Not worrying about my bag let me focus on more enjoyable things.

My trip to Prague using SealLine’s Boundary pack was a smashing success. The 35L model held all of my girlfriend’s and my things perfectly, with even a bit of room to spare. Our only additional bags were a small day pack for carrying around and a small handbag with gifts for our friends. That bag ended up going into the bottom of the SealLine after we delivered the presents.

As I noted in my original post, my first trial only presented the problem of organization. To alleviate this, I picked up a Sea-to-Summit Compression Sack for my clothes, a Stuff Sack for my girlfriend’s, two small bags for toiletries and then I reused plastic bags for our shoes. With everything compartmentalized I was simply able to stack the items in order of access–shoes on bottom, clothes above and toiletries/travel documents on top).

Over the whole journey there was very minimal carrying involved simply because we were always on buses, trains, planes or in hostels. The bag actually sat in the corner the entire time we were in Moravia and then later in Prague. Hauling it to the return flight was the only time it was slightly uncomfortable, probably having something to do with the raucous amount of Czech beer that I packed in it.

The bag is tough; it’s waterproof; it’s cheap and light. If you’re worried about a lack of space, pay the extra ten bucks for the 70L–just don’t shell out $200+ for a full-featured expedition pack that will never see the light of day once you return from hostel-hopping.

My gear list:
2 Icebreaker shirts (worn)
1 Tshirt (to oblige the lady)
1 pair jeans
1 pair hiking pants
1 pair shorts (worn)
3 pairs Smartwool socks (worn)
2 pairs EMS Techwick underwear
1 pair Icebreaker Beast underwear (worn)
1 EMS Thunderhead rain jacket
1 EMS Summit Fleece
1 pair Chaco Z/1 sandals
1 pair La Sportiva FC2.0 shoes (worn)
(+ books, papers, etc.)
*I washed a few items randomly towards the end of the trip to keep things fresh, otherwise it was all zero-maintenance

If you’ve ever studied torture, you know it’s the simplest of things that ruin a man’s spirit. Drops of water, a cold floor, not enough room to sleep through a good night; but to me, and any other homeless wanderer out there, you start to forget that there’s any other way of life. We are the pigs wallowing in shit, wondering why our two-legged brothers insist on beds and excessive comforts. Walking past “Le Petit Monsieur” Bakery I am once again reminded which side of the looking glass I am suited to live.

The whiffs of confection sugar pierced me long before I crossed the shop’s penitentiary doors; I knew it was early, the time of day for coffee cakes and danishes–once a weekly treat when I resembled a more conventional man, a man at all. Poised on porcelain plates of pain they rise and remain above me, beyond me. Had I not just scrounged last night’s falafel from a 57th street green can buffet I may have even been hungry enough to want one. If I had the means of procurement, I may have even taken it just as a symbol of insignificant victory.

On the lower racks, yet to be discarded is last night’s gang of cupcakes. Another reminder of life when I walked upright, when I changed clothes and even owned a place to change into them. Their pink, marigold and baby blue frostings sting of colors far removed from my optical palette–snowflakes floating into the hell of an urban street, doomed to soil at the first mere touch of a tainted inhabitant. The intensity of their sweetness would probably further inflame my diabetic nightmare.

In the event that I still had a life to celebrate, a birthday to commemorate, this is the kind of place I would want to go. My bitterness aside, its bitter-sweet existence compels me to tap my human reservoir, to accept my circumstance and realize that these pastries of pain are only reminders of not what I chose not to have, but what I chose to lose. Instead, I sought a life subsisted from a higher carbohydrate molecule, so simple a chemical change, so profound a result.

There was a time when the bakery could have even been mine. Its diligent and deft workers, answering to my command. Now I stand a broken man, arguably, looking through a glass reminder of a life I once lived, overshadowed by the reflection of what I have become. In the purgatory in between our two worlds, a cupcake, an eclair can dually serve as the object of hopeful sanctuary or the stone-engraved death sentence of a life’s failure and the price to pay. I walk on, awaiting my next crucible of shame.

Old nerdy joke from my high-school math club: a pessimist says the glass is half empty, the optimist says half full. The engineer says it’s twice as big as it needs to be. For whatever reason, the average traveler is forever doomed to the paradigm of taking much more than what’s needed for a bag– be it in terms of features, capacity or price.

