This sounds like one of those trendy interview questions.  I’m not sure where I will be in five months let alone five years.

The best way to tackle this is to first look where I was five years ago –  March 2019.  It’s a good thing I am a Facebook whore because I only had to go back and look at my profile to know where I was and what I was doing.

It’s a bit interesting that five years ago I was preparing to exit China.  Not so different from what I am doing right now except I am leaving Poland.  I can’t explain what it is, but I get to a point where I just wake up one day and decide it’s time to move on. Not that I make any decisions at that exact moment, but I have questions I ask myself.

In late 2018 and early 2019,  I started asking myself, “Do you want to be in Dong’e this time next year?”.   That answer came fairly easy, “as much as I love my life here, no, this time next year I can’t picture myself in Dong’e”.  Next question, “Do you want to be in China?”.  That was a little more difficult to answer, I didn’t know. Then, if I decided to answer the “Do you want to be in China?” question with no.  The next question was, “Do you want to be in Asia?”.  For the next several weeks I thought a lot about those questions.  I made the decision that I would leave Dong’e at the end of the school year which is July 2019.  I did know I had to be in Warren, Ohio on January 9, 2020, for the grand re-opening of the Robins Theatre and that the last time I was in the USA for Christmas was 2012.  I also decided I would go home for the holidays.  After the Robins opening, I would be free to make a long-term commitment to teaching somewhere and I was leaning toward SE Asia and Vietnam.

Over the first few months of 2019, I started to devise a plan.  The last time I was in Saigon, I met a young University student (Le Minh).  She has often asked me to come to Vietnam and teach English.  So, upon leaving China, I decided my first stop would be Vietnam and investigate job opportunities.  From Vietnam, Bali is just a hop, skip, and a jump.  I had friends in the States who had mentioned joining me in Bali in August.  So, I then decided to head to Bali after Vietnam.  Also, having friends in Bali, I decided to investigate an extended stay, meaning teaching/volunteer opportunities.  I would have about a month of R&R, then my friends would come for a couple of weeks.  After that, I found a School for Special Needs students, Yayasan Widya Guna, in Bedulu, Bali where I could volunteer for 6-8 weeks.  After a few more weeks of doing nothing but enjoying life at Kenari House, I would head back to Vietnam before returning to the States.

That sounded like a perfect plan to me.  Of course, you know what they say about the best-laid plans of mice and men.  Thinking I would return to SE Asia, I browsed opportunities on several ESL teaching websites.  At the time, I was also researching my upcoming trip to Paris in May.  So even though I had my sights set on Vietnam,  just for shits and giggles, along with SE Asia, I browsed opportunities in Paris and Europe in general.  After putting in my criteria, a company called English Wizards based in Warsaw kept popping up.  It looked interesting, a young company with hopes to expand outside of Poland, so I contacted them.  We talked back and forth for a couple of months, and I explained it would be almost a year before I would be available.  Long story short, on April 16, 2019, I committed to relocating to Poland end of January 2020.

As I sit here in Warsaw, Poland where I have lived for over 4 years, I started asking myself similar questions last year.  Do I want to be in Poland this time next year?  Do I want to go back to Asia?  Do I want to look for another ESL position and settle somewhere else?  When I say I don’t know where I will be in 5 months (other than hopefully finishing up camp in Bulgaria), it’s hard to even think 5 years down the road as I still don’t have all the answers to my questions.  Not that I don’t love my life in Poland, but no, I don’t want to be living and working in Poland this time next year.  Yes, I want to go back to Asia, but not to work.  I would like to visit Xiashan and see if it is still a small village not on the map.  I would love to see Marlon and his mom in Qingdao and visit my littles in Dong’e.  Will it happen?  Maybe!  I don’t want to look for another ESL position or settle anywhere next year.  When I do leave Poland, the only definite place in my itinerary is Azerbaijan.  I’m not sure where the road will lead from there, but as David Bowie said, “I promise it won’t be boring.”

I just wrote nine hundred words and haven’t answered the question.  These last four years in Warsaw have gone by in a flash.  The vision of myself I see in five years is this… My condo in Warren, Ohio will be embellished with mementos of my travels.  My hammock will be slung in the corner next to my floor-to-ceiling window so I can sip my coffee or wine while reading.  My Tibetan Prayer Flags will be hung between the windows over my fireplace.  Under the glass on my coffee table will be currency from all the countries I have visited.  The walls will be adorned with canvases of photos I have taken and there will be a story to go with each one.  At night I will fall asleep under the quilt I brought back from Bali.

