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you, me, and dupree

so as a quick side note, I moved yesterday from the very lovely Boston to the very wintery Toronto. I was sad to leave Boston, I don’t feel like I was able to give it a real chance, and really enjoyed the people I met while I was there. My roomies in particular were great to me, and a lot of fun to hang out with, then trivia night at the local bar with the trivia gang and a frosty root beer, and the church crew etc. Good people out there. Alas, rent surpassed me now that I am without income, so I packed up and moved to Toronto to live and work with my best friend Mifsud. I’ve setup shop in his office and am sleeping in his basement. Kind of a funny situation, but we (his wife, baby, mifsud, and I) laugh about it a lot.

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In the time I’ve been here it’s snowed 8 inches, what am I doing?

Here’s how we’ll do this

So I want to really convey the experience / adventure this trip ended up being for me, and I figure the easiest way to pull this off will be to give you a day by day playback and throw up there obscene amounts of photos in the process. I’ll leave them all small, cause most of them will be cleaned up and put up on doangang.com

So I’m queing them up, one a day or every other day and you can follow what my journey, like Paul,

Enjoy,

well thank goodness, or I will thank goodness personally next time I’m in the area

So just a quick note, I got home from my travels a few days ago and heard about what happened to Jake and Misty. For the readers digest version, BJ (Misty’s dad) had recently picked up a carbon monoxide detector for their new house a few weeks ago, and both surprisingly and luckily jake had it up and running. Luckily cause new years eve misty and the kids had headaches and such and had ended up leaving the house when jake got home from work and the carbon monoxide detector started going off. After firetrucks and artery digging at the emergency room (read doangang.blogspot.com if you want the whole shpeel) they are fine and replaced the stove that was the potential deadly killer.

The thought though, that a family of four as cute as theirs was in that much danger of going to sleep and just not waking up really kind of shook me up a bit. It just makes me a bit more appreciative of how fragile we really are and how carefully we should tread at times. Props to BJ for being the proactive grandpa, and props to jake for not yanking the battery out of that thing and forgetting about it like we’d done with smoke detectors our entire life when they would start going.

In short, love you guys, and am glad your safe and that we’ll all be around for Christmas and New Years next year.

Wrapping up

So I’ve made it to Cairo via Amman Jordan. Cairo is crazy. After a place like Israel, Cairo is so tourist driven. My experience so far is that everyone is trying to scam you and I’ve had to yell at my share of Arabs already.

It is something rather humbling to stand at the foot of the oldest structure on earth and have it be enormous and looming over you. At one point we just sat and looked, it’s all you can do.

The hotel we’re in is something of am adventure as well, I let Mikale pick it and she found one for only 12 USD! Bargains galore eh? Well let me tell you, turns out there are certain amenities I’ve grown accustomed to, like locks and free toilet paper. This place is a disaster. we’re moving out tonight cause I just can’t bring myself to relax in this room. And when I’m not on am iPhone I’ll write more.

Anyway. I’ll hit the Egyptian museum today and a few other sights then new years eve is reserved for sitting in my hotel (hopefully nicer than this one) room and writing in my journal, then new years day I’ll be flying home.

Thanks for all the comments and quick emails, it’s great to hear from people as much as possible while your out and away.

Enjoy

good times indeed

so I am here the night before I fly out from Tel Aviv to Cairo and my heart is full. In the last couple of days I’ve been able to visit some places that I am still in awe about. Places like Gethsemane, the Garden Tomb, and Bethlehem are not places that one would normally expect to see in their lifetime. It’s been an interesting range of feelings too as each day continues. I’ll write more on this later, but sufficeth to say, standing where something great happens does very little for me, but working to wrap my mind around a principle or concept in a concerted fashion has opened my mind to some great insights and thoughts which I’ve been consistently journaling. So after a Christmas in the Holy Land, I’m loving life. Jerusalem, and Israel as a whole, has really grown on me. I’ve spent quite a bit of time away from the groups and such (as me and Mikale are pretty much on our own most of the time) I’ve gained a small appreciation for their preservation of, and adherence to, many of their customs and nuances that make them a unique people. I would love to make my way back here again someday.

But that is today, off to Cairo in the morning. The adventures will continue. Stay tuned.

whew

So everything is fine with the car yada yada, here’s the run down…

First, driving in israel is truly an art, with everything being a bit ridiculous, people swerving into oncoming traffic, people jumping out in front of you and so on. So we rented the car and went to Galilee, were touring around and went to Capernum and to the mount of Beatitudes, etc, and then went to Nazareth, which really gave me a run for my money driving wise. Then on the way back, we’re parked at a stoplight with a lady in front of us and the rain was pouring, and I look in the rear view mirror just in time to see this guy plow us. So i go into the lady in front of us, our car is totalled, and needless to say, we didn’t make it to the mount of transfiguration… dang. But I had a couple of arabs who knew no english to deal with and work out insurance details. Merry Christmas indeed. In other news, we feel fine, a bit whiplashed, but nothing crazy, and after a nights sleep, we’re doing great (this is the next day, I put in the 7 hour delay between posts to build exitement. I’ll write more about seeing jerusalem, and the antonia fortress, and the temple mount, and so on later…. love you!

well shoot

Got in car wreck…. STOP

All is fine…. STOP

I’ll give you details when I can…. STOP

Bakor Tov

Well, merry Christmas, this very moment I am sitting at a hotel in Ein Geve Israel, which is right on the sea of Galilee, and thought I’d take a second to wish you all a merry christmas.

I am doing great, and stuff here is amazing. I’m in awe that I am really here, wondering the old city, haggling with arabs over lunch prices, etc. I am loving it.

Anyway, all is well, time is short. Today I goto the sites around the sea (mount of beatitudes, mount of transfiguration, capernum, Taberius, etc.)

I’ll try to keep in touch,

Enjoy

24601

so I’m in England, just accross the pond, if you will. And let me tell you, international flights have restored my faith in airline customer service. Food was great, people were great, etc.

But anyway, London is great. Heathrow is a disaster of an airport, but the city is amazing so far. Love, love, love hearing the accents all around and such. We got in and rode the metro into town,

and are staying with some friends right downtown, so that’s fun.

But yeah, haven’t done a whole lot yet, went and wondered around trafalger square and listened to carolers out (see below),

then wondered around town a bit to see the lights and the fun.

The highlight of day one though was definitely seeing Les Miserables on the stage in London. Fantastic. Seriously, I don’t know if I just haven’t seen it in forever, or if it really has gotten dramatically better, but it is such a powerful story and the music is great. Cool thing here is that all the accents are real too.

Anyway, I’ll post as I can and keep you up to speed on the adventures.

Merry Christmas!

the last train to clarkesville

so I’m off tomorrow (today) on my big adventure. It’s not coming at a very opportune time for me, but all the same, I am looking forward to it. The itinerary is to fly to London, spend a few days there, fly on to Jerusalem and surrounding israeli areas through christmas, then do new years in egypt and make it home in one piece.

Upon my return home I’ll be moving to Toronto to pursue business interests with my old buddy Mifsud, so I’m very excited about that. I’ll be heading over under NAFTA so we’ll see how long that lasts.

Also, I will be changing my phone number for the first and only time ever, I’ll be moving everything over to Skype, but I’ll mess with that come the new year. So big things are a brewing.

While I’m away, I am purging some of my pics I’ve been meaning to put up on doangang.com to make room for the new ones to come, so for at least the next three weeks, you get one a day. Enjoy them. – doangang.com

Send me notes via email, I love them, or just post on here, and I sincerely wish everyone a merry Christmas. Enjoy it, life is good.