"I want to live life and always be true..."

DISCLAIMER: Before you read this remember I still stand by the words "Bullshit is bad for you," even if it's my bullshit.

I can remember the smell of the coastal air as I lay awake on the sleeper bus traveling along the sandy beaches and hilly mountains of Vietnam. The light above my sleeper shone on my face like a spotlight in an otherwise dark cave of passengers. Tucked away in dreams of the salty sea air permeating their nostrils and sand between their toes the other passengers lay asleep as bus after bus jetted by in the opposite direction rocking our communal cradle. While they slept I reflected. I had been away from home for over 8 months and was still regretting having left at all. Maybe it was the darkness that brought me serenity that evening, maybe it was the pale white moon reflecting off the ocean, whatever it was, something that night made me contemplate my life in a way I had not in some time.

When people ask me about my trip to Asia I tend to break out the same generic, cliche experiences that most everyone that has traveled to that part of the world has had at one point or another. Every backpacker has been touched by the generosity of a local at some time during their journey, every travller has debated on setting up permanent residence on a beach in Thailand, and every visitor has been drowned in the bloody sadness of the Tuol Sleng museum in Cambodia. These are shared experiences. The majority of people who have gone to these places have felt these things, no one person owns them, they are in the public domain of emotions. I do therefore find it odd that I have never talked about one of the most poignant unique moments of my trip up until now.

The coast of Vietnam at night is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. It would be impossible to paint a visual picture with a bunch of letters on a computer screen so I won't even attempt to. While amazing in the day as well, there is something about the painted black sky and shimmering moon bathing the ocean with milky white ripples that is unparalleled. I looked out the window for hours that night; I didn't say a word the entire evening, only listened. I listened and I wrote. I wrote up business ideas. I wrote about fears I had. I wrote about the quicksand of sadness I had found myself sinking into. I wrote about love. And I wrote down the words I later had permenantly written on my body. "I want to live life and always be true"

I don't know if I will ever understand why I went to Asia in the first place. Maybe it was to one up an ex girlfriend, maybe it was to escape another ex , maybe it was because I wanted to prove something to myself, looking back on the whole experience I still don't really know. While I was there I tried to be something I was not because I had convinced myself that the person I had been before would never succeed. That night though something happened, something that had never happened previously and has not happened since. I experienced a clarity, an understanding of myself that I had not previously had. It didn't matter whether or not I ever succeeded at anything, career's, relationships etc. being true to myself was a success in itself that very few people nowadays can claim to have accomplished.

As fate would have it I came back with the memory of the person I wanted to be tattooed on my wrist, and it has since paid off. I'm happy now, really happy. I'm unsure why I wrote this post, I think maybe I just wanted to say Thank you Vietnam.

The American Dream

"It's all bullshit and it's bad for you," I don’t think I have ever heard such simple words convey something so intelligent and poignant.

This girl had just given birth the day before I met her, her mother, and her day old daughter. She was astonishingly beautiful, and incredibly soft spoken. Growing up in a city where a minimum of three conversations tend to be held at the same time and everyone only really listens to their own voice, it was actually nice for once to be forced to listen closely to what someone had to say.

For those unfamiliar with hill tribes in Thailand I will give a quick rundown. There are currently a variety of hill tribes living in Thailand, mostly in the Northern cities. The majority of these hill tribes are Burmese refugees, the Native Americans of Asia if you will. Having lived in Burma long before the Burmese settled there they were forced to flee to Thailand due to clashes with the Burmese army as well as very poor working conditions. The girl pictured above is from a hill tribe called the "Karen." While most Karen do not practice the elongation of women’s necks there are still some factions that do. While most hill tribes have been given land and many freedoms in Thailand the long neck Karen continue to be an oppressed people, treated like animals in a zoo, on display for the viewing pleasure of Thai's and foreigners alike.

It's amazing how words, when arranged in different ways can evoke such a variety of emotions. I never imagined that someone’s story could ever make me feel such pain until I met her. Her mother and her left Burma when she was a baby. She told me that in Burma, men, often engaged in conflict with the Burmese army, were unavailable to work, leaving the job to the women and children who sometimes tended the fields for 24 hours a day. At some point the poverty had become too much to bear and they could not withstand the pain of digging a hole for another loved one, so they relocated to Thailand. The Thai government had recently started allowing hill tribe refugees into their country, and for them it seemed like the American dream. Leave the poverty and killings behind to come to a paradise where they could tend their own land and lead a more prosperous rewarding life. Instead they got displayed like a herd of buffalo in a zoo exhibit.

