Intermission

First and foremost, I have (finally) posted pictures at concoursejaypics.shutterfly.com. They are only semi-organized and have no description. But, they look nice and now you do not actually have to read text any more, so enjoy.

I have more to say/write about Dubai, but in the end, I am just too lazy to type it, so the post already there will have to suffice.

I left the States on July 19. From there I had about 10 days of organized, guided touring in Israel. After that I visited a friend and his family for almost a week. After that I "really" started backpacking and did so for almost two months until I went on a family vacation in Mexico (where I am as I write this).

After Mexico, the real backpacking starts. I look at my time so far kind of as training for the real thing. I was less strict with money than I will be (or expect to be), particularly with food. I still plan on indulging with activities, because they are cool and really add to the trip. I will be adjusting the contents of my bag slightly (more on this later) given what I have learned over the past three months and putting to use what else I have learned. I will have about a year of this real backpacking and about 15 months total outside of the US.

When I first thought of this post months back I expected to have something insightful or to have had some epiphany to write about. Not so much. The trip has been great so far. I have met a ton of interesting people and experienced things I would have never either had the opportunity to do or would have have taken the opportunity to do. I supposed the pseudo-philosophical rule of thumb that I have developed follows along those lines: if there is something I have an opportunity to do that I would not have otherwise, do it. Of course, there are limitations, but this is a pretty decent guideline of my decisions so far. It pertains to small and big things alike (small: trying new foods; big: going shark diving), sometimes at the same time (small: I had a feces-spitting content with my tour guide [I won]; big: the tour guide was giving my a tour of Kruger National Park in South Africa with game all around).

I suppose the trip itself kind of follows that mentality. (Is this that epiphany I had not had?) I do not expect to have the opportunity to do a trip like this at any other time in my life so I might as well do it now. However, I think that is a cheap and over simplified explanation/justification of a trip of this magnitude and do not want to leave it at that. At the same time, I cannot verbalize why I am doing this trip any better so I guess it will have to do.

Adjustments to the contents of the bag: I am ditching the two cotton polos (the non-quick dry ones), one or two (I cannot decide) long-sleeved shirts (also non-quick dry), the pajama pants that I have never worn, a hat that I bought that is too big, the photobank (I think I broke it), several books, lots of at-one-time-local coins and a fair amount of notes that I picked up along the way and want to save, an assortment of rocks/stones from various beaches and historical sites that I wanted to keep, scores of train, bus, plane tickets and free pamphlets.

There are a couple of additions as well. My bag is getting more geeky: I bought a Asus Eee PC Netbook. I have only been using it for a few days but I like it so far. I also have acquired an iPhone through my exceedingly generous aunt and uncle. I do not really know how to use it yet, but I am getting more and more used to it and I am sure it will come in handy. With the Netbook I will probably post both texts and pictures more frequently, but I do not know this for sure. With the iPhone, I set up a Twitter account that I think might be interesting to use while traveling (twitter.com/concoursejay). I do not know how to use it yet, so there is nothing there and when I do learn how to use I am really unsure of how much I actually will. Right now it is just an idea, but I think it might be worthwhile and funny. Also, a different pair of headphones and a few new books.