So, Where Was I?
This blog entry about the events of Monday, June 24, 2013 was originally posted on June 24, 2013.
PROLOGUE FOR THE NEXT GLOBAL TRIP: The Global Trip travel blog has been around for ten years now(!), but it’s been quite some time since I posted a dispatch while on the road, from Berlin in the late summer of 2012. Well, that doesn’t necessarily mean I haven’t been traveling. If you recall my statement about “journalistic integrity,” I’ve decided to keep this here Global Trip blog independent (for reasons explained in said statement), meaning I would not blog about a press trip. And I’ve been on a few of them since last summer, on behalf of some of the travel publications I write for, which were Instagrammed and Facebooked instead — you know, for posterity. (Obviously, I also wrote the articles after the fact.)
- Last November, I narrowly escaped New York City after Superstorm Hurricane Sandy hit, ending up on one of just two flights that were allowed to take off when JFK International Airport had reopened after its unexpected shutdown due to flooding. From there I went Around the World in 18 Days, which encompassed back to back press trips. First I was in Abu Dhabi for the big Formula 1 race (and all the parties and events that led up to it), and it was a pretty over-the-top VIP experience with fast cars, black tie parties, and celebrities (as you can see in the Instagrammed Facebook album).
- From there, I made my way to Singapore via Dubai and Mumbai, for another press trip — one filled with roller coasters, night safaris, and a lot of food (and subsequent weight gain). During down time, I was able to meet up with my Singaporean connection Carol and Zac, whom you may recall from The Big Trip. Also while I was in the region, I took a personal side trip before flying back to the USA, to visit my Anchorman-quoting cousins — JayPee, Judiel (Joot), and Jessica (Jek) — who were still quoting Will Ferrell lines with me. (Obviously, we’re all excited for the upcoming sequel.) With us was my uncle/their father, my aunt/their stepmom, and above all, our “Tita” Josie, who had accompanied me island hopping in the Philippines during The Big Trip. Back in 2004-05, we had missed out on one major island of interest, Palawan, all the way west, so we all went there this time to check out its relaxed island vibe amongst limestone rocks (pictured above). My city-dwelling cousins hadn’t been there either so it was all new to them too — especially the bird’s nest soup in El Nido. Our antics continued as before, especially when Joot went all Gangnam-style.
- Last March, I went back to the Netherlands to work on a video, completely unrelated to the PR event I had been invited there for (video coming soon). Of course I Instagrammed my journey while on said press trip, and extended my stay to hang out with Lot, the Dutch girl I had met and traveled northern Thailand with during The Big Trip nine years ago. (She hadn’t changed at all.) After the Netherlands, I spent a couple of days working and bike riding in Paris, where I’d caught up with my former colleague Eve, plus the two French girls from my Patagonia trip, Marion and Sandra. The jaunt was short, but lovely, despite the fact that I still could not get a famous L’As du Falafel falafel as I tried the last Jewish holiday I was there.
Like many things, traveling as a journalist has its ups and downs. I mean, from a non-journalist point-of-view you’re probably thinking, “What’s not to like about it? You’re traveling for free!” The reality is, you’re traveling through someone else’s agenda and not your own, plus you’re stuck with the people they make you go with. (Generally they are great, but sometimes they’re awful — not that I’m going to name names.) Plus, you’re always taking notes and stuff, and you always have a lot homework to do, especially when you get back — unless you don’t. What I mean is, I had been invited to Abu Dhabi as a writer for Discovery.com, but just on my last day before heading back to the States (I was in Palawan), I got the email from my editor that our original web content team was being shut down in a big restructuring of the Discovery company, and we were no longer to write for them. Obviously, the Abu Dhabi Culture and Tourism Authority hated me for having sent me on their trip with hopes I’d write a piece for Discovery.com — only for me to not being able to do so. (Don’t fret ADCTA, I have a prospective article in an upcoming issue Departures magazine.)
I did get other pieces published though. My time in the Netherlands spawned an article for Cooking Channel, plus a new science travel video that is still in talks with one of my editors. My latest jaunt in the Philippines spawned another Cooking Channel piece. And a science travel video I shot in Singapore ended up on Treehugger, a subsidiary of Discovery — until that too got the boot from corporate, and was sold off to Mother News Network.
It was a bummer to lose my association with Discovery, but with that byline under my belt, I had enough clout and experience to work my way onto the digital team at National Geographic Traveler as one of their Intelligent Travel writers. That’s right; the guy who started a blog posting pictures of his traveler’s diarrhea is now a writer for the 125-year-old National Geographic Society! (Dian Fossey is totally turning in her grave.) I’ve authored a few pieces for them since, including one about Singapore’s hawker food scene. So that’s news for those of you who’ve been following this travel blog for ten(!) years.
This all brings me to my upcoming trip, slated to last a duration of five weeks. It’s based around a press trip to Papua New Guinea (PNG), which I’m going on as my first official assignment for National Geographic. Whether or not I’ll blog that part of the trip in detail out of a sense of integrity I’m not sure yet, but I’m thinking it might be a good idea since I’m writing in a more narrative style for Nat Geo — and blog entries have proven to be good notes. (You can compare The Global Trip blog entry on gorilla trekking with the piece that ended up on Nat Geo and see why that is.) However, I’m told that there will be really slow and spotty internet in PNG, so maybe not.
I will however, try to blog my travels before my time in PNG: Calgary and the Canadian Rockies (this time without a press junket) with Leigh-Anne, whom I met on Easter Island. With that region still in the aftermath of one of Alberta’s most disastrous floods in history, who knows what will happen?
I’ll also try and blog my journeys after PNG: New Zealand via Brisbane, Australia, which I’m going to make up as I go. I’ve missed those kinds of independent trips when you’re alone and don’t have a strict agenda, which leads to meeting new people and discovering more about a place. It’ll be the heart of winter there when I go, so if there’s anything on my loose agenda in that region, it’s snowboarding.
Anyway, 2013 marks an entire decade since people started reading The Global Trip blog in 2003. Thank you for your continued readership! The Fellowship of the Blog prevails!
THE GLOBAL TRIP CONTINUES… JUNE 27, 2013. (Really soon.)
I will not be posting pictures of my travelers’ diarrhea for National Geographic — unless they ask me to.
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