es Salaam AND Cape Town (my starting and ending destinations) from Bangkok. Most airlines in Asia fly to Johannesburg or Nairobi when going to Africa; several fly to Dar es Salaam; and one or two fly to Cape Town. But only one does both Dar and Cape Town from Bangkok. So by default, Qatar Airways wins - in spite of their singularly inconvenient schedule.

Anyway, after spending the first day or two in Dar recovering from the inconvenient flights, I'll take the ferry over to the main attraction of the region, the exotic Spice Island of Zanzibar. I've heard so much about the place and seen so many pictures of it that it is one of my must see destinations in the world. On Zanzibar I'll just hang out in the capital Stonetown for a week or so before returning to Dar in order to catch an organized tour to Zambia via Malawi. This will be a 12-day camping tour - the first organized tour that I will have taken in my life - and one of the few times that I will have slept in a tent as well.

I remember maybe one or two other times sleeping in a tent in my childhood. Once in the back yard with my friend Bruce (during which we were harassed/scared by older boys from the neighborhood), and once with my father and brother as part of a boy scout trip. My brother and I had it better than most of the other scouts as most of the other guys' fathers were city slickers who had no idea about camping, whereas my father was a Green Beret and Army Ranger, trained not only in extreme survival skills, but also capable of carrying huge amounts of equipment on his back - thereby relieving my brother and me from having to carry too much equipment ourselves. And being a Cajun who grew up on a farm, my father was also quite able to cook a proper meal at a campfire. (Pork chops roasted over a campfire on pointed sticks, I recall, is what we dined on that evening!) Nonetheless, this multitude of skills still didn't prevent my father from keeping me awake in the tent at night with his snoring! Speaking of which, on this tour, I will be required to share a tent with a complete stranger. I have already requested a non-snorer - a beautiful, blond, female Scandinavian one if possible.

This tour will take me from Dar es Salaam to Zambia via Malawi. The reason I chose to do a tour in this case is that the public transportation in the region, especially around Malawi, consists of very slow, overfilled buses departing at very infrequent intervals - driving very dangerously. I read some people's reports about having to spend two or three days on buses just to cover a few hundred miles. And while it is a good thing to see and experience how locals live, I don't need to experience discomfort in any particular place in order to be able to imagine it. I've done it before and I already know what it's like. Anyway, the fact that there was a tour departing from exactly where I would be and going exactly where I wanted to go - at just the time I wanted to go - was a sign for me to, after visiting 79 countries on my own, finally break down and join an organized group tour. I just finished reading a horror story about someone else's disastrous group tour in the same place under similar conditions, but I don't think they can ALL be disasters - can they? Actually that person was on a several month tour, whereas mine will last for less than two weeks. I figure it should take at least that long to start hating my traveling companions, although I'm sure they're going to be wondering how they were so lucky as to end up on a tour with me.

There are other advantages to such a group tour, the main one being safety. Being led around by people who know their way around is a good thing. There is also companionship, although for me this is a secondary consideration, as I'm usually able to meet fellow travelers when I travel. Still, it might be nice for once to have a pre-selected group with whom to share experiences for a couple of weeks. From this blog, you will of course find out how it worked out.

This camping tour ends in Livingstone, Zambia, at the Victoria Falls. However, since I was at the Victoria Falls last year, I might end my trip in Lusaka already. I'll see how things are going once I am there. Anyway, in Lusaka, I will stay at the Gossner Mission, the same place I stayed last year when I was in Lusaka. The retired German couple who run the mission there, Peter and Brigitte, have since become good friends (with me - not each other!) and we even met up here in Bangkok a couple of months ago when they were here visiting Peter's son, who was working on a project in Thailand at the time.

Essentially, I will hang out in Lusaka for two or three weeks while waiting for the departure of my next tour - from Johannesburg. During my time in Lusaka, I will make more of an effort to get to know the city and to get around on my own using public transportation. Taxis are rather expensive there (at least for pale faces like myself), so I'll learn to use the cheaper mini-buses. I mean, with most people being able to speak at least some English there, how difficult can it be to ask "Is this bus going to such and such - and how much does it cost?" I don't know why that seemed so difficult last year, but I'm going to try to do it this time. Actually Lusaka, like any big city in Africa, is not without its dangers. However, if I only go out in the daytime AND leave all of my valuables in my room, I should be able to get around the city without too much risk.

Aside from exploring the city, Peter has already volunteered me to teach English - for free, no less - at a nearby secondary school. I figure that if I'm going to be teaching for free, they won't be too disappointed if they don't get their money's worth from me. It will be a good opportunity for me to try out my teaching skills, which is something I've always wanted to do, although not necessarily for free.

