After trying 4 different hosts, I have finally settled on Logjamming.com -- and now the inaugural edition of my log is up and running. Yay! Lots more work still to come.

I spent this past weekend at the PMS Long Course Championships at UC Santa Cruz. The foggy mornings gave way to beautiful afternoons, and I was able to get in a few good swims, considering the fact that I have only been back in the water a couple of months after my year-long sabatical. My results were:

50 M Back (3rd place, :33.19)
100 M Back (3rd place, 1:14.63)
200 Back (3rd place, if I hadn't gotten DQ'ed on the turn (opps!) 2:44)
200 M IM (6th Place, 2:37.90)
100 M Breast (4th Place, 1:25.08).

I also swam the 200 Medley Relay and the 400 Free Relay.

Full meet results can be found on the Pacific Masters website.

After hearing about my twin cousins from California all of my life, I finally met one of them today. Candace and I had a nice lunch at Harrington Grill in the Financial District. The food wasn't all that great, but the company was. Surprisingly (to me) I felt a family bond with her -- surprising in that I often don't feel much of a bond with family members outside of my immediate family. In any case, I am really glad I met her after all of these years, and I hope I can meet her sister Amy someday soon.

My good friend Colin was in town this week. We first met at NC State and shared an office as we worked on our master's thesis under Dr. Lester. Ever since I had moved to San Francisco four years ago, we hadn't done a very good job keeping in touch -- but our time together this week was like we had been hanging out all this time.

We talked about what we had been working on lately, who we had dated over the years, and where we had been and what we had seen. He was especially interested in my upcoming trip to Asia, and we quickly admitted how little we really knew about that part of the world as we talked about the politics, culture and religions of SouthEast Asia.

Often times, when I tell people about my upcoming trip, the first thing they say or ask about is sex tourism. Unfortunately, "sex for sale" is a big part of many tourists agenda in Thailand, and it is unfortunate that the reputation is so strong that it is the first thing people mention to me. Colin took a different tack. "Are you expecting it to be a spiritual journey?"

I had never thought about it that way, but yes, in many ways it is. Who knows what I will find? Or what I am even looking for? But undoubtably Buddhism and spritual traditions of the past 1000 years will play a large role, as it is so intertwined with the culture and the personality of the Thai people. As Colin said, "You can't go to Judea without taking a spritual journey. Same goes for SouthEast Asia."

I have to agree.

I just implemented a Photo Album, with some pics of me in San Francisco. The plan is to upload pics from Asia here on a regular basis.

The design, of course, is still being worked out.

My friend Luke was in town this weekend for his brother's wedding, so we took advantage of the last couple of days to hang out and catch up. We first met at NC State in the computer science department -- he has taken the academic route by working on his PhD at MIT in computer science, while I came out west to make my fortune in the dot-com craze. Who was the smarter one? (ha!)

We had a very San Francisco weekend the last two days: Went to a BBQ for Nick's birthday at Crissy Field (a beautiful day which gave us great views of the Golden Gate Bridge and downtown SF and sunburned faces to show for it), then bar hopping in the Casto (Badlands, Cafe, Midnight Sun, Whisky Bar), dinner at Cha Cha Cha in the Haight (sangrias and tapas... yum!). Today we took a load of boxes and furniture over to my storage place in Alameda (free labor), then had lunch at Sam's in Tiberon (still sunny, but with sunblock this time), and visited Muir Woods (giant redwoods and tourists from Kansas).

So the last 24 hours have held a lot of "San Francisco Moments" for me. I know I will miss SF enough that I will eventually want to come back after my upcoming detour. Who I will be, when it will be, and what will be waiting for me remains to be seen.

Everything is finally packed. Just one more trip to Alameda and I will be all ready to go to Asia. Whew. Moving is such a hassle!

It's July 31, 2002, and that means that I am headed to Bangkok later this afternoon. It has been a hectic couple of weeks since my contract ended at Semaphore Partners. But I think I have everything in order and ready to go.

Of course I couldn't have done it without a lot of help from my friends:

* Luke, Kenley, and Travis helped me move furniture to my storage in Alameda.
* Brennan and Eleen gave lots of support and encouragement from SP.
* Do allowed me to use his car for several trips to Alameda.
* Joe gave me permission to stop coaching the swim team.
* Nick put me in touch with Wannee, who got me a great deal on the airfare.

So here I go...

Walking around in a bit of a fog might be expected on a visit to San Francisco. But this time the fog has been in my head due to a little jet lag from the trip from Bangkok yesterday.

I left San Francisco several months ago, after living here for almost four years. So, in addition to trying to stay dry and warm (I miss hot and humid Bangkok), most of my time on this part of my trip will be spent visiting friends I have not seen since I left. Not much exciting news there, but I am sure I will be glad to spend time with those closest to me.

Of my long list of things to do while I am in the US, one of the most important is getting another Non-Immigrant Visa. The visa I got in Laos will expire this month, and the International Affairs Office at school was afraid they wouldn't have enough time to process the Work Permit before the visa expired. (I can't believe it has been almost 3 months since I was in Laos. Zoooom!)

So after spending the weekend in San Francisco, I made a quick stop in Washington, DC to visit the Thai Embassy. My friend Tom was nice enough to pick me up at Dulles, put me up for the night, drive me to the Embassy this morning and then take me to National to fly out to North Carolina this afternoon.

Luckily, the visa process in DC was much smoother and easier than in Vientiane. The air was cool, the line non-existant. I filled out the paperwork and handed it over with the fee, my photos, and my passport and was done with it.

In general, my time at the Embassy was reflective of my entire time in the US so far. After struggling for months to communicate, to get around, to find what I need, everything here is easy for me.

I am also noticing how rich America is. Granted I was in San Francisco and Northern Virginia, two of the more wealthy areas of the country. But even still everyone seemed to be wearing the latest fashions from the hottest designers and retail companies. Everyone was driving shiny brand new cars with all the extras. Everyone lived in palatial estates with so many rooms filled with nice furniture.

Of course, again, it is all relative. My friends and family are mostly "American middle class", but compared to what I have seen in Asia, they are all millionares. I just hope they all appreciate what they are lucky enough to have.

I have been transported into a Hallmark Christmas special. "The weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful..."

Usually from the front balcony of my parent's house in North Carolina I have a wonderful view of the surrounding wooded mountains dotted with cute little farmhouses. But today all I see is the snow being whipped past the window by the howling wind.

Safe inside, the fireplace warms the room where this morning my family and I sat next to the decorated Christmas tree and opened the presents that we had bought for each other. We followed that with a big breakfast and for the rest of the afternoon we just lounged around the house, glancing up every now and then to look through the windows at the falling snow outside.

Tonight, though, the "traditional" Christmas was ended, as we ventured out into the winter weather to watch "The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers". We never made it to our big traditional Christmas dinner either. After the filling breakfast and the popcorn and cokes at the theatre, we settled for roast beef sandwiches. Not so Hallmark.

But soon the warm and fuzzy American Christmas scene returned. After eating we headed downstairs where my Dad had set up a screen. For the next few hours we watched old slides of family camping trips, of christenings, of dogs and cats long gone. It was a little bit odd to see pictures of my parents when they were my age, and pictures of my Grandparents when they were my parents' age.

And so that was the Towns' Christmas 2002 with traditions old and new. I hope everyone else out there is having a happy Holiday Season as well... be it Hallmark or not. May we someday have true Peace on Earth, Goodwill to All.

