Other Side of the Planet dot com

Meaningless Rant: Cockroach Bits

Posted on February 28th, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Meaningless Rants.

I returned home to my miniscule apartment that Tarzan and I claim as home after a full day of teaching.  I had recently returned from a bout of travel and had yet to clean - I will vaguely describe the state of my apartment as messy to save my dignity.

I can’t say why I noticed it almost immediately upon entering the main room of my studio - a few small, brown legs, none connected to each other or the original owner, along with a small chunk of - wing? exoskeleton? - don’t particularly stand out on the hardwood floors of my apartment.

And yet, they do.  At once the most insignificant, and the most eye-catching feature of my apartment, I stood just inside the doorway, eyeing it wearily.  In eight months, I had only encountered one cockroach in my apartment.  Now, quite suddenly, the number had doubled to two.
 
Standing there for more than ten minutes, I pondered the implications of the scene near my toes, which jutted dangerously out of the cheap, blue house slippers I was so fond of.

The negative was obvious: there had been a cockroach in my apartment.  Furthermore, cockroach bits were now scattered around my apartment.  Knowing Tarzan, the larger pieces were probably arranged neatly on my bed - the reason why I now religiously cover my bed with a comforter or blanket each morning before leaving.

Was there a positive aspect to this horrific scene?  What good could I see in having a cockroach in my apartment?

It’s not alive, I told myself.  That’s good.

Yes, if there must be a cockroach in my apartment, dead is undeniably the desired state.  And yet, unarguably dead and harmless though this particular cockroach was, I couldn’t help but feel apprehensive.

As I stared at the three legs and the triangular section of unknown cockroach part, there was only one thought in my mind, and it looped on automatic replay:

Where are the other pieces?

0 comments.

Mexico: Uxmal

Posted on February 25th, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Mexico, Travel.

The one guided tour I took was to Uxmal and Kabah.  The pronounciation on Uxmal is ”oosh-mal”, which translates from Mayan as “three harvests”, representing the three harvests of maize that they could reap from the soil at this location each year.

[The size of the main pyraymid overwhelms you as you enter the site - I couldn’t even fit the image into the scope of the camera lens.] 

Once again, you could see nothing from the entrance, a quasi-handicap accessible uphill trek.  When you get back down to the bottom of the hill, the trees finally part to give you a view of the back side of Uxmal’s main pyramid, a 39 meter (127 foot) temple dedicated to Chaac, the Mayan rain god.  As there were no rivers or lakes near Uxmal, its residents relied heavily on regular rainfall.

      
[Why do some Chaac noses turn up, and others down…?  Is there a difference…?]

Images of Chaac lined every side of the doorway to the room at the top of the temple, and thirteen huge Chaac faces accompanied you up either side of the main staircase (where numerous “no climbing” signs were once again placed.)  The rain god’s face was easily identifiable on other buildings around the site.

      
[Left: Dude with a jaguar head above him; Right: A snake winding its way around the roof.]

There was a fair deal of animal symbology scattered all over the site, which made exploration quite interesting.  The down side of being on a guided tour was that I didn’t have as much time as I would have liked to explore all these images - yet without the guide, I would have had no clue what they meant…win some, lose some.

Up on a hill was the governor’s palace, where it is believed that the rooms of the structure served as government offices.  (But they’re rather dank and musty and personally I wouldn’t want to work in there without a HEPA filter.) 

[Myself, hanging out with a rain god.  Everybody’s gotta have a hobby.]

Behind the governor’s palace was another pyramid.  This one had only been fixed up on the front side - the other three sides looked like a rocky hill, overgrown with grass and a few bushes.  This one we were allowed to climb - I couldn’t resist, of course.  Inside the small room at the top, I took a picture of myself with Chaac.

0 comments.

Mexico: Chichen Itza

Posted on February 24th, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Mexico, Travel.

The confusing thing for me, as I approached my first Mayan ruin, was that you couldn’t see ANYTHING from outside. In fact, the entraces to many of these places are set a ways away from the main sights, and you often find yourself trudging through the jungle for a while before you actually see something other than hawkers with their blankets full of sourveniers.

[El Castillo]

At Chichen Itza, the trees suddenly part to either side, opening up to a grassy expanse where El Castillo, the site’s most famous pyramid. At 25 meters (about 80 feet), with serpents snaking their way down either side of the four wide staircases, El Castillo was a great greeter to the ancient Mayan world.

