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Song of the Open Road

Song of the Open Road
A full time vagabond journey around the world. Many years and many countries. Share travel yarns!

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Articles

Tattoos in Chile and Friends
2007-12-29 19:39:00
Tattoos in Chile and Friends "No hay mal que por bien no venga."There is no bad from which good does not come.-Old Latin American adageI have not been with my Chilean friends since those fateful days I was tramping around South America. In Santiago, goods and amenities are divided into their own towering buildings by their particular attributes. Therefore, if you want underwear you just go to the building that only sells underwear and you will find hundreds of stores vending the same pairs of panties. These buildings are kind of like small shopping malls where all the shops only sell the same type of good. A very simple way of shopping, I say, for people who are just out to buy underwear.Well, the tattoo studios, underground record stores, and heavy metal t-shirt shops in Santiago are divided along these same lines and, likewise, have their own little mall. It is in the district of Providencia, and entering it is like coming into some kind of heavy metal roost of the underworld. Tatt...
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New Vagabond Journey.com Newsletter
2007-12-28 10:56:00
New Vagabond Journey .com Newsletter Howdy Folks,This is Wade, the jovial directionless editor of this Song of the Open Road Travel Blog, and I just wanted to let you know that I am putting together a monthly newsletter to act as a supplement to this travel blog and the Vagabond Journey.com website.In each monthly installment of this newsletter will be an update of my recent voyages around the world, the announcement of a new traveler poll (this month about Swiss Army Knives), a travel tip, an interview with a long-term traveler, and a Vagabond Community News Update.Sign up for the Vagabond Journey free newsletter in the sidebar navigation of this page (near the top of the page on the left hand side just below the traveler poll . . . it is the box that says Topica and asks for your email address).Thanks! and as ever . . .Walk Slow,WadeEight years of round the world vagabond travel. Wade from Vagabond Journey.com

Epidemic in France
2007-12-28 10:45:00
Epidemic in Franc e According to the Chinese calendar, this is the year of the Fire Pig: a year for epidemics, famine, and plague. Right now in the South of France over a million people are in the hospital with a virus that has been spread around to almost every person in this region. The hospitals have now closed their doors- there are no more beds, no free doctors, they are packed to standing room only capacity- and the people are left to fend off this epidemic on their own. I awoke a couple of days ago to a very ill household here in Anduze. Mira, the three children, and their father were all horridly ill. It was like an infirmary. I discovered that I was not really affected by this illness and just found a quiet spot away from the sick people to abscond. I uneasily let the day pass in front of the computer screen, trying to ignore the rapturous groans from the other room.Luckily, this epidemic is not very serious. It is just a gastro-intestinal virus that hits hard for a day or tw...
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Done Waiting for the Big Day
2007-12-26 19:34:00
Done Waiting for the Big DayI realize now that web traffic is earned, not won. I am learning this the hard way. To create a good travel website is one thing, to get people to go to it is quite another. I have read the books on Search Engine optimization, I have studied the tricks of the trade, and I only learned that attracting web traffic is a lot of work. I am only a pubescent newbie on this internet ship, but I now know that this project is perhaps the deepest black hole that I have jumped into yet. One question answered just leads me to ten more. I love big projects.Maintaining a website is an everyday task, and almost takes a certain degree of obsessiveness to keep up with it and the latest search engine standards, rules, and regulations. To slack for even a couple of days, is to watch your web traffic plummet. I am thinking now that a few month break from traveling so that I can get the Vagabond Journey.com site in good order could be extremely beneficial. This is a real job. ...

