The trip began... a while ago

Today in Nihn Bihn, Vietnam, finally I found a strong enough connection start publishing. While I was in China, I realized that something seen harmless in the West, such as a blog, is unacceptable to a regime afraid of free expression accessible to a potentially unlimited audience: this site and others that allow publishing a blog are blocked in China. Interestingly, a regime of the same seed as that of China, Vietnam, has no qualm whatsoever: the site is accessible, so here I am. To those who know me, it must seem strange that I finally relented my minimalist attitude toward cyberspace co-dependance and started a blog on my current trip. The idea milled around my head for a while after the trip started as it became evident that due to slow and irregular internet connections, it would be impossible to keep up in the personalized way I prefer. I realized that with one upload and at a time and one mass mailing, I could give all my friends the chance to give the answer to the question: what is that crazy fucker Sante up to today? This need came from missing you all and home so much: in spite of how glamorous my trip may sound to some of you, to travel in these parts is hard work, unless you go not even first class, but invited VIP status. The acute awareness of being a complete outsider, derives from the realization that in China I am not just an analphabet, I am also mute and deaf, for all practical purposes. And while debasing my frame of references brings a different level of awareness coming from the challenges of trying to communicate with people who speak a language I will probably never learn, it also makes me conscious of how much I like my surroundings and my daily "routine": if summer lasted year round, I would never want to be away from New York City. It has taken me almost 30 years, but I have become that kind of New Yorker, I find it hard to believe it myself. But being allergic to winter, I must go away when it's cold. Meanwhile, it is the first time in my life I find myself in a place whose language I absolutely do not speak and have no hopes to speak anytime soon: learning Chinese is a lifetime project for those who endeavor it and without languge there can be only a superficial understanding of the surroudning reality. Even the limited picture I am gaining can provide prospectives one would never have just staying home, but it can only be a very cropped picture, I believe. Because it took me so long to even conceive of this blog, I necessarily have to backtrack: So I am signing off with this picture that I took towards the end of my initial stage and first contact with the Far East: a week in the Philippines. Like many pictures I take, this one reflects my mood in relation to what I saw in my surroundings. It is night in Vietnam and I must catch a train i=ealry in the morning for a 14 hours trip to the (I hope, warm) Southern city of Danang: my last week in the tropics has been one of the coldest I can remember all my life. But when I return, and my temporary signing off, here is an image from the sweltering heat of Cebu, The Philippines.