Neun und Neunzig

I found out what the song is about. Growing up in a communist Romania, I turned 17 in 1984. It was probably the first year of dancing, clubs and interest in music hits. One of the best songs of that year was Nena's "99 Luftballons" and ever since the number 99 has a special significance for us. The song it's a fantasy about children who release a bag of balloons in Cold War era Berlin, soldiers think it's an incoming weapon, trigger a nuclear war and in the end one of the children stands in the rubble of the city and finds a single remaining red balloon (wikipedia). It was a protest song, I guess, we didn't know but we loved it.

There's still some room in these bags for a few items.

Ninety-nine days until we leave. We almost finished the luggage, we are ready. Six bags lined up, just a few more items to add.

We had several setbacks and turnarounds but the general attitude is that no matter what it will be fine. Just realized that the China visa will limit us to 30 days at a time. Considering that the time in Tibet is already tight there has to be some sacrifice somewhere. Still trying to get to China from Japan, I found a mysterious airline that flies from an obscure Tokyo airport to Shanghai. We didn't want to go to Shanghai, but we'll take it. It should save at least $1000 for the tickets, but it is another city, another stop. What do we cut?

We bought our tickets from Australia to Hawaii. Eleven days, two 10-hour flights, another expense, two more crosses of the Equator. We'll be there at the end of March and back in Sydney on April 1st. Don't ask why, it could be a never ending discussion. Why do we need borders and passports?

So we swapped Hawaii for New Zealand's Northern Island. What would you do? We'll take it and have a fabulous time.

I booked the campers. Apparently this is the way to go in New Zealand and Australia and for us it is surely the cheapest accommodation. But it's more than this, it is one major attraction for all of us. Two weeks in New Zealand, supposedly giving us the freedom to not plan ahead. Two weeks in Australia, two bookings, a 4WD for Uluru that should let us get off the sealed road and a fancy camper that should take us to Darwin. With a pretty tight schedule we couldn't wait for an unlikely deal at the last moment, just got the early booking discount.

No further plans after Kuala Lumpur on June 1st. I tried to believe it, I said it out loud, shared it with everybody and it didn't work. The word "Paris" has some special power over me, I feel it in my chest, I choke and my knees melt. And more. AirAsia had another sale, we thought for a few minutes and we'll be in Paris in June 2012. It was one of the options in the first place, Paris, London or Johannesburg. It's all about visas, embassies and flight connections. Don't get me started.

I'm wondering if I'm over-planning. I never bought a plane ticket at the last minute, I would love to go to the counter and get whatever is left, any destination available, just go. I will do it at some point, but for now it's just not realistic. I made a lot of reservations and our schedule is filling little by little. Almost all of the hotel bookings are for the cheapest price in a great location with free cancellation. Almost all the plane tickets are for a fabulous price and non-refundable. We'll just forfeit something if it doesn't work. I'm not over-planning, there's just so little time left and I really don't want to spend this trip looking for Internet and accommodations. I already lost a great apartment in Kyoto by a few minutes. Only ninety-nine days. I have to learn German. Neun und Neunzig.

This is the English translation of the song:

German Text: Carlo Karges

Translation: Hyde Flippo

Musik: Uwe Fahrenkrog-Petersen

Have you some time for me,

then I'll sing a song for you

about 99 balloons

on their way to the horizon.

If you're perhaps thinking about me right now

then I'll sing a song for you

about 99 balloons

and that such a thing comes from such a thing.

99 balloons

on their way to the horizon

People think they're UFO's from space

so a general sent up

a fighter squadron after them

Sound the alarm if it's so

but there on the horizon were

only 99 balloons.

99 fighter jets

Each one's a great warrior

Thought they were Captain Kirk

then came a lot of fireworks

the neighbors didn't understand anything

and felt like they were being provoked

so they shot at the horizon

at 99 balloons.

99 war ministers

matches and gasoline canisters

They thought they were clever people

already smelled a nice bounty

Called for war and wanted power.

Man, who would've thought

that things would someday go so far

because of 99 balloons.

99 years of war

left no room for victors.

There are no more war ministers

nor any jet fighters.

