Back in Japan!

Greetings from 30,000 feet or so above the Pacific Ocean just east of Japan (the pilot just told everybody on the right side of the plane, which does not include me, that they can see Mt. Fuji). I’m on a Singapore Airlines flight heading from Tokyo’s Haneda Airport to Singapore on the second leg of another one of my two week Asia tours. I’ve been in Japan for the past four days and have this vague feeling that I’m going the wrong way, ha; I saw planes from American and Delta Airlines near my gate and just wanted to yell ‘Take me with you!!!’ Still, every trip has new experiences and this one includes flying with Singapore Airlines which, last time I paid attention, was rated one of the top airlines in the world for service. Unfortunately, I think that may be synonymous with ‘not having any flight attendants over the age of 30’; makes me wonder if it’s only middle-aged business traveling men voting for these things. Oh wait, that will be me in a few years. Nevermind.

It’s 6.5 hours or so to Singapore which gives me some primo time to get my travel thoughts down. So here goes:

I started my trip with a new blunder: I didn’t book the proper day for my shuttle. Rather than have Super Shuttle pick me up at the house on Monday, June 18 at 5:15am, I had scheduled it for Wednesday, JULY 18 at 5:15am. Of course, I didn’t realize this until calling Super Shuttle at 5:45 wondering where my van was.

Ooh...maybe Singapore Airlines deserves the high marks after all. I’ve just been handed, for the first time ever in my flying career I think, a breakfast menu. I have a choice of salmon, vegetables and rice or baked egg with bacon, beans, mushrooms and potatoes. Since I’m in Asia, I think it’s more likely they do a better job with their salmon than their ‘Western’ breakfast. And if I want, I can wash it down with a Singapore Sling cocktail (I think I’ll stick with water thanks).

Anyway, it was actually Jennifer, who was waiting up with me while the Kid slumbered, who realized my shuttle error. So in about seven minutes we had the Kid up and at ‘em and him and the pooch loaded in the minivan for an early morning cruise to Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (it’s int’l only because there are flights to and from Cancún, Mexico). Since there is zero traffic in Austin at 6 in the morning and my flight didn’t leave until 7:35, I knew we were good. And so it was. It stunk for Jennifer to have to drive me but from my perspective, a goodbye said at the airport is a million times better than the goodbye in the living room of your house when it’s dark outside, you’re trying to be quiet so as not to wake your son and the Super Shuttle is waiting for you. Plus Jennifer was already packed up to take the Kid and Pooch to Dallas to stay with my in-laws and the Kid wakes up at 6am anyway so it wasn’t too much of a hassle for them.

The other good thing about that goodbye was that I think for the first time the Kid truly gets the fact that I’m traveling on an airplane and won’t be back for a while. He knows what an airplane is (we’ve been tracking the ones that arrive from points north and fly over our house for maybe the past year) and now has definitely made the connection that I’ll be on one. That and Jennifer shows him on the map where his daddy is. Actually, Jennifer told me he actually looks up in the sky in Dallas and talks to the airplanes that fly overhead like I’m on them. Awesome.

I arrived at my gate in plenty of time to catch my American Airlines flight to Los Angeles Int’l Airport (LAX). I say this all the time but I love Austin-Bergstrom for the very reason it’s easy in and easy out. No crowds and on nice days that I park my car I can actually walk to the airport. The downside is that it’s more difficult to get direct flights but there seem to be more and more popping up everyday (now you can fly direct to Washington, DC, yay). Yes, these are the things the near middle-aged business traveler thinks about.

 I love flying west because the scenery is better and the likelihood of cloud cover blocking your view is much, much lower since there is so much less precipitation. The travel agents for work had done their magic again and hooked me up with a window seat just behind the wing, the place I like to be, so I had an awesome view of the 2.5 hour or so uneventful flight. Unusually for me, I didn’t try to talk to my seatmate until we had landed. He was actually a pilot for DHL who lives in Austin but was about to chill out for 12 hours in LA then fly a plane to Leipzig, Germany, hang out for 30 hours, fly another plane to somewhere in Asia (I forget), then fly back to LAX. He works usually 20 days straight with 11 days off. See, it’s people like that (and of course soldiers on deployment) that keep me from complaining about being away from my family so much. But at the same time, it’s the career you choose, you know?

Anyway, the DHL pilot also has a two year old son which of course made me think of the Kid. I’ve reached a stage now that I enjoy seeing other peoples’ kids, regardless of age. Quite often it brings a smile to my face. I don’t remember if I used to be jealous when I saw people with their kids while on my trips but I know that back in the pre-childless and even pre-marriage days when Jennifer and I were going out I would be envious when I saw boyfriend/girlfriend and husband/wife pairs, particularly the closer in age they were to me. WHY ARE YOU ABLE TO BE WITH YOUR LOVED ONE AND ENJOY THIS BEAUTIFUL PLACE TOGETHER WHEN I HAVE TO ENJOY IT BY MYSELF?!!!! Sigh. I’m over that now. I’m just thankful I’m there to enjoy the beautiful place in the first place though, as those of you who’ve been reading me for a while, I purposely avoid the super awesome places like, say, the Louvre in Paris so that I can save the experience for when Jennifer and I are there together (or maybe with the kids though of course the three most boring hours of my life were spent at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art when I was 11 years old).

I had a three hour layover in LAX before catching my flight to Tokyo’s Narita Airport. The airline was going to be my old buddies at Korea Air which, if you’ve read my prior material, you may remember that I flew on my last Asia trip. I get a kick out of their baby blue planes and friendly staff, even if none of the female flight attendants are older than 26 and it’s kind of creepy how they all have their hair rolled up tight in a bun with a little baby blue ribbon/pin/thingy in the back.

I had another window seat for the Korea flight, this time right on the wing so I couldn’t see much of the ground. This wasn’t a problem for the flight since we were going to be going mostly over the ocean. There’s nothing to see when you’ve over the ocean except usually clouds so no worries there. I also had something even more important: my old friend Ambien. Ambien is the only sleeping pill that works on me and I was excited to have a stash again. Ecstatic. I had slept terribly the night before and was determined not to stay awake the whole flight to Tokyo (which would arrive around 3pm Tokyo time). Once we had reached cruising altitude, I popped one. Used to be I’d warn the person sitting next to me but this time I chose not to do so lest the person, a middle-aged American guy, think I was nuts. I love Ambien so much, we might name the next kid that, boy or girl.

I waited five minutes, put in my earplugs, put on my eye mask, wrapped a blanket around my neck and waited for Mr. Sandman. And waited. And waited. After maybe ten minutes of feeling foolish, I figured it wasn’t going to work and took everything off. Dinner came by and, even though I didn’t feel hungry, I took the tray. Here’s what I remember after that:

Telling the flight attendant that I didn’t want her to take away my dinner tray, even though I hadn’t touched it.

Opening my eyes to find the dinner tray was gone.

Holy smokes, it worked! I’d been out for about four hours which was absolutely awesome for an eleven hour flight. It doesn’t sound like much but I knew that would be enough to get me through the rest of the day without significant tiredness and would allow me to sleep once I was in Japan. I hope I hadn’t done anything crazy while I was asleep...

I spent the rest of the flight watching three movies: Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows, The Secret of Arrietty (the new Hayao Miyazaki animated film) and an Australian movie called Tracker (which could have been a Western and was quite good). After we landed I decided to apologize to the guy next to me in case I’d done anything strange. He said nothing except for the...

 Oops, breakfast time! Let’s see how this goes.

Yum, salmon for breakfast. Konnichiwa!

So the guy next to me told me I didn’t want to give the flight attendant my dinner but she came by after a few minutes and took it anyway since I was zonked out. The guy had seen me take the pill and, having been a sleeping pill user himself in his earlier days, sympathized. He’d decided to stay up the whole trip, something I usually do. He said I didn’t do anything else weird and I have to believe him. Anyway, I have a 1am-6am flight coming up from Singapore to Shanghai when I’ll make use of the Ambien again for sure.

Tokyo was enveloped in clouds and fog from 35,000 feet pretty much down to a minute or two before landing. Those kind of descents are always interesting as you pass through multiple layers of clouds and thankfully, for my turbulence-phobic self, rarely bumpy. And presto, I’d returned to Tokyo.

It had been four and a half years since my first and only previous visit to Tokyo or Japan in general actually. I remembered a few things about it:

- it was exceptionally clean
- there were tons of people but it never felt stressed like New York City does
- I love listening to people speak Japanese because everybody always sounds so happy
- Better be prepared to eat a lot of fish

After four days there, I have now added to my level of knowledge and my experiences. But first, some vocabulary:
- Hai! (must always be said with an exclamation mark)
– Yes - Eea (sounds like eee-ee ay)
– No - Subarashii – wonderful
- San – Mr or Mrs. My name in Japanese would be Beck san.
- Meegee – right (as in, turn right here Cab Driver san)
- Hirodi (I think) – left
- Dai jobe – ok/whatever (I really wish they were two different words)
- Campai – Cheers!
- Oosoi – you’re late! As in
  o Me to Nishimura san who had arrived late to a business dinner: “Nishimura san! Subarashii!”
  o Japanese Customer who does not really speak English and had consumed a rather large beer and two glasses of what must have been sake: “No. Nishimura san, oosoi!”
  o Me: “What does that mean?”
  o Japanese Customer: “Nishimura san, you are late!”
  o (all laugh uproariously)
- Sayonara – good-bye. Problem is I’m used to hearing sayonara in action movies right before somebody kills somebody else. I prefer to use the other acceptable term: bye-bye.
- Darvish – Beck san, you are from Texas!
  o For those who don’t get the reference, Yu Darvish is the half Iranian, half Japanese superstar pitcher who recently left his Japan league team to pitch for the Texas Rangers.
  o After asking people what they thought about good Japan league players leaving the league to go to Major League Baseball, the reply was most people are happy because usually the player plays for a competing team, eh.

