Exactly this! Jarno, fancy a trip to Cuba in December for some mohitos?
Trans-Siberia, including stop in Baikal, thats my dream also. hope some day
Being the intrepid traveler that you are, "hope some day" probably means next month! You didn't already buy a ticket did you?
brennanphotoguy
Well-known
Yes, the Faroe Islands look beautiful. Definitely high on my list as well.
Calzone
Gear Whore #1
John,
I use to be fluent in Spanish, because I was married to a Costa Rican. Anyways we use to fight and argue all the time. Of course the appropriate language was Spanish.
I could read a newspaper and more or less understand the story, and my Spanish was so good that I didn't have the accent of a Gringo. LOL.
Interesting to know that the biggest Chinatown in the new world once was in Havana Cuba because of immigration restrictions in the U.S. that prevented citizenship.
Many Chinese worked the mines and built the railroads in Latin America. Anyways seems like we don't mind doing dangerous work.
When we hang let's force ourselves to speak Spanish. Too bad I don't speak Chinese. If I could speak English, Spanish and Chinese I would be able to talk with most of the world, or a very big part of it.
Today through lack of use my command of Spanish has diminished. I need to practice mucho.
Cal
giulio stucchi
Well-known
I have none.
BUT
I would like to have more time to go back to Milan (the city I grew up), Munich (where I spent part of my life) and Sofia (to show our daughter where mom's grew up).
Also on a photography perspective I do prefer familiar places.
I understand I am in minority on this thread (well, possibly the only one without a dream travel destination).
Should I visit a specialist?
Giulio
BUT
I would like to have more time to go back to Milan (the city I grew up), Munich (where I spent part of my life) and Sofia (to show our daughter where mom's grew up).
Also on a photography perspective I do prefer familiar places.
I understand I am in minority on this thread (well, possibly the only one without a dream travel destination).
Should I visit a specialist?
Giulio
jarski
Veteran
Exactly this! Jarno, fancy a trip to Cuba in December for some mohitos?
Being the intrepid traveler that you are, "hope some day" probably means next month! You didn't already buy a ticket did you?
Hehe no tickets yet, Cuba nor Siberia
Weather in Cuba would be it's prime in December
Background of that pic is that I had just arrived Havana for the first time, and was sipping cuba libre in a small bar near Capitolio. Soon ten guys marched in and asked mohitos for the group. Bartender then got busy!
Let's make a point to hang once you get back. Though, we won;t be talking much if we speak in Spanish. We have too interesting of conversations for those restrictions.
True.
mcfingon
Western Australia
I went to Bhutan in 2014, traveling on a Royal Enfield motorbike, and would like to go to Tibet next. The Buddhist Himalayan kingdom's people and location have an exotic fascination for an Australian photography enthusiast used to nearly standard western culture and thousands of kilometres of mostly flat land.
Calzone
Gear Whore #1
John,
July got booked up fast. I have to make some time to catch up with friends like you. I also have to head out to Long Island to visit my musician friends.
I got on that call list at Leica to get my sensor replaced on my Monochrom. Expected to take about 3 months, but in the meantime I'm still using it. In February 2017 the Monochrom will be 4 years old.
At my age it seems like a decade is no longer a long period of time because time goes by so fast. Anyways in the spirit of this thread the time to live your dreams is now. Basically don't hold back and live life passionately I say. In the 70's we lived like there was no tomorrow. The times I grew up with impacted my lifestyle, and I'm glad I am living a life where I took every chance I could, embraced risk, and I maxed out in an extreme way.
I have lived no boring ordinary life. No regrets.
Cal
mcfingon
Western Australia
This quote seems good for motorcyclists and any other adventurers:
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!"
Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!"
Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967
Lauffray
Invisible Cities
That's always seemed fascinating to me, I'm at the point now where a year seems a pretty short time.
Nothing beats chatting with native speakers when it comes to learning a language, except maybe full immersion
Calzone
Gear Whore #1
When I was younger I had the ambition to race the Baja 1000 in the 250cc motorcycle class. The dream was to race in the smaller class of motorcycle to take advantage of my small build, and the goal was just to finish.