I leave early tomorrow AM to DC from Charlotte, so tonight my family and I drove down to Charlotte to spend the night. We had dinner at an awesome little Cuban restaurant where the food was great and so was the sangria.

The hostess (who also looked like she was in charge of the place) chatted with us a bit after dinner. She was born in Nicaragua, but was sent over to the US by her mother when she was a young girl. Her mother owned a clothing factory and two houses in Nicaragua when the Sandinistas took over in the 80s. They took one of her houses ("Why does one person need two houses?" they asked) and took control of her factory. The government supplied the fabric to the factory and took the finished clothing as well.

Since all of the fruits of the mother's hard work were taken from her, she started sending her children to the US one by one. When they were all there, she joined them and requested asylum. Of course she came to the US with nothing, since she had to leave everything behind. Otherwise she wouldn't have been able to leave the country.

It was a riches-to-rags story. The mother works in a factory now, but is no where close to owning it. Her childeren work in a restaurant. We asked the girl if her mother was glad she came over. She didn't really answer us, making us think that she wasn't really all that happy. But we still got the impression that after losing everything she had, she was glad to know that at least what she had now would always be hers.

If I ever write a book called "Getting a Thai Visa the Easy Way", the first chapter will be about Washington. Today I sailed in, turned in my receipt, and had my multiple entry visa in my hands in 30 seconds. Such a different experience than the stuggle in Vientiane and the additional hassle of getting the "multiple" part in Bangkok after I returned.

The rest of the afternoon was spent at lunch at my favorite coffee shop in DC - Soho Coffee, and then a long walk downtown, visiting the Smithsonian Castle, Washington Monument, White House, Lincoln Memorial, and Jefferson Memorial (with the latter being my all-time favorite).

Then it was a quick ride on the Metro to Silver Springs, where my friend Vinh picked me up and drove me to New York. I will be here for a few days visiting friends and seeing the sights, then its back to San Francisco for New Years.

I spent most of the day today with Kenley taking in the sights in New York around Broadway and Central Park. Our first stop was to see the afternoon matinee of La Boheme at the Broadway Theatre. I think this was the first time I ever saw an opera, and I really liked it. Of course the amazing sets and English subtitles helped.

After the show we walked through snow-covered Central Park and visited Lincoln Center before having a delicious dinner (which included the famous pomogranate margaritas) at Rosa Mexicanos.

Just seeing one show wasn't enough, so after dinner we saw Forbidden Broadway, a campy spoof of broadway shows in the style of San Frabcisco's Beach Blanket Babylon, but without the big hats. The rest of the night we walked around Times Square and marveled at all of the people and the lights and the tall buildings (how touristy!)

They say that who ever is with you on New Year's Eve is who will be with you for the rest of the year. If that is the case, then my year will be filled with Charles the cat and a very loud party going on downstairs while I do laundry and pack for a big trip.

The first part of the day was fun, though. Kenley and I hung out in North Beach and had an amazingly good Italian dinner at North Beach Restaurant.

In any case, I am starting 2003 by getting on a plane in a few hours headed for Bangkok, ending my 3-week, 6-city world-tour. I think I am ready for a rest, to be honest. As much fun as it was to see my friends and family and to travel to all of these places, I think that a few good night's sleep in my own bed will be very much appreicated.

Happy New Year to everyone. May 2003 be everything you are dreaming of now.

Every morning now I wake up to read the news about Iraq and the situation back in the States. I'm not sure why I do it as there is never any good news. Masochism perhaps?

No, I like to keep up with the news for two reasons: 1) to empathize with my many friends and family there and 2) to figure out when it's safe to go back. Right now, I think I will stay where I am.

For example, in today's SF Chronicle: "With the economy stuck in low-gear, local businesses are continuing to shed thousands of jobs, according to the latest layoff notices filed with the state Employment Development Department."

Ugh.

I don't know what it is exactly, but there is something special about San Francisco. There is something about it that makes it feel like home to me. I felt it on my very first visit in 1997, and I feel it on my return this Christmas season.

What about the city makes me feel so comfortable and at home? Is it the fact that I have so many friends here? That is certainly part of it. Is it the beauty of the bay and the rows of victorian and modern houses built on winding hillside streets? No doubt it plays a part.

Or is it just the diversity that appeals to me so much? Last night, Kenley and I ate dinner at a small Mexican steak restaurant near his new condo in the Mission. I sat there amazed as I realized the the crowd was a microcosm of the City. There was a table of 8 gay guys who were black, caucasian, and asian. Two other tables had straight couples -- one All-American caucasian couple from the Marina and one made up of an Indian guy and a caucasian woman. At the bar, 4 Mexican guys sat with their baseball caps on backwards and drinking MGD.

We were lucky enough to sit at the window, and the street scene outside was as typically San Franciscan as the inside. People of all races walked by, many of them walking their dogs. Across the street was an old church, painted some funky orange-redish color with aqua trim and was sitting next to a few old victorians.

But what I am describing is just surface. There must be a deeper attraction. I don't know what it is, but perhaps Rupert spoke correctly and I really am home now.

I think my first impression of San Francisco is that it seems very clean to me. Of course the moment I say this, I realize the irony of the statement since for all of the years I lived here, I complained about how dirty it was. But again, everything is relative. Compared to Bangkok, the air of San Francisco is very clean (which interestingly enough makes the sun much brighter); the houses are brightly painted; the streets and sidewalks are clear of trash and people and food carts and dogs. San Francisco seems very quiet to me. Where is everyone? On the roads, I marvel at how well the traffic flows; how everyone stays in their own lane and stops at every red light.

I did have a good time last night. After dinner with Kenley I went to the swim team party. I felt like the Thai Tourism Association should be paying me a commission, since I was trying to talk everyone into visiting Thailand. I felt like a missionary spreading the good news to the unknowing heathens.

In any case, yesterday wasn’t very productive since I was so tired from the jet lag and from staying out too late the night before. But today I was determined to tackle my storage. When it was time to leave, I had gone through 7 boxes and had thrown out two bags of trash. I feel a little discouraged though, as if my progress has stalled. So much left to do!

On the social side of things, I had a pretty good day. I had lunch with Richard near his home in Alameda and tonight I stopped by the pool to see my friends from the swim team. Manop and I had Vietnamese for dinner. I am still a little afraid to try Thai food in San Francisco. I think I will be very disappointed.

By the way, I just wanted to say that I am having a very productive, frustrating, tiring, cold, wet, fun trip so far. I just haven't spent much time in Internet Cafes, so I haven't updated my site much. I've been keeping track on my laptop, though, so I will upload my journal when I get back next week.

In any case, I am safe in Washington DC with my family. Today, we'll visit museums and go see Return of the King tonight.

Merry Christmas everyone!

"There is no way I can eat that whole thing!" I thought to myself when the super burrito full of beef and cheese and beans and who knows what else was brought to my table. I crave these monsters back in Bangkok, so now that I am in the US, appropriately my first meal is at a taqueria.

Despite my pessimism, however, twenty minutes later, helped by a Negro Modelo beer, the only thing in front of me was a red plastic tray and an empty aluminum foil wrapper. Delicious! I wonder how much weight I am going to gain this week. More than a pound or two, if I keep eating like this!

I didn't sleep much on the plane on the way over, so I am pretty beat now. I was able to stay awake all afternoon, but as soon as I roll my stuffed body down the hill to my rental car and drive back to my hotel, I will be in bed for what I hope is a long, long sleep.