[Yea though my Espanol sucks, I believe this frequent sight says “No Climbing”]

Unfortunately, however, tourists no longer have the privilege of climbing El Castillo. Most of Chichen Itza’s major sites are off-limits to tourists, which made me wonder what the point was of coming so far if not to climb them! The adventurous need not fear “the farther you venture from Mexico’s tourist capital of Cancun, the more fun you get to have at the ruins. So enjoy looking at Chichen Itza, and then move on to Indiana Jones-type fantasies can be fulfilled elsewhere.

[Myself in the midst of the Group of a Thousand Pillars]

I wondered around in an area known as the Group of a Thousand Pillars: it got its name for obvious reasons that I will leave the dim to guess at.

[Myself, just hanging out for a few minutes]

The grounds of Chichen Itza are vast, although I would later learn that this was not in the least uncommon. Although my visit was in the winter, it was still hot as I trekked from site to site on the grounds, only occasionally enjoying the shade of a jungle canopy. Somewhere deep in the jungle, I finished off the half-liter bottle of water I’d brought with me, and I ended up gratefully dishing out US$2 for a one-liter bottle at the foot of the Observatory. I was surprised that this was the ONLY hawker I met selling water all day. (Translation: Bring a lot of water with you.)

[The Observatory] 

The Observatory was a round building sitting atop a series of raised platforms (which you could climb) but once again, the inside of the Obsevatory, with its spiral staircase, was off-limits.

      
[Eagle (left) and jaguar (right) clutching human hearts, which they are eating - yummy]

Back near the entrance, there were a series of smaller buildings with a great amount of images portraying a couple of the mightiest animals Central America can boast - the eagle and the jaguar.  These animals were often portrayed eating human hearts, which they clutched tightly in their claws…kinda gives a new meaning to the words “eat your heart out”, doesn’t it?

Later, I noticed a random stone block on a grassy pile of rubble that had a skull staring back at me.  “That’s a bit creepy,” I thought, staring back at it as I strolled past.

Then I noticed that the low platform it sat on had a long row of skulls carved onto the stone walls, with remants of what looked to be red paint, although it seems more likely that there would be some metal deposits in the stone that would result in rust rather than the paint surviving the weather, but the color really didn’t indicate rust, either.

Creepy though I did indeed find this area, it wasn’t until I turned the corner to see a full wall, top to bottom and end to end, covered in skull images.  Named the Platform of Skulls, the heads of decapitated sacrificial victims were apparently kept here.  The term “creepy” doesn’t really seem to do the feeling justice.

[When I got home I found I had a number of pictures of piles of rocks, and it took quite some time staring at the pictures before I realized my reason (which I was convinced I must have, at one point, had) - I was snapping photos of the wild iguanas that inhabit the ruins.]

All in all, Chichen Itza was a good deal.  Heavy tourist traffic due to its proximity to Cancun has its drawbacks, but it was a fairly easy site that made for a good starting point on my little expedition into the Yucatan.

0 comments.

Mexico: Mexican Time

Posted on February 6th, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Mexico, Travel.

An observation on what they refer to here as “Mexican Time”, which is similar to Asian Time, (which means up to 30 minutes after the scheduled time.)  Mexican Time, however, unlike Asian Time, is not necessarily - but most likely - later than the arranged time.

Like when I tried to arrange a trip to Edzna, and the agent promised to come to my hostel at 9:00 that night to inform me if the trip would go.  At 10:30pm, she had still not arrived.  TWELVE HOURS LATER, a travel agent arrives and informs me that we’re leaving in 30 minutes.  Ten minutes later, another agent comes to collect me so we can leave immediately.  WTF???

When I go to buy a bus ticket at the second class bus terminal, it can take a half an hour (or more) with only five people ahead of me in line.  WHY?  What are they doing?  Standing there talking like they haven`t got a care in the world while the bus I’m TRYING to buy a ticket for IS LEAVING!

Except that it isn`t leaving.  It`s 9:00, and it`s scheduled to leave at 9:00, but in reality it won`t leave until 9:20…but perhaps if all the seats were full, it might have left at 8:50.  Or 8:30.  Who knows?

