April 2012
5 posts
Vegetarian Places in Bali →
By far, the most comprehensive and relevant listing of vegetarian and vegetarian-friendly restaurants and warungs around Denpasar – Singaraja area.
Spiritual Fluency →
The way we engage in these experiences and the imprint they leave on our consciousness depends on the state of our being. Whether pleasant or unpleasant, joyful or miserable, our own state of being–the way we engage and perceive the situation–will influence the experience and its imprint. Being aware of our sensibility, sensitivity and the correlative relationship they have on our experiences...
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Patagonia doesn’t own Farms, Mills, or Factories →
Straight from the souce:
Patagonia started off quite small as an outgrowth of an even smaller climbing equipment company that at the time had its own machine shop in Ventura but also had ice axes and crampons made under its name in Japan and Europe. The climbing community in those days was small and mostly poor – and decidedly international. People traveled a lot on cheap tickets and slept on...
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Layered Clothing →
Detailed guide on how to minimize clothing for lightweight packing while maintaining comfort and all-weather protection.
And a video too if you’d prefer watching.
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Packing Ultralight →
We’ve been moving gradually towards this for a few years. We traveled to Tokyo in 2009 with a backpack each, and moved from Guam to San Francisco in 2010 with a backpack each, then took a month trip with a backpack each. In those cases, the backpacks were usually filled with clothes and computers and various gadgets and toys.
If you think my pack was tiny, check out the 7-item content of...
March 2012
21 posts
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Man Denied Entry to US From Mexico to Bury Son, 10 →
“I told the customs officer that all I want is a permit to see my boy for one last time. They treat me as if I am a criminal,” Lopez, 34, a bus driver, said in an interview Saturday. “Right now, I need their support, and they are refusing to help me.”
Sometimes, rules are made to be broken. The world is awesomer that way.
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The One that Didn't Get Published →
People often ask me if my editor ever rejects particular Dilbert comics for one reason or another. It’s rare, but it happens. In fact, it happened yesterday. You won’t see this comic in newspapers. I guess I went, um, a little too f…
Funniest Dilbert strip you won’t see in newspapers. The web is awesome.
Gore-Tex's Dirty Tactics →
Here’s a fascinating story about Gore-Tex’s claim to fame and how they use their market-leading position to render their competitors as second-rate:
Then, in 1999, a small company called BHA Group began peddling an ePTFE membrane, similar to Gore-Tex, called eVent. Used for years in industrial smokestack filters, the membrane, tweaked to work in garments, was purportedly more...
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Want to know what you should be doing with your... →
As told by Patrick Rhone from his talk with the farmer:
“You gotta love the land.”, she said. Her whole tone of voice and body language changed when she said it. There was an unassuming yet palpable passion behind every word. “Not just the way it looks. The way it feels to be in it. To be a part of it. I wake up before sunrise every morning just itching to get up to my neck in it. The smell...
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What are some proven creativity patterns of great... →
The word ‘work’ appears in more than half of the answers.
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Hong Kong Trampers: Just Turn Up & Start Walking
“We meet up in a lighthearted manner, but we take hiking and the preservation of the countryside and the habitat of Hong Kong’s wildlife seriously.” wrote John Ure, one of the founding member of the Hong Kong Trampers, a group of passionate trail walkers who gather and organize weekly walks every Sunday morning.
Since its informal formation in 1997, it has seen hundreds, if not...
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Are you a traveler or an overpacker? →
I like traveling. But I don’t like carrying too much stuff. I have a 26L Goruck GR1 that I put to good use. I use it in the city, or on a one-day or week-long trip, I also use the same bag for long-term backpacking trip like the photo above.
My rule is only to carry the bare necessities. When you bring something just because you think you’d need it you’ll end up taking more...
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Diary of a Man with Wings →
Jarno Smeets:
“At one moment you see the ground moving away, and then suddenly you’re free, a really intense feeling of freedom. The true feeling of flying. A fucking magical moment. The best feeling I have felt in my life.”
He boldly claim to be the first man in history to fly like a bird. His secret? A self-built haptic wings that amplifies his arm flapping to mimic an albatross in...
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What are the best ways to take photos in cloudy,... →
There’s no single correct answer to your question. It all depends on what’s in front of you.
For landscapes (urban, nature, etc.) pay attention to the light and the resulting contrast in your picture, like what Rob Weir has suggested, such approach can bring strength to your photo.
For people, buildings & general subjects, it’s best to play with light and/or the...
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“Be yourself. Above all, let who you are, what you are, what you believe, shine...”
– John Jakes
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The Professional Hobo: 'my cost of full-time... →
…with the creative travel strategies I use to get free accommodation, travel slowly, and fly for pennies on the dollar, my cost of full-time travel is less than staying in one place.
Jump to read her cost-saving tips on her site. Including — cough — how to deal with a relationship fall-out on the road.
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A Cup of the Javanese Black Tea
This story was first published in August 15 2011 on The Journal of Fine Imagery.
As the U.S. of A celebrates her Independence day, a production team of four with myself included, embarked on a special journey on July 4 2011. It began as a simple photo assignment, one without any specifics, but it turned out to be something more than just a trip.
We were entrusted two SUVs, precious...
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'Freedom'
© Jeroen Toirkens
They roam the land, walk the earth, making a living out in the wilderness when the rest of us stick around in a polluted modern wilderness with no air to breath, and travel around with a pack on our back only to come back and return to the life largely shaped by ‘capitalism’.
Jeroen Toirkens’s book, Nomad, documents some of the world’s few remaining...
How to pack a suit for traveling →
A clever way to pack your suit for smaller bags. The folding isn’t new for me, but the use of a zip bag is.
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“We need to stop dividing the world into the ‘creative’ and the ‘non-creative,’...”