It’s funny because this trip is my first to Japan where I really needed to be the consummate professional/international businessman. This means being able to do the following:

- Dress the part. For a man, this means black slacks, white shirt and preferably a black suit jacket. I swear I was the only businessperson in downtown Tokyo wearing a green polo. Though to be fair, I suppose downtown New York or downtown Washington, DC are the same way.
- Bow properly. This is not as easy as you think because I don’t always know when to bow. I know to do it when greeting someone but exactly when? It’s easier with a handshake because with a handshake, you have to shake hands at the same time. With a bow, it’s like synchronized swimming because you need to bow at the same time but not touch each other (ouch). But then comes the question of how low to bow? If you’re in sales and you’re talking to a customer, your upper body almost needs to be parallel to the ground. But what about meeting a service provider? And do I look at the ground or look at the person? Bowing can be fun but when it really means something it’s a bit more serious.
- Clinking glasses properly while saying ‘Cheers’ (campai!). When you clink glasses, the most senior person’s glass is supposed to be higher. Well, was I the highest because I had Director in my title? Good thing as an American obviously a bit new to Japan I was being cut some slack. Or was I?
- Giving and receiving business cards. In the US, it’s easy because you give with one hand and take with your free hand. I do it without any second thoughts. But in Japan, you have to use two hands AND bow. Holy smokes. Even without the bowing, it’s tricky to extend the card holding it with two hands while the other person does the same, then seamlessly take their card while they are taking yours. Sometimes while you have your other business cards that you have to give to everyone else in the meeting tucked in your palm. I never figured it out while I was in Japan but eventually I did, even though Singapore and China don’t require the bowing and sometimes not even both hands.
- And I’m sure there are a lot of little things I don’t know about but I should at least be aware of. I’ll learn.

OK, now I’m in the Shanghai Airport waiting for my Korean Air flight to Seoul. I’ll get to that later in the travelogue but now, back to Japan!

I did get to do some sight-seeing while I was in Tokyo on the Saturday before flying out. I strolled out of my hotel around 8:30am for a walk around the city, at least places within walking distance of my hotel. Tokyo is such an awesome city due to its cleanliness and quiet traits which are seemingly hard to find in such a big, crowded place. Plus it just feels like there is a lot of culture while walking on the streets, whether from tall buildings, little apartments tucked away in corners, baseball fields in small spaces surrounded by fences that must be ten stories tall and children’s playgrounds that each have their own personality. It’s quite difficult to describe how I felt while walking around but mainly I was at peace, enjoying this city as much as I could as a visitor while thankful that I didn’t have to live there. Anyway, if you’re reading this, you’ve seen the photos on Facebook.

The one notable thing was that, for the first time in my traveling career, I had to take a taxi to complete a walk. Not only did I end up way far away from where I thought I was, I had to meet an old friend from my previous job at 1pm back near my hotel. At 12:45 I realized that wherever I was, I wasn’t anywhere close to where I needed to be and hailed a cab. And so it goes. I knew it would happen sometime but seriously, every walk I’ve ever taken in any city has always been a loop where I’ve managed to get back to my hotel. Usually though I’m not on a deadline so I’ll use that as an excuse.

My old buddy Manabu, who I hadn’t seen in 4.5 years until the night before when we met for dinner at an awesome little Japanese restaurant, was going to take me on a bus tour of Tokyo and a Japanese bathhouse. The bus tour was really more of a sight-seeing tour of a couple of local sights. We first went up in the 40 story tall World Trade Center to get a 360 degree view of downtown. Then we went to the Emperor’s Palace which actually is more accurately termed the Emperor’s Compound since you can’t get inside the walls to see the actual palace (the Emperor himself only emerges to be seen by the general public on his birthday, Dec. 23, and Jan 2). After that we went to a major Bhuddist temple which was crowded with people but quite interesting to check out, particularly for the rituals associated with good luck and curing ailments (which included have your affected body part touched by incense smoke).

Afterward we took a cruise down the river to the harbor with tons of other local tourists. One note about the tour: this was the first time I can remember ever being with a tour group led by someone carrying around a little flag on a small pole such that everyone in the group knew where he was and where we were going. There are three types of tour groups:
1. Tour groups with a guide but no discernible connection other than they’re standing in a group following one person who is usually walking backwards.
2. Group 1 but the person walking backwards has a flag.
3. Group 2 but they’re all wearing an identical article of clothing such as a t-shirt or hat.

Thank you Manabu for not booking a Group 3 tour.

After the bus tour, Manabu and I hopped a train to the Japanese bathhouse, called an ‘oosen’. The train was a monorail that took us on a bridge over Tokyo Bay to a spit of land that looked like it had been constructed of dirt fill quite recently. It was perfectly flat with buildings spaced widely apart, including the bathhouse. My image of a bathhouse was something tucked away in a back alley with 17th century architecture. This bathhouse was more of the Schlitterbahn of bath houses, catering expressly to families and groups. I didn’t care; I wanted to experience what the Japanese experience, even if it didn’t require any clothing. Here are the e-mails between Manabu and I about the subject:

 Manabu: Japanese Hot-Spring theme park (http://www.ooedoonsen.jp/higaeri/english/index.html) This is in tokyo and it took around 30min from Hamamatsu-cho station. I've been there once and there's entertainment besides Onsen as well and that is pretty fun. You can wear Japanese Yukata (kind of kimono) and feel Japanese old festival style.
Me: Excellent! If we’re going to use the baths, I brought my swimsuit.
Manabu: In Japan, basically, we cannot wear swimsuit in the Baths. So if you don't wanna take bath, probably it would be better that we can try one day bus trip instead of half day.

Let me say that I enjoyed the bathhouse immensely. I would go back at the first opportunity, solely for how relaxed I felt while I was there. It was a little strange of course but I’m not lying when I say it was totally family friendly. Let me explain.

You enter the bathhouse (I did not take any photos of course so you’ll have to be dependent on my descriptions) through a main door into a lobby. Off to your left are lockers, at the far end is a spot where people are being handed kimonos. Down the way is a desk where you pay. And in the middle, not unlike a movie theater lobby, is a queue where you wait to pay. We had arrived at 5:50 and sat here with many others to await the discounted evening rate to begin at 6. There were all sorts of people there. There were families with little children, teenagers in groups, boyfriend/girlfriend combos and random Japanese of all ages. I counted maybe four white-skinned people, all men between the ages of 20 and 40, the whole time I was there. Excellent.

The first step actually upon entering the bathhouse is to remove your shoes and place them in the lockers in the lobby. Yes, just your shoes. So everybody gets to see your nappy socks and nasty feet, ha! You take your locker key and other belongings and deposit your credit card with the clerks. You are then handed a bracelet with barcode on it and a key attached (it rotates into a hidden fold in the bracelet). After putting the bracelet on, we headed to the back of the lobby to select a kimono. Yep, even as a guy I was going to wear a kimono. Awesome. There were three designs to choose from so of course I chose the most silly-looking, one with a fat samurai wrestling a huge fish on the back.

 With our folded kimonos in our arms, Manabu and I proceeded through a curtain into the men’s locker room. In there, we found our lockers, stripped down to our underwear and put on our kimonos. Manabu tied my sash for me (the sash is seriously like ten feet long) and out we went into the main area, still with our key/barcode bracelets but wrapped up in our cool kimonos.

The main area is a bit like the mini-bazaar, complete with little booths to buy trinkets, a food court, two different small stages for performers and stalls for games not unlike you’d see at an amusement park. The atmosphere at the point though was totally Japanese bathhouse with dark lighting, a lowish ceiling and fake wood walls. Oh, and probably five hundred people walking around wearing identical kimonos. We would eat later; it was time to take a bath!

In order to take a bath, you have to get third locker. This time we went into the bath locker room (for men) and fully stripped down, taking a locker key to hang on your wrist and leaving your barcode/key bracelet behind. And your underwear. And your kimono.

Disclaimer: For those who don’t want to hear me wax ecstatic about being nude in public, please skip down a few paragraphs to the spot marked ‘IT’S OK TO READ NOW’. And for those on the fence, Jennifer has already edited this whole blog to keep me from completely embarrassing myself.

 Now, for my own posterity, I’ll wax on nudity. I’ve been using men’s locker rooms for time out of mind and walking around without clothes is just a thing you do. You don’t usually make eye contact with strangers though and you don’t look down except when necessary to make sure you don’t trip over a bar of soap. It doesn’t bother me. I’ve always felt that I could go to Hippie Hollow and as long as I knew no one was taking pictures I’d be good. Yet, I don’t have the urge to go naked in public so I’ve never been. Anyway, we were all born naked and the human body is the human body so it doesn’t bother me.

Back to the locker room. Now, you’re not entirely without cover. A washcloth is provided to you to take into the bath. It is large enough to sufficiently cover yourself. I decided that I would show that this American has nothing to hide. So with the washcloth held loosely at my side, I walked into the bath.

There are several steps before entering the actual baths. First, you have to wash yourself off a bit at a trough using a bowl. I never asked Manabu if it was ceremonial or not because the next step was to take a shower. Yep, a shower. And not just any shower: a seated shower. There were two rows of little stalls with low mirrors, bath soaps and stools to sit on. Thankfully the showerheads were on a cord so, after feeling awkward for about ten seconds while trying to wash myself while seated, I said to heck with it and stood up. Most people were still seated but to each his own.

Once the shower was done we could get into the tubs. There were several rather large ones to choose from. There was a slightly elevated one under a little roof. There was a bigger one level with the floor. There was one off to the side with little jets of water shooting out of the walls. There was one outside in a little walled compound set to look like a real Japanese garden (complete with rocks and everything in and around the bath). And there was even a cold one to sit in but it could only hold about six people without rubbing against each other.

There were lots of males in the bath. I only caught a couple of them looking up as I walked in but really, who doesn’t look up when there is movement sometimes? Manabu and I would chill out in one of the hot tubs for 5-10 minutes (I wasn’t trying to keep track of time), then we’d move to another one. It was so humid in the house I started to sweat, even though I was up to my neck in the hot water (at about 104 degrees it was quite hot), so we moved outside where the nighttime temperature was in the low 70s. That was quite nice so we stayed there for a while. Then we moved inside again and I alternated between the hot tubs and the cold tub (which at 68 degrees felt like it was about 36 but felt really, really good once you were in it). We were in there for at least an hour and it was awesome.

One last comment: when you’re in a jacuzzi with a swimsuit on, well, there are some parts of you that the water doesn’t get to. This is not the case in a Japanese bath house :)


IT’S OK TO READ NOW!!!!!!