As an Eagle Scout I can understand “Being Prepared,” as it is after all the Boy Scout motto, but I also argue that there’s a right tool for every task. If you’re traveling, and not backpacking–for a long distance that is, your best bang-for-your-buck, practical option is to pick up a Seal-Line Boundary Pack.

Boundary Packs - what you should be taking to Europe.

It’s water tight – as in, it floats. If you’re in a jam you could even use it as a buoy to float back to your ship (just ask John). A lot of packs are “water-proof” and made of water-proof materials but not made with “water-proof construction” and then there’s Gore-tex and eVent and…none of it is going to be as impenetrable as this bag. It’s made of thick vinyl and holds air like an opera singer, an especially fat one.

Weight wise, how does 2lb. 9oz. sound for a 70L bag? Yes, it’s only a single compartment, but how many times have you lost something because you forgot about it in your ultra-secret security pocket? What good are all of those pockets if you still can’t remember where you put things? One compartment is awesome for finding your stuff and just think of how fast security checkpoint will be when there’s only one space to open. If you’re that worried about organization, just get some Eagle Creek bags or Sea to Summit stuff sacks.

Maybe you’re leary about its practicality. Did you see the available colors? You could find your socks in the bottom of this bag in a black hole–that’s an insane yellow! Nighttime be damned! Sure it’s a little ostentatious, but I can almost guarantee that no one will mistake your bag for theirs at a baggage claim. It has a breathable shoulder harness, a waist belt and on the 70L and up models a harness that acts as a load-adjuster and grip if you’re just lugging it around. The face that it’s vinyl also means it’s not going to absorb your sweat all day while you schlep it around looking for the Hofbräuhaus. Should you need to check it on the plane, boat, etc. the harnesses come off and you’re left with a seamless, secure and water-tight bag.

John’s advice made a convert out of me so I picked one up for my upcoming trip to the Czech Republic (9 days). Packing my 35mm digital SLR, a few lenses, my clothes, shoes, books and toiletries, I know I’m going to have just enough space for my girlfriend’s things as well – and I bought the 35L. It’s also perfect carry-on size, so I won’t be waiting in any long lines once I hit the tarmac in Prague. I also won’t be rethinking the price. At $70 for a 35L, $80 for a 70L and $90 for a 115L bag, you’re still looking at one third to one quarter of what a full-fledged backpack can cost. My advice is to save the money on the pack, spend it on travel clothes (hence my two shirts for 9 days) and carry less overall.

As a caveat, it’s not a trekking bag and shouldn’t be used if you’re knocking out the Camino de Santiago or the Ho Chi Minh, but if you’re hostel hopping, island floating or just traveling around for only a few miles at a time, these bags are worth checking out.

Keep an eye out for my Prague recap in early September; I’ll let you know how the bag goes.

In the southern tip of India, in a land called Kerala, a vast network of waterways flows through the richest farmland on earth. Every year for millennia two monsoons have come to this very fortunate place, not just one as in most tropical lands. This bountiful rainfall has enabled the backwaters of Kerala to produce two robust annual harvests. This unimaginable fertility was legendary eons before the Romans traveled long and hard to trade with this verdant place. All this bounty is taken to the wanting outside world by boat and barge for there are no roads here. There never have been. In every way, water has always set the pace of life here. It was in this grand rural Venice that I was witness to yet another lesson from mother India. One that again would make apparent to me another time, another place, another way far different from my own.

As is typical of someone whose assumptions are in the process of falling away, it took me a while to really see what was in front of me . . .

At sun rise pairs of men, women and children in shallow, round wicker vessels much like large bread baskets – float past the window of my boat in silence. Even though they were just a few feet away, I wouldn’t have noticed them if I hadn’t happened to look up from my notebook. They made no sound. Slowly they drifted by, as they gently pulled up fine, delicate fishing nets that had been laying beneath my boat the entire night, trapping a few, flat fish that happened to swim by in the darkness. The fishermen had no paddles, oars and certainly not a motor of any sort. There was complete calm as they slowly drifted by and spun around and around on the surface of the water. The warm, still silence was complete.