Today I'm making my rounds

see the world lying in ruins.

I found a balloon,

think of you and let it fly (away).

Why Facebook

I love Facebook. Maybe for the same reasons as most other people. I love that I hear from long lost friends, people who completely disappeared on the other side of the world. I love that I can see what my daughter is reading, what the other one is listening to, what video clips my nephew discovered and so on. Our children's friends and our friends' children share funny pictures and stupid tests. I can share an article on The Economist without having to send emails around. I can easily find out what Shakira did yesterday...

But mostly I love that I don't really have to work on this. I can screen through hundreds of posts in a couple of minutes and I don't have to click delete or like or send a reply. When the mouse reaches the bottom of the page it loads more posts. Nobody really expects me to get back to them and they don't need to get back to me.

Why then have I sent tons of posts around, begging friends to vote for our page "Noi6 Around The World?" Apparently if I get 25 likes I can get an userID for our page. I don't know how that would make things different. The Facebook page should help as a feed reader. We have a blog at http://noi6.blogspot.com. Today it has 700 days since the first post. Ileana started a separate blog at http://dejurimprejur.blogspot.com. I still don't know how we will use our blogs. Ileana's is in Romanian only to make it easy for our family members who don't speak English. They wouldn't know how to use a feed reader, they might not remember to look for new posts and would definitely be put back by the mixture of English and Romanian. On my blog I will mix English and Romanian and hope that the English readers will put up with it. But everything will be linked on Facebook. We might post every day or every week or every now and then. We try to keep it slow at this point, despite making a lot of progress in our plans, still nothing is happening, we only leave in 135 days. On the other hand, on Facebook I can post short, quick updates. I spend many hours reading about travels and I run into other interesting resources. Facebook could be a perfect vehicle to share that. I don't want to increase my number of friends there and I don't want to decrease my privacy settings. Having a page accessible to everyone would keep things separated. Having a two way communication with people posting on our wall or sharing pictures is another possible benefit. And in the end, I am sure that there will be some family that will get inspired to follow their dreams after reading our notes. On Facebook ;-)

We decided early that we need to document our thoughts and keep track of how they evolve. A diary is good for that and nobody needs to read a diary. But in the 21st century nobody writes for the drawer. Everything is out there and we should feel comfortable with that. But of course, we don't. We need to learn how to overcome our fears and our nature. We have to share the wealth of information accumulated and what more will come. We read thousands of pages of family blogs regarding family travel for a year or so around the world. Sometimes we discovered links to some blogs that were kept private. It was frustrating and hurtful. What do they have to hide? We felt cheated when some stopped updating their sites and sometimes when they would only put updates every couple of months. They should keep their end of the bargain. I subscribed to their blog and they should keep me posted. At least on Facebook.

We are going to travel as a family around the world. It is something special. Everybody knows this. Especially if I define "special" as being other than usual. Hopefully it would also be "special" in the way of "something distinguished by some unusual quality and being in some way superior" (Merriam-Webster definitions). Even being able to dream of this proves how lucky we are. But we probably wouldn't be here if it wouldn't be for some others who did it first and proved that can be done. They came back, better, stronger, happier. And as far as I know everybody said "I would do it again in a heartbeat!" They shared their experiences and wrote books about it. They started programs or joined organizations that promote travel. Some never stopped, continuing to travel in open ended fashion. They feel that travel makes them better people and makes this world better. I cannot agree more.

[Paragraphs self-censored because they were too serious][...] After a couple of days I got the Facebook userID and now we have a direct url http://facebook.com/Noi6RTW. We can print it on a business card.

I estimate that I told more than 300 of my patients that I am leaving in October. I estimate that 99% of responses where positive. Explaining to them I understand better why we have to do it. People are happy for me and for my children and praise me for doing this. My leaving will affect their life, sometimes dramatically, but they respect my right to do what I feel I have to do. Some people remembered similar experiences with their parents and how much it changed their life. Always in a positive way. Some people wanted to do something special with their children but never got to it. A lot of people said "you only live once." (!?) Some people say that they will travel vicariously through us, maybe on this blog, maybe on Facebook...

A.M.R.