It's amazing what 11 hours of sleep will do for you. I'm feeling pretty good today, but just moving very slowly. It took me a full two hours to get out of the hotel room this morning, once I convinced myself that getting out of bed was a good idea.

The plan for today is to be in meetings and to have dinner with my friend Stephen tonight. Then tomorrow a little sightseeing around this beautiful city of Seattle.

This trip is zooming by. In the last few days I have been enjoying the sights in Seattle and in Vancouver. (Although I haven't been enjoying the cold and rainy weather!) Now, in a matter of hours, I'll be on my way to Taipei.

I haven't had any time to write, but I guess that is a good sign that I have been enjoying myself. Either that or I have just been to tired to type out my thoughts. Perhaps I will have time to write when I arrive in Taipei. In any case, I am very excited about adding a new country to my list!

Another undercurrent of my past week has been preparing for my trip back to America in October. Now that Piyawat has his visa (a 10-year visa, amazingly enough) we are ready to go. I will be cashing in some United Miles for this trip, which will definitely help out because the rest of the trip will be very expensive.

The plan, as I mentioned before, is to drive from San Francisco to North Carolina in a big U-Haul truck. It's going to be a long, but fun 2 weeks, I hope.

One of the stops we are planning on making is in Florida to visit my sister. Right now as I type this, she (and the rest of that part of the country) is getting hit very hard by Hurricane Ivan. I talked to her a bit last night and she is in good spirits.

(Click here for a big picture of the current radar.)

In any case, it will be interesting to go to Pensacola and to visit the beach. Who knows what will be left of it, because at this very moment, it is under about 15 feet of swirling, churning sea water. When I lived through Hurricane Fredrick in 1979, I remember going out to the completely flat beach that had huge sand dunes to play on just the day before. It was a shocking sight.

WOW! Just as I am typing this, I got an email from my sister. She is taking refuge at her boyfriend's office, which is in an old department store. It should be very safe there. This is what she said:

The worst of it, before the eye of the storm, is hitting us right now. Roofs are starting to leak, however structuring on a whole, things are okay. Elevator is broken, security systems is down (which means that no telling how long we will be here). Cell phones still seem to be working, at least for the time being.

Once this has passed ... looking to get back to tropical storm force winds, probably by late tomorrow afternoon .... it's going to be, I'm afraid, devastating for many, many people from Mobile to Pensacola, then pretty gosh darn terrible to the west and east of us. We won't know until tomorrow, possibly Friday.

Here is the email that I just sent to my friends and family who I had told that I was visiting the US in October:

I have some bad news. Looks like Piyawat and I will have to cancel our trip to the US. I made the mistake of not looking into the rental truck before making other plans. What I found out was that U-Haul has a very strict policy about the number of days you can rent and the number of miles you can drive. So, our plan of a leisurely tour of America has been squashed. Since renting a truck one-way is not a cheap option, we don't think that it is worth our time and money at this point.

I still want to move my stuff to North Carolina, so I think what I will do is to ship it in December when I come back to the US for Christmas. I found one company that will do this called ABF U-Pack. Basically you pack up a big crate and they ship it for you. Have you ever heard of this company or any like it? Sounds like a legitimate way to do it.

Needless to say, I am disappointed. Oh well. Guess I'll see most of you in December...

What a bummer. On the one hand, we will save a lot of money by not going. On the other, a cross-country drive sounded like a lot of fun...

The American Presidential election is upon us. Who will win? I have no idea, but I do think it's a bit of a shame that public opinion is divided down the middle, creating two Americas. You would think that we would be able to agree a little more.

In any case, in a few days we will know the outcome of the election. I don't talk much about politics on this site, but I just have to say that my vote is for Kerry for sure. He's not the most exciting guy, but to me, the person who is the President is only part of the picture. The people who the President surrounds himself with are also very important. And frankly, I despise most of Bush's advisors (Rumsfield, Ashcroft, Cheney, etc). Colin Powell and Condolleza Rice are the only ones I had respect for, but it seems to me that those two were shouted down by three mentioned above and now really have no say in what happens. Their credibility was damaged by having to go along with the Bush line.

Also, I think that Kerry is very a very intelligent man. (The same can be said for Gore, and the fact that he is a detail-oriented intellectual probably cost him the election.) I think that Kerry is a consolidator, not a divider. Being outside of the US I can see that most people in the world think that the US government has made a lot of mistakes over the last four years. When we went to Iraq and "took care of business" all by ourselves it gave us a very bad name. We still haven't been able to clean up the mess we made -- both on the ground in Iraq and in our relationships with other countries. I think that the world is getting smaller and smaller every day, and therefore cooperation is much more important than the US going on the offensive all the time, all alone.

Having written this now, I read back over it and can see that I am certainly no great political pundit. I'm just a regular guy who happens to be living overseas and who thinks it's time for a change in my home country.

It's time to wrap up Leg 1 of our whirlwind North American tour. Other than the jet lag, the first few days have been pretty good. As far as the work side of things go, we have learned a lot from the two interviews that we have done so far.

The interviews that we did in Australia last month, and most of the ones that we will do in North America on this trip, have been with children's television producers, as well as with the foundations that fund the productions. The first two interviews on this trip, however, have focused on the academic side: issues such as the influence of television on children and how to determine if a children's program is "educational". (For example, compare the Flinstones to Sesame Street.)

We talked with three of the most knowledgeable and famous university professors in this field: Dr. Alvin Poussaint at Harvard and Dr. Dorothy Singer and Dr. Jerome Singer at Yale. All three of them (as well as one of Dr. Poissant's collegues) gave us a lot of information about Children and Media that we will share with the rest of the Thai research team when we return.

We had a day off in between the interviews, so we drove the rental car from Boston out to Provincetown at the end of Cape Cod. It was a wonderful, slow drive through the historic countryside. The traffic on the winding two-lane back roads went slow enough that we were able to read the dates on all of the buildings that we passed: a church from 1734, a house from 1823, a store from 1774, on and on and on for mile after mile.

Provincetown was fun too. I often use the word "quaint", but I think that if you actually look "quaint" up in the dictionary, there will be a picture of Provincetown. The narrow main street was more of a walking path than an actual road, and it was filled with art galleries, independent clothing boutiques, shops selling pottery and household goods, and all kinds of restaurants. For a small town that is so dependent on tourism, it was nice to see that there were not any tourist shops selling tacky knick-knacks. Well, now that I think about it, there must have been at least a few, but the high quality of all the other businesses made the few t-shirt shops bearable.

So, that's all for the United States for a while. In fact, I'm actually writing this from Toronto. We'll be here for a few days and then go on to Vancouver before we return to New York. So far, so good...

Wow, it's been a very long time since I have published anything on this website. It's been exactly six weeks in fact. I think that is a record for me over the past three years since I started this website. (By the way, my three-year anniversary for sgtowns.com and my move to Thailand is coming up in a couple of weeks. Amazing.)

So I last wrote from Toronto, on the way to Vancouver. Our stop in Vancouver was very nice -- our meetings were productive and our visits with our friend Gordon were fun. Vancouver is another great city; one of the most beautiful I've ever seen. I wouldn't mind having a summer home there.

After Vancouver we headed back to New York City, where we had a few final interviews. One of the interviews was with a couple of puppeteers, one of whom was one of the original puppeteers from the Muppet Show. Since I used to love that show as a kid, I guess she is one of my heros. That afternoon we met with one of the original producers of Sesame Street. Guess he's on the hero list too.