When we left the bath, we showered (not together) and put on our underwear and kimonos again. We ate a nice little Japanese dinner in the food court with all of the other patrons (all wearing the six available styles of kimonos, three for each gender). Then we hit the doctor fish. What are doctor fish, you ask? They’re fish that eat your dead skin. Awesome. Manabu and I entered this little hut that had a shallow, square-shaped and recessed tank that was just large enough to hold sixteen people seated on the edges and just deep enough so that the water went to the middle of your calves. And then these little fish swam over and started nibbling on my feet. It felt really tingly at first but after that felt kind of good. The funny thing was that my feet had about five times as many fish on them as anybody else, so much that about every two minutes or so the other six people in the hut would chuckle simultaneously (the first time they did I responded with a perfectly-timed shrug and ‘Sorry’). Here’s a link with more info and a photo: http://health.howstuffworks.com/skin-care/problems/treating/doctor-fish.htm

I can’t say if it made my feet look nicer or cleaner but it definitely was relaxing.

After the doctor fish session we chilled out in the foot bath, basically an outdoor Japanese garden with a fake little stream running through it. You could sit on the edge and soak just your feet in the hot water. If you wanted to truly relax, or so the signs said, you could walk the length of the stream which was maybe fifty feet. The problem was that the bottom was embedded with polished stones sticking straight up which HURT to walk on. Manabu and I gave up after about five feet.

After the foot bath, it was 9pm and time for us to get back to town since my flight the next morning would leave at 6:25am. Manabu and I took the train to a station close to the hotel, I walked with him to his train station, we parted ways and I was off to walk another half mile or so in the dark. It’s always wonderful seeing old friends and visiting places you enjoy but it’s also always bittersweet to leave. At least on business trips to multiple places you get used to saying goodbye. And with my job being the way it is, being truly responsible for trade compliance around the world for the company and being in the weeds everywhere, I’ll be back sooner than later (though hopefully not too soon...I need to be home for the arrival of the next kid).

Taiwan, China and Korea Over Thirteen Days or So

Hello everyone...I’m sitting in the international terminal of Shanghai Pudong airport on a hazy Saturday morning awaiting Korean Air flight 894 to board in an hour or so. I’m about halfway through a thirteen day jaunt over to this part of the world to assess what’s going on in the company’s Taiwan, China and South Korea offices from a trade compliance perspective, my first visit over here for the company and my first since November 2009. From a professional standpoint it’s good to be back but from a personal standpoint, I miss my wife, son, psycho pooch and garden.

I count the beginning of the trip on the day before Thanksgiving when the fam and I packed up the car and drove to my in-laws in Dallas. After a nice peaceful Thanksgiving holiday, I woke up early Saturday morning to catch a 10:50am flight from Dallas-Ft. Worth Int’l Airport to Seoul, South Korea. For the first time ever I was sick to my stomach the night before the flight; something I ate I suppose. I had visions of a fifteen hour flight with the air sickness bag inches from my face. Thankfully in the morning I was feeling a lot better and thus not faced with the decision of whether to get on the flight or not.

I’d never flown with Korean Air before and was looking forward to it (yes, I’m now an airline dork). Air travel can be a bit monotonous, particularly with US carriers like American, United and Delta that I’m so familiar with, so it’s nice to see some fresh faces and aircraft livery. And Korean Air paints their planes with a light shade of blue that I don’t know how to describe but is pretty unique. As is my preference, I had a window seat near the wing that offered me a view of the ground. There was an empty seat next to me which was quite nice and my other seatmate, an American who does training for Hilton Hotels and was on her way to Manila, Philippines, seemed to be of the same mind of getting up every couple of hours to stretch your legs (which seems to become more important the older you get, eh).

Korean airlines had the plane decked out with a TV screen in every seat and on-demand movies, tv shows, video games and, my favorite, the in-flight map to show where you are. Problem was the map would always label the place names in Korean, requiring me to make a good guess as to what small town in northeastern New Mexico we were flying over, eh. The flight was going to be about fifteen hours, flying through daylight the whole way and arriving in Seoul in the late afternoon. I was going to attempt to stay awake the entire trip. Actually, staying awake wouldn’t be a problem as I can’t sleep on planes unless I’m a) lying down or b) take strong sleeping pills (Ambien is the only one I’ve found to work). I figured if I stayed awake the whole flight and for the following flight to Taipei, Taiwan, I’d easily fall asleep that night and avoid jet lag.

Well, the first thirteen hours went just fine. The skies were mostly clear until we hit Washington state so I had a good view of north Texas, Colorado and southern Idaho as we cruised along. I read the Hunger Games, the popular teen book which will soon be in a movie theater near you; I heartily recommend it though in a way you feel guilty being entertained by kids killing each other (though the political overtones are always lurking in the background which I love). Jennifer said I had to read it since she wants me to go see the movie with her when it comes out but I was interested in reading it anyway. I also spent a lot of time gazing out the window while listening to music on the iPod. As for movies, the only one that interested me was Captain America which, while a bit cheesy, was fairly decent as superhero movies go. Instead of other movies, I watched the first four episodes of the only scripted TV show I’ve ever watched much over the past fifteen years, Firefly (I’d treated myself to the 14-episode DVD set on Amazon for $25 in anticipation of this trip).

I’m definitely getting older. I tweaked my knee sitting down in the plane’s bathroom about two hours into the flight and it hurt on and off until I boarded my next plane in Taiwan. Ouch!

At some point we were supposed to completely close our window shades so that there was no glare on peoples’ TV screens. I couldn’t quite abide by that as I wanted to continue looking out the window so I only closed mine halfway. My seatmate said she didn’t mind though she may have just been polite :) Anyway, it paid off when we flew over parts of southern Alaska. Seeing snow-covered islands in the middle of what is undoubtedly a freezing cold sea was awesome. I love flying over the north. We even turned west a bit over a city which I’m pretty sure was Fairbanks, Alaska. I could almost see Sarah Palin shooting wolves from a helicopter below (but not quite within sight of Russia yet).

Later we flew over parts of eastern Russia, which was absolutely buried in snow. The cloud cover came back as we flew over northern Japan and turned directly west towards Seoul. By this point I was starting to feel horribly tired, seeing as it was around two in the morning Austin time. In fact, the last two hours of the flight were a bit miserable as I was not tired enough to sleep, too tired to concentrate on a book, lacking sufficient battery power on the laptop to watch another Firefly episode, too close to Seoul to watch a full movie and too much of a snob to watch anything else. Thankfully after a while we touched down in Seoul after cruising in over the ocean (I love those landings where the runway is right next to the ocean so that it looks like you’re going to crash into the sea until the runway appears at the last minute...going into Washington D.C.’s Dulles airport is great for that because as a bonus there are people sculling in the Potomac). Leg 1: complete!

I wandered through the Seoul (actually called Incheon because that’s where it’s located) airport to my next gate for my flight with Eva Air to Taiwan. Eva Air is, I believe, Taiwan’s national carrier. Most small countries have just one airline, sometimes (or maybe all the time) owned by the government. In the US of course we’re big enough for multiple airlines as is China (China Airlines, China Eastern, China Southern and Shanghai Airlines) but most countries are not. Therefore you have Korean Air, Eva Airlines, Thai, Malev Hungarian, Air France, British Airways, Finnish Airways, Lot (Poland), Iran Air and, still my favorite, Uzbekistan Airways (www.uzairways.com). I get a kick out of flying these new airlines so I was thrilled (in my jet-laggedness) to be flying with Eva. Plus their logo has green in it and darn it, I like green.

The last time I flew in this part of the world I had extremely bumpy flights from Shanghai to Beijing and back so I wasn’t surprised when our plane was rocked pretty good flying over the Pacific to Taiwan. The pilot came on the intercom and apologized though which was nice. I would have been more worked up over the turbulence, which lasted probably twenty minutes total, but I was much too tired to care. I just was imagining arriving in the Taipei airport, passing through Customs, collecting my roller bag and finding my new best friend, the driver holding up a card with my name on it just outside the baggage claim. And so it came to pass. His name was Jimmy.

As I wrote about in 2009 when I was last in Asia, I’m fascinated by the English names Chinese people choose because most foreigners can’t pronounce Chinese worth a lick, myself included. I learned the term for why it’s so difficult: tonal. Chinese is a tonal language where there are four different ways to pronounce ‘ma’, each meaning something completely different. So I may think I’m saying ‘thank you’ when really I’m saying something completely different or gibberish. We think to ourselves ‘how can they misunderstand me’ but really it’s all about your tone, inflection, etc. I realize that’s one of the reasons that China and Taiwan are not among my favorite places to visit: it’s too difficult to learn the language. In southern Belgium, I can reasonably pronounce ‘boulangerie’ either after somebody tells it to me or I read it on a sign. In Japan, it’s impossible to mispronounce ‘hai’. But in China, if I ask Leslie at the hotel front desk how to say ‘good morning’, I’m going to totally butcher it. It makes me feel like there’s a part of the culture I can’t take part in, even though I’ll only ever learn a handful of words. But the gap between knowing nothing of the language and knowing even four words is enormous. It bothers me. What I need to do is to make really good friends with someone in either the Taiwan or China office who can tutor me. Oh, and take the time to really sit down and try to learn. On the plus side, I learned one Chinese character: da! 大 Of course, I have no idea what ‘da’ means though or how to properly say it.

Doh, plane’s boarding.

And that reminds me, here’s my favorite article about Chinese people why so many of them in international business choose English names:

http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2009/04/the_names_du_xiao_hua_but_call_me_steve.html

Alright, now I’m in the Ibis Hotel in Suwon, Korea. For those who haven’t stayed in an Ibis, it’s like the Motel 6 of international travel: everywhere, relatively cheap (though not that cheap) and always feels like something important is lacking.
Anyway, Jimmy the driver drove me about 30 minutes in the dark to my hotel in Hsin-Chu, a large industrial center outside of Taipei. My hotel was on the 12th-18th floors of an 18 story tall building with a shopping mall on the first seven floors. I checked in and within a half hour was out like a light.
The next morning I was up sometime around 6. I went down to eat breakfast at the hotel buffet at which point I realized I was in a luxury hotel for business travelers. How could I tell? Let’s see:

- The waitstaff and reception desk staff spoke excellent English
- The breakfast buffet was full of mostly non-Taiwanese who were dressed at least business casual if not more so
- The breakfast buffet was extensive and had a healthy selection of (YES!) Western food such as scrambled eggs and bread (including croissants)
- All of the staff were outgoing and friendly, wishing you good morning
- There was someone at the front entrance of the hotel to open your car door for you when you got in

I realize that the company I now work for puts everybody in these types of hotels but it’s really a statement of where I am these days as a professional. I’ve got the word ‘Director’ in my title which means, at least to me, that I need to act more like the typical business traveler. When I got this job I spent $130 on a professional laptop/document bag and another $100 on a heavy long black coat (at Burlington Coat Factory, but still), replacing the L.L. Bean liner that I’d been wearing since high school. I find it harder to make friends with people whose positions are closer to entry level; am I imagining things or is it because of my job title? Should my days of staying in off-the-beaten path hotels lacking certain amenities like air conditioning but meeting my needs and avoiding other foreigners be over? I don’t know but regardless I need to be more cognizant of the consequences of my sometimes non-professional actions where my fun-loving and sometimes offbeat and sunny personality pokes through.