I am now 58 years old, but when I was 49 I had the opportunity to run the NYC Marathon "off the couch." Basically a friend at work, an elite marathon runner, had overtrained, had gotten sick, and offered me his bib on a Friday before the Sunday race.
So I only had one full day to get ready to run a marathon, and really had done no training. My gal was worried that I would end up like the legend: run 26.4 miles and die at the finish line. It just so happened that that Saturday that an Olympic Trials was scheduled in Central Park and a world class athlete collapsed and died while trying to secure his spot on the U.S. Olympic team. I had to promise my gal that I just wanted to finish.
But that all changed on the Statin Island Ferry ride heading to the start when I met this stoner who offered me some hash brownies (his fuel of choice to run a marathon) because he told me that if I completed the race under 5 hours I would get my name published in the New York Times Marathon Special Edition.
Because earlier in life I raced bicycles (road and mountain) something triggered me to race, and my new goal was to finish under 5 hours even if it killed me. Because I was once an endurance athlete I was not in bad shape, but my longest runs were only about 6-7 miles.
Anyways the RFID that was tracking my race progress made my gal aware that I was racing, and when I ran up to her on the corner of South 3rd Street and Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg Brooklyn my time was under two hours and the halfway point in Greenpoint was not far away.
In Greenpoint I made a very serious mistake and stopped for 6 minutes to use a Porta-Potty. I figured that this would be my last chance before heading into Madhattan, but meanwhile my lactic acid levels spiked. On the 59th Street Bridge I knew that the second half marathon would be all about pain and how close I could get to seizing up from cramps, while somehow continuing to move forward.
If I hadn't stopped I likely would have finished around 4 hours, but all these hallucinations started happening towards the end. I saw a sign that said "Finish Line 4 Miles" in Central Park, but then I saw that same sign a second time. I cursed to myself, saying "M-F'er Central Park isn't that big," but the time was now to run as fast as I could to make the time under 5 hours. I just had to push past the pain and discomfort.
I didn't find out if I finished under 5 hours until the following week. I beat the clock by 26 seconds. My friend is Southeast Asian, and his first and last name is 26 letters. The day after the marathon I could not walk, but it was one of those peak moments in one's life that you count on your fingers.
Funny how life gets played out.
Cal
Calzone
Gear Whore #1
That's always seemed fascinating to me, I'm at the point now where a year seems a pretty short time.
Nothing beats chatting with native speakers when it comes to learning a language, except maybe full immersion
Jerome,
Now that I'm in my late 50's it seems that a decade is not a long time and that perhaps I only have a few decades left.
Anyways in life full immersion it seems is the way to go in everything. "Go big: or don't go," Mark Cuban said.
Too much mediocrity in the world if you ask me. Anything crazy is worth doing. In the end you don't want regrets. "Wise men never wish they were younger."
Cal
Lauffray
Invisible Cities
I totally agree with this, playing it safe is boring. I meant full immersion more literally though, as in go spend a few weeks in Chile where you'd be "forced" to speak only Spanish. The weeks I spent in Latin America were much more educational and useful than any book or course I'd ever taken
Roger Hicks
Veteran
Dear Cal,
Nor do they make insupportable generalizations.
I'd like to be younger (better health, in an era when there was more properly paid work for more journalists) but if I were I'd do much the same as I did when I was younger.
The trouble is that it's very hard to imagine ourselves at any given younger age right now. At a vernissage recently, I was talking about exactly this with the daughter of an acquaintance: she's studying her prépa, a sort of ultra-high-pressure two-year sandwich between school and university to qualify for admission to the Grandes Ecoles. You need to be very clever and very hard working to complete your prépa.
We talked about the nature of an economy of plenty (Galbraith), the nature of capitalism (Ha-Joon Chang), the importance of randomness and survivor bias (Taleb), and how much is enough (Skidelsky father and son). We also talked about how the world changes, a point which all too many people ignore: they think only of changes in themselves. As I pointed out, if I were to imagine meeting her when our ages were similar, I'd be imagining meeting her in (say) 1968 because I can't really imagine being in my 'teens in 2016. She was minus 30 years old in the late sixties. Or as my sort-of-adopted daughter said some years ago, "You've been 18 but I haven't been 58". She was born on my 40th birthday.