One of the highlights of our time in NYC was meeting and hanging out with Joe and Peter, whom I met through this website. They turned out to be cool guys and we very much enjoyed hanging out with them. They took us to a delicious cuban restaurant near Union Square for dinner. Aroi Mak!

Our last few days were all about some R&R at my parent's home in North Carolina. We did the usual tourist things like eating country-style dinners and visiting the swinging bridge at Grandfather Mountain. It was, of course, great to see my parents. I'm glad that they got a chance to meet Piyawat too, since they have read his name a few times on these pages.

Then, it was back to Bangkok for two weeks as I had to start teaching the summer semester. I'm teaching Prepratory Math again, and as usual, the student's aren't very interested in learning much Math. But since this is the third time I've taught it, I think that so far we have been quite successful.

And then, believe it or not, after a short while in Bangkok it was time to go back to the US again, this time for my sister's wedding in North Carolina. The wedding was a beautiful ceremony in an old country church on the top of a mountain. My sister had a bagpiper (is that the right word?) play the bagpipes at the service. It was partly a nod to the Scottish heritage in that part of North Carolina, as well as the Scottish heritage in our blood.

The reception was held at my parents' home. It was great fun to see relatives whom I haven't seen in years. In fact, some of them I haven't seen in decades, and some of the younger ones I had never met. Two of the young ones, boys from Texas, had me out in the yard throwing the baseball and the football along with plenty of punches-to-the-arms and elbows-in-the-ribs as 10 and 12 year old boys are wont to do. We also played my new favorite sport, "Throwing Rocks at a Barn". Needless to say, my shoulder was quite sore in the morning.

And now, for the last two weeks or so here in Bangkok, I have been trying to catch up with all the work that has piled up, as well as teach my math classes. Just today I finally feel that I am "working" rather than "catching up", which is a nice change. I even have some time to write a long blog entry. (One of the longest, I'm sure.)

It looks like I will be working a lot over the next month or so, so I don't know how often I will be able to post anything here. But I'll try to pop in now and then for a quick update...

By the way, just a little small post here to say that my thoughts go out to my sister and her new husband in Florida as they are living through Hurricane Dennis right now. From the looks of the satilite photo to the right (click for a larger version), it looks like the weather is already pretty bad there, even though the eye won't hit for another 6 hours or so.

I have never participated in blog memes, but I did run across one today that I thought was interesting, in light of my post yesterday about visa runs three years ago. The meme asks, "What were you doing 10 years, 5 years, 1 year, and 1 day ago?" Well, this might be fun, but I think I will start with 20 years ago.

20 Years Ago, July 1985: I just started competitive swimming a year ago. Spurred on my 8th grade Civics teacher, I joined the middle school swim team. I loved it so much, that I soon joined the city-wide team. And let me tell you, this team was hard-core! Three years from now, three of my fellow teammates will compete in the Seoul Olympics, and one of them (if memory serves) will bring home a silver medal. So, to make a long story short, I am spending most of my free summer time swimming with the city team.

Now that I think about it, was the Summer of 85 the year that I made a mission trip with my church group to Jamaica? I think it might have been. I was just thinking about that a couple of days ago when someone mentioned going to Jamaica. There were about 6 of us from my church that made the two-week trip. We spent most of the time in the mountainous jungle in the middle of the island.

It was my first major trip outside of the U.S. and my first experience with a completely different culture than what I was used to. In the small village where we stayed, we found ourselves in a sea of black faces, and for the first time in my life I realized what it was like to be a minority. I remember one little black girl ran up to me with her arms up. When I picked her up, she immediately reached out her little hand and touched my blonde, straight hair. Perhaps she had never seen something so strange and exotic before.

Continuing the theme in yesterday's post, today I have been thinking about what I was doing ten years ago. In some ways I wish I had a blog, or at least a journal or diary so that I would know for sure what I was doing. I guess I could go back and try to find old emails. But other than that, I really don't have a record of what I was doing. Of course all of that will change, for my memories starting in July 2002 are saved for posterity. (Or at least as long as someone keeps registering this domain!)

So, I am not exactly sure what I was doing Ten Years ago, but I think I can make a decent guess. So, without further ado:

10 Years Ago, July 1995: Quite simply, the last few years (1993-1994) have probably the most confusing points of my life. After a less-than-stellar undergraduate career (as far as GPA was concerned, at least) I had started and then quit graduate school for Mechanical Engineering at the University of Florida. I had been taking more undergrad courses at UF trying to figure out what to do with my life. First, it was Electrical Engineering, then Computer Engineering. Neither had quite sparked my fancy as much as I wanted, but it had brought me to want to give Computer Science a try.

In addition to going to school part-time, I was working two jobs. During the day I was a substitute teacher in public high schools. Talk about combat duty! I'm convinced that being a substitute teacher is one of the toughest jobs out there. At night I was a waiter at a Steak restaurant. I knew that I didn't want to be a teacher in American public schools, and I knew that I didn't want to be a waiter for the rest of my life. And as I said above, I knew I didn't want to be an engineer either.

So I realized that I needed to make a big move, a big change. I needed to shake up my life and get back on track. This summer of 1995, I was probably in the middle of transition, preparing for this move. The move took me to North Carolina, where I finally found my groove. Three years later I had a masters degree in Computer Science, my name on several academic papers, and a desire to move to San Francisco to ride the dot-com wave.

Ten years later, this little exercise of taking a look back over decades makes me want to look for patterns and for explanations as to what my life has been. (What a surprise for me to try to ANALYZE this!) I see ups and downs. Periods of amazing success as far as numbers and productivity are concerned. Then there are periods where I was focusing on my social connections and on pushing my boundaries and not worrying so much about productivity. And then there are periods of confusion and doubt where I was wrestling with personal demons and not really focusing on anything.

And perhaps the hardest part of all of it for me is to just accept the limits that being human has bestowed upon me.

One of my most prized possessions is a small, 30-year old notebook where I used to record my jogs through the neighborhood. The first entry is sometime in 1974. I was only four years old, but I made it on one half-mile loop around the block. I continued to use this book to record my runs (more or less) all through track seasons in middle school and track and cross country in high school. Not only does this one book hold my first run, it also holds my last and fastest high school run -- a 15:58 three-miler at the Florida State Championships.

But this post is not about me, it's about my Dad. This past weekend, he was inducted into the Forrest City High School Sports Hall of Fame. I think he was the most proud of the fact that he was the first runner inducted.

Since I wasn't around in 1958 to watch him run, this is what the local Forrest City Times-Herald had to say about his career earlier this week:

A 1957 graduate of Forrest City High School, Stuart Towns was one of the state's early pioneers in distance running, lettering with the Mustang track team for three years and also running cross country during his senior year.

Towns also played basketball for two seasons.

As a sophomore, he finished second in the District 880-yard run and was third in the state in the 880 event. He won the district 440 title during his junior year at FCHS and went on to finish third in the state meet.

As a senior, Towns finished second in the state cross country championship meet becoming the first Forrest City High School student to run cross country. Self-coached in cross country, Towns finished third at the University of Arkansas Invitational Cross Country Meet and third at the Little Rock Invitational Meet.

During his senior year, he won the District 440, 880 and mile finishing first in the state in the mile run and third in the state 440. He also anchored the mile relay team at the state meet.

