Palau kayak tour

Very American breakfast with lots of fruit juices though they are mostly from concentrate. Disappointing in a tropical island. Lots of processed foods actually, mostly imported from the US and Taiwan, even eggs! 

Weird...In Palau, cars drive on the right-hand side of the road, like in Europe but they all have their wheel on the right-hand side of the vehicle, like in the UK. Very strange. Maybe it's because here cars come mostly from Japan where they drive on the left-hand side of the road so it makes sense to have the wheel on the right-hand side here it's just strange.

We are picked up at our hotel by Marete, a stereotypical tall, blond, blue-eyed Danish lady who is spending a gap year traveling and working around the world with her boyfriend before going back to Denmark and continue her studies. Great idea. Not many Italians do this, even fewer Chinese I think. Too many Italians stay home with mamma until they move in with their wives. Anything to avoid cooking or having to manage a household.

Chinese are just beginning to understand the concept of a gap year. Until now they have to work as soon as possible to support the family. But the rising middle class now knows that is an option and can afford it, we'll see. 

Amazing canoe tour at Risong. A small group of us with a guide who comes from Tinian but has worked here for 12 years: meny more tourists, more money to be made. He takes us through the unmistakable Palauan volcanic formations carpeted with luscious green bushes whose branches overloaded with deep dark leaves reach all the way to the waterline.

An American pilot is with us with his Japanese girlfriends (panta rei, a few decades ago she would have rather died than be anywhere near him). he works for United Airlines is enjoying a day off before returning to Guam, US aviation and military hub in the region. We join a group of 4 elderly and very energetic American ladies. one asks where we live, and when I say London but not sure after Brexit she invites me to move to her native New York city.  

  

We can see small fish of all shapes and colors, a few baby reef sharks and lots of totally innocuous jelly fish, which do not sting as they have no predators in these protected waters. 

Dinner at the Yue Hai restaurant, owned by Cantonese family who moved here some two decades ago also run the hotel's jewelry shop all in the family, including some cousins who have come here for a few years to help and make some dollars. The restaurant is far more appealing and much better value than the jewellery store.

Beyond the Wall, my book on a Polish and Soviet adventure available on all Amazon sites.

My latest book:

Beyond the Wall:

Adventures of a Volkswagen Beetle

Beyond the Iron Curtain

has just been published and is available on all Amazon sites.

Description:

1980: the Cold War between capitalist West and socialist East is in full swing. Tensions are high but, at the academic level, some channels of useful exchange remain open. The author and two classmates would join one such program linking a leading American university and its counterpart in Poland. They drive to Warsaw in a bright yellow VW Beetle and, in addition to attending classes, travel far and wide within the country as well as to several of the neighbors in the socialist bloc where the Soviet Union called all the shots. They drive across the USSR and visit the Berlin Wall, the symbol of the division of Europe. Throughout, Marco takes detailed notes of what they see and hear.

Almost four decades later, the East-West division of Europe is gone. Marco recently found his diary and decided to publish an expanded version of it. His written notes from 1980 have been enriched with descriptions and analyses of historical events that will help the reader see his personal experience in a more significant cultural, social, political and economic context.

The author hopes this real life story will help younger generations, who did not live through the Cold War, better appreciate the blessing of living in a European continent that is immensely more open, rich and free than it was then.

Skiing in Cervinia and Zermatt

Sled-dog in Cervinia

National day in Guiyang

Today it's China national day, the anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic in 1949. It is the beginning of one week of celebrations in the whole country.

We take a walk in the Culture Park. Lots of families, and quite a few children, many waving Chinese flags.

Chicken paws

We celebrate in the evening when we have dinner with family and friends. The main curiosity of the day is pig intestine, at least for me, they are used to it of course. Also, duck paws and melt-in-your-mouth breaded pork cutlets. To finish off the meat dishes, some frogs! Everything delicious!

Pig intestine

The men are drinking considerable amounts of distilled alcohol, 4 of them share a bottle. O. empties the bottle into their 4 glasses and then they make various toasts and challenges to each other until it's all gone! (It does not take very long!)

Drinking away

O. says he wants his son to marry a girl who has an older brother so he can protect her. But he wants his daughters to marry men with older sisters who would then help their younger brothers set up their families. It is a bit convoluted but his reasoning has its own logic from a traditional point of view. Good luck! These days Chinese kids find their partners online and I doubt the gender of their siblings is an important part of their decisions.