In the morning maybe I will make Turkish coffee in my cezve or ibrik that I brought back from Istanbul.  Then I will sit at my desk and write.  Or I will be getting ready to head off to tell my story to young people or anyone who wants to listen.  I will meet friends for drinks or have small dinner parties at my home with my favorite dishes from around the world.  Then I will start to get the itch for Paris or to visit Warsaw or take off for some far-off place I haven’t been.  The travel bug will kick in and I will have to go, knowing when I return, I will pick back up right where I left off.

“Why do you go away?  So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors.  And the people see you differently, too.  Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.” From “A Hat Full of Sky” by Terry Pratchett

 

I am a huge list-maker.  Looking at my desk right now you will find my “To Do” list.  My to-do list doesn’t have deadlines.  It is just the things I need to accomplish soon, like answering emails, changing the wall in front of my desk, working on my spreadsheet of countries, practicing my flag challenge, and so on.

I keep a list of books I have read.  This is mostly done, through Goodreads but I also have a written list of books that have had an impact on me.  I also keep a list of books I want to read.  Again, mostly on Goodreads, but also a physical list that supersedes the Goodreads list.

In one of my journals, I keep a list of words I like. It was a thirty-day challenge of a word a day.  I also keep a written list of words or phrases I like, some are English some are Polish, and some are from other languages. For instance, “Dolce Far Niente” ~ Italian for the sweetness of doing nothing.   One of my favorite Polish words is “chrząszcz” and it means beetle.  I recommend putting it in google translate to hear the pronunciation.

 

Another favorite from Polish is the word for winter – “Zima”.  There is however a story behind this word.  Back in my younger days, there was a popular malt beverage that was introduced in 1993 by Coors.  It was marketed as an alternative to beer and I loved it.  As some of you may remember, it was called Zima.  Then there are some English words/phrases which have gotten lost in translations.  My kids in China called a home aquarium a “fish house” and they called an aquarium that you go to visit a “Water Zoo”.  Believe it or not, many languages don’t have separate words for fingers and toes.  I can’t tell you how many times I have heard the word “foot finger”.

In my journal, I keep a list of quotes.  It also started as a thirty-day challenge, but I am constantly adding to it.  My journal lists go on and on.  I have a list of Chinese spices, herbs, etc., that I consider essential in my kitchen.  I have a list of things I love about Paris.  I have a thirty-day thirty-songs list.  There is a list of countries I have visited and another with UNESCO sites I have seen.  I have a list that is just called “foodstuff” and a list of gins I have tried.  I think you get the picture.

Now, let’s get to the subject at hand….a bucket list… a list of things that I haven’t done before but I want to do before I die.  Of all the lists I keep, would you believe, I don’t have a written bucket list and I have never made one?  I have a few ideas in my head but nothing on paper.  Some of the most popular items on bucket lists have to do with travel.  From way back when, for me, that would have been Paris, the Great Wall of China, and the Pyramids.  I have nothing pressing on my travel list because lately I get an idea and I just go.  But don’t worry, for the sake of this blog I will come up with a couple of places.

Here goes:  Wendy’s Bucket List

1. Be able to identify all the flags of the World
2. Name all the capitals of every country
3. Set foot on one more continent (I have North America, Europe, Asia, and Africa)
4. Visit China and Bali again
5. When back in Warren, Ohio I want to tell my story to young people and encourage them to take that gap year or at least travel somewhere different from what they are used to
6. Visit Azerbaijan and at least 3 “Stan” countries
7. Do a WorkAway in India
8. Continue to understand my purpose for existing and fulfill it
9. When in India, visit Dharamshala (where the Dalai Lama lives) and try to be in one of his audiences
10. Not only tell my story but write it

I have written diaries and journaled most of my life.  I started my first blog on MySpace.  When I moved to Paris I started “Down the Rabbit Hole.”  Unfortunately, it was lost when I didn’t maintain my domain.  I started “Down the Rabbit Hole” again in February 2017 and have been pretty faithful for seven years.  Of the ten items I listed above, numbers five and ten are the most important to me. For a long time, I have felt that my PFE (purpose for existing) has been to tell my story. Not just from my years traveling, but also my life story as I know that experiences in my childhood have impacted my life today.  Everything I was is intertwined with who I am now and how I face whatever life puts in my path.  It’s been an amazing ride and it’s not over.  One thing I hope I have been able to share with my blog and one day in a book is how many beautiful, kind, people there are in the world and what they have taught me.   Maybe someday, someone will have seen something through my eyes and it will encourage them to follow their dreams.