Christmas in France
2007-12-26 14:42:00
Christmas in Franc e Passed Christmas in France with friends from Chile. It was a real warm time as I watched their three children open their presents. They yelled and screamed with excitement and kissed and hugged the newly minted pink plastic toys that they freshly unwrapped. Christmas in France was really nice. Mira and I gave the children plastic fish and dinosaurs. The little boy now walks around the house all day trying to hang on to all of them at the same time. He asked his mother this morning if she could buy him a pair of pants with pockets big enough to accommodate all of his fish and dinosaur toys, so that wherever he goes, he will have his toys. The kid is a traveler! I exclaim. This may be my next travel tip- “How to make pockets big enough to carry all of your toys.” Haha. My friends are from Chile and they celebrate the “Santa Clause” aspect of Christmas a little differently than we do in the USA. In Chile, all of a child’s presents come from Santa, while, in...
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The Dancing Hitchhiker Video
2007-12-23 18:31:00
The Dancing Hitchhiker Video After standing on the side of a highway in France for a touch longer than she fancied, Mira from WanderjahrJill came up with a new way to get a ride:DancingThat is right, not even a little leg show or burly old me hiding in the bushes was going to get these French drivers to stop, but Mira dancing, and the both of us laughing and having a good time, was just the ticket to warming a Frenchman's heart in winter.So Mira took off her hobo hat and stoic glare and cut a rug right on the side of the highway. And it worked. Withing minutes we had four different offers to take us in the opposite direction than we were traveling. A few minutes later we landed a ride in a sleek sports car going straight to the city that we after.This may seem odd, but who would want to pick up a couple of grumpy old hitchhikers? My travel advice: if you want a ride, make the drivers laugh. People pick up hitchhikers not just out of the kindness of their hearts, but also because the...

In Montpellier France
2007-12-22 22:44:00
In Mont pellier Franc e Montpellier seemed to be a decent place to walk around for a day. . . Or ride the tram. I think buying an all-day pass on a city train system and just riding around at random all day is now one of my favorite things to do. You never know where you are going to end up. I like this feeling. We ended up in the outskirts of the city in an area that was largely Muslim. It is interesting to me how large the Muslim populations are that surround every major city in Southern France. Mira and I went into a KFC in the outskirts of Nimes to use the bathroom and it was completely full of Muslims. I thought that I was back in Morocco for a moment. In Montpellier, Mira and I just road the tram and loafed about the city eating loafs of cheap bread. Old, Old and made of stone is Montpellier. I could just imagine the stories that must breathe out of the cracks in these cobblestone streets. Montpellier was a nice terminus to our short hitch-hiking journey. ----------------------...

Hitch-Hiking in France Part 2
2007-12-22 16:12:00
Hitch-Hiking in Franc e Part 2To read the first part of this European hitch-hiking story please go to Hitch-Hiking to Andorra in WinterMira and I walked on from the highway junction that lead to Ales towards Nimes. We just tramped in the glorious French countryside and figured that if we would not get far hitch-hiking, we would at least hike. We had everything that we needed- three sleeping bags and enough clothing- to sleep the night outside, so we cared not where we ventured to. We just about gave up the idea of hitching to Andorra, when a car came to a quick halt next to us and offered a ride to Nimes. We were back in the saddle again.So we jumped into the car and introduced ourselves to the driver. His name was Yannick and could speak a little English. “English was my favorite subject in school,” he said, “everything else, I did not learn.”So Mira and I gave him a good ol’ English lesson as we rode on to Nimes. Yannick proved to be as hospitable guy as he seemed and he ...

Hitch-Hiking to Andorra in Winter Part 1
2007-12-21 22:37:00
Hitch-Hiking to Andorra in Winter Part 1It can be said that all adventures begin with a bad idea. As such, this plan to hitch-hike to Andorra from Anduze, France in the beginning of winter was hashed. I do not how this happened. For some reason I have always wanted to go to Andorra. I have been told that it is nothing but a giant shopping outlet and the only reason to go there would be to purchase tax-free commodities, but I am still drawn there for some odd reason. Perhaps it is because it is a small country? I like small countries, especially one that is nested in the middle of giant Spain and giant France. Perhaps it is because Richard Halliburton stuck a real homely image of the country in my mind when he wrote of traveling through Andorra in, The Royal Road to Romance:“Your people seem supremely content.” [stated Halliburton to the president of Andorra]“Yes, it is true. It is true because we have nothing with which to contrast what we think is happiness.”I have always w...