They moved into their first government run Thai camp a little over twenty-five years ago. These camps tend to be on incredibly small plots of land which the residents are not freely allowed to leave and return. If a man chooses to go out to work in the fields for a day he must pay 150 baht ($5) to get back into the camp, AND since working in the fields only pays 75 baht a day a man must work out in the fields for at least two days just to pay his way back in. While the men go out to work in the fields the women are left on display in the zoo. Entry to the zoo costs 250 baht per person (for a foreigner, it is free for Thais) all of which goes to the Thai government. In return they are given no health insurance, no food rations, only the privilege of being allowed to sell homemade items to visitors. Her mother told me that when they first moved there they made enough money to support themselves and while it was not the dream she envisioned, it was a lot better than life in Burma. However in recent years tourists, for various reasons, have stopped visiting these camps as frequently and families can't make enough money for three meals a day or medicine for the sick. This girl’s sister, at 25, died in her sleep of a stomach ailment that was never diagnosed because they could not afford a doctor. The practice of neck elongating was actually going out of practice until they realized it was one of the few ways they would be able to generate some income for food and medicine. To top it off their battle with the Burmese army has not ended, the bloodshed continues.

People from many countries have this dream of coming to America and "making it big" or leading a better life, yet when they arrive in this "Land of opportunity," those "opportunities" suddenly disappear. For far too long it seems that the only opportunities that are offered to these people are to drive our cars, cook our meals, or take care of family members whom are to old for us to care about anymore. It's unfortunate that so many people across the world can be so disillusioned. "It's all bullshit and it's bad for you," because at the center of every human being is greed and this greed manifests itself in the exploitation of people far to often whether it be paying them less than a viable wage to clean up our elderly parents shit, or to sit on display in a zoo and be gawked at for our differences. We as a people have to do one of two things, to not allow this monster to take control of us at the expense of others, or wise up and understand that that may never happen. Land of opportunity, HA, "It's all bullshit and it's bad for you."

This too shall pass

I'll start this blog in a very similar fashion as my previous two. In my opinion a great comedian doesn't just make you laugh but also makes you think. A lot of people can make us laugh, all of us in our adult life have fallen victim to laughing at a fart joke, but how many people have we listened to that have genuinely made us laugh and contemplate life at the same time. "It's all bullshit and it's bad for you," it’s amazing how those few simple words can pertain to and make us rethink so many things.

This Picture is not from my travels in Asia although there is an Asian person in it. I took this picture a couple of weeks after returning home from Thailand. A friend had wanted a second tattoo and asked me to come along so I did. The words she chose to get etched into her forearm were "this to shall pass," a famous quote from the bible involving King Solomon. I won’t go into her personal reasons for getting the tattoo but historically the saying was meant to remind those who are down on their luck that things will turn around soon and get better, but was also meant to keep those too confident and comfortable humble, to remind them things will not be this way forever. With the presidency about to change, I thought this was a fitting quote and therefore a fitting picture to use to center my ideas around.

When George Bush "won" the presidency in the 2000 election anyone with half a brain knew we were in for some sort of national downturn. In exactly what way and how bad I don't think anyone was really sure, but you don't necessarily believe things are going to get better after a president-elect steals the election. So 7 years and a whole lot of ignorance later everyone was reminding themselves, "this too shall pass," after they watched him collapse both our biggest building and the worlds biggest economy down into the ground. Then along came a campaign, a campaign that was run by the word change, and millions of people looked down on the etchings on their forearms and jumped onto the change bandwagon.

Fast-forward to election night 2008, a bigger party night this year then new years and Halloween combined. People wore Obama's face plastered across their chest and went out to their favorite bar or club to watch state after state turn blue on flat screen plasma televisions. People inebriated past the point of reason screamed in the streets "We won," and "change!" And as I took the whole thing in I couldn’t help but think, I feel as if we have all kind of missed the point here. Where had we as a people gone wrong, to allow our support of change into something else, a trend, a fad, something that was cool and hip, and something that we would blindly follow and believe in no matter what, because it had taken on these properties.