I had a ticket for a bus that would stop at 4:40pm.  When the bus pulled up at 4:40, I lined up to get on.  They sent me away, insisting that it was not my bus - this was the one before my bus…that was…30, maybe 60 minutes LATE…and it`s normal.  Sure enough, the 4:40 bus came at about 5:00pm.  WHAT?

I never see Japanese tourists here - now I think I know why.  They could never hack it here.

5 comments.

USA: New York City (Winter 2007)

Posted on February 5th, 2007 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, NYC, Travel, USA.

*Posts with my personal photos will come after I return to the states where I can download and down-size everything. 

This trip begins with a stop in New York City.  As there was no difference in cost between airports (and NYC is serviced by three of them,) I chose to fly into La Guardia, which I have dreamt of doing since seeing the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie. 

(There’s a scene where Raphael, chasing Casey Jones, does a rolling jump over the hood of a taxi.  A nervous, preppy young businessman is sitting in the back of the cab.  Shocked, he asks “What was that?”  The cabbie, in a thick New York accent, says casually: “Looked sorta like a big turtle.  In a trenchcoat.”  He looks back at his fare and adds: “You’re going to La Guardia, right?”  The businessman nods quickly, terrified.)

I haven’t had the opportunity to see any Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on this trip yet, but every time I walk over some grating on the sidewalk, I look down and point and tell my mom: “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles live down there.”  It’s also gotten me thinking about how many superheros the Big Apple has - Spider-man, the Ghostbusters, can’t think of them now…  But the point is, how come they got all the awesome people here, and places like Minneapolis are so neglected by the amazing saviors of modern society?

While in New York, I saw two Broadway shows this time (as I love Broadway.)  I recall in my junior high school music class, we studied the topic of musicals for a while.  My teacher asked what makes musicals unrealistic, and someone answered that they are unrealistic because, in real life, we do not break out into song and dance.  To my shock, the teacher said she was right.  I break out into song and dance constantly, and musicals are an accurate representation of my world.  Thus, I watch them.

First, we saw Chicago, which was on sale at the TKTS booth in Times Square, where they sell discount Broadway and Off-Broadway show tickets.  Chicago is the story of a show girl who commits murder, and her subsequent efforts to get off the hook.  The best character in the show was Amos (played by Rob Barlett,) her gullible husband who no one seems to notice or care about (he has a song called “Mr. Cellophane”.)

The other show we saw was Hairspray, a popular new show set in Baltimore in the 1960’s.  Mostly a feel-good show appealing to women, Hairspray tells the story of an unpopular teenage girl’s quest to pursue what she wants in life.  I wasn’t that into it half-way through the show, but by the end it had won me over.  It has a good bit of comedy, but about half of it went over my head (probably it is better enjoyed by people who were alive in the 60’s.)

I did a bit of sight seeing.  Did the usual stuff like Times Square, Rockafeller Center, and the Empire State (where King Kong lived! TMBG )  I bought a bright, lime green Empire State t-shirt, which makes me happy.  Being the world-traveling hippy that I am, a trip to the UN was also mandatory, and I’m not on a quest to obtain a blue UN beret (size 7 1/8, I think, if you happen to be at an army surplus store.)

My last day I hit up the State of Libery and Ellis Island.  We actually got to go into the base of the statue this time…last time I was here, I consider myself lucky to have gone to Liberty Island at all.  As it was, the security measures were extreme.  Still, it was fun to climb up in there, and a glass ceiling lets you peer into the hollow bronze statue.

I spent a LONG time at Ellis Island.  I, like more than 100 million Americans (that’s somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of us!) can trace my ancestray back to that little clump of dirt.  I think many people only visit first and second floors, but if you get up to third floor, there’s a ton of stuff to be seen (including an excellent series of photographs!)

For my last meal, I had an excellent slab of meat, and a good bottle of wine, at Les Halles on Park Avenue (thank you, Marcus.)  Finally, after a good year subsiding of thin slices of over-cooked meat and meat substitutes like tofu, I finally got the chance to sink my teeth into a soft, tender, juicy steak, rich red in the middle with juices gushing out.  Definately recommended.

[I`m going here!]

Much thanks for all the love and support out there.  It’s now time to go get killed in Central America.  (The Central America Trip, however, has been renamed the Yavin 4 Trip.  The night before my departure from Taiwan, I discovered that one of my destinations on the trip, Tikal, Guatemala, was the filming site for the rebel base in the original Star Wars movie.  I’m so excited!)

0 comments.