Anyway, I was picked up by my co-worker, Richard, in Environmental, Health and Safety (a different type of compliance) who would be my chaperone for this whole Asia trip and driven to the office. This was my chance to really see Hsin-Chu and, well, it’s not very visitor-friendly. Lots and lots of tall buildings, industrial areas and crowded tenement buildings along with innumerable buzzing mopeds on the streets. Just a crazy place, even as a pedestrian. This brings me back to another theme of mine in travel: it’s difficult not to stereotype a country based upon the experience in an urban area. I can’t base my opinion of the entire country off of my experience in Hsin-Chu. I told Richard about this and he agreed; he’s not overly fond of Hsin-Chu either :)

One other issue I have with Chinese culture: I just can’t get into the food. Everything tastes a bit off, even something standard like beef and broccoli. I can eat most everything but it just isn’t appetizing. And occasionally there is something extremely interesting to eat like the Taiwanese hot dog: a steamed rice ‘bun’ that is more tasteless than tofu, something resembling a sausage in the middle and various stewed vegetables as a topping. Chinese food we get in the States is oh so totally different. On the plus side, I’ve probably lost weight since I’ve been here since the food I’ve been eating has been healthier and in smaller quantities than normal.

I was in Taiwan for only two days and then hoofed it out, with Richard, on a Wednesday mid-morning flight to Shanghai. I was thrilled, and yes, I’m a dork, to be flying for what I was pretty sure was the first time on a Boeing 747, the double decker planes that have been around for decades. Even though Taipei and Shanghai are only separated by a 1.5 hour flight the number of people flying back and forth merits a large plane. Now that I think of it, in every Asian airport I’ve been in so far all I’ve seen have been big planes, very much unlike all of the small and mid-size planes in US airports. Anyway, I had a window seat on the 747 on the first desk and neglected to take a quick peek at the second floor (though I’ll bet it looked the same).

The weather in Shanghai as we descended was rather interesting. Not really rainy or smoggy near as I could tell but there was crazy fog-like clouds until about two minutes before we landed. I’m still impressed with pilots and their ability, with the help of technology, to land in such adverse conditions. At least the ride was smooth.

So I was back in Shanghai, a place I hadn’t been in two years. It felt like a homecoming of sorts since I had half-decent memories of the last trip when I was awed by Shanghai’s size (but immune to its craziness as my hotel and work were in the suburbs). It became even weirder when I took a cab to the office that afternoon to find that it is located next door to the hotel I stayed in in 2009 and within walking distance of the Shanghai office of my previous employer (and where I was working in 2009 during that visit).

While in Taiwan I was never taken out to eat. This suited me ok because I was going to bed at 7 or 8pm anyway and waking up at 4 or 5 in the morning. By the time I reached Shanghai though I’d fully acclimated to the local time and thus was happy to be taken out to eat. The first night I chose a pizza joint because, well, I felt I had nothing to prove eating-wise. In retrospect, I should have chosen Chinese food to better show appreciation for Chinese culture with my new co-workers. Oh well. The second night found a group of us in a Thai restaurant but we had had Chinese food for lunch. I’m not too bad with chopsticks but at both places I avoided dishes that required a lot of deft chopsticking such as fish with bones in them. The following day we had pizza for lunch (not my choice, actually) and then Taiwanese food for dinner. That dinner was interesting actually in that three of us with ATMI had dinner with two of my old colleagues at National Instruments. It’s weird when you leave a company and then interact with your former co-workers. I found very quickly that I didn’t care too much about how NI is doing and really, after that sometimes there’s not as much to talk about. Thankfully my new co-workers hit it off quite well with the old so the dinner was a success, even if 80% of the time they were speaking in Chinese among themselves.

During the trip I’d been pretty good about staying in touch with Jennifer and the Kid over Skype. With Taiwan and Shanghai being 14 hours ahead, 7am my time was 5pm theirs. This made Skyping quite conducive to my rising early in the morning. Now I’m in Korea which is 15 hours ahead, making Skype still doable. I love Skype.

So yesterday, Saturday, Richard and I flew with my new friend Korean Air to Seoul, South Korea. I hadn’t been in South Korea since a two-day, all-work, no-play stop in 2005. Richard and I arrived in the mid-afternoon, enough time for me to head out from the hotel and walk around the million citizen city of Suwon, about a forty-five minute drive southeast of Seoul. I had a good time wandering around the back alleys of the city trying to find the Hwaseong Fortress, a stone wall built around 1796 to defend the country. Richard told me I had to go see it for myself and I enjoyed walking along the entire 3.5 mile length of it, checking out the different main gates, hidden gates and view towers. I was joined by many Koreans out for a stroll or a power walk as well as teenagers looking for a place to get away, in at least one case to make out as I walked by. That made me realize that one thing we take for granted as adults is having a private space to ourselves, namely our apartment or house (although the older the kid gets the less private I have a feeling the house will feel like, eh). All in all, I walked about 8 miles that night, and successfully purchased two bottles of carbonated apple juice (didn’t realize they were carbonated but they tasted good) and an apple.

The next day Richard and I hired a van to take us out to the coast and into Seoul. I really, really wanted to get to the ocean and wander around. We ended up on a little island called Jebudo (do, pronounced ‘dough’, means island) and actually walked around most of it, maybe a two mile walk. It was mostly beach with a bit of rock cliffs thrown in. It was in the 30s temperature-wise but my new wool jacket and my Peruvian stocking cap (it pays to have a stepmother from Peru, eh!) kept me nice and warm. In the cold though, it was interesting to see how many Korean women still wore shorts or skirts. Oh, and heels. On the beach. Whatever works.

Richard highly recommended also going into the heart of Seoul to walk up the biggest hill in town: Nam-san. It was a nice brisk walk up, accompanied by a bunch of other locals and tourists, though most tourists took a bus 9/10 of the way up and walked the rest, especially the women in high heels. The view up top was pretty neat, particularly as I thought about other cities where I’d visited the high point of such as Athens, Santiago, Tokyo and Budapest. I’m of the opinion that all cities are exponentially more interesting if they have hills in them, including Austin. There were two interesting things at the top besides the view. The first was the wall of locks where couples in love would leave a lock with their names and a note on it signifying their undying love for each other, ha! The second were five signal fire ovens used for communication of an enemy invasion at the border. One fire was lit if all was normal, two if the enemy was at the border, three if the enemy was across the border, four if the enemy was being fought at the border and five for the enemy marching well past the border (I think). You could even see the mountain in the distance where the next signal fire oven was. Just like that scene in ‘The Two Towers’ where Pippen lights the fire in Minas Tirith to ask Rohan to send their army to help break the siege of the city!

Here’s the scene from the movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZbJrn7L_X4

I like Korea a bit more than Taiwan and Shanghai because a) the language is much easier to learn and b) the food is a bit better, though still not anything I crave when I get back to the States. Eating in Korea is fun though as many restaurants have you sit on the floor, Indian style, leaving your shoes at the door. The poor waitresses have to bend over a lot (bad ergonomics). Usually your meal consists of something actually cooking in the middle of your table, either meat over coals or a soup/stew over a gas burner. The most interesting stew was military-style stew consisting of hot dogs, spam and various vegetables (the story is that starving Koreans during the Korean War made the stew out of leftovers from the various armies in the country, including the US one).

After six days, it was time for me to go home. I hopped on another Korean Air flight, this time for LA (and only ten hours, yay!) and unfortunately stayed awake most of the time despite popping a sleeping pill (I may have slept one hour). And now, here I am, probably somewhere over southern New Mexico waiting to walk out to the pick-up area in Austin-Bergstrom, dressed up in my khakis, Doc Martens (oops, probably still unprofessional), polo shirt and wool jacket and do the professional thing: take a cab. And then home to see Jennifer, the Kid and Maisy Insaisy. Time to be home!

As always, I hope you enjoyed this travelogue (those of you who made it this far, eh). I hope each and every one of you is doing great and appreciating everything you have in life.

A Brief Note about Connecticut because, well, I said I would

Well, I said I was going to write about Connecticut so I will. I’m in the Jet Blue terminal at New York’s JFK airport about 36 hours before Hurricane Irene is projected to hit New York City so that’s kind of dominating things. I moved my flight from 9am Saturday to 8:25pm Friday night just to avoid any unforeseen chaos here. The subway will shut down at noon Saturday and people are being told to evacuate low-lying areas. All of the people at the ATMI office seem fairly nonchalant about it but I hope they’re all ok. The lawyer who I work with, who lives on the coast in Greenwich, Connecticut, is talking about having a football game with friends during the hurricane.
So anyway, I’m outta here.
Now about Connecticut. It’s a nice-looking green state with lots of high hills. The weather is quite fantastic as the highs are in the mid-80s. Of course they pay for it with the winters but still. I didn’t take much time to tool around Danbury, the city where ATMI’s HQ is located but I did notice a few things:
- If you want Italian food, you can do worse than be in Danbury. Within a mile of my hotel there were four pizza joints, three Italian-style delis selling sandwiches and an Italian-style chain called, I believe, Banucci’s.
- Danbury is very pedestrian unfriendly. Sidewalks are a rarity as are crosswalks. I tried to walk to the Banucci’s last night, which isn’t even 1/3 of a mile from the hotel, and had to cross a four lane road in the dark twice each way because to stay on my side of the road I would have had to walk on top of the guardrail over the Still River. Though I guess if you’re under snow for 1/3 of the year there’s not too much walking going on.
Um, that’s about it for Danbury. So since this post seems kind of short, here are some things I’m looking forward to about being home:
- Seeing my own wife and kid. I’m tired of seeing everybody else’s though seeing the antics of well-behaved kid four and under never fails to make me smile.
- Not having to pack up my stuff in my suitcase every day before I leave. I don’t like to leave a mess out for the cleaning lady and also would like to make it difficult for her to steal my prized Porco Rosso DVD if she were so inclined.
- Home-cooked food. Italian food and grinders are nice but it’s time for some of Jennifer’s cooking (I can cook too but she’s taken over that job full-time).
- The Texas triple digit heat. Oh wait, wrong list.
- Turning on the radio and knowing which station NPR is.
OK, my flight’s going to board soon and I need to go buy me some dinner to take on the 3.5 hour flight home. I’m looking forward to being back. My next trip will be probably be a two week jaunt to East Asia but at least I’ll get 3-4 weeks or more at home. Texas ho!
POST-SCRIPT: That was one of the bumpiest flights I’ve been on in a long time. It’s like the pilots were going out of their way to get close to the hurricane. When you’re having trouble seeing the wing at 38,000 feet you’re in something weird. Boy was I glad to be on the ground.