I grew up in a “Christian” household, Presbyterian to be exact.  Mom and Grandma taught Sunday School, sang in the church choir, were elders, deacons, etc.  You get the picture.  My dad knew the bible inside and out.  He read me bible stories as bedtime stories and I remember “Old Rugged Cross” and his favorite, “In the Garden” being played as part of the Sunday morning repertoire on the antique green stereo console in our living room.  But Dad only attended church on Easter and Christmas or a special event in which we (me or my brother, Mark) might be participating.  He said he didn’t need to sit with hypocrites to justify his faith.

I have been blessed to live and travel to many places around the globe that don’t practice Christianity.  I’ve heard the calls to prayer in many countries, visited mosques, and listened to the prayers of those of the Islamic faith.  I was in Qatar and Dubai during Ramadan.  I have sat with monks in Buddhist temples.  I have been in synagogues and attended a Jewish wedding ceremony.  I attended a service of Caodaism (cultivating self and finding god in self) in Tay Ninh, Vietnam. I have sat in monasteries in Tibet and read the teachings of the Dalai Lama.  I have been to a Hindu cremation ceremony in Kathmandu, Nepal which follows closely to the Hinduism of India.

In Bali, Indonesia I have attended many Balinese Hindu ceremonies which differ from those of India.  I have witnessed the exhumation of a human body for cremation (Ngaben).  I’ve been to a Nelubulanin/Nyambutin ceremony which is like our baptism and is performed for a baby when they reach three months (105 days) by the Balinese calendar.  I’ve been to the temple ceremony of Odalan which is the anniversary of the Temple and I have had the opportunity to pray at Pura Besakih or the Mother Temple.  I was overcome with energy and couldn’t hold back the tears.  As I sat in a drizzle of a cleansing rain, my guide talked me through the prayer ceremony.  He lit the incense (the smoke takes our prayers to heaven) and explained what to do with the flowers in the offering.  After the prayer service, the Priest came and blessed me with holy water and gave me holy water to drink.

The guide then one by one took 9 strings of color and wound them into a bracelet.  It is to be worn until it falls off or breaks.  Peace, energy, harmony, balance, gratitude, and spirituality are just a few of the emotions I felt.  I still wear the bracelet (it has been 5 years) and it reminds me daily to be thankful for the blessings I have received in life.

Watching the sunrise/sunset on Mount Everest was a very spiritual experience.  Was it a Christian experience?  I honestly have to say no.  Did all those things like God and “How Great Thou Art” go through my head?  Yes!  But I was on the mountain with Tibetan Buddhists, so I got to experience spirituality from their point of view.

Growing up Christian, we heard stories of missionaries in far-off lands converting these “pagans”, “non-believers” and even those of other faiths to Christianity.  Through my travels, I have come to question this practice and ask, “Why”?  Why do we in the West think that our religion (Christianity) is the one true and right religion that everyone else should follow?

I must admit that living abroad and experiencing different religions firsthand has changed me.  I haven’t denounced my Christianity, but I find myself being open to accepting the beliefs of other religions.  Born and raised a Christian I have always believed in a greater being, namely God.  As Christians, we are taught to be Godly in our everyday life, say our prayers before bed, etc. but, truth be told it is “seen” mostly on Sundays.

Traveling solo and living in different cultures has allowed me to look deeper into myself and my personal journey of spirituality.  The first place I really felt a pull of spirituality was Tibet.  I had such a peaceful feeling there that I struggle to find the words to describe it.  There was something magical about Tibet.  I am still drawn to that culture, but the connection I feel to Bali is overwhelming.  I have never experienced a culture that is more welcoming or a people that always seem happy and peaceful.

The National Motto of Indonesia is “Bhinneka Tunggal Ika” or Out of Many, One, or Unity in Diversity.  The full motto states, “It is said that the well-known Buddha and Shiva are two different substances; they are indeed different, yet how is it possible to recognize their difference in a glance, since the truth of Buddha, and the truth of Shiva are one?  They may be different, but they are of the same kind, as there is no duality in truth.”

Am I still a Christian?  That’s a tough one. I am not trying to turn this into a religious debate but, my views on Christianity have been drastically altered.  I think it is hard for Westerners to admit maybe Buddhism, Hinduism, and other religions aren’t so far off from Christianity.  Am I a Christian?  I am going to answer yes, but my Christianity has become more spiritual.  The language all over the world is different, why not religion?  Are we all worshipping the same “God”?