Towns attended the University of Arkansas where he lettered in both track and cross country for three years. He was a member of the Arkansas cross country team that won the Southwest Conference title in 1959 and finished second in 1960.

After college, Towns competed with the U.S. Modern Pentathlon team and was a first alternate for the Pre-Olympic World Meet in Tokyo and other Olympic trials.

Towns helped establish the men's cross country and track programs at the University of West Florida in 1985 and coached the two teams until 2000.

His teams qualified for the NAIA National Cross Country Championship meet nine times. He was named NAIA District 27 Coach of the year several times.

Towns was a professor on staff at the University of West Florida and at Appalachian State.

Currently he is on staff at Southeast Missouri State University.

When I worked for the Internet consulting firm back in San Francisco 3 years ago, one of my favorite co-workers was a guy named Jerry Tang. He was one of the main engineers, and even though he and I never worked on the same project, he was always a good guy to chat with over the proverbial water cooler.

Last night I received an email from Jerry's wife saying that he has gone missing in the city. He is a 39 year old, 6'1" Asian guy and was last seen at his home on Ashbury St near Golden Gate Park. He had a stroke a couple of years ago (at age 37!) and needs medication for seizures.

He was also a very intelligent, super nice guy. I hope he is found safely, soon. For those of you in San Francisco, please keep your eye out for him!

News article about Jerry's disappearance

A wiki with more information

National "Missing Adults" website

Update 7 Jan 2005Over a month later, and unfortunately Jerry has still not been found. I see that a lot of people are coming to this website after searching for "Jerry Tang" on Google, so I wanted to add that perhaps the best place to get new information about the search is at a new Yahoo Group called FindJerry

My friend Jerry has been missing in San Francisco for five days now. Here is an email from the search team. What a sad, sad story. Those of you in San Francisco, please keep your eyes open as you go about your business in the city this week.

Dear Friends,

Today we continued the physical search efforts looking at areas around the city and the South Bay. Once again, people were out on bikes, in cars and on foot looking for Jerry and spreading the word with posters and by talking to people.

We expect there to be an article in the San Francisco Chronicle tomorrow asking for volunteers to join our search for Jerry and directing anyone who wants to help to come to the 828 Ashbury Garage any time after 9 am.

If you can help with the searching again, please come to the garage or call 415-564-5864.

Tomorrow we would really like people to take the large posters to populated areas.

As the 5th day of searching for Jerry comes to a close, we have begun shifting modes from one of crisis management to one of longer-term planning. We now have a Yahoo users group to facilitate our communication in the search for Jerry. We will shortly be inviting all of you to join the group. Once you have joined, you may invite people you think would like to be part of the group to join as well. This will probably be the last email sent to everyone. After this, we will use the user group to communicate.

Thank you to everyone who has worked so hard over the last 5 days to find Jerry.

We would like to send this letter out to Jerry wherever he may be:

Dear Jerry,

It's been almost one week since we've seen you. In the last several days, so many of your friends and family have come together and sent their loving thoughts out to you. You have an amazing group of friends and family who care about you. We all miss you so very much.

We love you and are full of hope that those who come across your path will show you kindness. We pray that you are somewhere safe and warm and that you are able to come back to us soon.

It's been a tiring, but a wonderful week in the States. I am over the jet lag, at least physically, but mentally I still feel a little foggy. Every now and then, something happens and I think "I should write that on my blog," and then the moment of clarity passes and the fog rolls back in.

I've done a lot of traveling on this trip: A few days in San Francisco, a few days in Missouri, and now a few days in Florida, in the town that I spent the first 18 years of my life. And, I have to tell ya, my old hometown is like a foreign country to me. Sure, most of the buildings and the roads are familiar, but at the same time it feels very strange and exotic to me -- so much so that I just can't imagine living here again. And to think that Bangkok seems more comfortable to me now. Odd, isn't it?

So, perhaps I will be able to write some more of my thoughts down later, but for now, I just want to tell everyone "Happy December 25th". (Is that the most PC way to say it these days? ;)

On a warm Spring day, New York City is one of the most amazing places in the world.

That was the thought running through my head as I walked the streets of Manhattan today. New York itself is not a terribly beautiful city, but on a day like today, I was struck by the beauty of the historical buildings, and by the energy and diversity of their inhabitants.

I walked through a few different parks: Union Square, City Hall Park, and Washington Square. And every park bench in every park was full of people enjoying the warm sunny weather. I wonder how many languages I heard today. Certainly Spanish and English were the top two, but I am sure there were many others.

Thai Airways' non-stop flight from Bangkok to New York arrives before 7 AM, so after a quick taxi ride to my hotel in Flushing to drop off my bags (it was too early to check in) and a taxi over to a friend's house in Queens, and a bus and subway ride, I found myself on the streets of Manhattan.

My main task for today was to buy a new laptop to replace my Sony Vaio which seems to have permenantly died. I first visited the amazingly sleek Apple Store in Soho, which I realized was a serious mistake because when I went to Best Buy, Circuit City, Staples (3 of them), some other random computer shop, and finally J&R Electronics, every single other store made me physically ill to be inside.

Why is it so hard to create a store that provides an enjoyable shopping experience? How difficult is it to hire intelligent, knowlegable, enthusiastic staff? Is designing a store layout that allows you to easily compare and try the products a monumental task? Apparently, all of these things are next to impossible, since of the 6 chain stores I went to, only Apple pulled it off.

In some ways, I feel like I am voting with my money when I buy something. So, to make a long story short, I am now in my hotel room typing on my brand new iBook. It wasn't my cheapest option, by far, but I am so happy that I made this decision.

As I mentioned in my last entry, I spent my first night in America in Flushing, NY. Before my trip I checked out hotel room prices in New York City and was shocked at what I found. There was no way I was going to spend $250-$300 for a hotel room in Manhattan. That's the same as one month of rent in a nice apartment in Bangkok!

So I took a chance and booked a room at the Comfort Inn in Flushing. All I knew was that Orbitz said it was near LaGuardia Airport, and that the price was $120 a night. I was a little bit worried at what $120 would get me, but it has turned out to be exactly what I was looking for.

Before I left the hotel yesterday morning, I didn't get a chance to look at the neighborhood. The guys at the front desk said that I was only 5 blocks from the subway, but who knows what those five blocks held. So as I was riding the subway back out, with my new iBook in hand, I was a little bit nervous. If people get mugged in New York for their iPods, what will they do for a new iBook that's still in the box?

Well, it turns out that I had nothing to fear. In fact, I feel quite at home, for I wasn't expecting to travel all the way around the world to be surrounded by Chinese people. But judging by what I saw on those five blocks to the hotel, the population in this neighborhood much be at least 85% Chinese (With 5% white, 5% African-American, and 5% other, such as hispanic and Indian).

So... it has turned out to be a great deal: $120 for a clean room, 5 blocks from the subway (it's the last stop on the 7 Line), relatively close to both JFK and LGA, good neighborhood, free DSL in the room, free breakfast, and a super efficient front desk staff. I'll probably stay here every time I go to New York from now on.

I graduated from high school almost two decades ago. And, as with many people Im sure, I've changed quite a bit between my late teens to mid-thirties. Since I left my parent's home for the last time when I was 18, my life has had several main chapters: college, graduate school, working life, losing everything in the last half of 2001 and rebuilding a completely new life in the new millennium.