Mă pregăteam să ies din unitatea militară în care îmi făceam săptămâna obligatorie de armată, când soldatul de la poartă m-a întrebat: Cât ți-e amereul? Continuând să merg, încercam să îmi dau seama ce ar putea fi amereu... Au Mai Rămas atâtea zile până la eliberare.
Pentru noi 138. Azi. Mâine vor fi 137. Ca și în armată timpul pare că abia se târăște. Starea lucrurilor se prezintă așa: se pare că vom închiria apartamentul de deasupra biroului (nu avem încă un răspuns definitiv) și casa noastră.
Studiem zilnic despre locurile în care urmează să ne ducem și la masă discutăm motive pro- și contra-.
Bagajul are un colț de casă unde depozităm toate obiectele pe care dorim să le luăm cu noi și grămada crește.
Chineza a mers ceva mai greu, pentru că cursul de la iknow.jp se axează numai pe semne, nu îmi oferă suficientă practică pentru citit și aproape de loc pentru scris. Am schimbat pe cartea Modern Mandarin Chinese for the begginers de Monika Mei, care a scris-o pentru turiști și ca urmare mă învață cum să comand suc, cafea, rață, să întreb cât costă, etc.
Cu excepția a două călătorii avem toate biletele de avion pentru primele șase luni din călătorie. Cincizeci de bilete pentru aproximativ o mie cinci sute de dolari! Acest lucru i se datorează lui Mihai care supraveghează noapte de noapte site-ul de web Air Asia si află de diferitele sale-uri și are răbdare să introducă informațiile despre noi. Și tot lui i se datorează și faptul că știm pe unde o să mergem și când. Citeam despre Angkor Wat și urmărind link-urile de pe wikipedia am aflat că o sa prindem Anul Nou al lor chiar când vizităm noi templul și vor avea dansuri și spectacole în cinstea acestui eveniment. Foarte bucuroasă i-am comunicat și lui acest lucru. Reacția lui: normal, eu am făcut programul.
Școala trebuie împinsă de la spate, dar nu are cine. Eu ar trebui să fac asta, dar eu m-am desprins de școala lor cu mult timp în urmă, când am terminat să le fac programarea. În plus de asta a venit un val de căldură care ne toropește mințile.

Ce mai avem de făcut? Eu învăț să fac fotografii mai frumoase. Tatăl meu a fost operator de imagine și a încercat să mă învețe abc-ul fotografiei. Nu s-a prins de mine decât ceva superficial. Sony alpha 100 e un aparat bun care mi-ar permite să fac niște fotografii speciale, dacă aș ști să umblu cu el.
Am de cusut fustele fetelor și pânzele de țânțari.
Avem de adus la zi vaccinările din America (cele pentru febră galbenă și turbare ne gândim să le facem la o clinică în India, unde ne-ar costa mai puțin de 800$ de persoană).
Și încă multe alte lucruri care depind de închiriatul casei și la care nu vreau să mă gandesc.

Fifty Tickets In 24 Hours

Three months after deciding the departure day. Less then five months until we leave we find ourselves closer and closer, sometimes too close. We bought the first tickets for an amazing price, breaking our trip in two, Asia until February 29, then New Zealand and the rest. In March I bought the first leg of our trip. Another great deal, taking us from New York to Osaka. In April I bought another three tickets, from Kochi, in the South tip of India, to Kuala Lumpur, then to Guilin, Hong Kong, Macau and back to Kuala Lumpur on January 27. It was a quick and impulsive decision, but we wanted more time in China, we wanted Hong Kong, we initially wanted to avoid the Chinese New Year. Then we realized that we actually want it in the craziest, busiest, most crowded place we could imagine, so we will be there for it. That wasn't anymore a time to look for cheap tickets, I think I justly assumed that the closer it gets the higher the price so we got the tickets and even reserved 2 rooms in Hong Kong for 3 nights and payed for 2 nights in Macau! Then we took a long break. We bought more things for the road, we bought some books, we read some more and went on with our life. We kept talking about it. We answered some questions, took some decisions, postponed some others. We are stuck (for now) trying to decide how to get from Tokyo to Beijing. Considering that the cheapest one-way direct ticket is more than $2000 (even more for return ticket), I have to come up with an alternative.