The day before the departure of my second organized tour of this trip, I will fly down to Johannesburg to hook up with the tour. That tour will be a 15-day accommodated tour from Johannesburg to Port Elizabeth via Kruger National Park, Swaziland and Lesotho. Originally I was planning to take a camping tour on this leg of the trip as well, but I found out that at this time of year, it is FREEZING in that part of the world, often even snowing in some places at higher elevations. That's NOT the place I want to sleep in a tent! (Heck, I nearly froze sleeping under a pile of covers in a comfortable guest house room in Windhoek, Namibia last year - and it will probably be MUCH colder in Lesotho, for example.) It's kind of funny though: When you live in Bangkok, you become unable to imagine what cold feels like. So at this moment I'm thinking, "Cold? Big deal! I can take it." But I know it will be different when I'm there.

From Port Elizabeth, I will have about a week to make it back to Cape Town, where I'll spend my remaining few days. Unfortunately, this will be the cold, wet and windy time of year in the region. But the good thing is that I will be on my own again and therefore able to choose my own (warm and dry) accommodation. I will also be able to travel at my own pace again.

And, after Cape Town, it's back to Bangkok again, as mentioned via Doha. So, that's it. That's the plan. As always, I reserve the right to make changes to the plan at any time and I probably will - although I will try not to come home early as life has taught me that there is really no hurry to get back home anyway. And besides, if I make any changes to my return flight schedule, I'll have to pay not only a change fee - but also any difference in the price of the flight.

There is no point in reproducing my packing list here as it will be essentially the same as for every trip - with the exception of a little more cold weather gear than usual and a new sun hat, of which I am extremely proud. (My previous hat cost one dollar at the Russian Market in Phnom Penh. This new one set me back about sixty bucks at Central Department Store in Bangkok. Normally I wouldn't pay sixty bucks for something that I could get for a dollar, but this is the first hat that I've ever found in Bangkok that was big enough for me. And besides, I think the new hat looks a whole lot cooler than the one dollar one.)

The major technological advancement for this trip will be the palm-sized computer-like device that I will carry for the purpose of writing my blogs wherever I am without having to pay by the hour to compose them in internet cafes.

01-My handheld computer with expandable keyboard

I will only need to connect to the internet to upload the blogs (and to check e-mails and stock prices), but all of my writing can be done offline - for free. As a companion to this little gem, I bought a full-sized collapsible bluetooth keyboard.

02-Same device with keyboard expanded

So it will essentially be as easy to use as a full-sized computer - at only a fraction of the size (but unfortunately the same price as a full-sized computer!) I justified the expenditure by telling myself that I'll make up the cost on internet charge savings during my travels. (In my heart, though, I know that it is an extravagance that will never pay for itself monetarily. In pleasure of use, though, it just might!)

12 May

Well, I did it! I got my annual Thai visa renewed today. And all it took was 5 minutes - for the processing. Unfortunately I had to wait for 5 hours and 20 minutes before my turn came. I arrived at the Immigration Bureau at 11:16 and didn't finish getting my visa processed until 16:33. As a result, I was unable to do the second part of the procedure, namely the "re-entry permit", because that office closed at 16:30! (That's right - getting a visa only allows me to STAY in Thailand. If I ever want to leave the country and come back again without causing the visa to lose its validity, I have to get a "re-entry permit", or, as it is more commonly known, "just another excuse to suck money out of foreigners".) Since the government employees don't stick around for even a minute after 16:30 knocking off time, I will have to go back again to complete this procedure. Fortunately the re-entry permit is just a technicality - and a matter of paying a good sum of money. (Or rather, good for them - but bad for me.) It's not like the actual visa, about which one has to worry and wonder if it will be renewed.

Anyway, the point is that now that I have my Thai visa, I am in a position to proceed with the next steps for this trip: Buying the plane ticket (assuming that my flight booking status will be able to be upgraded to "confirmed" from the current "waitlisted".); paying for the two above-mentioned group tours; and booking my connecting flight from Lusaka, Zambia to Johannesburg, South Africa. I also still have a lot of research to do regarding accommodation, transportation, eating, etc., in those places where I will be on my own, such as Dar es Salaam, Zanzibar, Cape Town, etc.

15 May

Well, my flight is paid for, the two above-mentioned tours have been paid for, I even went to the dentist today and got my semi-annual teeth cleaning. All I have to do now is buy my sleeping bag and I'm ready to go!

16 May

So, you didn't think I was going to get off that easily, did you? Things were proceeding so smoothly - perhaps just a little TOO smoothly - until this afternoon, when I got a call from Nomad, the Cape Town-based company doing the two above-mentioned tours that I booked and paid for already. I was informed that the first tour I had planned to join, from Dar es Salaam to Lusaka/Livingstone, Zambia, has been canceled due to a lack of participants. Actually they didn't admit the real reason at first, attributing the cancellation to "operational reasons". They don't want customers to think that they would just abandon us solely because they would have lost money on the trip. Actually customers are not stupid. I for one don't expect them to lose money on their trips. But I do expect them to notify me in a timely manner of any changes in circumstances, as it is even more unfair for them to cause customers to lose money on our trips as a result of their problems! They actually knew about this cancellation on Monday but failed to immediately notify my agent. Had they done so, I could have made other flight arrangements because, as you might recall, I hadn't bought my plane ticket until Tuesday. So basically, and to put it politely, I was stuck, as my plane ticket is, for all practical purposes, unchangeable. (Aside from there being a penalty to make changes, there also has to be a seat available on the new date that I would wish to fly.)