I bring all of this up because I am feeling a big pensive about the past two decades, simply because I just had lunch with my friend Betsy, who I haven't seen since 1988. As we shared our "powerpoint bullet points" of the last 20 years, we realized that our story arcs have been quite similar: college ending with master's degrees, riding the dot com wave, losing it all at the end of 2001, and rebuilding a new life that has some remnants of our pasts, but in other ways forays in completely new directions.

Two main themes came from our discussion over omelets and bacon this morning: angst in the past and plans for the future. In these themes, however, we were very different. Betsy claimed that she lived an angst-free past and meticulously plans her future. I on the other hand, seemed to have a relatively angst-full educational experience and have a distinct inability to make a definitive 5- 10- or 20-year plan for my life.

So, enough navel gazing for now. All I know is that my time in Thailand has been mostly angst-free. And that is why I have never left. But what about my future? I still have no concrete plans, but I just have a vague goal of wanting to look back over my life at the end and see a pattern, a path. I want all the experiences I've had to lead to something, to mean something, to create something worthwhile.

What those somethings are remain to be seen...

I have been spending the weekend in Nashua, New Hampshire, at a Regional Faculty meeting for the online university I have been working for. It's always great to see my work colleagues face-to-face. In fact, there were two of them who I have been emailing quite a bit, who I finally met for the first time. It's always nice to finally be able to put a face to a name.

But perhaps more importantly, as with every time I go to an academic function, I wonder if I should spend more time on my teaching career. Perhaps I should really get started on that PhD I've been threatening for years.

Oh well, we'll see where that leads once I get back to Bangkok. But on a more superficial note, after the meeting was over I did the exact same thing I did after last year's meeting: I found an Outback Steakhouse and had one of the best steaks of my life. I do miss having a truly great steak every now and then.

The last three days have been spent in travel to and from Washington, DC, and hanging out with friends there. My main reason for going to DC was to try to get the 60-day tourist visa at the Thai Embassy that other expats had told me about. Sure enough, I was able to get a 60-day, single entry tourist visa to Thailand. The embassy warned me that if I didn't have a return ticket from Bangkok, then the Thai Immigration staff might give me a hard time. I have never been asked to prove that I had a return ticket before, so hopefully they won't ask this time as well. (Since I basically live in Thailand, I don't have a return ticket!)

I also took the opportunity to hang out with a few friends in the area. I stayed with Clayton, who was nice enough to let me crash at his place in Capitol Hill. (Or else he was just paying me back for his stay over in Bangkok a few months ago.) I also had a chance to have dinner with Kenley and to see his new home in Columbia Heights. I had never been to this area of DC before, so it was a new experience for me.

Last night I had dinner with another high school friend that I haven't seen in forever - Eric. I also got to meet his adorable 3 year old daughter for the first time. Eric and his wife Lacy (but mostly Eric) cooked us a fantastic dinner of teriyaki steak with portobello mushrooms. After dinner Eric and I had a chance to sit out in his back yard and talk. It was as if the 20 years since high school never happened, as we talked about some of the same things we used to talk about. After meeting with him and meeting with Kenley, I realized that even after all of the experiences we've had over the past few years, we are still the same people inside. Betsy and I talked about some of what we considered to be radical changes that have happened, but they were relatively minor changes because our core personality and beliefs haven't changed. We are who we are, and we will always be who we are.

After I picked up my Visa this morning, I had lunch with Tom, an old friend I met over the Internet years and years ago. (I'm not actually sure when we first met, but it's definitely been a long time.) It was good to catch up with him and to have a chance to make fun of his ridiculously huge Hummer in person.

This afternoon I drove my rental car from DC to New York, picked up my parents at LaGuardia, and headed back to our hotel in Flushing. We had dinner near the hotel at a fantastic Thai & Malaysian restaurant called Green Papaya on Prince Street in Flushing. After three steak dinners in the past four days, Thai and Malaysian food was a nice change.

So, I am not sure what we have planned for the next few days, but basically I'll just be hanging out with my Mom and Dad in the Big City. Should be fun!

I'm sitting in the 3rd floor cafe at what is perhaps my favorite Barnes and Noble Bookstore in the world -- at Union Square in Manhattan. A diverse crowd fill the many tables here. So, instead of working, I spend most of my time just watching people working, reading, talking, thinking.

A young Asian fashion designer with a jacket, vest, and scarf all of three different colors and patterns and textures makes notes and sketches in a drawing book.

Behind the mix and match style of the designer, a round-bodied elderly gray haired man takes the monochrome approach with matching grey shirt and black pants as he flips through a comic book.

Two Japanese ladies thumbing through eclectic product catalogs and home design books sit next to me. I can only make wild guesses as to what they are chatting about in Japanese.

A long haired girl in a t-shirt and dark rimmed glasses sits by the window. An earnest concerned look is etched into her face as she makes her points to her male companion. Is she saving the world?

Across the large room, a table of Indian business men, sharply dressed in designer jackets and ties and glasses smile and nod and speak of important things. Perhaps they are tacking the same problems as the girl by the window, but I would guess that their approaches might be quite different.

Saving the world is definitely not on the mind of the pot-bellied middle-aged caucasian guy a few tables over. But I do wonder what he is thinking as he studies a Thai kickboxing book.

And perhaps a mirror image of myself sits facing me a few tables away. On his table is an open laptop that he glances at now and then. But he is seemingly more interested in scanning the room around him as he thinks, paying more attention to the comings and going than to what is on the computer screen.

My mother, father, and I have spent most of the day in the car, driving through Long Island. It's been a very educational trip for me, as my impression of Long Island was nothing like the reality. My lack of knowledge of the area showed through at the very beginning of the trip. We started from our hotel in Flushing, Queens, and I soon asked: "When are we going to cross the bridge to the island?"

My Dad was quick to rescue me from my ignorance: "Queens is on Long Island". Oh. Duh.

I was also expecting to see mostly urban or at least suburban areas. But most of the island that we saw was small-town rural, full of history that stretched back to the very beginning of the European experience in North America. There were centuries-old homes and churches and cemeteries around every corner it seemed. It reminded me a lot of the drive Piyawat and I took through Cape Cod a year ago.

But no complaints here: the drive was wonderful. We went out to the end of the South Fork of the island and then crossed two ferries and drove to the end of the North Fork. The day was capped off with an amazingly good dinner at a Greek Restaurant. With the amount of great food that I have eaten this week, I must be gaining weight. Oh well, I'm going to enjoy it as long as I can.

There are many things that I enjoyed in my "past life" as an American that I don't necessarily miss, until I experience them again on my trips back to the U.S. Driving on smooth highways with wide shoulders that are free of motorcycles, vendors, and chickens is one of those things. On our way back from Long Island today, I could really appreciate the convenience of the American Interstate system.

Today I realized that baseball is another one of those things. We spent the afternoon at Shea Stadium watching a great game between the New York Mets and Atlanta Braves. I just love baseball, especially when I am watching it live, on a warm summer day. Unfortunately, though, soulless Shea Stadium leaves a lot to be desired (I've been spoiled by Pac Bell Park in San Francisco).

As I watched the game I thought that perhaps being a Major League baseball player is the best job in the world. And one that I would never be able to do. I had flashbacks now and then of my less-than illustrious Dixie Youth baseball career as a kid. For some reason, I was never any good at baseball. I wasn't too bad at shagging fly balls in the outfield, but my hitting skills were non-existent. I guess part of the reason I love to watch baseball so much is that I have so much respect for the player's ability to actually make contact with a small round object coming towards them at 95 miles an hour.

