Last Updated 04/15/02
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At the
Fruit Stand
Beneath the midday heat
Within the darkened shed
The fruit monger and I
Fill my plastic bags,
A kilo of this,
A kilo of ...(more)
I used to be afraid to go to the toilet by myself. I thought there were giant boogie men that lived in the bottom of the bowl. Just waiting for a little girl to spray their face with urine, and moments before the little girl finished spewing, they would grab her and pull her into the huge depths of the sewer and eat her as a side dish to poop. My mom knew my fear and always escorted me to the bathroom, knowing she would always be there, I used to hold it until I got home from school. I tell that only so you'll know why I was terrified of traveling alone...(more)
Definitely
Not Girls
I'm no poster-girl for adventure. But when a guy in the karaoke
bar told us there was no way we could hitchhike from Osaka to Tokyo,
that was all we needed. "Not in Japan - definitely not
girls," he said as he stumbled past us to the stage, mike in
hand, to sing "I Will Survive." I don't think he
understood that by saying that, he essentially turned our
harebrained idea into...(more)
Disenchanted
September
Tired of going to Europe alone and inspired by romantic Edwardian
films of the Grand Tour, I asked all my friends one spring,
"Want to rent a villa in Tuscany next fall?" And several
did. Because it was spring, we had time for monthly planning
get-togethers where we decided on which villa, what and how many
cars, personal travel styles, airline tickets. We watched
"Enchanted April" on video and...(more)
A First
Triathlon
"Ya'll better
hurry," said the guy tending the parking lot as we pulled in.
"Hurry?" I thought. "It's only 8 o'clock, and the
race starts at 9...."
Roy rummaged in his duffel bag and came up with the registration
brochure. "It starts at 8," he groaned.
Thus began my first triathlon...(more)
Being that I am a last-minute kind of gal, I was super proud of myself for leaving several hours to get to the airport. I was looking forward to a leisurely check-in and the proverbial cup o'coffee. Little did I know I would be in a traffic jam on an Oregon freeway for two hours, stuck with...(more)
Laughing
in the Bush
Being a Valley Girl from LA
never left me the opportunity to be the outdoorsy type. Don't get me
wrong, I spent my share of time outside growing up, but it was
usually watching the skaters olly off the half-pipe in my front
yard. I was a cheerleader, not a hiker. I liked to dance. Who wanted
to camp when I could have a slumber party in my bedroom? My idea of
camping was a party on the beach with 20 guys and a case of vodka...(more)
The Magic Place:
Ghost Ranch, New Mexico
I
found the house where Georgia O'Keeffe lived and painted the first
night I spent at Ghost Ranch. She lived in an adobe, smack on the
Painted Desert, a flat stretch of sand and sage with hills and
cliffs to the back, a wide line of low mountain with a narrow flat
top to the front. Stepping outside or climbing the handmade ladder
to the roof to paint, she did not...(more)
Monumori
Green caves of
Zaire
wake me with your
feverish whispers.
I reach through
the rising suns,
the thick, blue skies.
I reach for secrets...(more)
The
Price of Progress in China
At first I didn't notice all of the obvious signs around me, too
busy straining for a glimpse of traditional Chinese culture I wanted
to find in the shadows of fluorescent lights. I frequented
marketplaces, got intensely into the bargaining game with my basic
Mandarin, adjusted to the crowds. I took cliched pictures of kids
roller-blading in front of ancient temples, of tiny old men in Mao
jackets sitting in the expansive parking lot of Price Mart. I
marveled in the coexistence of old and new, assured in my belief
that the Chinese had a respect for tradition...(more)
Tackling
Mountains
Trish Kaplan
pursues adventures few women would dare undertake.
Inspired last year by a fierce desire to test her body in a
beautiful and remote mountain you can see only on foot, she booked a
trip through Wilderness Travel in Berkeley California to Pakistan,
(where women have no rights,) for a16-day trek on foot to Snow Lake.
Only 5 people were hardy enough to endure this climb through
day-time temperatures that reached 120 degrees and nights that were
below freezing to a summit where...(more)
Thai
Hike
When I decided to go to Thailand, I wanted to avoid the insulated
circuit of remote villages that get overrun with trekking tourists,
so I decided to take my chances and hired an independent guide I met
when I got there and hike around the country--just him, my friend
Tracey, and me. Our
first destination was a tribal village...(more)
If any place has one foot in the old world and the other in the new, it’s Turkey. A Muslim country where drinking spirits rivals praying to them, and a nation whose largest city, Istanbul, straddles Europe and Asia, Turkey never fails to contradict itself and surprise its guests. Most travelers glimpse only Turkey's western and southern coasts, following the well-trod loop from...(more)
Wild
I hear a call. I don’t know where it is coming from, or if it is
just a trick of my mind, but I hear it nonetheless. A call from a
time long past. A time when there were no cities. And there was no
"society," as we know it today. A time when people and
animals were one. When survival was the basis of life. When there
was endless land. Before technology. Before the internet. This time
no longer exists, yet I keep longing for it, and dreaming of a way
that I can somehow return. Going camping in the wilderness isn’t
enough. I know that it is just a vacation that will soon end.
Reading about it isn’t enough. Something deep inside of me is
screaming out that I have been misplaced in this time period. That
my heart and soul are waiting for me somewhere else...(more)
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