~~Sensory overload~~

As the plane began its landing the butterflies I had been feeling turned into a pack of rabid dogs, I was suddenly having second thoughts about starting in the Philippines. I had heard some scary things about the Philippines and not knowing where we were going to be sleeping suddenly scared me. as soon as the plane unpressurized I could small Manila, the air was hot, and thick, it was like breathing jello. there was also a smell, it wasn't strong. I can only describe it as a combination of mildew and exhaust.

As we disembarked the plane I said to Lisa, we might be spending the night in the airport with a smirk on my face, she didn't look impressed. as soon as we cleared customs we went to the luggage belt grabbed our packs strapped in and went to look for a phone so we could try to find accommodations, I didn't really want to stay  at the place the lady in Korea had suggested, mainly because it was far from the city center. when I found a pay phone I discovered I couldn't dial out, GREAT!! we were off to a bad start but still in good spirits. We decided to go to the tourist information center to see if they could tell us how to dial out. the girl was eager to help us find accommodations, I assume she got a kick back from the hotel if we stayed there, but we really wanted to try a place from our lonely planet guide book. so she called around and said that none of them were answering. finally we gave up it was late we were exhausted I really just wanted to sleep. she booked us a room at a hotel that was out of our budget but we submitted I think the room ended up being 26 cdn per night, the young guy at the desk took us outside and helped us get a taxi he told the taxi where we were going they put our bags in the trunk and away we went. as soon as we left the airport I noticed the taxi didnt have his meter on, we asked him to turn it on but he told us that it was 500 pesos from the airport to anywhere in the city, which we found out later from the staff at the hotel was a big fat LIE!! haha they sure saw us coming that night. you learn very quickly that you have to stand up to people in these countries, in the Philippines you have to let them know your no fool. I found that telling them you were going to call the tourist center and ask how much a taxi would be was the best way. another good idea is to ask the hotel to tell you how much it should be to get from one destination to another. when we arrived at the hotel and checked in I was so excited I took a bunch of pics out the window. 

I wrote this in my journal at the hotel before I passed out from over exhaustion,

Laying in bed right now, its about 1:30 am, all I hear is construction maybe a jack hammer. there is live music across the street, first impression of Manila for me is big dirty and loud! so I cant wait to get to the beach. anyways time for me to get some sleep, big day tomorrow.

looking back now I realize although we should have planned it better, we did okay for our first night, and the Philippines really did have a certain charm to it. I think I can say it had some of my favorite places in all of South East Asia. 

Thoughts to Reality

My post today is going to be a little different. I had a comment from one of my readers about something I said in my last post. this is what he said,

 I read you blog.

The part about the pre trip anxiety was quite poignant for me.

It is exactly those feelings that prevented me from doing much traveling of late.

Your solution, to just do it despite the fear factor is the truth.

I think Id like to talk about getting over that hump of daydreaming and actually doing. First off it doesn't take anyone special to want to explore the world. what it does take is pushing yourself just a little bit to get the ball rolling. if your thinking you would like to get out into the big beautiful world the very first step is to decide on a place you would like to see. easy right! take some time to research the place you want to go, find out what kind of things there are to do, what type of transportation is common and cheap, look at pictures from other peoples trips, I would highly recommend getting a good guide book. the guide book is a good starting point in my opinion, there is usually a ton of information inside of it, everything from things to do, places to stay, what those places are like and usually a brief description of all the cities. the guide book can really give you a feel for a place, keep in mind though that the people that write guide books are usually well traveled,  their idea of good accommodations and yours could be very different. so I also suggest checking out what some other people have to say about where you plan to go, try the thorn tree forum http://www.lonelyplanet.com/thorntree/index.jspa. 

Okay so you have picked an adventure but its still just what you dream about instead of doing your job. my next recommendation is make a little financial commitment to this journey. maybe go out buy a backpack, money belt, travel towel, something anything that you might need if you were to take an extended trip from home. if you buy a backpack make sure you get a decent one, you will be living out of it and carrying it with you a lot. I would say no more then 60 liters is good, my next bag will be 40 most likely, you always need way less then you think lol. 

So you bought a backpack ! congratulations ! you are on the road to being a free citizen. at this point I would hope you have gotten a rough idea about how much money your going to need to make this happen, in some places you can live on $15.00 cdn a day while others its easy to spend $50.00 cdn so make a budget that fits where your going. for example if your planning to travel Canada $15.00 cdn isn't much for one day, but in India you can get by quite nicely. a budget is very important, again do some RESEARCH!! its easy to find this type of information. after you figure out a budget you can figure out how long it will take you to save the money to go. now its time to go out and make the big commitment, BUY YOUR TICKET, this is the most important step in all of this. once you have your ticket its real, you will start cutting down on your regular expenses,  because you know you have to leave in X amount of days. this is when dreams become reality. you start focusing on leaving and don't worry about regular life as much. 


