Pyramids, Pagodas and Pizza

Hi.

I’ve been meaning to write. Really.

Through a combination of several factors, I spent 90 days spanning from the middle of November through last week doing one thing. Traveling.

To be precise, during my little adventure, I’ve been on 42 flights in 4 continents and set foot in China, India, Egypt, Turkey, the U.S., the U.A.E., Japan, Thailand and Burma. Yeah, I know….ridiculous right?

While it was nice to see my room in Medina and Hyderabad, I’m glad to be sitting on my couch in Wuhan. Since December 24th, I’ve only been in my apartment for less than a day. I more or less flew into town, checked my apartment, unpacked, repacked and got back into the taxi. In the middle of January, I got home at 145 AM and was out the door by 600 AM.

So what have I been doing? While I have been working like crazy, I have been able to get a few steps closer of a life goal; visiting one hundred countries. I had 2 separate trips over the last few months which were as extreme as can be. My first trip was to Egypt and Turkey with Sachin, Ruchi, Asad and Laila.

Asad, jokingly (I think) said we should go to Egypt while I was in the U.S. back in May. We ran with it and before I knew it, the trip was falling into place. Sachin and Ruchi joined in as well which gave me the honor of being the 5th wheel on my own vacation, an international one at that.

I was a bit nervous about this trip because my two prior trips with Asad and Sachin involved me A. Screaming at Asad on my phone during a LIRR trip and B. missing a flight and showing up to Asad’s wedding without socks. In addition, I’d be traveling with their wives, which clearly adds an interesting dimension.

I’ve already talked about this trip so much with most of you that I’m too lazy to give you a full recap. Here is a summary:

• A. Egypt has a lot of pyramids and hieroglyphics. If my knowledge of Egyptian culture went beyond what the movies have taught me, I probably would have cared a lot more. I don’t regret going to Egypt, in fact, I’m glad I did (especially given recent events) but if someone asked me for my top 5 favorite countries or “must see” spots, I would not think of Egypt. It’s like going to Italy…one of the countries you should visit, but not necessarily the one you should visit right now.


• B. Egypt has women, you just don’t see them. Whenever we were out, we would only see men. When I was in Morocco, I saw women, but they were covered up. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think Egypt has no women. No wonder why those guys were protesting.


• C. The Pyramids are cool but when you’re up next to them, you get bored rather quickly because it’s just a pile of rocks.


• D. I realized I have the attention span of a five year old…our tour guides would give us detailed explanations of whatever we were looking at. We’d all gradually drift away or just stare at something else. I’m sure our guide was thrilled when we asked him to sum up a 3,000 year old temple in 5 minutes.


• E. Don’t go to Egypt for the food.


• F. Anyone who knows me realizes that I’m very self-deprecating. Thank god I am because any other person would have killed themselves on this trip. I’m very close with all my friends, (I even got Laila to say “I don’t hate you, I can tolerate you”), but it rather unusual to go on vacation with two married couples. I never really even thought about it until every shopkeeper pointed to my friends and then me and asked where my wife was. I simply replied, Priya, my girlfriend, wasn’t feeling well and was either in the car or at the hotel.

What’s more pathetic? Being a 5th wheel on a vacation or making up a fake girlfriend to impress Egyptians shopkeepers? You decide.

Great Pyramid of Giza

We were in Egypt for several days and then headed to Istanbul for New Years. I had a great time in Istanbul and really loved the city. People were friendly, the city was filled with interesting monuments and all in all, I had a great time. It was really interesting to see the Christian and Muslim influence side-by-side.

We accomplished a lot in Turkey but I think the highlight was New Years Eve. It started out being a solid night but after midnight, it just got ridiculous. To sum it up, we brought in the New Year at a bar in an alley. Then we went to a Wild West-themed bar that had a conga line being led by 12 year olds. To top it all off, there was free cake and we weren’t charged for half our drinks. I know I’m not doing full justice to our night, but let me assure you, it was amazing.

Sophia Hague - Converted it from a Church into a Mosque by throwing up some Arabic. I love the laziness factor

After my little fun, I headed to India for a 4 day trip that somehow stretched out to 21 days. I then flew to Medina over Chinese New Year (2 week holiday in China) to surprise my parents. After my mom’s initial surprise, she did what she always does; sent me on some errands including a run to Buehlers (one of my mom’s crowning achievements is somehow getting me to go to the grocery store four times in one day)

After my trip home, I headed to Burma for another trip. Much like my trip to Kashmir, this trip started out as a joke and then somehow before we knew it, tickets were booked. Like Egypt, this was another trip with people I had never traveled with. It started out with just me and Sanjay planning to go. After briefly mentioning it to Ed over drinks, he latched on. When Sanjay posted on Facebook that he was going to Burma, his friend Jyoti read the message and figured ‘why not?’ So just like that, I had a new travel group including a person I had never even met before.

Burma was an interesting trip and had a completely different vibe from my Egypt trip. We didn’t even pretend to care about the historical sites beyond “that pagoda has a lot of gold” and “wow, that Buddha statue is big” We essentially lounged for a week and took in sites whenever we deemed it convenient. Were there days that we could have visited a pagoda but chose to watch Animal Planet? Yes. Did we once pass up an opportunity to explore Rangoon so we could get massages? Definitely. (To our defense, it was really hot)

There were many fun things about the trip including Jyoti raving about organic chickens during our hot air balloon ride, the time we thought Sanjay had a stroke or Ed patronizing the locals with his sarcasm but I’m too lazy to write about everything. I apologize to my travel group, it’s not that I didn’t find this trip interesting; I’m just really hungry and want to eat dinner.

Temples in Bagan

I’m back in Wuhan and will be in China for the next 2 months, which sadly, is the longest I’ve stayed in China. In addition, due to my work permit renewal, I have to surrender my passport which means I can’t leave Wuhan for a month (which also is a record).

So how did I spend my first day back in Wuhan, which also happened to be Valentine’s Day? I went to dinner with Mr. Ma and Mr. Wu to celebrate “Love Day”.

Good thing I was driving because I can’t imagine a more appropriate reason to drink the sadness away.