But not only that, the game was, in my opinion, as perfect as today's weather. The game started out with a bang, with a few runs in the first inning. The middle innings went by quickly. (As much as I love baseball, I admit that the games can get a little long sometimes.) And the end was an exciting one, as the Braves battled back in the ninth inning, only to fall short by one run. Even though I wasn't really cheering for either team, it's always more fun when the hometown team wins.

So, it was another stroll down memory lane for me today, this time it was compliments of Major League Baseball.

Yesterday was my last full day in the U.S. My parents and I spent it at a travel writer's workshop put on by National Geographic Traveler magazine. I must get my love of travel from my parents, and obviously I enjoy writing about the things I have seen and experienced, so my Dad (who is a communications professor, by the way) thought that a travel writing workshop would be a fun family activity.

And it was. It turned out to not be quite what we were expecting. And we were able to come up with a long list of ways it could have been improved, but it was a good experience for the most part.

And since last night was, in fact, my last night, I stopped a few stops short of our hotel to meet my friend Eddie for one more night on the town. I had seen Eddie when I was in New York a week ago, and my worst fears came true when one of the first things he said to me was, "You look fatter!" Thanks, Eddie. I swear I'll be back on the treadmill the first day I get back to Bangkok.

Back home to Bangkok safely and fighting the usual jet lag, I can look back at this past trip to the U.S. and see that it gave me a chance to reminisce about my life, and to think about where I have been and where I am going. From catching a Mets game and thinking about my short-lived baseball career, to chatting with my high school buddies Betsy and Eric who reminded me of my time as a high-school nerd, and meeting up with various other friends here and there who saw me through college and my working life in San Francisco.

That was my past, but what about the future? Should I come up with a 10-year plan like Betsy has? What kind of work should I do? Do I want to be an academic? Or a travel writer? Or a major league baseball player? (Ok, maybe it's too late for that one.)

In any case, I think I will be taking a small break from all the crazy traveling I've done so far this year. I think it's time to concentrate on taking the next step, to moving towards the next chapter in my life, whatever that might be.

Going back to San Francisco is always a strange experience for me. It is at once familiar and unfamiliar. So many things stick out in my mind: the beauty of the hills, the diversity of the City's inhabitants, the amazing array of delicious food that is available, the sky-high prices of everything...

Every time I make my annual trip to San Francisco, it's always a whirlwind visiting friends and my favorite old haunts. This trip was especially good, though, as for the first time since I left at the end of the dot-com implosion, people are actually in a good mood and are optimistic about the future. Before this trip, every visit to San Francisco seemed to have a veil of uncertainty and doubt and a longing for "the good old days".

But things are different now. The restaurants are full. Companies are hiring. People feel like they have freedom to do as they please, with a bright future ahead. And I would guess that the Democrats victory in the last election didn't hurt the jubilant mood in this famously liberal city.

I had one lunch with a few ex-colleagues. Six years ago we were all toiling away at an Internet consulting firm at the center of the dot-com boom. And now we have all gone our own ways -- one friend just launched a "Web 2.0" startup, another ex-project manager is sewing handbags and selling them online, while still another is touring the nation as the lead singer of a rock band that is becoming more and more popular. And then of course there is me, living the expat life in Thailand.

So it's been a good few days here. San Francisco is still one of my favorite cities in the world. Now it's time to turn my attention to my family and the holidays, with Houston, St. Louis, and Florida on the itinerary.

Even though I have a lot of family in Houston, Texas, it's been about 15 years since I have been here. The first two days in town was spent getting my Thai Business Visa at the consulate, the next two days were spent catching up with my three aunts and their families.

Today was especially busy. Aunt #1 drove me from Houston down to Galveston, just to do a quick drive-through of the historic town. And historic it was, but quite a bit run-down, unfortunately. It reminded me a lot of downtown Pensacola, before all of the renovations turned a down-and-out area into a quaint historic shopping and entertainment center.

Then, it was on to Clear Lake where we had lunch with Aunt #2. And although I didn't get to meet her grandchildren, I got an ear-full about what they are up to these days. After lunch we stopped by Aunt #1's house and spent about an hour there playing duets on her piano. I haven't had piano lessons in about 20 years, but she did a pretty good job of teaching me some tricks about how to play bass chords by reading the treble clef. It was so much

After piano lessons, I headed out on my own to find my grandmother's old house. She passed away about 20 years ago, but I just wanted to see where we used to go visit her. I didn't realize it as a kid, but she lived out in the middle of nowhere. Even now, the signpost into her town said it had a population of 773. And by the looks of it, that sign might have been optimistic.

The next and final stop was to visit Aunt #3 near Cold Springs, north of Houston. I also stopped by to visit a cousin who is just a couple of weeks younger than me, but who I haven't seen in decades. Aunt #3 fixed me a delicious steak dinner with red wine and cheesecake. It's times like these that I LOVE the US.

And then it was a long drive back to Houston to spend the night before my plane leaves in the morning. All in all it was a nice visit to get reacquainted with family members I haven't seen in a long time. Tomorrow, it's on to St. Louis, and then to Florida for Christmas. Ho Ho Ho!

Thanks to the fact that Wi-Fi Internet connections are becoming popular, I am posting this from Chicago O'Hare Airport. I'm glad for the fact that I have Internet access, as it allows me to catch up on some work, but I am not glad to be sitting here because my connecting flight is four hours late. (And I really wish the Internet was free, but it's not.)

O'Hare is a zoo today, most likely because the Denver airport has been closed for a day or two. So I flew out of Houston today thinking that travel might be difficult, and sure enough, here I sit.

But, according to flightstats.com, this particular flight is on-time only 56% of the time, and the average delay is 86 minutes. So there is a 44% chance that this flight will be late on any given day. I was ready to cut United some slack, but that record is just criminal!

The year is 1976. I am sitting on the couch with my neighborhood buddies, Chris, Jay and Lee. Bowls of Cheetos sit between us. We spend hours on this couch every day, either watching the afternoon re-runs like the Mickey Mouse Club (the Annette Funicello version) or Tom and Jerry or Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie. And if we get tired of the re-runs, there's a brand new PONG home video console waiting for us to play.

The old-fashioned games of Monopoly and Life and Yatzee always entertained us as well. They were stored on the shelves in the old garage that was converted into offices. A huge set of Matchbox Cars were yet another excellent diversion that could be found on the shelves.

Living in Florida usually meant that the outdoors were even more fun for us kids than the indoors. Behind the house was a huge forest that went as far as we were willing to walk. Trails had been cut in the woods and we spent thousands of hours exploring, building forts, turning over rocks, searching for crawdads in the creek, or playing hide-and-seek.

But none of us actually lived in this house by the woods. Instead, it was the home of a woman who was like our second mother. She had five teenaged kids of her own, but still opened her house every afternoon after school to watch over the neighborhood kids whose parents worked.

Thirty years later, I am standing in the same living room that used to hold the TV and the couch and the PONG game. The board games are still out in the garage on the shelves, albeit under a thick layer of dust. Our "second mother" is there as well, still looking much the same as before, with just a few more grey hairs, still showing her stern side, but always quick to laugh. We reminisced about the old days when her house would be full of ten kids aged 5-18, and she would keep us all entertained and under control.

"Good memories", she finally says, thinking back decades ago.

Good memories indeed.

At 5 AM on the day we were to leave Panama City, we got the phone call that we have been waiting for: my pregnant sister, her husband, and my mother were on the way to the hospital.