I will leave you with this, author unknown, ”Travel, because you have no idea who you are until you experience yourself through different people and realize we are all the same”

I guess this was to be expected after yesterday’s “What Makes Me Happy?”.

Merriam-Webster tells us sad [ sad ] is an adjective meaning affected with or expressive of unhappiness.

If you spend any time in Bali, you will probably notice statues wearing a black and white checked cloth called a saput poleng which symbolizes the coexistence of opposites and the ultimate goal of harmony.  The Balinese people believe that joy will always be balanced by sorrow, and that good and evil exist in the world and everyone.  They embrace differences because they create balance and harmony.  Following this theory, you can’t experience happiness if you have never known sadness. Think about it, without sadness, happiness has no meaning.

Today’s topic might be even more challenging than yesterday’s.  I won’t say that I never experienced sadness because that would mean I’ve never been happy, and I like to believe I am happy most of the time.  So what makes me sad?

I think it was easier to feel sadness, believe it or not, as a kid.  I’m not talking about deep, sorrowful, depressive sadness, but the sadness that comes when you’re six and you misplace your favorite toy.  Or you’re ten and your Little League team loses.  How about when you get your first B on your report card, and you have always had straight A’s?  Then there was that time one summer when you got a new bathing suit, and you couldn’t wait to wear it on Sunday because you were going to the Elk’s Shore Club on Lake Erie in Ashtabula, and it ended up raining.  That all-important Warren, Ohio football rivalry, Harding vs. Reserve.  How sad we were when our team lost.

There’s a different kind of sadness that comes with being an adult.

I was sad when my friends came to visit me in Bali and I took them to visit Pura Lempuyang, the Gate to Heaven.  I was sad because when I was there just a year and a half earlier, it was just an important temple for the Balinese people.  When I took my friends, there was a two to three-hour wait to take a photo at the now Instagram-famous Candi Bentar or Gate.  People were surprised/disappointed to discover there was no lake or water at the gates but merely a camera trick of placing a mirror beneath the camera lens so that the picture appears to be reflected on non-existent water.  Not only that, but you must hand your phone over to a “local” photographer with a donation so he will snap your photo and you get 3 poses.

I find the Gate to Heaven stunning without the Instagram sham of water.  It made me sad that most people were there to get that all-important Instagram shot and forgot or maybe didn’t even know that Pura Lempuyang is one of Bali’s six major temples known as Sad (six) Kahyangan (place of Gods) or that it is only one of seven temples in the complex.  It made me sad that people were disrespectful to the fact that it is a sacred place to the Balinese.

I was sad every time I left one of my schools in China.  Sad, because you say, “I’ll come to visit”, instead of saying goodbye, but deep down you know, it’s goodbye.  You get through that by thinking of the quote from Dr. Seuss, “Don’t cry because it’s over.  Smile because it happened.”

I was sad when I left Bali, but happy I was going to Ohio for the Robins Opening.  I’m sure I will be sad the day I leave Poland, but excited for what awaits me.

In my adult life, the thing that has brought me the most sadness is death, the death of my parents, but not in the way you might think.  Death is always sad, but it is a part of life.  The saddest thing about their death is what they have missed.  It made me sad that they weren’t there on January 9, 2020, sitting in the front row of the mezzanine (my dad always liked to sit in the balcony).  My dad letting out a whistle when Mark stepped from behind the curtain.  I’m sad they never got to see what he accomplished in downtown Warren and across the globe.  It makes me sad that they never got to see me follow my dream.  I guarantee they would have been to Paris, China, Bali, Poland, and anywhere in between to visit me.   Please, none of that bullshit, “Oh, they were there”, or “They have been with you”.  Nah, not the same.  Not only that, but I’m also not sure I want them with me all the time or seeing everything.  I mean seriously, if “they were there” on opening night, what about that time I got a little freaky with so and so?  Nope, best they aren’t around.  I will settle for being sad that they weren’t there.

 

Anyways, life has its ups and downs, its happiness and sadness, and somehow through it all, life is pretty damn good.

Dictionary.com tells us that happy  [ hap-ee ] is an adjective meaning delighted, pleased, or glad, as over a particular thing; or characterized by or indicative of pleasure, contentment, or joy.

Simple, right?