Brief Work Trip to Belgium

Goede morgen/bonjour from Belgium! Yes, the country I only knew as a) associated with waffles and b) the route for Germany’s invasion of France during World War II, is now graced with my presence, holy smokes. Why am I here? Because ATMI, the new company I’m drawing a paycheck from, has not one but two facilities here! And, since it’s my job to see what’s going on at every facility and meet and train the key contacts, I get a trip over here. I’m not thrilled to be away from Jennifer, the kid and the dog for two weeks (I’ll also be spending some time at our HQ in Danbury, Connecticut) but it’s nice to get away from the Texas drought and see a country that I’ve never visited.

I got here via two Delta flights: first from Austin to Atlanta and then on to Brussels. The only items of note on the trip were a) seeing the Milwaukee Brewers’ team plane in Hartsfield-Jackson airport (at least, I hope it was theirs since someone who wasn’t the team owning a plane painted in Brewers colors and covered with their logo would be pretty scary) and b) being bumped to the rear of the plane for the Brussels flight since there’d been a plane change and my seat, 20C, didn’t exist on the new one. I hate, repeat, hate, the back of the plane since it shakes so much more than the middle and front. Thankfully the flight was for the most part pretty stable. I was sitting next to two twenty-something French guys who were frustrating by the plane’s lack of working overhead lights, thus preventing them from playing cards during the eight hour flight.

So, about Belgium. The first thing to know about Belgium is that culturally it really should be divided in two and annexed by the Netherlands and France. I thought Flemish was the official language of Belgium but I was wrong on two counts. First, Flemish is only a dialect of Dutch (and thus extremely similar) and second both Flemish and French are the official languages. In fact, there is a set dividing line between the Flemish and French-speaking regions based on governmental regions (like states or counties). Brussels and the Walloon region in the south speak French while the Flemish region in the north speaks, well, Flemish. Our office in Brussels speaks French but the office in Hoegaarden (pronounced pretty much like hoo-garden), located only 20 miles to the east, speaks Flemish. Weird. All things considered I prefer being around French speakers since it’s easier to understand, being similar to Spanish, but I much prefer driving to the Hoegaarden office since it’s located in a bucolic town the size of Buda.

I’ve got a rental car. And it’s a friggin’ beamer, the first I’ve ever driven, though of the station wagon variety. This is also the first time I’ve ever had a rental car for a business trip outside of the US and the first time I’ve ever tried to drive in Europe, even though this is like my tenth trip in the past seven years. Thank God they drive on the right side of the road or otherwise I’d really have trouble. You see, driving in Belgium isn’t that much different than in the States but it’s just different enough to cause problems. Let me count the ways:

- Roundabouts. Four way intersections made seamless. I actually kind of like them now that I’m used to them but they were a bit disconcerting at first.
- My sideview mirrors. BMW thinks it’s a hoot to make the sideview mirrors concave (or is it convex) so that you can see your blind spot in them and thus don’t have to look over your shoulder. That’s nice except that it’s difficult to perceive how far that car in the next lane is. Is it in my blind spot or further back? I have to look over my shoulder to find out, eh. One good thing though is that if I don’t see anyone in the sideview mirror I can change lanes.
- Road layouts. Roads have arrows to show you which lane to be in but the intersections can sometimes be a bit confusing based on where the median is, dotted-white lines are, the presence of pedestrians and cyclists, and such. It’s like they’re a degree or two off of normal, just enough for me to hate being the first car to go through an intersection when the light turns green (better to follow someone else, eh).
- Drivers are a bit more aggressive here. In a way it makes it easier for me to compensate for my screw-ups but it’s disconcerting when people cut you off, ride your tail or drive about 60 mph faster than you on the freeway.
- Narrow streets. This is especially true in older parts of cities built before cars. I hate it. Especially because...
- One lane streets aren’t necessarily one-way. Yes, in Belgium you can go the wrong way down a one-way street in certain circumstances known only to Belgians. I’ve been told that there is a difference between Northern and Southern Europe in terms of driving craziness with Southern being much worse. Let’s just say that Belgium tries to ignore its geography.
- Pedestrian crossing. You’re supposed to yield to pedestrians when you’re driving. This makes little sense to me but I’m working on it. I stop for them while I’m driving but when I’m a pedestrian I still try to hang back until a big gap appears.
- Parking. Parallel parking is the norm. Luckily I haven’t had to do it yet where I had to back in. Parking garages usually have very tight spaces as well. Why’d the rental car company have to rent me a friggin’ boat?
- And last, motorcyclists. They don’t respect traffic lanes, thus making Belgium a Level 2 driving country. See, I have a system of measuring a country’s driving craziness based on the behavior of its motorcyclists. I call it the Motorcyclist Lunacy Index. Here are the levels:
o Level 1 – Motorcyclists usually respect the traffic rules and drive like cars do, i.e. staying in their lanes and respecting the speed limit. Ex. United States
o Level 2 – Motorcyclists drive in between car lanes as if they own the joint. This can be either on regular roads or traffic-clogged freeways. Ex. Belgium
o Level 3 – Motorcyclists not only disrespect lanes but they also run red lights if nobody’s coming. Ex. Mexico
o Level 4 – Motorcyclists drive on the sidewalk. Ex. South Korea
o Level 5 – Motorcyclists drive like they’re suicidal but then again so does everybody else. Ex. India (where the safest place to be when you’re on the road is on top of a cow)

Of course, as I mentioned before this is the country that also thinks it’s ok to go both ways down a one-way street in certain circumstances.

Now let’s talk about GPS. See, the BMW has built-in GPS which I’ve figured out how to use. I hate the idea of GPS. I think everybody should be able to read a map and practice that skill as often as possible. I consider it an essential life skill and Graham’s going to have to learn it once he’s got this whole reading thing down.

But...I’m going to give a pass to a person driving by themselves in a foreign country. See, right after I landed at 8:40am on Wednesday, I had to drive from the airport into Brussels. I hadn’t slept on the plane. I was driving an unfamiliar car in an unfamiliar city with roads that were confusing as all getout (the guy at the rental counter couldn’t even adequately explain how to leave the airport while drawing a map). Without GPS, I would have spent double the time to get there and greatly increased my likelihood of getting in an accident. In short, the GPS was a good investment by ATMI in that it saved me stress and time. The system has a comforting female voice that seems to soothe a bit, even when she tells me to u-turn (because I ignored her instructions and missed a turn). And she ALWAYS knows where I am and how to get me to my destination. Once I learned how to interpret her commands and her sense of timing (oh, ‘turn right now’ means NOW?) I’ve become quite comfortable with her. And yes, it’s eerie saying her but seriously it sometimes feels like I have a navigator popping up whenever I have to make a turn.

I’ll talk more about GPS lady later. We had fun together on Saturday.

So what else about Belgium? It’s very green here and quite overcast. They’ve been getting a ton of rain lately. In fact, on Thursday when I was in Brussels, the Hoegaarden office got 50cm of rain in a half hour. That’s about 20 inches!!!! Peoples’ houses had a foot of water in them and it even flooded the back part of our factory. The worst though were the winds that knocked over a stage at an outdoor rock festival, killing three people. For ATMI employees who had kids or spouses attending, it was a nightmare to ensure they were ok since cell phone service was knocked out.

http://www.ksdk.com/news/article/272478/28/Belgium-storm-hits-music-fair-leaving-five-dead

The food is fairly decent though I’ve only had one solid meal where I had real Belgian food (it was chunks of beef in some broth and it tasted good), the other meals being my normal staples of pizza, sandwiches and gyros and the like. The pizza is the normal Italian-style with thin crust and not much sauce but I found a mostly empty restaurant run by a guy who speaks Italian. I went back once and will probably go back on Monday just because he likes to speak to me in Italian with me responding in Spanish. Much easier than being in a Flemish-speaking joint trying to make myself understood though I have learned some words:

- Dank u wel – thank you
- Altublieft – please
- Ja – yes
- Ik spreek geen Nederlands – I don’t speak Dutch
- Goede morgen – good morning
- Goed – good

Um, and that’s about it. Mostly I try to get by without speaking or use French (not that I know much more French but I know enough more to feel safer and plus I do a fairly decent French accent). Je ne parles pas Francais, indeed!

Thursday was spent in Brussels, where I had a fun 45-minute commute due to traffic (and I probably could have found the office without the GPS lady but I didn’t want to chance it). Friday was spent in Hoegaarden where apparently everyone brings their lunch so I had to drive by myself down to the Shell gas station to get a very-pressed ham and cheese panini.

Music on the radio is interesting here. No rock or country, but lots of pop and dance music. And they don’t bleep out the cuss words either so Cee-Lo Green’s love ballad F--- You doesn’t insert the word ‘Forget’. The pop queen is Katy Perry, particularly her ‘This Friday Night’ song but I’ve also heard Jennifer and my old fave, ‘Vamos a la Playa’ twice. Oh yeah, and that annoying Bruno Mars song about doing nothing all day long. Regardless, it’s always fun to hear the DJ cut speak in French or Flemish and then throw in the English band and song name (“goeden woerd voordje kleine sterren ‘Franky Valli and the Four Seasons – Oh What A Night!’”).