~Continued~


I highly recommend you start a list of everything you need to do before you leave, then priorities it. also when you go to buy your ticket you can ask the travel agent about what kind of visas you will need for the places your intend to go. I recommend calling around and finding an agent that will do some work for you, they are on commission so see who gives you the lowest price, but also make sure they are knowledgeable about traveling. I cant tell you how many times Iv been in a pinch needing help and my agent really went to bat for me. when your so far form home it can be hard to get online sometimes the people at the airline don't speak English very well, or just don't really care to help you.


If your planning to visit a lot of countries make sure your passport had lots of pages left, some countries wont let you in if you don't. another thing to find out is if you will need to provide an ongoing ticket to another country to be approved for a visa on arrival. I have had to purchase an ongoing ticket at the airport before boarding my flight. which brings me to another point, when you run into a problem like this don't become angry at the staff at the airline or the airport, people will help you for the most part if you remain calm and polite for the most part, I have had the staff let me use the executive rooms in the airport free of charge to print tickets, find information, or just check my email. always keep in mind you represent every traveler, don't leave a bad taste in the mouth of the people that have to deal with us. it just makes it harder for those who come after you.   


At this point I would say you are past the point of no return, enjoy your adventure :)

send me your feedback or ask me a question just click feedback.

stepping into the abyss (my first journal entry written Jan 20/2010

After close to twenty six hours we have arrived in Manila! I'v had maybe three hours of sleep at this point, and I feel like I'm in some strange dream. The flight was really good, when we landed in Seoul Korea it was so foggy I couldn't see the runway. I actually didn't know we had even landed until we stopped moving!

After we got off the plane, and into the airport, we checked Lisa's email, and were very disappointed to find out the guest house we were planning to stay at was fully booked......SHIT! so
so we scrambled to find other accommodations, but couldn't get a pay phone to work so we could  book somewhere to stay. so instead we wrote some places down and hoped that one of them would have a spot for us. otherwise we would be spending our first night in the Philippines in the Manila airport.

while we were in the Korean airport waiting to board our plane, we met two filipinas who were also on their way to Manila. we told them about the little snag we had run into, and one of the ladies offered to call a friend of hers who ran a small guest house. I was cautious to accept, but they seemed to be genuine so we agreed to take his number. she also called to let him know we might be showing up late. turned out that one lady was a chemist and was working on a vaccine for malaria.

The Korean airport was massive I think I saw a sign pointing to gate 160!! thats insane! it was late night and not much was open. I noticed that there were lots of high end fashion like burberry, lv, and guess. nothing we would be able to afford for a very long time. not that either of us would want to afford anything with such a ridiculous mark up anyways. I cant even imagine what drives people to buy these types of things.

D Day

the night of January the 18th was a sleepless one for me, I was glued to the computer trying to load all my music onto my new cheap mp3 player, doing last minute checks to make sure we had everything that was a necessity, first aid kit which I filled with all kinds of over the counter meds like pepto, advil, gavisgone, anti poop pills there was so much extra stuff the bag almost wouldn't close.

I laid down but my mind was on auto pilot there was no way it would shut off, there were so many things going through it, there was a strange mix of conflicting emotions.... excitement.....anxiety......happiness...... sadness.....I thought about all the things I would miss, my family and friends, birthdays, and easter it would be the first time I didn't spend easter with my family. the hours passed slowly that night but when the time came to get up and go it seems as though I had only been in bed a short time. I was in a strange daze somewhere between dreaming and reality when we walked out of the house. the ride to the airport was quick and quiet. Lisa's Mom and Dad were the last familiar people we would see other then each other for a very very long time. By the same time the next day we would be in Manila, Philippines.

At the Calgary airport, we checked our big bags, then sauntered to our gate. There wasn't much open that early but somehow we managed to get a Jugo Juice, which I needed, I was low on energy and we had a very long day ahead of  us. we took some goofy pics to pass the time, then boarded the flight to Seattle. there was about a five hour layover in Seattle before the flight to Korea, if you have ever spent 5 hours in an airport you know there is nothing to do but spend money. there is a strange feeling when your on route to the other side of the world, the anxious excitement has become one of my favorite parts of traveling. stepping into the unknown. Like walking into a dark unfamiliar basement, unsure of what you might find. I mean you don't think your going to get eaten by the boogie man, but the feeling is similar. I guess its a bit of a rush, to step out of what your used to. throwing yourself into something you don't know how to deal with.

