Instead, I want to talk about all the weird little things you come across in the course of travelling. The strange food, forgotten temples, uncomfortable conversations, etc. It seems obvious, but it draws criticism sometimes - when you step out of the safe-zone of writing about yourself you have to start making judgements and assumptions that are often incorrect or offensive. Still, I think admitting and embracing the lens you're looking through is way more interesting than pretending to be objective or talking about yourself. Maybe it's ethnocentric to call things "weird," but I'd rather say something stupid once in a while than be boring all the time.

> It wasn't so much being fed up as an intense fear that I was going to end up doing 9-5 in an office. In college someone told me, "Getting a real job doesn't mean you have to stop travelling. You'll still get about two weeks of vacation a year and you can do whatever you want!" Two weeks?! That scared the bejesus out of me. The complicated thing about wanting to travel is that it's completely at odds with everything you're supposed to do. You can play guitar or cook in your spare time, but travelling isn't something you can relegate to the evenings after work. It seemed like I had to choose between a steady income and a life of adventure, excitement and intrigue, so I sold everything I couldn't fit in a backpack and left. 

> The second one. But it's working pretty well! 

> One time I convinced myself I had rabies, which has a survival rate of precisely zero (I was fine.) I've fallen off motorcycles more times than I can count and that moment between hitting the ground and standing up is always terrifying. I'd like to think I've gotten a little smarter lately, but last week I ate a fingernail-sized piece of naga jolokia. It's the hottest chilli in the world, about two hundred times spicier than a jalapeño. I was pretty sure that was the end. 

> I think disasters always make the best travel tales. There's probably a bit of schadenfreude in there, but a good disaster can turn a run-of-the-mill vacation slideshow into a story about overcoming hardship. Nobody writes fiction without conflict and plot twists, so why should travel writing be any different?

> This is way back before I started blogging seriously, but there's a restaurant in Saigon called the "Jungle Barbecue." It pretty much serves everything in the jungle… um, barbecued. I used to go there about once a month and by the time I left Vietnam I'd checked off iguana, rat, sparrow, weasel and all sorts of unmentionable animal parts. 

The low point was probably dog meat, coincidentally also in Vietnam. I ate it on purpose once or twice just to say I did, but later my friend and I took a motorbike trip up near the border with China and there actually wasn't anything to eat but dog for a good couple of days. It's not repulsive, but I'd rather not touch it again. 

The take-home lesson here is that there's a reason humans mostly eat pigs, cows, chickens and the like - we've spent thousands of years breeding them to be delicious. Dogs and porcupines have had no such conditioning. 
 

> Thanks! I've never had any serious training, but I've always been into design and it's kind of the same thing. I've also been using Photoshop for about ten years, but I think once you figure out how to use a camera properly the rest is just composition. I'm working on a lens collection but most of the time I just use a Nikon D60 and the standard 18-55mm that comes with most dSLRs. I have a whole philosophy behind it, but I think I just made it up to justify the fact that it's a pain in the ass to carry ten pounds of gear and I'm not responsible enough to own anything expensive.  

The camera doesn't really matter though. A fancy SLR or 200mm lens might help, but if you know what you want to shoot you can do it with a camera phone. I think illustration comes before emotion, at least as far as travel photography goes. Feeling and mood are essential but it's more important to give a real sense of the place you're photographing. Unless you're calling your work art, which I don't, pictures have to be of stuff. 

> All of them! Lately I've been pretty into the idea of spending a winter in Mongolia, but I'm not sure I could handle that for months on end without someone else I really liked along for the ride. Really though, if someone bought me a plane ticket tomorrow I don't think there's anywhere I wouldn't go. I've found that you can't actually say anything about your interest in a country until you've been there - places you've never even thought about can become fascinating the second you land, and ones you've always wanted to visit might turn out to be completely lame.  

> I'll be honest: I'm not a fan of Laos or Panama. I know hating on Laos is backpacker sacrilege, but there are all these little things about it that bug the ever-living crap out of me. It's all stupid stuff I have no right to complain about, like people blaring Thai pop at 5am and the food being awful, but I've never found the peaceful land of elephants all the guidebooks talk about. And Panama... Panama feels like some sort of dystopian caricature of the US's worst aspects. There's nothing to eat except fast food and nobody seems to do anything except watch TV. I'm sure if I spent more time in either country I'd come to like them, but I don't have much desire to.

> The places I enjoyed the most are usually the ones where I stayed the longest, which I don't think is a coincidence. It takes a long time to start to see a country or city on its own terms and until that happens you're liable to miss out on the best parts. There are amazing experiences to be had everywhere if you look hard enough, and I'm starting to think the effect of place on travel is overstated. 

Still, everywhere is different, and Vietnam never let me down in the adventure department (I wish I'd blogged more back then!) The landscape is incredible, the politics are absurd and the food is delicious. Colombia is amazing, too. I was only there a month, but I met some of the most sophisticated and interesting people I've ever come across. India is shaping up to be pretty ridiculous, but it'd take a lifetime to get a handle on this country. 

> Oh hell yes, that's my new favourite Youtube video . My first blog was about animals eating each other, maybe I should start it back up.