Here are some good songs I’ve heard though:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lC_dclLci6g (a French/English duet)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td5RJ2uBSbo&feature=related (a good dance song that happens to have a lot of yelling)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suRsxpoAc5w Moves Like Jagger by Maroon 5

My hotel is located in the center of Leuven, a university town with a quite old town center (that is heck to drive in, at least at first). Cute little cobblestone streets, lots of old buildings including big churches, many of which were reconstructed after World War II and a fair number of tourists (but no Americans near as I can tell, yay). The hotel has an underground parking garage which is quite difficult to navigate my BMW boat through but it beats parallel parking on the street. The showerhead sticks to the wall, thank goodness, and for the first time ever the maid doesn’t put those useless throw pillows I never use back on the bed when she cleans. She put them on top of the wardrobe the first day, saving both her and I effort. Awesome. Oh, and lastly Belgium is on the euro if you were wondering but I don’t know what their economic problems are (though apparently they’ve been without a fully-functioning federal gov’t, i.e. no prime minister, for like the last year and a half).

Part of the reason I’m here is that there’s a work emergency I’m working to take care of and thus I didn’t give any thought to what I was going to do with my free weekend in Belgium until Friday night. The Americans working for ATMI in Belgium had some good suggestions. Ghent and Bruges are both great old cities to wander around in. Brussels is the capital of Europe with the EU HQ there. Ostend is a nice town on the North Sea. Or if I wanted to hop a train, I could be in Amsterdam, Paris or even London in about two hours. Whoa. Well, I’ve been to those latter three (though didn’t have enough time to explore each properly) and besides I don’t want to go to super-cool places that Jennifer would like to go to as well without her if I can help it (Jennifer, forget the Kid and come to Europe with me, eh!!!!!). Belgian cities didn’t appeal to me because they’re too stressful and there were bound to be tons of tourists. I thought about what I love most about Europe: old buildings of course! And, as it turns out, Belgium has a ton of old forts, called citadels here. Awesome!

Now, I should have just bought a travel guide to Belgium before I left. I didn’t think about it so I was left with the trusty internets. I found a list of the best ones and using Google Maps figured out where some of them were clustered together. I wanted to be in the hilly regions which meant going south to the French-speaking Walloon region, another bonus. I knew the towns the citadels were in were Namur, Dinant and Bouillon (pronounced, I believe, Boo-yone) but I didn’t know where they would be. And I couldn’t get that shifty GPS lady to tell me so I was reduced to driving to the towns and hoping for proper signage (something you’d think the local authorities would ensure is adequate but half the time is not the case) or for the citadel to be easily visible (and with them always being on the high ground, this was likely).

I told the GPS lady I wanted to go to Namur. It was at this point she and I had our first fight. See, GPS Lady likes it if I take the freeway. But I don’t like the freeway except on the way back when I’m tired. When I’m driving somewhere new, I want to SEE the places I’m in and that means taking the two-lane backroads. Armed with a map that I had purchased at the first gas station I passed in Leuven (where I also confirmed I could use my American-style, not European-style, credit card to buy gas), I knew which road I wanted to take to get there. And I knew she wouldn’t like it. The interaction went something like this:
- GPS Lady (about ½ mile before the turn): “Prepare to turn right.”
- GPS Lady: “Turn right in 300 meters.”
- GPS Lady: “Now turn right.” I continue straight ahead on the road I want.
- GPS Lady (after five second period of silence): “Please u-turn if possible.” I continue straight ahead.
- GPS Lady (after about fifteen seconds as she’s realized I’m not u-turning and figures a new route to get me back to where she wants me to go): “Turn right in 300 meters.”
- GPS Lady: “Now turn right.”
- GPS Lady: “Please u-turn if possible.”

This cycle continues at least once more. Then she gives up and reroutes me to the route I wanted the whole time. Since there are no instructions to give since I’m going straight I don’t hear from her again for a while. It’s as if she’s sulking. Poor GPS Lady.

When we reached Namur, I turned the GPS Lady off because as far as I was concerned she’d done her job and it would be up to old-fashioned navigating and searching to get me where I needed to be. Namur was a bigger town than I thought, probably New Braunfels-sized. I didn’t see the fort when I drove in so, when I got to a point where I knew I didn’t know where to go, I stopped the car and consulted the GPS Lady’s map. I figured the citadel was on the other side of the river but I didn’t know how to get to the other side without consulting GPS. Armed with this new info, I saw the fort as I was about to turn across the bridge. Score one for old-fashioned navigating (sort of).

Now there are two things a guide book would really have helped me on. First, it probably would have had a detailed map of the city with the location of the fort on it. Second, it would have told me that I didn’t have to find a parallel parking spot at the base of the hill but rather that I could drive up to the middle of it and park. It actually worked out for the best because the fort was rather lame, being a bunch of walls on the side of the hill but no meat inside. Or maybe it would have been better if I had signed up for the Segway tour but I figured that, well, I had two more forts to get to and it was already 11am. I did get some great views of the Meuse and Samois river valleys with Namur splayed out across them. I also found out, after getting a map of the fort, that there was a chateau at the back end. I walked back down to the base, got in my car and drove up to the parking lot at the chateau. I had to because Jennifer and I had been watching BBC period mini-series like ‘The Way We Were’ and ‘Downton Abbey’ so I needed to see if it was a building like that. No such luck; it was just a nice looking big house with a hotel and restaurant inside. I got in the Beamer, turned on the GPS Lady and got on my way to Dinant.

I had to pull another change of route on GPS Lady but how the heck could I miss out on following the Meuse River for the 30 or so miles? GPS Lady don’t know nothin’ ‘bout travelin’. She wasn’t silent for long though as there were a bunch of roundabouts on the road and she never lets a roundabout go by without giving me instructions: ‘Turn right at the first/second/third turning of the roundabout’. I was glad to give her something to do so she’d feel useful.

The signage for the citadel of Dinant was quite good and I easily found the parking at the top of the cliff where the citadel was situated. Whereas the citadel of Namur was free to wander around in, this one required 7 euro (about $11 or so) to get in. I soon found out why: you had to have a guided tour to wander the grounds. Bleh. Not only did I have to hang around for 15 minutes waiting for the next tour but the tour would be given in two languages, neither of which I knew: French and Dutch. I did get a little pamphlet in English but its descriptions were quite paltry. Whereas the French and Dutch speakers got five minutes of speaking at each spot, I got maybe three sentences. Way to go Dinant tourist authorities. There was at least one Spanish speaker with us and two people from Great Britain and maybe a handful of others, likely Germans. Well, the fort was fairly good so the overall experience was quite positive. We had good views of the Meuse River valley and the inner workings of the fort.

The history of these forts is quite interesting. They were set up beginning in maybe the 900s (or later, depending on which one you’re talking about) as a common line of defense. The thing is though that today’s countries didn’t exist. Sure, you had the kingdom of France but there was the Holy Roman Empire for a while and tons of little principalities and fiefdoms. By the 1600s the region was owned by either France or Holland (Belgium didn’t come into being until 1830), seemingly switching back and forth with each successive war. And that’s not counting all of the random fiefdom invasions and attacks. The worst was when Charles the Bold ransacked the town, tying 800 townspeople in pairs and throwing them into the river to drown. As civilized as we always think Europe is/was, there sure were a lot of stupid little wars and lots of action like that. The forts were sometimes even fought over in World Wars I and II (there was one story about 12 French soldiers who were trapped in a tunnel in citadel of Dinant killing 58 German soldiers while fighting to the last man).

And speaking of World War II, it’s weird to think that if I were living in Belgium in 1939 I would be going to war to fight the Germans (or be working in the underground to try to make the occupiers’ lives miserable). War is such an abstract concept to us younger Americans because the last one fought on our soil was fought 150 years ago and the last draft we had was in the early 70s. But here they lived it. They fought. They were bombed. They starved. They were beaten. They endured and survived. It’s amazing. I think most of us Americans have really no idea of war (not that the average young Belgian knows anything about it either but still). Watching Band of Brothers was the closest I’ve come to it but perhaps next visit I’ll drive over to Bastogne where the American army was besieged during the Battle of the Bulge.

It was during the tour of the citadel of Dinant that I really missed home, specifically Jennifer and the Kid. It may seem strange to you that I would miss home while being in such a cool place but seeing husbands and wives together and little kids running around reminds me strongly of my family back home (if I saw a dog jumping up and scratching people I’d assuredly miss Maisy too). I’m happy for them that they are traveling together and slightly sad that I don’t have Jennifer to enjoy this with me (and an older version of Graham though he probably wouldn’t really enjoy something like this until he’s 11 or 12). Still, I’m quite fortunate to have a job that allows me the opportunities to do stuff like this, on the company’s dime no less. It doesn’t always make up for the time spent away from family but it helps sometimes.

After the hour-long tour I took the cable car down into the town of Dinant right on the river. I found what I was looking for, one of the reasons I wanted to come down into the French-speaking region: a French sandwich shop! I had a croque monseiur that tasted awesome even though the bread looked it came from H-E-B. For some reason the waitress brought me ketchup which couldn’t have been to go with my salad because it already had dressing on it. Was it because I looked American or was it normal? I never found out but that’s ok.

I took the cable car back up and got back in the car for the drive down to Bouillon. This would be about fifty miles or so, still on backroads (sorry GPS Lady) through small towns but unfortunately over farm fields and not following rivers. It was about 3pm when I made it into Bouillon, a place that let you know through the signage that a citadel was there but giving you absolutely no signs to tell you how to get to it. It did have an awesome little riverfront with shops and restaurants all along both stone-lined banks which, while I was cruising saw the citadel up high above it. I found a place to park way back at the edge of town but since Bouillon is a really small place it wasn’t far to walk. There were a bunch of tourists there, it being a Saturday and all, and the place really felt like the Belgian/French version of Eureka Springs, Arkansas. In short, really cute and touristy without being too tacky. And Eureka Springs has nothing quite as cool as a citadel (though the monster statue of Jesus is pretty impressive).