Essay on Mandarin Chinese Language
2007-12-21 21:23:00
The Dispersal of Language in China and the Creation of Standard Mandarin The story of the Chinese language stretches far back into the annals of prehistory and is, therefore, deeply shrouded in the opaqueness of antiquity. Simply put, any attempt at understanding the Chinese language from a historical perspective is tantamount to entering into a vast museum at night with only a small flashlight to guide your way: only a slight portion of the riches are viewable and to proceed necessitates a large amount of guesswork and speculation. The modern dispersal of, and the variations within, the many forms and dialects of spoken Chinese is an equally complicated tale to tell, and is the result of over five thousand years of political maneuvering, migration, and geographical restraints. This investigation is but a meager attempt at shedding some light on the hidden riches behind the modern Chinese language. All variants of Chinese are categorized into the Sino-Tibetan language family which, i...
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Retirement Homes in India
2007-12-21 21:03:00
The New World Looks Ahead, Not BackThe elderly left behind with their times in the new India We piled into a mini-bus and took off through the traffic wretched, exhaust poisoned streets of Bangalore. It took us over an hour to get to the outskirts of the city where we came upon the retirement home. We pulled into a long driveway and rode passed a cluster of workers assembling a new complex of buildings. An elderly man, who was the manager of the retirement home, came up to me and offered a greeting that sounded something like, “Welcome to Shanty-town!” I just laughed and looked forward to a rather humorous time talking to India’s dispossessed elderly.In India, it is traditionally an abomination to disassociate oneself from family obligation, and the young, with scarce exceptions, take care of their parents when they reach old age. This is the grand model of family reciprocity that once was prevalent throughout the world- parents take care of their kids when they are young and, ...
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Technology in Southern India
2007-12-21 20:54:00
“Smoke is an indication of work . . . therefore, we are proud of our smoke.”Reactions to the thoughtless acquisition and utilization of introduced technology in Southern India .“Developing countries must not and will not allow themselves to be distracted from the imperatives of economic development and growth by the illusory dream of an atmosphere free from smoke or a landscape innocent of chimney stacks.” -A.K.N. Reddy In A.K.N. Reddy’s essay, “Technology , Development, and the Environment: An Analytical Framework,” he asserted that modern societies are developing and utilizing technologies that are perilous to their environmental and social ecosystems without recognition of the inherent risks. He also addresses how the technologies of the developed world are, “. . . in the process of massive transfer to the developing world,” and the increased degradation that these societies have undergone as a result. In response, I intend to address the essay’s major points, a...

Tribals of Arunachal Pradesh
2007-12-21 20:44:00
A Respectable Development?The Tribals of Arunachal Pradesh : Then and Now“. . . we are faced with the phenomenon of a rapid material, social, and educational development of a tribal society which has found a place in the modern world without so far losing its identity as a distinct ethnic entity.” -Christoph Von Furer-Haimendorf (approx. 1980)From time immemorial the until the later half of the twentieth century the people of the highlands of Arunachal Pradesh have lived in almost complete isolation and autonomy from the main body of Indian culture, economics, and civilization. But in 1944 and 1945 the Indian government began a policy of establishing contact with and administration of the tribes that lived in the Kameng and Subansiri districts of the region. At initial inception, the new government policies were very pro-tribal and by the mid 1980's the communities of the region were flourishing by the standards of the dominant global paradigm. My interest in writing this paper ...
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Indian Notebook
2007-12-17 22:34:00
Anecdotes from the Indian Notebook Gave Mira a nose piercingTraditional Indian way just meant dirtyWe found out thoughWent to an old time jeweler and she said she wanted A traditional nose piercing done in the traditional way“You know, where the piercing is put through the acupuncture point”Indian piercing man made a special tripTo jewelry shop to pierce foreigner’s somethingHe tried to stick a dirty needle hole through her earMira screeches“No! I want a nose piercing in my nose, not my ear”So dirty piercing man fumbled about With his dirty Indian hands All over the dirty needle that would be stuck throughPoor Dirty Mira’s nose(now this needle was just a regular old wire that had one end cut at an angle to make it “sharp”)He manipulated this home made needleWith his poop hand and rusty pliers til’Mira said, “No way!”And I got to pierce her nose for her (at least Wade washes his hands she said) Goopymop is having a ball of a day with the maid next door. It began ...