I’ll tell you what isn’t simple.  This thirty-day writing challenge.  I thought as the days went by it would get easier.  Boy was I wrong.  While I was sipping my morning cup of cardamom coffee before my classes started, I was not sure where or how to start today’s topic.  I first returned to a blog I wrote in January 2018, “Wendy and the Search for Happiness”.  I wrote it because I had just watched the movie, “Hector and the Search for Happiness”, not because I was searching for happiness myself.  Honestly, I am pretty happy most of the time.  I considered comparing Hector’s list, The Lessons on Happiness, with my life, but I kinda, sorta did that in the blog.  Then I thought about creating my own “lessons”, but that was way too much thinking.  Since I was about to teach an English class, I looked up “Happy” Idioms.  My students love idioms; Happy Camper, Happy as a Pig in Mud, Happy Go Lucky, and Happy as a Lark are a few, but nothing struck me.  So I decided to jot down a list of things that make me happy.

Two things immediately came to mind.  It was a drizzly morning, and I was enjoying my coffee.  Not only does the smell of coffee (especially this cardamom coffee) make me happy, but so does sipping it in the morning while it is raining.

Having lots of time to read makes me happy.

Auguste Escoffier said, “Good food is the foundation of genuine happiness.”   Noodles make me happy.  They can be lamian, rice, ramen, udon, or just plain spaghetti.

Snail-mail makes me happy.  I wrote this list while I was sipping my joe and when I went out this grey afternoon, I had a sunny yellow envelope in my mailbox from Warren, Ohio.  It also may have made it in world record time…a mere 9 days across the pond.  Texts, emails, and video chats are great, but it always brings a smile to get a surprise card or letter in the mailbox.

Friday nights make me happy.  A shared flat wasn’t my full-time plan.  I moved into my current flat thinking I would eventually move to a studio…then Valeria happened followed by Zaka and Tarlan.  I came to love my shared flat and the cast of characters that have come and gone.  Soon, Friday nights found me making pizzas, drinking wine or martinis, and sharing the evening with a group of 20-somethings playing card games, listening to Frank, Elvis, and the Saturday Night Fever Soundtrack, dancing, laughing, and general craziness.

Creating art, whether in my journals, making my own stationery, doodling, adult coloring books, or on random pieces of paper, makes me happy.

I introduced my flatmates to pickle pizza.  I also make random desserts with French pastry.  It made me very happy when the guys asked me to teach them how to make pizza and pastry.  And, yes, sometimes they even get busy in the kitchen.

An icy cold, slightly dirty Beefeater martini with a bleu cheese stuffed olive makes me happy.

Somewhere along the way, you may have picked up on the fact that I love Paris.  Over the years, I have met friends and family in La Ville Lumiere.  It makes me happy to share and enjoy the city I love with them.  To be honest, it’s not just Paris.  I have had friends and family join me in China, South Korea, Bali, Morocco, and Poland.  It makes me happy to show them a little about the places I have considered either home or a favorite place.

Sleep…sleeping makes me happy!  I’m good at it too.

I have a severe case of Wanderlust.  Planning my next trip makes me happy.

Bottom line….my life makes me happy!

Here we go with “favorite” again.  I’m not a big moviegoer.  I can’t tell you the last time I was in a movie theatre.  My best guess would be when I was in China.  In four years, I know I went twice.  I did, however, watch more movies in China because I had a teaching assistant, Alice, who would sometimes spend Friday night at my apartment to be there for Saturday morning lessons.  She loved watching English movies, so we often had movie nights.

I don’t have a subscription to any streaming service because I don’t watch enough movies or series to make it worth my while.  In total, I may watch 4 to 6 movies per year (for the last 10 years, but hey, I guess that adds up).  I do have a bunch downloaded to my external hard drive that I occasionally watch, or I use one of those “Napster”-like sites to download.  Shhhh…don’t tell.  Then there are those shady sites that you must back out of ads in order to watch a movie, I use those once in a while too. Again, shhhhh….don’t tell.

I can tell you my dad’s favorite movie was, well he actually had two, “The Quiet Man”, and “Song of Bernadette”.  I went through a phase when I thought “The Exorcist”, “Friday the Thirteenth”, etc. were cool.  Not so much anymore.  There was also a time when I loved the classics, with “Casablanca” and “Gone with the Wind”  topping the list.