People ask me if I am excited. Yeah, maybe, I don't know. I explain that "travel is the saddest pleasure", at least planning for it. This is a quote from Paul Theroux, I will read something by him at some point. It makes sense. With the whole world and "all the time" to see it, we find ourselves constantly making sacrifices, eliminating things, giving up on some dreams. Every yes for a destination involves a no for several others. Deciding to go to China a second time means no Laos, Burma, or Northern Thailand. No Vietnam. Going to Xining means no Chengdu and so on. More days in Tokyo means no to Hiroshima and South Korea. So I explain it sometimes, but I'm not sure if I get my point across and I wouldn't blame them, nice problem to complain about. We set some dates to break our trip in different stages. Then we break it further apart, leaving room for decisions on the road. Anything could change at some point and we just need to know our options. How can we tell if we'll survive India? How long should we stay there? We all are very excited, very eager to discover it and a bit scared. How long should we stay in Nepal? Every extra day there would take a day away from India. So we decided not to decide anything. We'll cross Himalaya on December 3rd and then six weeks later we'll have to catch a flight 2200 km away. That's 1340 miles by air, but it will be much more and much slower by land. We are all confident that we will make it somehow.

Last week I started to hear rumors that AirAsia is having the yearly sale. Tons of tickets for 10 cents for travel from February 6 to June 20, 2012. We had to decide quick on a day to leave Australia, that being one of the most expensive tickets. We did that and starting Monday night I bought 50 tickets in 24 hours. I also worked for 12 of those hours, slept for 4 and else. After getting the Darwin to Bali ticket on May 8, I decided to buy a ticket from Penang to Kuala Lumpur on February 29. Then I had the "great" idea to try to fly from Bali to Yogyakarta, no direct connection, but who cares. I bought tickets from Bali to Jakarta, then return Jakarta - Yogyakarta. After another hour or so, I decided that we really don't want to spend any time in Jakarta so I got tickets to Singapore, one year from today. Initially they were $2.42, but until I made my mind they were gone. Finally I found 4 tickets for that price, and got another one for $25. It was enough for the evening, it was after 2 am. I went to bed still trying to solve some puzzles. Next morning at 7, I bought tickets for Thailand, leave Bangkok to go to Krabi (February 8), return on February 22 to fly to Penang. I went to work and when I got home I bought the tickets from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur. Funny, the tickets were listed as 7-8 cents, but the final cost with all the taxes and convenience fees was $215. Still a good price for 5 tickets. At this point Ileana said STOP! I was done anyhow! I got 50 plane tickets for a little over $1500. Average of $30 per flight, that's a decent price especially considering that most of it is in fees. $200 of that is just the luggage cost, for just 2 bags.

Overall an amazing thing, we now have 15 flights bought and still plenty of open dates in our calendar to make our plans as we please. There are some missing links, three more mandatory flights, two optional ones and we are set with the air transport until June 1st. The first 230 days of travel. After we are done in that half of the world, assuming that we want to go on, we will most likely move to Africa. I'll write more before that...

The World Is Coming To The End

A young Englishman married his fiancee in London this Friday. A million people celebrated in the streets and about 2 billion people watched the wedding on their TVs. They kissed twice! So there is one good thing happening and everybody clings to it, they don't really have much else.