Wood Carvers in India
2007-12-17 22:22:00
Sitting with the MastersA Day with a Family of Master India n Wood CarversI was picked up in the morning by the master wood carver, Umesh Singh, and we rode off on his motorcycle through the busy Jaipur streets to his home in a little neighborhood near the public commodities market. Umesh is a traditional Indian wood carver and makes his living from carving and selling little statuettes and motifs of idealized Asian spiritual figures as well as the animals that once roamed the region freely. He is a very stoic, proud man and he carries himself with that particular authority of a man who has perfected his craft. I had met him the day before at his little stand of sandalwood carvings in the art district of the city palace and he invited me to come to his home so that I could watch him as he went about his work. I was very curious to learn if the contemporary Indian craftsman continues to utilize the riches of ancient tradition and folk-knowledge or if his art has also been gentrified b...

The New Mask of India
2007-12-17 22:11:00
“What is the Good of That?”and other reasons why I cannot stomach the faith of commerce“….the idea is that no society is ever complete, neither are its needs exactly the same as those of other societies.” -Idries Shah, The Way of the SufiVarun (or Victor for work purposes) declares: 'An air-conditioned sweat shop is still a sweatshop. In fact, it is worse because nobody sees the sweat. Nobody sees your brain getting rammed.'-Chetan Bhagat, One Night @ The Call CentreUnless we recognize the present low state of our society as contrasted with our ancient progressive civilization, and unless we soon introduce such reforms into our social institutions as are calculated to bring about our regeneration, there will be no salvation for us, the Hindus, as a race. We should try and remove all causes of our degeneration. Whatever encrustations have gathered themselves in the lapse of time round our social fabric, we should carefully scrape them away. -A. Mahadeva Sastri, The Vedic ...
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A Visit to a South Indian Archaeology Site
2007-12-17 22:01:00
A Visit to a South Indian Archaeological Site And a head first jump into the folk-lexicon of village KarnatakaIt was mid-September and the beginning of a very temperate South Indian Autumn; a group of students and I were on a visit to a local archaeological site just outside of Bangalore city. We all packed into a mini-bus and rode out the sixty mile journey to the Ramanagara Taluk Valley, where we soon came upon the ancient environs of the Kunagal Hills. Our guide in this venture was the archaeologist, cultural anthropologist, and folk-lore scholar, Dr. M. Byregowda.Dr. Byregowda is a man of action who possesses a great love for pre-history, folk-knowledge, and old-time Indian tradition. He took his doctorate degree after doing an extensive field study on the Iruligas tribals. “My thesis on the Iruligas for the PhD comprised 480 pages. But I ended up writing 18 books, including children’s plays based on folk-tales, practices, traditions, and games,” he was quoted as saying in ...
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French Hygiene and Stereotypes
2007-12-17 21:38:00
French Hygiene and Stere otypes Hygiene in France- if there is such a thing- is somewhat different than in most parts of the planet. I am in a position where I must state that the smelly French man stereotype really did come from somewhere. It is true- French people stink.Well, so do I. But I am a traveler and have eight years of Road crust growing over me. I must say that my pharamoans are a little different than most.My friends from Chile, a place where the people wash themselves almost obsessively, seem to find a little humor in the French cleaning habits. “You can smell some of these people from five kilometers away,” she said, and continued with, “The people open their mouths to laugh and they don’t have any teeth! They just have black holes and no teeth!” My friend then continued to tell me about a time when she went to a dentist in France and told him that she wanted her teeth cleaned. With a puzzled expression on his face, the French dentist asked her why in the worl...
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Village Life in Southern France
