I have often asked myself how my transient ways affect my ability to have meaningful friendships. Leaving travel aside, I have moved cities 8 times in my life (Ottawa-Palo Alto-Ottawa-Edmonton-Camrose-Edmonton-Kingston-Toronto-Ottawa) and that does not even count the places I have lived for shorter periods of time (France, Burkina Faso, Guatemala…)
I only really have three [...]
or
“I Hemorrhage Money”
or
“Now Taking Bets on When I Will Be Broke.”
I am not nearly the “budget traveler” that I’d like to think I am.
This isn’t to say that I mind roughing it. I am, as my father would say, “a mudder.” I sleep in the $4 dorms, I enjoy cheap street food [...]
Whether you are traveling in a developing country or Western Europe, chances are you have hidden money somewhere on your person. Presumably, this will keep it safe from criminals and act as a backup supply if everything else is lost. I guess this might be a tad paranoid… but it doesn’t hurt so it can’t [...]
I guess if I judged cities based on the caliber of the teenage boys who loiter the streets, I would have to love Edmonton, hate Amman (groped) and hate Ottawa (grabbed… on Fifth Ave. in the city’s yuppiest neighborhoods, of all places.) But I loved Amman and I feel content (if a bit bored) in [...]
Man: The way you look at polygamy is the way we think when we look at your culture on television and see two women or two men getting married. It’s scandalous! We don’t understand!
Woman: We intellectual women fight for the liberation of women, but in our homes our husbands still try to maintain their authority. [...]
I want to engage more with online and print articles on the subjects that I am interested in (travel, international development, gender issues, etc.) So here is my first article review.
Title: Innocence abroad
Author: Karen Kleiss
Source: Edmonton Journal, May 17th, 2008
To read the full story go here.
But the short version is basically this: A kind, generous [...]
“Times flies when you’re having fun.”
I’m sure you’ve heard this a million times, as I have. It’s common knowledge, right?
But hold on. Does time really fly when you’re having fun? I have always disagreed.
Ever since I was a little girl, I have found that time only flies when things are “okay.” You know, when [...]
I pay much closer attention to the news from the foreign countries I’ve come to love than I do to Canadian news. (Maybe this is because last year, the most exciting thing to happen in Canada was when two stodgy white guys formed a coalition to take power from another stodgy white guy.)
Last year in [...]
You know you’re a grade A procrastinator when a friend asks advice about where to live in Toronto, and instead of giving a three sentence answer, you take a break from your MA thesis and illustrate a colour-coded map.
I do love Toronto. A lot. It’s a patchwork of unique neighborhoods. Once you start living [...]
Over the last two years, and especially since learning how to salsa last summer in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala, I’ve been really into Latin music.
Of course, I probably have really terrible taste in Latin music. In fact, I’m almost certain that I listen to the Spanish equivalent of stuff like the Backstreet Boys. But I figure [...]