I hiked up to the citadel and paid my €7,50 (they reverse the use of commas and periods in numbers here) to enter. No guides this time, yay, it was all self-guided with a very detailed guidebook in English! The citadel was originally owned by Geoffrey of Bouillon, the guy who started and financed the first Crusade back in 1095 (he went over, conquered Jerusalem and died there). Note: watch Kingdom of Heaven for a decent movie about the first Crusade. It had a succession of owners afterward including Louis XVI, who sent this awesome engineer named Vauban to make a bunch of improvements (which I won’t go into detail on here but they were cool). The citadel of Bouillon was pretty awesome and definitely the best of the bunch (actually, they each was better than the previous).

After my visit to the citadel, I wandered down by the wild side of the Samois river where there was a big open grassy area to chill out in with woods on the other side. People were fishing, swimming in the river, sitting on parkbenches or lazing about on picnic blankets. It was like San Gabriel Park in Georgetown but ten times better (and without the soul-sucking heat). It was at that point I wished I’d had the foresight to book a night in a hotel in Bouillon instead of having to get back to my hotel in Leuven that night. Or at least bought a guidebook so I would have known where to park and to bring my swimsuit. I wanted to sit in that river so bad but oh well. Perhaps when I bring Jennifer and family. Anyway, Bouillon is now included on my list of totally awesome towns to visit and spend some downtime in.
On the walk back to my car I found two more establishments I was looking for: a boulangerie (boo-lahnge-air-ee) and a chocolate shop! The word boulangerie not only sounds good but is also associated with awesome bread, croissants and quiches. Well, actually the bread is usually awesome, the croissants don’t taste much different from croissants made here and I actually don’t like quiches but feel compelled to eat them because a) I’m in France or a French-speaking region and b) they’re a good source of healthy food I have a tough time finding on the road like broccoli or salmon. I got a bunch of miscellaneous chocolates for Jennifer which hopefully won’t melt before I get them back to Austin.

I let GPS Lady have her way and direct me to the expressway to return to Leuven. I stopped at a grocery store outside of Bouillon to get some apples, bananas and bottled water to have for dinner (along with the bread, croissant and quiche) as well as stash for later days. I haven’t found a good granola bar equivalent in Belgium but it appears that my stash of granola bars and trail mix from the US will last me through Connecticut so I’m ok.

I hate the expressway in Belgium. Too many people driving like bats out of hell for me and too boring scenery. Still, it was already six when I left Bouillon and it would take at least 1.5 hours to get back so it was better to at least not have to think as much. Belgian freeways are pretty much like ours so there’s nothing interesting to report about the journey back. It wasn’t like GPS Lady even sounded happy or anything to have gotten her way.

Today I slept in until 10:36 which may be the latest I’ve slept in since I was in college ten years ago. I’m not sure I’ve slept in past 7am since Graham was born. Since I went to bed around 11:30, that was a whole eleven hours of sleep. Wow. Guess I needed it. The good thing was that I wasn’t driving anywhere today, only spending the day wandering around Leuven on foot. I set out at noon and there were still hardly anybody on the street or any shops open.

I had one place I needed to find and that was the cemetery with several British soldiers killed during the early years of World War II. I found them along with a bunch of soldiers from other British territories like Australia, New Zealand and Canada (well, Canada wasn’t anymore but the guy was in the Royal something-or-other), Belgium, the Netherlands and even, near as I can tell, Germany. There was a big section for Belgian veterans who died after the war. And there was even a section for those who died in concentration camps and those who survived them (I’m not 100% certain I’m right but the inscription at the entrance to the area had ‘Buchenwald’ written in it). Read ‘The Boy in the Striped Pajamas’ for a really sad children’s story about the Holocaust.

I ended up walking 10.5 miles, a good distance but not quite as far as the 15.5 I did a month ago in Minnesota. Highlights included getting out into the countryside (cow poop smells the same here as it does in Texas), seeing an automated machine selling loaves of bread in a gas station parking lot (it was called ‘broodautomaat’), seeing a basketball backboard with the mid-90s Houston Rockets logo on it, seeing several women wearing outfits which were combination halter top dresses and MC Hammer balloon pants and finding an all-ages track meet by following the sound of the PA announcer’s voice. The track meet was interesting in its banality: it was exactly like a track meet might be in the US except for the language difference. I stuck around to watch two 3x600 relays run by girls who looked to be between 9 and 10 and then left.

I’m sitting on my hotel bed finishing this after doing my own laundry at Nemo’s Laundromat just down the street (for only €4, less than the cost of having the hotel clean a t-shirt). Well, it’s almost done in that all of the clothes are hanging on towel racks and chairs drying off (Europeans aren’t big on dryers). Tomorrow I take the train into Brussels for a meeting with the export authorities for the Belgium-Capital and Walloon regions though I’ll be somewhat of a bit player as the meeting will be in either French or Flemish. I’m not nervous about taking the train or the meeting but together I’m slightly nervous (I shouldn’t be). Hope it goes well. In the afternoon I’ll be back in the Hoegaarden office and on Tuesday I’ll be on a nonstop Delta flight to New York’s JFK in order to reach ATMI’s HQ in Danbury, Connecticut. Yep, I’ll be renting another car but I don’t know if it will have GPS. In a way, I secretly hope it does :)

I’ll write more about Connecticut after I experience it a bit. I’m planning on being back in scorched Austin on Saturday, hopefully bringing some of this Belgian rain on my tail.

Current Bike Commute To Work

So for those who haven’t heard my last day at NI will be June 24. I’m moving on to a different company, ATMI, in a different space, chemicals, in a different location, Round Rock. I will find out more about what I’ll miss about NI once I start but the one thing I know for certain I’ll miss is the commute to work by bike (ATMI is about ten miles away and regardless there is no good bike route to get there as I’m not suicidal). So, to commemorate my current ride for posterity, let’s do a blog post on it.

Actually, this is the third route I’ve used to bike to work as two of my previous houses were both within biking distance. One of them involved riding 400 yards through weeds and crossing a railroad track, ha!

Right now I live about 6.75 miles away from work which is definitely close enough to bike. These days, since I’m trying to get back down to my pre-Graham weight of 185 pounds (I’d jumped up to 195 due to increased soda consumption and decreased sleep) I try to bike in as often as possible, usually making it three days a week. My ride of choice is a hybrid bike I bought for $375 in 2004 from Buck’s Bikes in North Austin. I had no idea what different types of bikes were at the time, my last experience with a bike having been with my old Schwinn with no gears and blue tires, endless amusement being provided by riding hard then skidding on the concrete to leave a little blue tire streak. This new bike has 21 gears and hand brakes, both of which were entirely new concepts to me but of course I now have a handle on. And for those who don’t know what a hybrid bike is, it’s a cross between a road bike (ultra-thin and smooth tires, very light, no shocks) and a mountain bike (thick and knobby tires, very heavy and big shocks, even for the seat). The Buck’s guy told me my bike was what people in China used to commute. Sounded good to me!

Of course, I had to make some modifications to make the bike commute-worthy. I used to carry my stuff in a backpack but a couple of years ago added a little luggage rack to the back of it upon which hang two panniers, a fancy word for saddlebags. I need them to haul my laptop, lunch/snack food, my electric razor, keys, wallet, NI badge, cell phone and wedding ring (I take it off when I ride so as not to worry about it falling off). The panniers are a lot better than a backpack because there is no weight on your back (though some people claim you are less maneuverable). Of course, bikes aren’t designed to have so much weight on the back tire so I use a thicker thorn-resistant tube on it which seems to help prevent tube blowouts. The panniers also have a pouch for a fluorescent green rain cover should it ever rain again here in Central Texas.

During the winter my early morning ride begins in darkness so I take some steps to make myself visible. First of all, I have a blinking red light on each pannier. They don’t blink synchronously which must seem weird to drivers on the road but if it makes me more noticeable that’s good. I also wear a reflective jogging vest and have a little xenon light on the front, more to be seen by cars turning out onto the road than for seeing objects since I ride on some well-lit streets (and now in summer ride in early morning light). The more visible I am, the better.

So even though I’m a serious cycling commuter at this point I still don’t do the spandex thing. I used to when I first started out, wearing tight spandex shorts, a tight cycling jersey with the pouches on the backside to hold your stuff and shoes that would clip you into the pedals. A few years ago I gave it all up because I decided that I wanted to keep cycling a somewhat fun activity, not a serious one. Therefore, my riding outfit is usually a white t-shirt, basketball shorts, old tennis shoes and, in the afternoons, sunglasses. Oh, and a bike helmet. Gosh I thought those were dorky when I was a kid (never wore one until 2004 actually) but now that I’m an adult, well, they still look a little dorky but they may just save my life. I’ve worn the same one these last seven years and though the plastic housing is severely cracked the styrofoam core is solid. Still has my number from the 2004 MS150 on it too, eh (riding that first 100 miles was probably my life’s ultimate physical accomplishment).

My commute begins with a mile or so ride through my neighborhood. There is no bike lane and the road is fairly narrow but there’s also very little traffic at any time of day and particularly not at 6:30am. I do have to watch out for the occasional stray dog or limb but otherwise there are no obstacles to worry about. There is a sidewalk so I also don’t have to worry about joggers or walkers, all of whom I try to wave at in a friendly manner. It’s my opinion that cyclists are too standoffish, looking like we all want to be Lance Armstrong and that we own the road. Therefore, I try to do the little things to make people feel more comfortable around me. This includes following most traffic laws (more on that later), waving at pedestrians (or sometimes just nodding), smiling when I know people are looking at me like when I go through an intersection, giving drivers a thumbs up if I know they’re hanging back on purpose to give me some space and telling other cyclists hello when we’re sitting together at an intersection or I pass them (unless they’re doing something stupid like riding on the 183 feeder with no helmet or lights at an abysmally slow pace).

I do encounter three stop signs before getting out of the neighborhood, bringing up the issue of cyclist behavior. Should you act like a car or not? I try to act like a car as much as possible but I won’t come to a complete stop at stop signs if there is not a car that is arriving before me or around the same time. After all, it’s best for everybody if I get off the road as quickly as possible and besides, it takes me quite a bit longer to get up to full speed than a car does. So of course at 6:30am I just roll right on through the stop signs, sometimes halting my pedaling just to show any cars following me that I am paying attention. Not sure if they notice but what the heck. If there are cars arriving ahead of me at an intersection, I’ll take my legs off of the pedals and come to a complete stop. Most of the time it seems like the drivers think I’m going to roll through so they’re surprised when I come to a stop. I like to think that the more I do it the more people will become used to it and thus we’ll reduce accidents. Of course, there will always be morons like the guy Jennifer and I saw yesterday on Lamar pass everybody on the right and roll through the red light without even looking. That’s another thing about intersections. Most cyclists seem to roll right up to the front at a red light. Why would you do that? All of the cars just have to pass you again, increasing your risk of getting hit. I hang back in my spot in the queue, sometimes even getting out into traffic to do it. The exception is if there’s a bike lane but I’ll still hang back a little bit if it’s prudent such as when people are turning right.