At first it all seemed so directionless and unguided, spinning and turning any which way in powerless circular boats that had no front or back, no left or right. But when I watched them, really watched them, I could see that they used the current, the breeze and the slow pull of the nets to guide them along. At any moment they may face east, west, north or south, but the direction they were facing ultimately didn’t matter. They were moving. They were collecting fish. They were together. And during all the slow spinning and turning no words were spoken between them. The experience of generations united them with exceptional skill. Why speak? What needed to be said? Confidence in themselves and each other was profound and absolute. As was their knowledge that these prolific backwaters would certainly give them what they needed and could only take them to where they were going. Once you trust yourself, your friends, your place why struggle to always face forward – the auspicious path just may lay in some other direction.

There is no Alec Baldwin narration, no naming of corrupt FDA traitors–simply a display of contextual truth. We, the audience, are completely encouraged to make our own conclusions on the matter. Rather than the “bread of life” that Jesus referred to in the Bible, it seems quite apparent that our modern food system revolves around a mechanized “bread of death,” with little regarded to the fact that our food was once alive. The rendering of meat, which was once very human and in perhaps an esoteric way sacred, is now enslaved to cold, stoic process–completely for the sake of yield.

As silly as it sounds I watched the perfectly-engineered, steel behemoths slaying bull after bull, pig after pig, salmon after salmon and I couldn’t stop thinking about the Terminator franchise, where humans are at war with machines. Watching the efficiency of these systems–I have to think that the war as it stands has already been lost.

If you’ve ever seen the size of a full-grown bull, seen the capriciousness of a feisty pig, or seen the majesty of a full-breadth salmon, it becomes depressing to see their lives ended so quickly, their entrails so effortlessly plucked. I see it as not only a bastardization of the entire human condition throughout history, but a blasphemy towards what this documentary may cite as divine providence.

Even the very right of reproduction is engineered with these animals. The mighty bull takes his natural mount behind the heifer only to have his essence extracted and stolen for later use–or genetic engineering. He may have even been lucky compared to the piglets, comprising one of the most graphic scenes, who are swiftly made eunuchs and left tail-less while their head clamps prevent them from protesting the matter. If only Snowball and Napoleon could see this…

Being long enough to be excruciatingly thorough (92 minutes), Our Daily Bread covers a full gamut of the industrial food chain and not just the aforementioned animals. The highly dosed and doused plant crops are shown, as are their robotic attendants. Salt mining is illustrated, olive tree harvesting demystified, and a lovely landscape scene showcases a crop duster–having its way before the combines raze the stalks in the impeding harvests.

Our Daily Bread is by no means an exciting film, nor is it necessarily invigorating as are many of the shock-value films of our current times. It is however completely honest and very thorough, making it suitable and palatable for the seasoned, food-enthusiast or the life-long factory farm diner. The verdict will of course be up for grabs.

Special thanks to Meredith Miller at Icarus Films for recommending this film for review.

After walking across almost the entire breadth of Tokyo the day before, I arrived in Kyoto via Shinkansen train a broken man. Flip flops had aided in developing huge blisters in the arches of my feet and others were starting on the balls and heel. How do you even say moleskin in Japanese?

Hauling my three small bags (this is before I was more travel-savvy) I oriented my map and made my way warily through the busy streets towards my hostel. One nice thing about Japan is that when you feel like you’re close to a hostel–just follow the westerners and you’ll probably find it soon enough. Kyoto’s Cheapest Inn has a bit of a cheeky name but is actually quite a nice facility for a single guy on a budget. I checked in to the group room, pulled my curtain and unpacked, soon giving in to wanderlust and the remembrance that I didn’t cross half the world to rest in my bunk bed. Also not wanting to punish my feet for the rest of my journey, I was able to locate some moleskin and patched them up good enough to tour Nijo Castle–the last stronghold of the Tokugawa Shogunate and a cozy 10 minute walk from the Inn.

Nijo-jo Castle Exterior

The warm summer day was already soothing my fatigued being and I soon became witness to the still beauty of Kyoto. Flowers in full-blossom perfumed the air with an aroma of fragrance, acting almost like an aromatherapy for the traveling soul. I arrived at Nijo-jo (Japanese name) and payed the meager entry fee (600JPY); what I could see beyond the walls was already giving me a return on investment.

