jra's thoughts

Category: Travel

  • Just Married

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    jra
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    I’ve been away from the web for a while because I was in Olivone, Ticino, Switzerland getting married! Thanks to friends and family who came from so far away to witness such a special day. And thanks also to our wonderful vendors, who made the day go so well. If you are thinking of putting…

  • Comparing Geographical Sizes

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    A long time ago I thought it would be fun to open two windows and see two things on Google Maps next to each other. That way, I could compare the sizes of them. But getting the scale set the same on both maps was not easy. Wouldn’t it be neat if the scale of…

  • Vanity Fair on Iceland

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    I became aware of Iceland’s bankruptcy through a curious route. A local geek mailing list had a posting from a friend of one of the guys on the list. She was Icelandic, and she was really in distress — able to understand how serious the situation was, unable to understand it at the same time,…

  • Landlords – Les Propriétaires

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    This posting on Boing Boing reminded me of something I wanted to mention about Switzerland. Though I sometimes makes it sound like heaven, with beautiful Swiss girls begging to marry you, cows that give chocolate milk when you milk them, and every man with an assault rifle, that’s not the whole truth. Swiss landlords are…

  • Malaria Medicine Advice

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    A friend sent me this question: Speaking of healthy, when you’re in Africa, do you take malaria medication the whole time you’re there? Is 45 days too long to take it? First, taking it 45 days is no big deal. It’s taking it for months on end (9, 18, 60) that is not recommended —…

  • An Interview with a DVD-man

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    Rare is the dinner in an expat restaurant in Africa which is not (politely and quietly) interrupted by a DVD-man. They have a stock of DVD’s in their backpacks, and work their way through the restaurant giving you a chance to peruse their wares. You have to see the DVDs to believe them, they are…

  • Too Much Travel is Bad for the Soul

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    There’s an interesting little nugget of reality near the end of the first page of Ask the Pilot this week: If I have grown more cynical in recent years, it is travel, I think, that has pushed me in this direction. Exploring other parts of the world is beneficial in all the ways it is…

  • Atomium

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    Today I had the afternoon free so I went to Atomium. Here are the pictures I made there.

  • Debugging our way around Sumatra

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    I last wrote from Padang, where we were looking into the state of the technology and looking to see if NGOs responding to the earthquake there needed help with it. What we found is that the technology needs were well in hand, either because the needs were not dire or because people had what they…

  • Hello Pandang, Indonesia

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    So I have neglected to write an update for a very long time. Here’s a tiny update to give you a taste of things to come in the next few weeks. I got back from Morocco and settled into my home away from home in Switzerland. I met Marina, a former coworker from MSF who…