Anyway, I cross Anderson Mill at a traffic light that is usually frequented by enough cars I don’t have to run it. Why would I run it? You try sitting at a pressure-sensored light waiting for a car to show up so you can cross. I could walk over to the pedestrian crossing light and hit the button there but that’s too much trouble. Anyway, I rarely have to run that light. I just hang to the right as far as possible and let cars turning right go around me. When the light turns green, I go straight across, staring at anybody coming the opposite way making a left hand turn to hopefully make sure they see me, not that I could do much if they didn’t.

After Anderson Mill I pass a middle school and then follow the road to the right, pointing me almost due west as I roll through a neighborhood of duplexes. This is the spot where the wind is most likely to hit me hard if it’s blowing in in the morning. Riding into the wind on a bike can be a major effort, particularly when you’re riding a hybrid bike with a larger-than-normal rear tube and about twenty pounds of extra weight on the back end (laptop and lunch in glass containers). It’s funny too how, while you definitely notice when the wind is against you, you don’t notice as much when it’s at your back (though it definitely helps you go faster).

After another third of a mile I’m at the intersection of Turtle Rock and Pond Springs (Broadmeade turned into Turtle Rock at Anderson Mill). This is also a traffic light and it takes an ungodly amount of time to turn green even though traffic on Pond Springs is quite light. My old rule for this intersection was ‘wait for the green if there is a car there’. After one too many four minute waits, the rule changed to ‘wait ten seconds for the green if there is a car there but after that get outta there’. I don’t like disobeying the traffic rules but I think everybody sitting in their cars would do the same thing and are envious :)

Pond Springs is two-lane with a nice bike lane on the side. The pavement is also quite smooth so it’s a rather pleasurable part of the ride except for the occasional road debris from an accident. You never know what will puncture your tires but you also can only do so much to avoid things without getting into traffic. I err on the side of staying in the bike lane. I also have to watch out for people pulling out of apartment complexes. If I see someone who is on a pace to intersect my path, I always slow down until I know they see me. Better to stop and let them go through then getting hit.

After ascending a small hill, Pond Springs crosses Hunter’s Chase at a traffic light that is quite reasonably timed. After that it’s a nice downhill slope to a dogleg into US Highway 183. I don’t like crossing 183 but I have no choice. It’s a funky intersection where I cross under 183 at a traffic light at Pond Springs, take a left turn onto the feeder road, immediately go through the light at Spicewood Springs/McNeil, pedal fifty yards uphill on the feeder, take a right turn onto a side street and then almost immediately turn left onto the four-lane Jollyville Road. The part on the feeder is definitely the most harrowing part of the commute but the good thing about having people sitting behind me at the Pond Springs/183 light is that I know they see me and they’re going reasonably slowly. Once I’m on the feeder they all pass me and then there is a gap before the next set of cars coming down the feeder road rolls through. I ride like heck on that part. Occasionally there is someone riding in front of me who is not wearing a helmet or not trying to ride fast which makes me angry. Get a move on, moron!

Jollyville is the third major segment of the ride and it’s interesting too. For starters, it’s a major four-lane road that is used as an alternative to 183 which it parallels. People can go 40 or faster down it. It also winds and is slightly hilly. It has a lot of businesses and side streets that open onto it. But at least it has a bike lane. This is where I’ll usually see a cyclist or two. I try to stay in the middle of the bike lane as it’s very narrow and sometimes cars get quite close (as well as buses). My guess is that Jollyville was originally built without bike lanes but then added them without widening the road, narrowing the lanes instead. It’s not the most comforting but at least there are more cyclists on the road so hopefully the drivers are used to them.

I stay on Jollyville for a mile or so then take a left onto another major road with a bike lane, Duval. Taking that left is interesting as I have to cut across two lanes of traffic to get into the left hand turn lane for cars. I’ll usually steal a glance over my shoulder when I’m getting close and dart across if I don’t see anyone. If there’s a car coming, I’ll usually stop and turn to get a good look, waiting for an open time to cross. At 6:50am I don’t have to wait very long. It’s fun being in the left-hand turn lane because then you really do feel like a car. I turn onto Duval and roll down a quick hill (past the Chuy’s where sometimes I can smell what I think is the frying of tortilla chips) to my old nemesis, 183. This time it’s a straight shot through an intersection with very few people behind me and then into a bike lane as Duval turns east and into a one-lane road.

Near 183 on Duval is an elementary school with an elderly crossing guard. I make a point of saying hi to him every morning and every morning I think he’s surprised to hear a cyclist talking to him. He composes himself enough to say something back like ‘good morning’ or ‘how are you doing?’, the latter being useless because by that time I’m rolling right past him and unable to answer. I also like that spot in the ride when the school zone is in effect and I can ride at almost the same speed as the cars on the road.

I continue down Duval for a mile or so, watching all the while for people pulling out of their driveways or out from side streets. At the bottom of a small hill it turns abruptly left and crosses the railroad track that runs behind NI. This is a little difficult as I have to make sure I’ve slowed down enough to negotiate the curve and not be going so fast I can’t signal that I’m turning right after the railroad track into NI’s back entrance. Sometimes also there is a train coming through which is fun to pass up the long line of cars and go right to the front. One time I even went under the guard arms but only because they were just coming down, the train was very far off and, well, because I could. Graham and unnamed kid #2 (no, you don’t even exist yet), if you’re reading this don’t do that.

The back entrance to NI is tight and windy and there is usually no room for anyone to pass. Luckily enough there’s usually not anyone to do so. I go up one last small incline, turn left into the Building B parking lot, turn right towards Building A and wham, I’m there. Another ride down!

Going home is a bit different as of course it’s always hotter, particularly during May-September when it’s in the mid-70s in the morning and the high-90s in the afternoon. On those afternoons the turn onto Duval makes you feel like you’re breathing in fire from the black asphalt. I have to do some tricky maneuvers on the ride home. The first is turning left out of NI’s back drive onto the sidewalk, then riding it for a minute or so across the railroad to the first side street. At that street I do a quick 270 so I’m like a car wanting to turn left onto Duval. I can’t take a left out of NI’s back entrance because cars are only supposed to go to the right and there’s a big median anyway. And also it’s quite un-carlike (is that a word?). At the side street I’ll usually cross into the middle of the road, stand there and wait as Duval has a lot of cars on it in the afternoon. When there’s a gap, sometimes after more than two minutes of waiting, I cross over into the bike lane and continue on my way.

Getting to 183 is also tricky. The problem is that Duval turns into two lanes and then three for the right-hand turn lane. But I want to be in the middle lane so I can go through under the overpass. What I have to do is hug the right-hand side until a gap opens up, sometimes by a friendly driver who recognizes my predicament, and then roll into the middle lane up to the light. Most people are taking a right so once I get into that middle lane I’m ok.

I go under 183 but then have to scale a little hill with no bike lane on it, forcing me to get onto the sidewalk in front of a car dealership. Luckily there are usually no pedestrians and regardless I don’t want to be on a four-lane road with no bike lane while riding uphill (which of course causes me to ride considerably more slowly, particularly if I’m riding against the wind). I get to Jollyville on the sidewalk, take a right and then immediately get into the bike lane.

A note about wind. It seems it’s always either out of the southeast or the northwest, the predominant directions I travel on my commute. That can make it a bear but hey, it’s good exercise. I prefer having the wind in my face in the morning since it’s cooler then but also because there’s less traffic and thus I’m not in as much of a hurry to get off the road.

Jollyville abruptly ends at the side street whose name I forget right next to 183. To get up to Spicewood Springs/McNeil, I take a left on this side street (while being in the left lane, usually in a line of cars inching forward) and then an immediate right into an older shopping center dominated by a Big Lots. I always figure this shopping center is not a great place to ride as you have to watch out for cars from several directions, your view sometimes being obscured by other cars.

I get up to Spicewood Springs at the end of the shopping center. At that point the road is three lanes. The two on the right go straight through (there is no dedicated right-hand turn lane) and the one on the left is left turn only. The middle lane is where I want to be because you can also turn left on it, putting me on the right side of the feeder road and able to easily turn right onto Pong Springs. There is always a lot of traffic at this intersection and I usually have to wait for the light to turn green to be able to ease out into traffic and sit at the red light. It’s interesting as I’m literally in the middle of the traffic, surrounded by cars and heat and enveloped in the noise and gas smell from them and the traffic on 183. I like it though when there is a car sitting behind me because I know they know I’m there. When the light turns green, I accelerate as fast as I can (which isn’t abysmally slow but the gap I create is probably 2-3 car lengths), get up to the feeder, throw out my left hand to indicate I’m turning and make a hard left. It’s not the easiest turn, particularly at full speed, but I haven’t wiped out yet. And I smile for the benefit of all of the people sitting on McNeil staring at me, eh!

Then it’s back on nice smooth Pond Springs where, if the wind is from the south, I can really move. I go through Hunter’s Chase and make an easy right onto Turtle Rock at the light. The hill leading down to Turtle Rock is one of the steepest on the ride and I have to pump my brakes sometimes if someone who is coming the opposite way and is turning left doesn’t look like they might see me.

I continue down Turtle Rock and then veer north towards my neighborhood. It was at that veer that I got, out of nowhere, stung by a bee on the side of my head. I thought I’d been shot with a BB gun or something. Also around there was where I was chased by a stupid golden retriever that thankfully I was able, with some furious pedaling, to outrun.

I cross Anderson Mill at the light (also getting into the left lane to avoid the right-hand turn lane) and am back into my neighborhood, Forest North. An easy ride on the two lane road through three stop signs, a right turn and then a left, a short ride up a little rise and wham, I’m at home, all sopping wet with sweat and ready to be attacked by the Kid and the Dog (well, mostly the Dog).

That’s about it for my commute. Thanks for reading and we’ll see what exercise I’m able to whip up at ATMI to make up for its absence.