If we learned anything from the Bush presidency I hope we learned, "It's all bullshit and it's bad for you." Unfortunately we have been filling ourselves with it since we knew Obama was going to run away with the presidency. Obama is Jesus and will feed and clothe every homeless in America, "its all bullshit and its bad for you." Obama will find every person in America a job when he becomes president, "its all bullshit and its bad for you." Tomorrow when Obama becomes president America will stop shooting innocent Iraqi's, "Its all bullshit and its bad for you." Will things get better, definitely. Does Obama have a lot of good ideas and plans to make this a better country, I for one think so. Is Obama a miracle worker? NO!

The bad times will pass and so will the good ones, but things like this don't happen overnight. When Solomon looked at his ring with the inscription "this too shall pass," he was saddened not because he thought he would lose all his wealth and prosperity the next day but he came to understand that it couldn’t last forever. Things will get better, it's the way the universe works, but it will take time and nothing can make things perfect. In a perfect world we wouldn't have people looking to exploit this presidency by making a quick dollar off a tee shirt or a button, and election night wouldn’t have consisted of going out to get drunk and have a one night stand. So when you’re worried about being able to make your rent next month and someone comes along to reassure you by saying, "don't worry Obama will find you a job," just remember "its all bullshit and its bad for you."

Perceptions of a Sleeping Thai

For those of you who are new to my blog I'll give you the rundown. George Carlin, one of the greatest comedians of all time, once said in a stand up act he did right before he was put into the ground "Its all bullshit and its bad for you," so in memory of Carlin I've chosen to make this the central theme of my blog.

I took this picture at the main Northern bus Terminal in Bangkok at 3 in the morning. I was about to travel to Cambodia and was told over the phone by information that the bus station had an 8PM bus departing for there. Unfortunately she was feeding me bullshit so when I arrived at the station I was left with no other option but to sleep there until 4 o’clock the next morning at which time the next bus to Cambodia would leave.

I think this is personally MY favorite picture from Thailand. There is something about the sleeping mans face that just looks so tired to me, it’s a look that can't be achieved from simply a lack of sleep. The bus stations in Thailand are interesting places. For the most part not many people speak English so a little Thai goes a long way when you need to find something out. After the general confusion and chaos that is involved upon entering the bus station I proceeded to grab the most comfortable seat since my ass would be occupying it for the next 9 hours. While I was waiting I began chatting with a Thai woman who was on her way to her hometown for a vacation. She asked me to watch her bags while she went to the bathroom and when she got back she went on to talk about how she had trusted me because I was a foreigner.

I was an American! The country that bred such good and honest men as Bernie Madoff, and Kenneth Lay. Such respectable, intelligent, good hearted people would never even ponder the thought of stealing even a piece of lint out of someone’s pants pockets. I found her initial perception of me to be a little too generous and those of her fellow Thai people a little to negative. Throughout my encounters through Thailand, as a whole I can honestly say I have never met a nicer, friendlier, generous people then Thai's. When it was time for her to take her leave we said our goodbyes and I went on to ponder her perception of me and people’s perceptions in general. For the rest of my time stranded in that bus station I brooded over how subjective we think our perceptions are and how un-subjective they genuinely tend to be.

Go into a bar, any bar, classy, trashy, artsy, I don’t care where you go just go somewhere, and ask the first person you see what language Thai people speak and see what answers you get. For all the knowledge and intelligence we preach we're all really full of bullshit, we don't know dick. Outside of our own little box of experience we don't know anything and yet we still have perceptions of the unknown. We have perceptions of how our government works, we have perceptions of what heaven will look like, and these perceptions are nothing more than images we've painted in our minds from information we've been told by various persons and medias. Whenever I tell someone that I lived in Thailand for a year I can see the brush in their mind go to work as it paints a picture of prostitutes and poverty. A dark, dank dangerous place where if you turn your back from a second you're likely to be robbed and raped, but travel to Thailand and if you’re welcomed by anything but smiling faces and generosity I will buy you a beer. I find it simply amazing how we have allowed people to complete the construction of our knowledge with sparse or false factual information and from that created an un-sturdy house of perceptions based around a television set of experiences. This is a worldwide phenomenon, no one is spared, myself included. In south East Asia westerners are idolized. Their perception of us is not of a people who blow up civilians for oil, or steal billions from their own country, and that’s simply because their perception is an un-subjective one.
Weeks after I finally trekked my way through Cambodia I met a Thai girl who had been robbed by a Canadian guy. Her "boyfriend" stole 200 American dollars from her, and her diary to boot. Had the woman at the bus station encountered the Canadian man instead of myself she most probably would have been traveling a lot lighter to her destination. We can't make perceptions about people, places, or things we don't know because what we are fed about these things is often nothing but a steaming pile of bullshit. We have to learn to rely solely on our own experience when it comes to making judgments about these things, so next time you find the brush stroke against the canvas of your mind, painting a picture of the unknown just remember "It's all bullshit and its bad for you."