Cambodia and Thailand are fighting at their border. There will be elections in Thailand later this year and the politicians and the army are likely using this issue for political advantage. So they kill a decent number of soldiers and flatten some of the temples they are fighting about. "What is not in doubt is that this won’t be the last time that Thailand and Cambodia lob shells at each other over the border. They have been tussling over this land for many years, and politicians know better than to be reasonable and generous in a situation like this." (the economist) We plan to cross that border somewhere south from where they fight.
Earlier this year there was a major earthquake in Christchurch and we bought our plane tickets there two weeks later. Maybe some people didn't hear of Christchurch before, but when we mentioned it, they knew now: "this is where the earthquake was, right?" And then there was another major earthquake, a tsunami and a nuclear meltdown in Japan and a few weeks later we bought our tickets to Osaka. So when we said something we left some people speechless.
A tibetan monk sets himself on fire to protest against the Chinese occupation, China closes some areas for tourists "because of the unrest" but we are still going to Tibet. India eliminates American companies from the 10 billion bid for fighter aircraft as they arm themselves to be better able to fight (who?). People are arguing back and forth about the reasons for this and the American ambassador to India will retire for "personal reasons". Nobody cares how much 10 billion could do to help some poor people or some hungry children, we need war planes.
There is a guy in Syria who is killing innocent Syrians en gros and the world is watching and not doing anything about it. There is a guy in Libya who kills Libyans and the world wanted to help so they went there to kill some Libyans too. We might have to skip Syria next year. We knew that we wouldn't be able to go to Libya, but now, who knows?
Tornadoes happen in US and 340 people are killed in one day because they didn't listen to their radios, or they listened but didn't act on it.
As the price of fuel jet goes up, AirAsia restores some fuel surcharges and will make our plane tickets more expensive. Meanwhile America is recovering from recession but continues to manipulate the data about inflation and subsequently the dollar value will continue to go down and the price of oil will continue to go up. We will have less money on our trip. So what?
Annette just told me the other day that she knows that it is the end of the world, some guy who died and went to hell returned to tell his pastor and then the pastor went to Texas and died in a car accident. At least with this theory it all makes sense now, I have one less thing to worry about.

According to Britney Spears latest single we still have until December 21st 2012 - "till the world ends". She recommends that we keep on dancing. We will keep on planning and taking our trip until then and maybe dance a bit.

A Long and Potentially Boring Description of My Easters

Well, despite having celebrated it twice this year,* I believe Easter was a very happy occasion. The weekend's events include dressing rather morosely on Good Friday for our funeral of sorts, and, like at most funerals, giggling madly. I've never been to a funeral other than this one, and from past experience and books/movies/that one line from "One Week" by BareNakedLadies, people tend to laugh at funerals. Continuing with the actions occurring on said Friday, my friend Aimée, Ria, and I proceeded in lighting our candles an hour or so too early. This resulted in having very little candle to light our way as we walked around the church. Of course, the wind made several attempts on the lives of our flames (and, naturally, succeeded), which resulted in us following up on another Good Friday tradition: bother Jesse (Aimée's older brother) senseless by asking him to relight our candles. Unfortunately, this tradition could not be followed upon due to the fact that Jesse was, this year, up at the front with the priest and we were, of course, at the back. We did manage to, however, relight our candles once before Jesse suggested we take a second candle. This comment resulted in my throwing away my pitiful stub and exchanging it for a full-length candle before being scolded by Ria and putting it back. These comments resulted in my inability to further participate in any Good Friday traditions other than senseless giggling.

Saturday's events included standing outside (this time with full-length candles) with an unnamed accomplice [Aimée] and spending the whole time asking each other if each pause the priest made in his speech really was the end... or just another false alarm. We also made slightly amusing comments on various things and debated whether Jesse really was singing along or if his lips had simply gone numb from the cold. We then proceeded to walking around the church and fighting against the bitter wind to keep the little flame from our candles alive, and then we listened to what I shall forever consider as the world's weirdest knock-knock joke. Then, towards the end, we began to discuss the texting apps on our iTouches before reentering the church. Later, I might've ruined a shirt I rather liked by nearly setting it on fire, ruined a perfectly good skirt by dripping hot wax on it, was nearly set on fire by Aimée and due to my overactive [and slightly paranoid] imagination, I have convinced myself that I also nearly set the priest on fire. O______o Afterwards, when the sermon finished, I informed my unnamed accomplice [Aimée] that I "officially re-hate your brother. Again" before hugging her good-bye. Shortly after, we gorged ourselves on eggs, cozonac, and various forms of cookies. Once we tired of this we went to our hotel room where we slept soundly until around 10 am, when I woke up and went to the bathroom.