2007-12-17 15:05:00
Village Life in Southern Franc e I am overwhelmingly impressed by the quietude and quaintness of village life in the South of France. I am in Anduze now- I don’t know if anyone has ever even heard of this place- and I feel as if I am in a world apart from the information that comes flying over my computer screen. News of this and blog posts of that . . . Andy is in the Philippines making jokes about vagina repair services, Ubertramp is in England doing some wild things with his website, and I am sitting in this nowhere land that is hemmed in by large granite cliffs that block out the world. I write on my website about what I am doing, but I fail to believe that anyone is out there beyond the cliffs to read it. I have found the peak of seclusion. France.This is the land of legend and lore. There is a landscape behind the fairy tales and Disney cartoons that adores the minds of the American child. This landscape is meant to simply represent the Far Away, it is suppose to be the neutra...
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Rajasthan: Houses and Men
2007-12-16 21:39:00
Rajasthan: Houses and Men by Tito DalmauI received the following press release from the publisher Contrasto Books inquiring if I would be interested in reviewing the book Rajasthan: Houses and Men by the photographer Tito Dalmau. I quickly said that I would not mind doing this, so they one day express mailed me a copy of the book. I had it sent to my folk's address in the USA so I will not be able to write a proper review of it until I run through there in January, but, due to the publisher's punctuality in getting the book to me, I will now put up portions of the press release and some photographs of the book, as well as my initial impressions.Photo by Tito Dalmau, from his book, RajasthanFirst of all, I really enjoy slowing flipping through the pages of big books of travel photographs- I spent a large portion of my youth doing just this while map gazing- so when I was offered this book for free in return for reviewing it, I quickly jumped on this chance.As I have already stated...
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Truphone on Facebook
2007-12-16 20:54:00
Truphone on Facebook I received the following message from a marketing intern at Truphone (Software Cellular Network Ltd.) informing me of a new "free" telephone service available through the Facebook social/ web-community page. I do not have a Facebook account, so I have not been able to check out this service first hand, but, if it is as Nick tells me, it could be a great money saving travel tool.From the email, I take it that Truphone partnered up with Facebook.com to offer a free telephone service that is available through your user profile. I am told that you can call landlines and cellphones (within the US/ Canada). It is unclear through Nick's email if you can make calls to other countries. But if it is free- it is free- and could be a good way for us wanderers to keep in touch with long-gone families back at the homestead.As I have previously stated, I have not used this services because I do not have (or want to have) a Facebook account. But if someone out there does use Fa...
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The Tattoo Apprentice- Wanderjahr Jill
2007-12-13 18:52:00
The Tattoo Apprentice - Wanderjahr Jill Mira from the Wanderjahr Jill travel blog found herself in the shoes of the tattoo apprentice here in the south of France. My friend from Chile that we are visiting is a well established tattoo artist and, after looking over Mira’s drawings, agreed to teach her a little of the trade. So Mira goes to work with him, asks loads of questions, flips through tattooing magazines with a newfound exuberance, and- under supervision- has even tattooed a small piece on my leg.Mira was a little nervous as she approached my leg with the oddly weighted tattoo machine for the first time. She had a little difficulty getting use to its odd shape and its oblong heaviness, and I must say that the machine really did look awkward swimming around in her hand. But once she put the buzzing needles into my skin I had full confidence that she would do a decent tattoo. The Master showing Mira how to fix a tattoo stencil with a skin penAnd she did. Mira took that machine ...