Taofucianhauism?????

All, or most of, the pictures that I will be posting on this blog will be from my trip to Asia. I had grandiose plans of starting a picture blog while I was there but dumbing down my English all day every day definitely made it difficult to write intelligently and stunted my creativity. I think it's been good for me to remove myself from the pictures for a while anyway. It's given me a chance to examine exactly what it is I saw and look at them from a more subjective eye. I think if I had written this while I was in the midst of my travels I would have missed the point behind a lot of them.

First of all, I don't remember who said it, but someone once said, "we should cherish our comedians, they contribute more to our society then we realize." Tonight I watched the last stand up HBO comedy special George Carlin did before he passed away. He spoke on religion, politics, and family amongst other things and constantly repeated the line "It's all bullshit, and it's bad for you." In homage to Carlin and because I feel that that statement is one of the most universally true statements I've ever heard that will thread through many of my own posts I’ve decided to name my blog "Bullshit is bad for you."

I took this picture in a famous temple in Hoi An, Vietnam. I chose it as a topic centerpiece for my first post because it was always a good friend's favorite and because of that I always wanted to use it for something. I didn't ask the monk to pose for this picture he was actually performing temple duties at the time.
Vietnam is an interesting country with an interesting religion, a religion I personally admire for numerous reasons. Since I'm never amazed by the ignorance of people here (if one more person asks if they speak Taiwanese in Thailand I really think I'm going to have to blatantly call them out as mildly retarded) I'll explain a little about the religion the majority of Vietnamese people claim to identify with. If you were to go out on the streets of Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh city and survey people most would probably claim to be Buddhist, BUT only because it would be too confusing and complicated to explain what they really are, which is essentially a hodgepodge of three different religions or philosophies. Due to the overwhelming influence from China and other countries years ago Vietnam has sculpted it's own religion from the clays of Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism. While they still call it Buddhism, and there still are a lot of similarities, there are still many obvious differences that I'll choose not to delve into.

I'm not "that guy" that thinks believing in God, Buddha, nirvana, heaven or whatever it is you want to believe in, is a bad thing. They’re all great stories that help a lot of people get through rough times in their life but ultimately they’re stories, the star wars of the BC generation. If these stories had been written in contemporary time and been placed in the non-fiction section of your favorite Barnes and Nobles, the author would be bitched out on Oprah within two days of the book hitting the shelves. The problem with religion for me is it takes away the ability for people to think for themselves and determine for themselves what good and bad is. Instead they are told the difference between "good" and "bad." They are TOLD what is acceptable and what is not, and millions of people around the world blindly follow it. What I loved about the Vietnamese people, and what I have tried to do in my own life, is they took pieces from different religions, ideals that THEY thought were good, and made set their OWN sets of morals based upon them. Now I'm not here to endorse or censure the beliefs of the Vietnamese people, I just think it's a feat to be commended that they didn't buy into the bullshit. I'll be the first to say those books, the Bible, Koran, Preaching’s of the Buddha, they all have some really great, meaningful, fulfilling ways to live your life by, but they’re also a how to guide book for anyone with half a brain to obtain power over someone else. What I think we have to do, and what the Vietnamese people as a collective have done, is learn from these things without following them blindly. If we are blind there isn’t even the possibility of us seeing the bullshit. Ultimately I think we just have to remember "its all bullshit and its bad for you," because if we remember that we will never go blind.