Fortunately, within just a few hours, my trusty agent Shawn of Detour Africa in Cape Town, was able to locate a very similar tour leaving from the same place on the same day, this time with Acacia Tours. The main difference is that this tour will first head off to Zanzibar before returning to Dar to continue through Malawi on the way to Zambia. That's fine with me because I was planning to go to Zanzibar anyway - as you already knew. So I'll go to Zanzibar as planned and I'll spend a week longer there than the rest of the group. I'll then hook up with the group in Zanzibar when they arrive there - and take the ferry back to Dar with them, from where we will proceed more or less as the other trip was going to do - down to Lake Malawi and then westward across over to Zambia.

As soon as I got these matters settled, I went out and bought my sleeping bag and, in addition, a mini head lamp to use inside of the tent at night. I don't normally like to spend forty bucks like that on something that I will probably only use for ten days of my life, but if I would have been sitting there in the dark in my tent, I'm sure I would have wished that I had bought the lamp. The forty bucks cash wouldn't have provided me with light in a dark tent - unless, perhaps, I had converted it to forty, one dollar bills and burned them one at a time.

23 May

The past week has been one of ups and downs. Starting with the downs: Well, what can I say? Some things never change. In the past four days, I got another whacking in the stock market. Both the market - and my reaction to it - are so predictable that it is like a broken record. I sold all of my stocks several weeks ago after having made back all of my losses plus a nice gain on top of that. Not one to leave well enough alone, after the market didn't fall in the weeks since I sold, I once again took that as a sign that it was safe to get back in again. And like clockwork, as soon as I bought back in, my stock started tanking. In four days, I managed to lose exactly ten times what I will spend on this entire two month trip to Africa. Crap! I have no one to blame but everybody else. Seriously, though, it's all my fault. I had a well thought out strategy to ease back into the market gradually in the event that the market fell again. But I didn't stick to my plan. Patience is clearly not my strong point. (I'm trying to be nice to myself here.) All I can do is to try to do better next time.

Now for a bit of good news: Seven months after quitting the job in Abu Dhabi, I finally got an e-mail from the friend who had hired me there. (You might recall him from the story above.) Anyway, he has since left the company himself - as there were some shady dealings going on with which he did not want to be associated - and my direct boss - the one on whose account I left the company - is now the acting CEO of the company - and is hated by all who work for him. So my instinct to leave the company was right. But the way I left it - fleeing the country on the next available flight without saying goodbye - left something to be desired. Nonetheless, I do feel at least somewhat vindicated by how things turned out after I left. It wouldn't have worked out for me anyway had I stayed longer. So I will give myself credit for being quick to size up the situation and act on the facts that were staring me in the face. Whether that's a rational assessment or not I am not sure. But it does make me feel better, and that's got to count for something, right? I have also heard from another former colleague that many people have since left the company due to their inability to work for my former boss. Had I been younger and hungrier, I might have stuck it out. But now? Not a chance.

Aside from those not-directly-trip-related matters, I have also made very good progress with other aspects of the planning for this trip: I have found, for example, that there are many flights from the Dar es Salaam airport to Zanzibar, and the price is so reasonable (US$60-65), that it hardly makes sense to go into the city and take a ferry to the island. The ferry costs $35; a taxi into town would be another ten dollars or so; and the area around the ferry terminal is a hotbed of petty thievery, lies, scams and deceit. Furthermore, the flight takes only 20 minutes, whereas the ferry takes two hours. So I will do my utmost to try to fly this route. I will get to experience the ferry on the way back - with my tour group - which I will be joining on the island at a yet undisclosed location. Then, I will have the safety of numbers, as well as of an experienced guide to lead me safely through the maze.

26 May

Okay, with everything more or less set for the trip, we can consider the planning stage of this trip to be completed. My next update should come in a couple of weeks from Zanzibar. I hope you will join me.

27 May - update:

I just got an e-mail from my mother reminding me of the unrest currently taking place in South Africa, where I plan to spend the last two weeks of my trip. They are experiencing their worst violence in 14 years there (in an already very violent country), with locals killing foreigners who come to South Africa to "take their jobs." (I always believed that jobs should be "taken" by those willing to do them, but that's another matter.) I hope that the killing has "died down" by the time I get there. (Pun intended.) In case it hasn't, my strategy will be to keep a low profile and try to blend in with the locals. In any case, let me make one thing perfectly clear to all South Africans: I AM NOT LOOKING FOR A JOB! I PROMISE!