France is Old
2007-12-11 15:35:00
France is OldI have been to France before, but I think that I slept through most of it. I rode a ferry boat out of Ireland in 2003 and landed in Cherbourg. From here, I walked around by the port for maybe an hour, tried to find decently priced food (failed), met some artists kids that could not understand my English or Spanish, and then bought a train ticket to Paris. In Paris, I ate a tuna fish sub, walked out of the station, saw a fat bald guy, and then walked back into the station and boarded my train for Spain. . . So that was Paris?Now that I am back in France, I have a little time to look around. I am with some friends, who emigrated from Chile, in a small village called Anduze in the south. The architecture in this little village is amazing. Winding alleyways give way to a hodge-podge of buildings that are stuck together in any fashion imaginable. . . that craziest part is that they are all really, really old. As an American, I know that I do not know time. The house that I a...
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France is Expensive
2007-12-11 10:54:00
France is ExpensiveFrance is Expensive. I have not yet been to a more costly country on the planet. I cannot comprehend how people can live here, let alone travel. I live and wander as a pauper who goes in the guise of a king. Here, I am only a pauper. . . like everybody else. An item that could go for two dollars in the USA fetches five here. A forty minute train ride costs $12, a fifteen minute cab journey will costs $45, a cheap beer in a bar- $5, a hotdog- $5.50, entrance fee to an archaeology site- $15. I cannot report here how much a meal in a restaurant will costs, as I have not had the balls to try one; nor can I tell you how much any recreational activity will run, as I have just been absconding in the home of my Chilean friends in Anduze. But I can tell you that it will be expensive- everything is. The cost of living in France is absurd.Usually, staying with friends and in people’s homes is a sure way to travel the world cheaply. But here in France I am graciously taking...
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Drinking in Lisbon- Barrio Alto
2007-12-10 17:29:00
Drinking in Lisbon - Barrio Alto I walked out of my hotel in Barrio Alto on a Sunday morning and could only wonder about what had happened the night before. There were bars, beer, wine, a funny Russian, funnier Portuguese, a foosball table, Mira being really drunk, and thousands of people in the ancient stone streets just partying. I smiled to myself as I realized that everybody who stumbles out of into these streets after a good long Barrio Alto night wonders the same thing- “what happened?”I suppose I was not that drunk, as I somehow managed to drag the stumbling and drooling Mira through the graffiti mazes of the old neighborhood back to our room in the hotel. It was a night. We had fun. Pic of Barrio Alto GraffitiScreaming over a mad game of foosball, Mira and I jumped up and down cheering on the Portuguese kids (who were way too good at foosball to be normal) to up the level of competition and get louder and louder as they knocked the silly little ball back and forth across t...
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Buy a DVD and Support Grupo Alavio
2007-12-10 16:05:00
Buy a DVD and support Grupo Alavío!By my old friend, Marie TrigonaGrupo Alavío would like to send a special holiday greeting and give a special fund raising appeal. Keep the group’s video production and website Ágora TV up and running by purchasing a DVD. We are completely viewer-funded and volunteer based: your contributions help us to produce ground breaking videos from the Third World. Ágora TV provides a radical space for cutting edge video activists all over Latin America.Ágora TV is a community television production collective that currently broadcasts over the internet. The project reaches a global audience of grassroots activists and citizens tired of status quo media. We work on issues including Argentina’s recovered factory movement, labor conflicts, social movements, indigenous struggles, and gender equality.The Buenos Aires-based video collective Grupo Alavío built the website (www.agoratv.org) in 2006 as an organizing tool and alternative media space for group...
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Hitch-Hiking in Japan with Mr. Fuji
2007-12-04 22:37:00
Hitch-Hiking in Japan with Mr. Fuji So I was standing on the side of the road in the mountains of Japan’s Shikoku Island in the middle of spring 2004. I was hitch-hiking the 88 temple Kabo Daishi pilgrimage, and a mini-van nearly ran me over as it quickly stopped to offer me a lift. I was not in any position to be overly critical about a particular driver’s navigational ability, as I needed a ride on to the next temple. So I jumped into the van and introduced myself to the driver. His name was Mr. Fuji, and was a middle aged Japanese man with long bushy eyebrows that stuck up out of his forehead like butterfly antennae. He was a really short man and could not have been 5 ft tall, as he has to really stretch to push on the pedals- and this he could only do with the tips of his toes. But Mr. Fuji seemed friendly enough, even though my attempts at conversation fell a little fallow. So I remained silent as we tore back onto the highway and through the beautiful mountains of Shikoku. ...

Graffiti in Portugal: The Other Side of the Wall
2007-12-03 22:41:00
Graffiti in Portugal : The Other Side of the Wall “I write graffiti because my head and my heart demands me to write. Because I wake up and I go to bed with graffiti in my mind. Because it's the only thing that makes me forget my problems and my sadness completely. Because it makes me happy.”-Mister Dheo, Portuguese Graffiti Writer.Portugal: home to ancient ports, ornate cathedrals, old-time cobblestone streets, and some of the most amazing graffiti in the world today. I stepped off of the bus into Lisbon on a sunny day in autumn, and I was immediately absorbed into the grandiose scene that spread out all around me. I felt as if I had stepped back in time, everywhere I turned I saw the amenities of an ancient stone world, but covering it all, was the luminous shout of the modern age- bright, bold, and extremely well done- graffiti.All through Lisbon, bright tags emblazon 400 year old porticos, magnificent contorted faces dance upon the high white walls of ancient ports, and highl...
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