Posted on September 29th, 2009 by james
The castle on the rock is so strongly grounded, bounded, and founded, that by force of man it can never be confounded; the foundation and walls are unpenetrable, the rampiers impregnable, the bulwarks invincible no way but one to it is or can be possible to be made passable. - John Taylor 1618
The final chapter […]
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Posted on September 17th, 2009 by james
Andorra exists in an odd stratum of countries called microstates. These nations have avoided getting absorbed by larger states throughout history by arming themselves with extravagant casinos and various tourist traps. Invading armies would fall into a vicious cycle of gambling degeneracy and taking their kids to petting zoos, only to fall to the point […]
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Posted on September 11th, 2009 by james
Reduce
Ildefons Cerdà, the fucking guy who designed the city had a fetish for octagons. You can tell because every intersection in the district he planned is shaped in one. Pedestrians aren’t able to cross directly with the traffic, you need to walk around to where the crosswalks are then walk back around again to get […]
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Posted on September 3rd, 2009 by james
A mere two and a half hours on a fast train from Amsterdam will get you to the fine city of Antwerp. The city is neither overrun with ants, nor were twerps a problem I encountered. I would have liked to have been here longer, but only had the day, so my experience here is […]
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Posted on August 29th, 2009 by james
Amsterdam was my second stop on this prolific pan European tour. It is one of the most pedestrian friendly cities I’ve been to, being perfectly flat, loaded with human scale urban design, and plenty of easy ways to get around. Sometime in the past the potheads who were tired of getting lost in the forest […]
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Posted on August 25th, 2009 by james
When I’m not cruising around in my flatulence powered Prius, or sipping my organic green tea while chained to fin whale, I’m usually thinking about how I can save the planet. Since I’m traveling through Europe, I’m going on a mission to save the environment here from the hazardous waste we know as eurotrash. It […]
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Posted on May 10th, 2009 by james
Anyone seen my coke stash? I’ve got some art to create and I need to be in the right state of mind…
798 was a former military industrial complex, used by the commies in the 50’s with some help from the East Germans and their Russian comrades. What’s fascinating is that several of the factories within […]
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Posted on May 4th, 2009 by james
A part of my excursion to the nation’s capital during the Labour Day weekend was a little side trip to the recently refurbished Qianmen Street. Qianmen means front gate, cause the street runs right in front of the front gate to a certain infamous square and the Forbidden City.
Naturally I picked a day of the […]
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Posted on March 29th, 2009 by james
I didn’t really get to do any tourist stuff the whole two weeks I was in Italy. Instead I just ate food and stared blankly at rocks. The one day I went to Florence, I didn’t even get to see David, they were too busy washing washing his balls or some such.
I did get […]
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Posted on February 10th, 2009 by james
Tiger Leaping Gorge is a World Heritage Site carved into the mountains by the Yangtze River north of Lijiang. Being a WHS, you better recognize it’s worth visiting compared to those anemic “scenic spots” that every county in China has. Many people go on an overnight trek through the trail system, and wind up either […]
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Posted on February 6th, 2009 by james
A friend and I decided to hell with the fact that Chinese Spring Festival is the worst time of year to travel, we passed around the lube, bent over and with big bearing grins prepared for the exorbitant pain prices that we would pay for airfare and to stay in hotels at this time of […]
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Posted on January 8th, 2009 by james
My trek to Jingdezhen was realized by way of 8-hour direct bus from Hangzhou after the return from Anji. For those interested in getting there, I would advise against this method. It’s expensive (140rmb), the buses are shit, and for reasons beyond my explanation they play really loud versions of old James Bond movies dubbed […]
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Posted on August 5th, 2008 by james
A week ago, my friend and I decided that we’d had enough of the perpetual routine of visiting the same three bars in Qingdao. In order to break the cycle we decided suddenly Saturday afternoon to head to the train station and jump on the next train to Weifang. Why Weifang? It was close, only […]
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Posted on April 2nd, 2008 by james
In Tianjin this sign constitutes false advertising.
This weekend I made a quick jaunt up to Tianjin (or Tientsin for you British Imperial types) with friends for a mission with two primary objectives. This first objective was to examine a factory and make sure that the products they made didn’t spontaneously combust after one use; the […]
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Posted on February 18th, 2008 by james
• Everyone has satellite tv…in their car…that they watch while driving.
• I was expecting there to be American GI’s prowling the streets mercilessly trying to bag Korean girls, I only saw one guy in uniform ball and chain with a girl.
• Very few western people outside of Seoul. So if you leave that city, better make sure you […]
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Posted on February 9th, 2008 by james
So I was in the Republic of Korea, recharging my body with enough soju to make it through another Joseon Dynasty. One way of staying there is by staying in what the Koreans call “Motels”. These places are also known as Love Hotels. They have them in Japan but I’ve never seen them in mainland […]
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Posted on November 26th, 2007 by james
Being as my head is already huge, there was no room left for my face to swell up anymore. Quite frankly I didn’t have any aspirations of picking up backwards mountain women during our 6 hour hike up Taishan. I really didn’t care much about the bites, other than they itched like a piece of […]
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Posted on November 15th, 2007 by james
The imbecility of my prior actions began to set in as I accepted that I had in fact missed the train and this was not some horrible hangover induced hallucination. The hangover itself was kicking into full gear and I hadn’t had the masochistic pleasure of one like this for a long time. The only […]
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Posted on November 10th, 2007 by james
Mount Tai or Tai Shan is one of the 5 holy daoist mountains of China. It is also the only one located in my home province of Shandong. My friend thought it would be a good place to visit during the week-long break we had as the rest of the class went on school trips […]
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Posted on October 31st, 2007 by james
Qingdao’s luxurious Meng Gu Lu Bus Station
This weekend I took my first Chinese long distance bus ride up to the city of Changyi to visit my Japanese friend. I’ve wanted to visit him now for a while for a number of reasons.
1)Partying at the same two expat […]
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