Entering the brilliant green courtyards, perfectly landscaped into a zen-harnessing utopia I have to say it was a pivotal moment in my life. It was the first time I had ever truly experienced something that I had waited my entire life to not only see, but to be consumed by a very presence. Seeing the sakura (cherry blossoms) dance through the warm winds with the garden orchestra, giving audience to the intricate and masterfully crafted walls and roofs of the castle harmonically became something more than a scene; it became an understanding of the people that created it and I believe in some way that in their situations I may have found the same conclusions on life, love and immortality. This setting, these elements; these are the building blocks of culture.

Nijo-Jo's Gardens

After countless photos of the grounds and having a tour of the interior spaces, I found myself recharged with lusting adrenaline and a new craving to know more about this land Kyoto, the capital of Japan before it knew the West. Turning my sails to the north I headed to Marutamachidori, a main east/west running street and the location of Kyoto Imperial Palace. I wouldn’t be storming the gates today, but at least wanted to scope the lay of the land.

Kyoto Imperial Palace’s landscape, like many parts of Kyoto, bears a tranquil serenity in the soothing summer air. Tapestries of the lush foliage cast shadows onto the sun-drenched golden walls of its perimeter. Doubling as a “Central Park” of the city, sporadic couplings of residents and their Shiba-Inus stroll through the grounds. The perfectly poised canines look quite at home in their native homeland.

Running low on daylight and having my fill of taking photos, I continued east on Marutamachidori hoping to at least cross the nearby river before heading in for the night. Halfway across the bridge I was stopped dead in my tracks by the ethereal beauty before me on the north side of the pass. I stepped into a nearby pedestrian alcove on the sidewalk, bewildered with the shear symphony of the river, the trees, the rocks, the people all flowing under the brilliance of the sunset. A sensation that I have only ever known there at that instant enclosed my presence; I have simply described this saying that the Earth hugged me–wallowed up and wrapped its arms around me with the utter perfection of this moment.

Kyoto's Loving Arms on Marutamachidori

I entered Kyoto a broken, hobbling man, found something I had sought my entire life and carried on to seek its next treasure. Crossing this bridge I can only say that I was rewarded for my venture with an unfounded peace, and the absence of any pain or strife that I may have endured in arriving at that point. Japan’s warm summer winds from the southeast restored my faith in the reasons why I had gone there in the first place. As I said at Nijo-jo, seeing the elements of a culture made me better understand the people possessing the culture. On this bridge I knew that not only had the course of my future been affected, but I also held a greater admiration for my past and origins because had any one element in my life been different, then I may not have ever been here to see this myself. Kyoto became a part of me.

See Kyoto for its temples, palaces, castles, gardens, geishas and shops–but don’t forget to realize that the origins of all of those things stem from the very land itself.

Dorian “Doc” Paskowitz leads the sort of life that the weak ridicule, the mediocre lament and only the strong will attain. At face-value it may come across as an observation of zealous pride and cult-like elitism. As Stanford cum laude Medical graduate and the head of Hawaii’s American Medical Association, Doc chose at the height of all worldly and societal comforts to leave it behind for a soul-searching odyssey that ultimately gave him a third wife, nine children and a lifestyle of controversy and admonishment. His vessel on this quest–the surfboard.

After first introducing the art of surfing to the shores of Israel, one of his journey’s first stops, he came to the conclusion that his sexual ineffectiveness precipitated the loss of his first two wives. From that epiphany he set forth on a crusade of sexual mastery, learning new techniques (one in particular he labels as “life-changing”) and developing a “male deficiency quotient” system to rate women that he encountered. Upon taking his highest reading at a 93, he chooses a young woman from California and after an incredibly short courtship he proposes to a gladly-accepting bride-to-be.

In as short a time as anatomy would allow his wife is with-child and stays in said condition or nursing for the next ten years. His initial decree to her is that he would not be outdone by any monkey (or other primate) and so if it breast fed for two years than he would expect her to follow suit. With the children falling into order, so begins the wild chapters of the film–the rearing years, all housed in one form or another of a 24 ft. RV.