More on Sunday's events: after spending about 2 or 3 minutes the night before (because surprise, surprise, I fell asleep rather quickly last night) worrying that the Easter Rabbit would not fill my shoes because I had, in fact, placed them beneath my bed and not with the others, I awoke and discovered that they had been moved and now had a yellow marshmallow bunny-pop in them. After eating a rather unbalanced breakfast of eggs, left-over cookies and whatnot, I got dressed and rehearsed my little "piece" I was going to read later in church. Then we actually left for church where I made a rather starling and depressing discovery before the actual cool part came along. You see, every Easter Sunday, we read the same excerpt from the Bible in multiple languages. Sometimes there are more, sometimes there are less. This year we had Romanian, English, (read by the priest), French (read by his wife), Spanish (read by Aimée's and Jesse's older brother), Latin (read by I-don't-know-who), German (read by the deacon), Russian (read by Aimée's and Jesse's father), Ukrainian (read by another older brother of Aimée's), Chinese (read by my mother), Japanese (read by moi), and Hebrew (also read by the priest).

Following these activities we went downstairs for "coffee hour" and had lunch. My U.A. [Aimée] and I bumped each other some apps for our iTouches and tried to also bump each other music, but to no avail. On the other hand, these apps are really fun!! Thanks Aimée!! :D After Aimée left, though, I listened to a bit of music and helped Johnny and his friend Dimitri with their Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego? game, and then we went home. The car trip was okay, after we finally stopped playing Britney Spears's new album, and then we got home where it was freezing.

After some time, Ria, Johnny, and I settled down to watch three episodes of Remington Steele <3 Then after dinner I sat down and wrote this lengthy description of my weekend. On my iTouch. Not computer. I find that verging on suicidal, but I've always had a screw loose. ;)

*The first time this year I celebrated Easter was, in fact, much shorter and because of this, might be considered less boring. During the sermon, I was wedged between Aimée and Jesse, which made it rather awkward for me, due to the fact that I could not stop yawning and was so, so sleepy... zzZzzZZZZzzz... somewhere around half-past one I succumbed to slumber and my head found a pillow in Jesse's right shoulder. About an hour later at two-thirty I awoke and began to express my embarrassment as quietly as a half-asleep person can while apologizing profusely. I soon realized, though, that while it was indeed 2.30 am, and that perhaps because I was so sleepy, the fact remained that Jesse would not now nor ever mind that I fell asleep on his shoulder. This may be due to the fact that it was mid-January and Jesse was asleep in his own bed while I, four hours worth of driving away, was lying in my own.

Perseverență

Planurile noastre se transforma incetul cu incetul in realitate. "Am dat o lovitură cum încă nu s-a dat": am cumpărat bilete să ajungem în Noua Zeelandă din Kuala Lumpur cu 105$ de persoană, mai rămâne să ajungem acolo. Mihai cercetează liniile aeriene zilnic pentru a găsi bilete ieftine. Continui să învăț chineză (azi am terminat primul curs cu 102 hanzi) iar copiii își văd de existența lor netulburați, în ciuda încercărilor noastre de a-i interesa în planuri.

Am comandat haine de merino de la Icebreaker și veste de la Scottevest (care au multe buzunare). A Ilenei era mică, așa că a moștenit-o Ioan. El e mulțumit că are vestă, dar nu s-ar putea să fie de la bărbați? (dimensiunea cea mai mică de la bărbați ar avea mânecile până la genunchi).

Am început să informăm lumea de planurile noastre. Marea majoritate a reacțiilor au fost de bucurie, am primit oferte să ne fie cărate bagajele sau să fim însoțiți. Părinții au fost inițial șocați, dar și-au revenit și chiar ne vom întâlni cu ei în China. Asta nu îi împiedică să ne poarte grija în restul timpului (cu toate cutremurele astea din Christchurch sau Japonia, și revoluțiile din nordul Africii). Pentru Mihai a fost cam stresant să își informeze șeful și colegii, dar a trecut cu bine, ei s-au bucurat pentru el.

Nu știm dacă vom închiria casa sau nu, dar pentru că în luna mai este un garage sale în tot satul, selectez lucrurile de care nu mai avem nevoie pentru a le vinde (și dacă închiriem, îmi va fi mai ușor să împachetez).