Grandes Ecoles: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandes_écoles
Prépa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classe_préparatoire_aux_grandes_écoles
To bring the post back on topic, I was taking to the young lady in question at the 2016 Arles Rencontres, which is somewhere EVERY serious photographer should go, as often as possible (July every year).
Arles 2010: http://www.rogerandfrances.com/subscription/arles 2010.html
Cheers,
R.
oftheherd
Veteran
I've mentioned before that about 1978, my wife and I, and two cats, traveled from Ft Knox, KY, to NW Missouri, then through Nebraska to S. Dakota, across Wyoming, cutting the corners of Montana and Idaho into Yellowstone NP. From there to Salt Lake, a stop at Bryce, then to the Grand Canyon North Rim. Up to the four corners and indian fried bread, and the cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde. Across Wolf Creek Pass into Colorado Springs and up Pikes Peak, then across the Kansas plains to NW Missouri, and back to Ft Know. All in a VW camper and in about 3 weeks. Saw petrified forests, dinosaur museums, mountains, the Great Salt Lake, Coral Desert, and more. Hard trip but fun. It was especially hard for my wife, who is Korean. She had no idea a car could drive so many miles without swimming in the ocean. I wouldn't mind doing it again taking more time, not so sure about the wife.
As to Vietnam, surprising to me to see so many people want to go there. I was fortunate to get an all expenses paid vacation there for 4 years in the late 60s and early 70s. Just can't understand everyone wanting to go there. But many of us used to say it was a beautiful country if there hadn't been a war on. And it was. And to this day I really enjoy Vietnamese coffee.
I wouldn't mind doing it again taking more time, not so sure about the wife. As to Vietnam, surprising to me to see so many people want to go there. I was fortunate to get an all expenses paid vacation there for 4 years in the late 60s and early 70s. Just can't understand everyone wanting to go there.
But many of us used to say it was a beautiful country if there hadn't been a war on. And it was. And to this day I really enjoy Vietnamese coffee.Calzone
Gear Whore #1
Roger,
I was not making a generalization: it was a quote that has become a colloquialism that I think you misunderstood.
To me age is a state of mind, and the idea I was implying is to live life fully without regrets.
"Wise men never wish they were younger" really is about not having regret as one ages, not about thinking one was younger. Basically it is about not wasting your youth.
Cal
Calzone
Gear Whore #1
I walk to work to save a $2.75 bus or subway fare. Believe it or not this helps support my photography. Today on 1st Avenue and 92d Street on top of a mailbox I find a black hardcover book about a square foot in size. The Title is "Key West Color" by Alan S. Maltz.
Anyways it is a first edition...
Key West is another interesting place. I will add it to my list.
Anyways lately I been feeling "divine intervention" of course which I cannot prove is the case. Too many chance events happen to me that is beyond luck; things that are not suppose to happen; all beyond coincidence.
Anyways perhaps I was destine to wander, perhaps not lost...
Cal
Anyways it is a first edition...
Key West is another interesting place. I will add it to my list.
Anyways lately I been feeling "divine intervention" of course which I cannot prove is the case. Too many chance events happen to me that is beyond luck; things that are not suppose to happen; all beyond coincidence.
Anyways perhaps I was destine to wander, perhaps not lost...
Cal
Nothing beats chatting with native speakers when it comes to learning a language, except maybe full immersion
Kind of a generalization and not everyone learns the same way. I need to see things to learn. Auditory learning is harder for me.
I see where you are coming from... However, when your skills are so poor that you can't understand what someone is saying, full immersion is futile and people's patience will fade quickly. I speak to this woman every day, but she's trying to perfect her English so we speak in English. However, once I get some basics down, I'll speak to her more in Spanish.
Calzone
Gear Whore #1
John,
In one Spanish class I took we were forced to speak only in Spanish, and if we spoke any English we were fined $0.05 as a penalty.
This type of situation forced people to really struggle, but it also taught everyone to be patient with themselves, and it created a safe place where it was a level playing field for everyone because we all struggled together.
Mark Cuban also said, "Go big: or don't go." Then again full immersion is the hard way, but with speedier results IMHO.
Cal
Roger Hicks
Veteran
Dear Cal,
Sorry. It is not a colloquialism I had previously encountered, which is why I mistook your meaning.
Cheers,
R.