A Review: Nine Most Popular Posts.

"I have what you call, KTV fever." One of my favor...

Evidence.

Hanoi "Street food"

A surprise--another post!

It's TIME--to begin blogging again.

Ostrich--Tuoniao.

Skype.

Down Under--Melbourne.

The Golden Week; The ultimate test of a traveler i...

9 months. ahhhh...

Rain, rain and warriors.

A weekend in Xi'an.

The allures of a port, all around the world.

I've always thought there was something magical about port towns--the constant flow of water bringing new stock, new ideas and people.

Trapped dead-center in America, beyond the cornfield in the backyard, I was connected to water only through a small pond. And many a times, like the fish, I too was surprised that I lived there. I felt trapped, as if in a figurative desert, thirsting for water as only a fool without it can feel. I was the only one to blame, equally trapped in another box, my never-ending wanderlust dreams. As it so often goes, the beauty of the land lost on me, until I left.

But it's easy to see why, the world-over, port-towns thrive. They're alluring, mysterious and if you don't want to live there, you'd be lying if you didn't want to visit at least one: Seattle, Stockholm, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, but that's just a few, the world has 926 such towns in 109 countries. And the world's biggest cities (and busiest ports): Los Angeles, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Mumbai.

With Shanghai being no exception to either rule. What defines the city is not the stamped entry, but the port's connecting river into the busting metropolis of 22 million. Not small in any marker of the word, but a pumping beast that smoothly divides the city into two. Making Shanghai look like a soul with split-personality disorder, the new and the old.

And Australia's Sydney would be no different to this story, except that communism never cracked down on their party, but that's another tale.

If there ever is a man of legacy to Australia, James Cook is it. Aussies celebrate him for finding and claiming the place. And to be fair, it wasn't an easy task, even if the mass of the large island down under is roughly the size of the 48 states.

Today, Sydney is best seen from the harbor that started it, including the penal colony history and all. The ships rock in the sea and tourists clamor to fit the Harbour Bridge and the Sydney Opera House into the iconic photo frame to add to their collections. A respectful place for any Sydneyer to hate, understandably. Ingrid and I sealed our trip there (we had to) with postcards of the same, but also added some shirtless Aussie men, reminiscent of the Gold Coast, to mix it up.

(Inevitably telling someone, "Yes, hit the silver button. Nope, ah, that wasn't a photo, push it harder--Greeeeat--this is what I wanted.)

The port isn't the same as James Cook found it, in fact, it's commercial value has outpaced any other city in the country, including Melbourne, but its beauty doesn't reflect that. It's classic, as a port will always be to me.

As I inked my postcards, reflecting on it, I thought of the magic of a port's honest reality, arrival and departure. And how this intersected with our philosophical ports, the different chapters of life that define and shape us, not just as the traveler, but all of life.

Not alike an airport, at all.

And if you go:

The best harbor-side place to be in Sydney sans crowds, easy, the fish market. As told by Rough Guides' East Coast Australia, it's the world's second largest (Tokyo being number one, of course). Ingrid and I pushed snooze to the 5 a.m. rush, but did manage to arrive for a late salmon and tuna sashimi breakfast, complete with fresh mussels, altered only with lemon juice.

Birds flocked, ship men may have stared and we ate the best, freshest fish our of lives. We may have even called our parents to let them know...

Evidence (despite that face, we really enjoyed it, promise).

Hanoi "Street food"

Hanoi, Vietnam's capital in the north, is a concentrated, congested buzz. Not alike a soothing cup of tea, its a triple-shot of espresso, dumped in coffee. If you're there, get on a motorbike and join it.

(Hanoi Beer snaking through town. However, if you want the real speciality of the city, skip the bottled variety and try the raw, micro-brewed stuff. Spot it by its keg contrainer at street-side food vendors. To drink it, be prepared to sit for a spell on a knee-high squattor chair, typical Asia style.)

(Baguettes, the mark of the French and their colonial days here.)

(Chaos and potatoes)

(Leopard print and limes)

(Ah, finally, rest & café; gossip time)

Amid a mess, remembrance.

I’m a planner by nature, even if my notes end up as disorganized, haphazard, many times lost, to-do notes, which are ometimes created on bar coasters, receipts, or a torn flight itinerary. The principle is the same. I plan. I do.

If not, I forget my wet laundry in the washer—for days. It isn’t good, for anyone.

So, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that I usually have a working, yet changeable timeline scrambling in my brain, everyday.

I don’t like to share it, not that I’m terribly afraid something won’t happen on “the list”. After all, one of my loosely hatched plans—to travel through Asia (Tibet & Nepal) after I finish teaching English in China—is on execute phase as we speak. However, sometimes even I admit, the ideas are a little too “Anna—you’re crazy” and I don’t like hearing that. My ego can seem mighty, but it’s fragile like the skin of a rabbit (read The Last American Man if you’re unsure on this metaphor, page 72).