Getting into the gate

I'm gonna shorten the rest of the beginning up.
If you have any questions you can send me a comment.  I want to get into some of the stuff I wrote in my Journal, because I feel like it will be more interesting.

So after January 1 I didn't go into work much, there wasn't really any reason for me to because it was so dead. I thought to myself I'm lucky I'm leaving when I am this recession is killing business. I was however still at the bedroom depot on and off until I left. Lisa and I planned a huge going away party at the fiddlers court yard, I sent out tons of invitations on Facebook expecting about a third of the people that said they would show up to actually show up. I think almost everyone showed which was nice, we got to catch up with people we hadn't seen in a long time, and tell them about what we planned to do and were we planned to go. 

Trudging in quicksand

December was a slow month, the prodigiousness of what we were about to embark on hadn't really set in at this point. Mom and dad bought me an awesome backpack. It took me buying and taking home 5 others before I could find one I was comfortable with. I ended up with a Gregory 60 liter in the end. It fit my shoulders nicely, and it had lots of little storage compartments, plus there was access to the main compartment on the side. so I wouldn't have to take everything out every time I wanted something from the middle of the bag. I was nervous to tell my boss at Mitsubishi that I was leaving but gave them around 3 months notice. We agreed that my last official day would be January 1/2010, but I would come in to tie up loose ends with my clients. 

As January approached I realized there was still so much to do. we still hadn't chosen a health insurance company, didn't know who would drop us off at the airport at 4 am, we needed to print tickets make copies of id and so on. You wouldn't believe how many health insurance companies I talked to but still couldn't find one that covered us for riding scooters, rock climbing, scuba diving, or any other activities where you were likely to get hurt. whats the point in getting insurance if they don't cover you to do anything fun! In the end I decided Blue Cross was the best they covered pretty much everything there were some stipulations but they were reasonable. 

I was also still trying to sell my car in January, I hadn't had much luck. Then one day around a week before we were leaving I had a call from my ad. the guy came and loved the jeep bought it on the spot, so I had an extra 3700 bucks! which was fantastic because I really thought I would be staying longer then we had planned.

So we had a rough plan, a start, there were so many things to take into consideration, Christmas, money, health insurance, should we keep our cars? visas, what to take my God! where in the world to start?

If there is one thing I can say about actually doing something like this, its GO BUY YOUR TICKET!!!! because until you have spent the money, and have an actual departure day its way to easy to come up with reasons why you cant go. That being said I went out and bought our tickets, but not before we did some research, and came up with a rough idea of where we would go, after hours with my face planted in my lonely planet, I decided we would fly into Manila Philippine,s from there we would travel to Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, India, Nepal, Burma, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, then go to Hong Kong to visit my eccentric Grandfather and finally Taiwan to see my uncle and cousins. Those plans did get quite a few revisions but Ill talk about that later.

We had so much to do, I was busy working at mitsubishi as a sales consultant, Lisa was in Calgary working as many hours as she could, I decided I needed a second job because I wanted some extra cash for when I got home, so I got a Job working opposite shifts from Mitsu so I would work 9am to 3pm at Mitsu then speed up to the Bedroom Depot for 3:30pm and work till 9pm, I was constantly exhausted but I had a clear Goal, when I needed motivation I read my lonely planet or stared at photos of the amazing adventures other people had, the days seems to all blend together like one long theater production that had no intermission, by the time we were ready to go I was completely and totally sucked dry of my want to work lol, I just wanted to get on the plane and go.

Every Journey Begins With One Step

The first step ... One night Lisa and I were at one of my favourite late night dives, called U and Me restaurant in China town, having some Wor Wonton soup and all night Dim sum. I don’t remember how we got to talking about traveling but the subject came up. I talked about my short trip to Taiwan and Hong Kong and Lisa told me about her travels to Australia, Thailand, and parts of South America. At some point she said half jokingly, we should go traveling! I said that I thought it was an awesome idea where would we go? I said I had always wanted to go to India and SE Asia and she agreed that it would be fun to go back and said she always wanted to go to India. Lisa also told me her brother Jeff and his girlfriend, Jemma had been to the Philippines which I had not really intended on going to but they said they loved it there so we figured all of SE Asia and India and maybe Nepal. The next question was how long would we go for? I think we figured we would need a year and that was even a bit short. The details are a little foggy as it was almost 2 years from today that we laid the foundation for what would be one of the best years to date of my entire life. So it was decided we would one day travel together but when? Well Lisa said she could get a summer job and save some money and she would take a year off school. I said I would need about 6 to 7 months to save the money which would put us around December. So she said are we really gonna do this and I said yeah lets do it!