The more I travel, the more I realize that I don't like taking short touristy trips, and that I'd rather go places with a purpose. If it is a totally new and foreign place for me, staying there a year should be the minimum prescription...so that I can wholly immerse into the fabric of the social and cultural web of the place. This I like to call "travel." If you're not a traveler, you're a tourist, and the tourist is easy to spot. Usually the tourist carries a camera and a guidebook, like the lonely planet, buys a copious amount of tickets to historical sights, cultural shows, or goes often for massages, spas or beaches...and does not meet many, if any, local people. If I'm to be a tourist, I've decided it's best to bring parts of "home" with me, since I won't have the time and resources to make the country a part of my web of homes... I'd bring maybe some friends or family I'd like to get closer with, otherwise if travelling alone I'd jump into the Capoeira or Salsa scenes.

Capoeira and Salsa, I've especially discovered, are the languages I'm somewhat fluent in, and that are more universal in communication than English or Chinese in my travels. Nowhere have I gone where I couldn't find a group speaking them.

These days I'm reading several memoirs to see how I can write my own. I highly recommend From Heaven Lake.