So, to reassure myself on this last sudden change of thought, route, plan, destiny, whatever you want to call it. I consulted an old journal I filled with precious thoughts, various ramblings and mementos; the same journal that I brought on my unexpected journey back East to teach English in Zhengzhou. A town, which turned out to be a mega city. And though I was nervous, anxious as hell, in fact, and unsure if I had the made the right hasty decision—it turned out okay. In fact, actually better (consult this blog’s archives, in case you’d like a detail of my ups & downs in ZZ).

So, I reopened it on this day that I felt my head shake. What should I do? Abort the planned plan?!

(The "traveling pine cone" which did in fact travel with Ingrid and I on her big move from Tahoe, California to Magnolia, Iowa to New Zealand--though the pine cone didn't follow her to the last, nor unfortunately did I.)

Better than a magic eight ball, this is what it said:

(Before you read, remember this is a personal journal, the thoughts may represent me, but please, really, do not take them too seriously. I heed you. I wrote most of this while I was thousands of feet in the air, again, unsure of my destiny.)

“My passport finally arrived, the package was marked as Ms. Anna Frisky. I can never change my last name, obviously.”

Real wisdom, I know.

“If you really want to do something, you’ll find a way. If you don’t, you’ll find an excuse.”

–Samuel Butler

This, above, is one of my favorite quotations of all time and something I try to live by.

Followed with: “Green is good. Life’s a garden, man. Dig it.”

--Anonymous friend, the identity of which will remain concealed.

These equally wise words were spoken the night we climbed Cold Stone and slept on its downtown rooftop and consequently became “roof people” for several hours, one summer night. Oh yeah Mom, that happened, whoops.

As well as many photo-booth moments at Deadwood, an Indian feather and a Chinese propaganda postcard—usual suspects in a journal, I’m sure. With the words, New Beginnings, starting it all.

To seal my thoughts of stretching beyond a comfort zone in the next chapter, or at least rewriting the script, one last quote from another individual on the road:

“I should have listened to my father when he told me to become a teacher, but I told him, ‘What? Are you high? I don’t want to deal with those little brats.’ Now I’m 52. How did that happen?”--Shuttle driver in Rocky Mountain National Park

Ah, a reality of the 60s.

Of course, as to my real plans, I can’t tell you until that happens.

(This random and scatter-brained blog post could be representative of some of my to-do notes. Tis true, tis life. Now, I need to go get that laundry.)

(Rocky Mountain National Park, on top of the world.)

Lost in refresh in China.

I remember it distinctly, I was nabbing another stolen french fry in ketchup as Wes casually broke the news to Briana and I. It was a text from his mom, that news, that his mom had learned how to cross the seas with a message, had seemed just as alerting. "Obama got Osama Bin Laden. He's dead." With the sting of those words came updates from her day, I went golfing with so-and-so.

"What?" I asked, slightly shocked, but I continued to chew just as attentively on my stolen fry. It was 2 in the afternoon, Beijing time, and I was sitting in a McDonald's in Shanghai's Old Town. A joke, I thought for sure.

Though, what kind of weird joke would that be? Right...

Sitting in as "American" of an establishment as you can get--McDonald's arches are actually the most recognized symbol to children around the world--thank Fast Food Nation for that fun fact. Compounded to the fact that many foreigners extract American food to purely be Mcfood, well, you get the idea, I should have felt the comfort of my homeland with ol' Ronald.

But as I listened, and moments later the reality of the event sunk in, "Osama Bin Laden is dead," I felt even more detached from home, or rather AMERICA. A text and some fries don't translate to being on the home-front of jubilation.

12 hours later, I waited impatiently as the hostel's Internet slowly refreshed to the same. Check your Internet connection, try again later. No, I couldn't even check my favorite form of breaking news, The New York Times, for what by now was hardly even new news.

Around the city of Shanghai, I could hear guards whisper in Chinese, grabbing my attention only when an accented English name would surface, Obahhma... ;alskdfj a;klsdjf .....Osahhma Ben Laden.

Everyone worldwide knew, but the news was just a side-note to the day, and perhaps only reminded when a foreign face brushed by.

Two days later, I read about the American reaction. Was it too much? Commentators asked. "Hey, hey, GOOOODbye."

I felt a pang of jealousy. What would the world think of that? Perhaps too much, also. I was jealous; I wanted to experience the momentous moment, a chance to feel part of history, to feel at home.

Nope, instead, I was stealing a McDonald's fry and living in the People's Republic. An experience to feel as foreign as possible, sometimes even at McDonalds. Not even here do we speak the same language.

My reality, living abroad is like that internet connection, try again later. This (or any other) reality probably won't hit "home" until I've reached there, just like the way a skype screen is detached from a real kiss goodbye.