– David Kelley, founder of IDEO & Stanford’s d.school
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Give it five minutes →
Jason Fried on ideas:
Dismissing an idea is so easy because it doesn’t involve any work. You can scoff at it. You can ignore it. You can puff some smoke at it. That’s easy. The hard thing to do is protect it, think about it, let it marinate, explore it, riff on it, and try it. The right idea could start out life as the wrong idea.
Apply it now, go and spend five minutes reading his post,...
February 2012
21 posts
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The Bike of the Dragon Tattoo Girl
Justin Kell as reported by Bike EXIF:
I got the call to meet with David Fincher and discuss motorcycles for a new film he was doing. I bought all three Larsson books and read them in three days; the character of Lisbeth Salander is killer. As I read the books, I kept thinking that Lisbeth’s bike would be the kind of bike most twenty-somethings with limited financial recourses would ride. She...
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Tango Meets Yoga
Yoga is personal, Tango is communal. But they both share the same philosophy: intimate harmony.
Marco Di Giano, a fellow Art of Living teacher in Latin America brilliantly conceived a new breed of Yoga Workshop where elements of Tango is mixed with the Art of Living’s unique breathing technique. He share this bit about the origin of Sri Sri Tango:
I associate yoga with a lifestyle, how...
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The Case of Single- versus Multi-Tasking
Dave DeRuchie, in an article titled ‘Please Put Down the Device & Let’s Just Talk’ is making an argument about how poorly we perform tasks when we do it all at once:
Many argue that handheld devices make them more productive. Multi-tasking makes it all worthwhile! But this isn’t the case. The myth of multi-tasking demonstrates why we can’t talk on the phone, read email, send or...
“At first people refuse to believe that a strange new thing can be done, then...”
– Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden (via bookmania)
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Seat Sixty-One →
Probably the only, if not the most comprehensive site on train travel in the world.
It is Mark Smith, a retired British Railway Officer who publishes and maintains the site. And here’s what he has to say about the name ‘Seat 61’:
Zaharoff, the notorious arms dealer, would always book compartment 7 on the Orient Express to or from Istanbul. When treating myself to...
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“Live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart.”
– From Act of Valor
A Vietnamese Tale: 'My Perfect Wife' →
Infatuated with Vietnamese women, a westerner came to Danang and met a local girl in a bar. Within a few months time they were happily married and call Australia home. Until one day, he found his wife gone and realized everything was just a scam. A big scam:
I wonder just how many good willed western men are deceived by Asian girls & then become hard, cold & intent on playing their own...
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The Magic of Photography
Having been asked countless times about ‘what camera should buy?’ or ‘how to take better pictures?’ or ‘how did you take that photo?’, I realized how largely misunderstood photography is.
It maybe the marketing department of your favorite camera brand, or perhaps it’s the jaw-dropping photos from the latest National Geographic Magazine, photography...
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Patrick Rhone: TV Is Broken →
“Why did they stop the movie again?” Beatrix, asks. Thus leading to essentially the same conversation as before. She just does not understand why one would want to watch anything this way. It’s boring and frustrating. She makes it through the end of the movie but has little interest in watching more. She’d rather play. The television is never turned on again during our stay.
The television...
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Riding with the Cops in Bangkok
The following is a first-hand account of how an iPad was stolen, and how, with the help of the Bangkok Police Force and Apple’s Find My iPhone, someone’s crime of opportunity became another’s thrilling adventure.
If you prefer photos click here to view to the accompanying pictorial, or use the outline below to jump between chapters:
My Name is Sheikh | Bangkok, We Have a...
Tech-Savvy Police Officer Uses 'iCloud' To Catch... →
The 24-year-old victim said she was sitting inside a store on Sixth Avenue when a man pointed a gun at her and took her iPhone.
Police began looking for the suspect with no luck until an officer used Apple’s iCloud feature on his iPhone to make the stolen phone beep.
That’s when police say George Bradshaw, 40, walked by on Eighth Avenue.
Stolen iPad recovered with Find my iPhone →
I pull up the App again and see that my iPad is now moving away from the airport on the highway. After several minutes I watch as it turns into a neighborhood and pulls up outside of a house. There it stays for about 20 minutes. Meanwhile I have been sending alerts to the iPad screen with my contact information asking whoever has it to contact me immediately. Luckily they had not turned it...
Stolen Ipad tracked, recovered and youth arrested →
South Australia Police News:
An Ipad stolen from a car in the CBD has been recovered by police after the owner was able to pin-point where it was at all times. […]
With an in-built GPS and other clever applications used by the owner, including Google maps the Ipad was in a house at Woodville Gardens.
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Find My iPhone
I was recently in Bangkok for a transit back to Jakarta. During my stay there, my iPad was stolen and I managed to get it back.
Many have asked how.
Apple introduced a feature called Find My iPhone. It allows us to register our iOS devices and using the devices’ location services, the browser-based interface & the iOS app can help us locate registered devices so long as they are...
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French Alps of the East →
Joel Hawksworth, on one of asia’s prettiest city:
Not expecting much from Dalat I mainly went there because it was on the open bus ticket I got. But after arriving and quickly discovering its adventure pedigree it has become my favourite place in Vietnam.
Joel and I met on a canyoning trip in Dalat along with the lovely couples Roland, Nora, Eyk & Juliane. We all shared the sentiment...
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January 2012
10 posts
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Laos and the strangely ambiguous but functioning...
Funny how the biggest carrier in Laos that has a perfectly functioning corporate website doesn’t provide a basic information like how to enable 3G manually.
At the time of this writing, Unitel of Laos is yet a member of iPhone’s 100+ official carriers. That said, enabling 3G connection on your iPhone needs a little more work than a regular Stupidphone like your old Nokia.
Also at the...