A Paskowitz family portrait in front of the RV

Surfing, true to its definition, becomes the only constant platform guiding the family through life’s waves of change. All of the children are taught to surf and the eat healthy, surf clean-live clean mantra becomes their code. Docs rules are absolute and simple, a demand to surf and a demand to stick to the family program–fireworks ensue.

Because of their perpetual movement and wave-chasing, the Paskowitz children were never formally schooled and didn’t necessarily exist in the “system.” Doc’s intention was to teach them the difference between knowledge and wisdom, the latter being the greater in his philosophy and therefore set out to give the children as many experiences as possible, thereby forging wisdom. The now-grown children reflect on this, at first with a resentment and ultimately with a gratitude for the irreplaceable memories. It’s beyond me to say if their upbringing is a viable crutch for their difficulties in reaching certain goals. Ultimately they all leave the 24′ nest for their own pursuits, all seemingly quite successful (by society’s standards). Only one son has chosen to replicate his childhood with his on progeny.

Adding raw gems of wisdom to the film is Dorian; commenting on true health (as opposed to the absence of illness), the healing power of the sea, human nature and the conquering of strife. Even beyond his high-brow education, he is a brilliant man and has the sort of grounded self-understanding that few can experience–even through someone else. His methods are his, pure and uncompromising; any substitute would be likened to blasphemy of his very being.

Admiring their unorthodoxy is not really my intent, however I do agree with one of the son’s in that people spend entire lives working, acquiring assets and preparing to live their ideal lives when this man was simply able to let go of everything and seize it, that spiritual utopia. I acknowledge and respect Dorian as a romanticist and someone who taught his children essential principles, but as paramount gave them his passion. In many of my other articles I’ve mentioned life priorities and how we actually allocate resources towards them. I think this man loves his family and surfing, hence they harness the finite energies of his life.

To learn more about the Paskowitz Family through their Surf Camp website>

The film hits me close to home considering my hometown of Salisbury, MD–also home to Perdue Chickens is featured in the film, though they declined comment. Unlike an uncouth PETA documentary, there are few shocking images trying to turn people away from carnivorous diets altogether but instead a focus on what created the monster factory farms in the first place–money.

Corn is the lifeblood of our modern, industrialized food industry and the film very thoroughly links farm subsidies in corn to the decrease in meat prices for consumers (but at what real cost?), saturation of corn-derivative products and even the increase in Mexican immigration when subsidized U.S. corn and NAFTA precipitated the unemployment of 1 million (yes million) once-employed in Mexico corn farmers. Meanwhile so many Americans are wondering why they don’t just find jobs in Mexico. They then had footage of a meat-packing company, who notoriously hires the immigrants in the U.S., instigating INS raids on their worker housing to deport unneeded, undocumented workers instead of offering due-diligence through layoffs.

Killing the appetite further is the legal aspect of the food system, from the protection of companies over the consumers, as seen in the denial of Kevin’s law (not me), to the veto of California’s GMO labeling act–shot down by Governor Schwarzenegger (shame on you Arnold). Putting a face to the names of these bastards, they listed several FDA and governmental decision-makers all making a direct transition to and from executive slots in the global food conglomerates. It’s nice to see the governmental regulators are watching out for our best interests.

Sowing the greatest seeds of wisdom in the film are by far the actual farmers, who thoroughly understand the nature of the proverbial shaft they’re being subjected to through the law of economic scales. One of the film’s traditional and organic farmers beautifully encapsulates our food system by saying that we have become a nation of technicians constantly asking “how” we are to achieve the next objective, but never considering “why” that may or may not be a good idea in the first place.

Being only 93 minutes, it doesn’t have the depth of each individual topic as King Corn does for corn production or In Defense of Food can for dietary revolutionaries, but it’s a palatable start and will hopefully act as a wake up call for the populace–people may even make the obvious connection that eating garbage will turn us into exactly that.

If you want to change to an unadulterated, nutrient-rich diet I suggest exploring realmilk.com and the Weston A. Price Foundation. Be warned the rabbit hole of information goes deep, but it just might save your life.