The flight back to the US was uneventful, but we were full of anticipation to hear the news from the hospital. As soon as we landed, we headed there to meet the newest addition to our family… a cute little girl named Ava Marie. Soon afterwards, I was able to hold the hours-old baby in my arms.

After spending some time with the baby and the new parents, my mother and father and I headed out for some dinner. They were both in a celebratory mood, as Ava Marie is their first grandchild. At the restaurant, we heard that some family friend’s had dropped by the hospital, and were now on their way to join us. And then we heard a big surprise that one of my aunts and her daughter had secretly driven all the way from Houston to see the baby, and that she was on the way to the restaurant as well.

It was a great party, once everyone arrived. The wine flowed freely and we made the kitchen stay open a little later than they perhaps wanted, as we kept ordering more food as new arrived.

All in all it was a great day. I look forward to sending little Ava Marie birthday presents every January from now on.

As I sit here and hold day-old Ava Marie, I reflect on the whole amazing process. Since births happen all the time, I would think that we would get used to it. But no, it is still an awe-inspiring experience to share in the creation of another human life.

I was looking down at the sleeping baby in my arms, and my aunt asked me, "See? Isn't she beautiful?" I had to agree. "Doesn't it make you want to have one of your own?"

"Umm.... No. Absolutely not."

And I said it with a smile, because I really don't know why I missed out on the need-for-procreation gene. But having a baby of my own was the farthest thing from my mind at the time. And I am well past the age where that desire was supposed to kick in, so I guess that means that it's not going to happen.

It's funny how my sister's and I had the same childhood and share most of the same DNA, but our lives have taken wildly different paths the last few years. I have moved to the other side of the world and have done my best to put myself in as many different places as I can, as often as I can. She, on the other hand, found a wonderful husband, bought a house, and had her first child.

And we are both very happy with the outcomes and the paths ahead of us. So as she might marvel at the exotic places I go and things that I see (as she often comments on these pages), I too will marvel at her as she plays the premier role in shaping the life of another human being. It is a huge undertaking, and I have a lot of respect for her and the way she is going about it.

These paths that we have set ourselves upon are mutually exclusive. It would be impossible to do both, so we will just have to admire each other from afar. We will have to settle for living vicariously through each other as time goes on.

That's not such a bad thing after all...

A childhood friend of mine, Everett Spain, is serving in Iraq right now. But he is in a very special position: the top aide to Gen. David Petraeus, the new U.S. commander in Iraq. Everett says in a recent interview that he's more or less an executive assistant to the General. Or, as he was quoted as saying, "My job is to make him as efficient and effective as possible in order to expand his positive impact."

My parents are still good friends with Everett's parents (in fact, they were at our celebratory diner when Ava Marie arrived a month ago), but reading the article made me realize that I have lost touch with Everett and his life. He's married now with four kids, the last one being adopted from China.

The article goes on to say that Everett has already been wounded in fighting in Baghdad and received the Purple Heart award. (I wasn't aware of this either.) I hope that he stays safe for the rest of his time there and is able to return to his family back in the US soon.

You can read the whole article about Everett (entitled Commander's right-hand man) from the Pensacola News Journal website. Thanks for passing it along, Mom!

Who is afraid of getting old? Apparently not my parents. After I dragged them on a whirlwind tour of Southeast Asia (5 cities in 14 days) they went back to the US and continued the active lifestyle. Mom is competing in a golf tournament this weekend, while my Dad completed the swimming leg of a team triathlon.

The local newspaper reported, "The male team of Jim McInturff, Wilbert Dawson and Stuart Towns, finished third in their division and probably took top honors as the oldest team in the race."

According to Dad, there was no "probably" about it. He says, "We were the oldest team by far -- 193 years combined."

So hat's off to both of my competitive parents who refuse to get old! (Hope I say the same for myself someday!)

The full story can be read at 24th Mightymite has first time winners from the Forrest City Times-Herald.

Looking out my window today I see a much different view than usual. What's up with all this white stuff that is falling from the sky? And why do I have to wear all these clothes when I leave the house? After five years in tropical Thailand, I think it's safe to say that my blood has thinned and I better hurry back before I freeze to death.

We had a lovely Christmas here in Denver. It was my niece's first Christmas, so most of our time has been spent watching her crawl around the house making strange noises and putting everything within reach into her mouth. Other traditional Christmas activities that we participated in was an emergency run to the grocery store in the snow (pictured here), eating as much food as possible, and of course opening presents this morning.

My brother-in-law measured the white stuff outside the house and he said it was 8 inches deep. Even though I was complaining about it earlier, it's actually good news because I wanted to do some skiing on this visit. My parents brought my 10-year old skis with them to Denver, and my Christmas gift pile was mostly much-needed ski apparel. Hopefully I will be able to hit the slopes sometime in the next couple of days.

Oh, and although I haven't written about it yet, last week, my dad and I had a great trip to Peru. We spent 2 days in Lima, then 4 days up in the mountains based in Cusco. While there, we had one day-trip to see Macchu Picchu, and one day-trip to see other Incan sites, like Ollantaytambo (pictured here). It was a truly amazing experience. I'll try to write up some more details and post some pictures soon.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

It has been a great, but mostly uneventful trip back to the US for Christmas. My first stop was in San Francisco for a few days visiting friends there and checking out some of the cool new night spots, such as the very highly recommended Pisco Latin Lounge. This bar is owned by a friend of a friend, and is very stylish and the picso cocktails are tasty. Small neighborhood bars like this one is something that San Francisco definitely has over Bangkok.

Then, I headed to Denver, where I spent several relaxing days with my family. It wasn't snowing much this year, so we were able to get out a bit. The family all piled into the truck one day and headed down to the "Garden of the Gods", a cool rock formation outside of Colorado Springs, where I met up with Pete, a good friend from college. I hadn't seen Pete since graduation, so it was great to catch up with him and meet his family.

We also stopped by the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and walked around a bit. They have an amazing cathedral there that looks like it is made from huge airplane wings. It is definitely one of the most unique houses of worship I have ever seen.

I posted a few pics to Facebook, in case you are interested in seeing the Garden of the Gods, or the USAF Cathedral, or my friend Pete!

Now, it's on to Taipei for New Years with Piyawat and some of my Taiwanese and Singaporean friends.

After a full two weeks, I found myself back in the Taipei International Airport flying back the United States. This time, most of my time was spent visiting friends in New York and Washington DC.

I was in New York on January 20th, and although I was staying out in Queens near a friends house trying to save money on hotel costs, I went into Manhattan hoping to watch the Inauguration on TV somewhere. Crowds were starting to gather in Times Square, and the pre-show events were on all of the huge jumbotrons all around the Square. I would have just watched it out there but it was much colder than my Bangkok-trained body could stand.

I finally found a BBQ restaurant with the heat turned on and the inauguration on TV, and so I grabbed a seat at the bar and thoroughly enjoyed the proceedings for the next couple of hours. For me, the highlights of the day were Aretha's hat, and seeing freezing cold people in Times Square, just around the corner from where I sat. Then again, even though I was warm and comfortably seated, perhaps I missed my chance at five seconds of International Fame.

The next day I rented a car and drove down to DC. The whole purpose of this part of the trip was to see as many people as I could, and I did a pretty good job of it, although I didn't see everyone on my list.

But now, I am headed back to Asia one last time, and hopefully I will stay there for a while.