PS – Another thing the movie stated is that I could probably be sued for saying that factory-farmed food isn’t good for you. Bring it on : )

In Katano Japan, when your hosts asks if you can ride a motorbike, the answer is always YES – even if the last time you mounted such a steed it ended with you rolling across the pavement while watching your friend’s motorcycle skid by. Seeing true Japanese drifting in the mountains outside of Osaka is by far worth the risk.

Taking my word for it, Takashi and I sped off into the warm summer night in search of the infamous racing circuits. My transport, his father’s motorbike, ran beautifully all the way to the fuel depot–our first stop and just far enough to get my confidence up for the rest of the journey. Staying true to their formal and hospitable reputation, Japanese gas station attendants wear full-mechanic jumpsuits make quick work of filling up our small tanks. The scent of gasoline ignites my courage for the rest of the trip and certainly not taking time to chit-chat, we proceed.

With as much of a roar as our small bikes could muster, I followed Takashi through a few more winding roads–driving on the left for the first time in my life, until I could soon hear the whining screams of performance Japanese engines; I knew we must be close. Coming to a new, wider road ahead of us I could see the cars brooding, searching for the next race. We merged onto their path before pulling off to meet some other observers stationed on the opposite side of the road. Takashi spoke with them for a bit, far too fast for me to understand, and explained that the races were higher up the mountain and that if I wanted to go, we would have to ride our bikes on the track…

Knowing that I only live once, I agreed to go for it and we took off on our bikes, climbing steadily into the dark mountains. Suddenly from behind I could hear an approaching predator, fast and blaring with its electric blue headlights–our first visitor, passing us furiously to continue the circuit. Then came others, most far enough away to just be loud, one coming so close I feared the concussion would’ve put me into the grassy, gravel shoulder. But we persevered and reached a lookout point with the cars, and motorcycles, below.

I soon realized that the bikes, buzzing like turbo-injected hornets, were in a tight line formation and that only the lead bike had his headlights on! Takashi explained that headlights sap electrical engine power and so to add into the thrills–and to take a competitive edge, bike racers will turn off their lights when hot on the pack leader until they are able to overtake him. This shocked and bewildered me, and despite the inherent danger in this, I didn’t see stupidity, I saw bravery–the kind that isn’t exactly common in everyday modern life. It started to make many things about Japan make sense, the high regard of honor, saving face, and now these young men – the “swordless” Samurai, willing to perfect their craft above all costs…they inspired me.

Circuit racing, what I was observing, has apparently gained in popularity in these mountains over drifting because the police have studded the roads with reflective beacons to deter drifters from crossing the lanes (while sliding sideways). Now on many roads the goal has become having the fastest lap times, and not necessarily an actual overtaking victory. After a while more, Takashi and I decided to head home, it was after all late given my 2-hour delay in arriving to Hirakata-shi, not Hirahata as I mistakenly had done…

Taking a few pointers from my Japanese compatriots, I rode as fast as I could down the mountain roads even to the point of maxing out the bike (appx. 45mph). Admittedly–Takashi was a bit hard to keep up with. Everything was smooth sailing until close to his house there was what I saw to be a construction site on the road with strobes, flashers and men in reflective blue vests (actually a Japanese sobriety checkpoint). Takashi was stopped ahead of me and then allowed to pass, I cautiously rode up and after hearing something indistinguishable in Japanese I uttered “wakarimasen” (I don’t understand) and the officer chuckled “ahh…uhh…alcohol check…please blow here.” Though put off as an American by the involuntary breathalyzer, I was damn happy not to be arrested–Takashi later found out that I should have had an international driving permit to operate the motorbike. We arrived safely at his home and I ended what was one of the most incredible nights of my life–all possible only because I believed the idea that there’s a little Samurai in all of us.

My host, friend and motorbike guide - Takashi

Author’s notes: Takashi was a friend I met through HospitalityClub.org– a way to meet friends and gain free lodgings almost anywhere in the world. Katano, his town is nestled just east of the region between Kyoto and Osaka Japan. My stay with him included not only this biking adventure, but more motored tours to temples, towns and sushi spots–even a Japanese grocery store. None of it would’ve been possible without the generosity of him and his family. As for pictures, Tak and I agreed that camera flashes are not a good idea for midnight mountain racers.