 

Of all the decades of my life, I probably watched the most films in the 80s.  Admit it, that was a great decade of movies.  Some of my favorites were, “Dead Poets Society”, “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”, “Fatal Attraction”, “Bull Durham”, “Die Hard”, “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”, “Back to the Future”, “The Last Emperor”, and of course, “A Christmas Story”.  I could go on, but you get the idea.

 

I was into “foodie movies” for a time.  Not surprisingly one of my favs is “Ramen Girl”. I also like “The Hundred-Foot Journey”,  “Julie & Julia”, “Chocolat”, “Eat, Drink, Man, Woman” (this may be in Chinese with subtitles.  I know that’s how I watched it.), and of course “Ratatouille”.

Of course, travel movies are in my top choices, but I am not going to get into those.  I wrote a blog post, “My Favorite Travel Movies”,  and you can read about those in the link.

However, as I plan to leave Poland at the end of this year, travel planning is constantly on my mind.  I need to get to Flying Tiger and pick up a wall map of the world while I am contemplating my course.  Even though my “plan” is to not have a “plan”, some structure is required.  I am considering a stop in Romania first and then working my way across Türkiye.  From Türkiye into Georgia and Azerbaijan.  After that Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan, and maybe a couple of other stops in that part of the world are on my list…you know, the Silk Road. Here I meet a fork in the road, head up into Mongolia, down into China, South Korea, and Indonesia, or spend an extended period in India and then on to China.  Either way, I plan to spend time in India and maybe even drop by and say “hi” to the Dalai Lama if he still receives audiences.

You are probably asking yourself what this has to do with my favorite movie.  Even though I talk about it in the blog mentioned above, it is the last movie I have watched and will probably watch again.  If you read the blog linked above, you can skip this next paragraph because I cheated and am repeating what I said there.  I mean, why reinvent the wheel?  The trailer is linked to the movie title below.

If there is one movie that best explains the feelings, the experiences, the ups and downs of the last 10 years of my life, it is  A Map for Saturday.  Although I am not a young backpacker, on the road for a year, or staying in hostels (I have but not usually my first choice), it does do a great job of showing all the feels.  I have mostly had a home base in some country or another over my journey, but I have also traveled extensively during this time.  Those first hours of being alone in a new destination, meeting people throughout your stay, and knowing when you leave it really is “goodbye”.  Most of the time it isn’t “see you later” because deep down you know you probably will never see these people again.  The movie’s filmmaker, Brook Silva Braga, quits his lucrative job as a producer with HBO Sports and documents his 11 months of backpacking around the world.  During those 11 months, he spent time on four continents, Australia, Asia, Europe, and South America.  The title of the film comes from the fact that when you are on a long-term travel with no obligations, every day feels like Saturday.  When I eventually return to the States (yes, someday but no idea when), I would love to talk to young people.  Their parents will probably hate me, but I want to tell them to take that “gap year”.  A foreign concept to most Americans but it is embraced by other cultures.  What you can learn when you move out of your comfort zone and embrace the chaos of Asia, or the mindset of Europe is not something you will learn in the classroom.  I agree that lifestyle, even for a year, or my lifestyle which has been even more long-term isn’t for everyone.  But I can’t repeat it enough if you have even the smallest desire…GO!  Even if you aren’t a young person who hasn’t settled into a 9 to 5 life, if you are someone unhappy with a job, or just want to experience living a different culture from your own, even if it is for 1 month, 3 months, 6 months…GO!

If you want to understand my lifestyle and what it might look like next year because it is something so hard to put into words, watch this movie.

The words of Freya Stark, “I have no reason to go, except that I have never been, and knowledge is better than ignorance. What better reason could there be for travelling?”

 

I once read an article about what you can tell about a person by looking at their garbage.  When I looked at today’s topic, I wondered what someone would deduce about me based on the contents of my handbag.  I also realized I wasn’t even sure what was in it and then wondered if I would embarrass myself.  I decided probably not because I’m not easily embarrassed. The next thing I did was check out the web for one of those psychology quizzes/articles on what your handbag says about your personality.  Sure enough, I found several.

I have carried the same handbag for at least 3 years.  It is a khaki-green crossbody by Cabin Zero.  It is a 3L pack that features an adjustable shoulder strap, a large, easy-access main compartment with two inner pockets (one zips), and pockets on the front and back.

From an article The Psychology of Your Handbag:  The Crossbody Aficionado: On-the-Go and Free-Spirited

Crossbody bag enthusiasts are often free-spirited and always on the move.  You’re likely the type who enjoys hands-free convenience and doesn’t want to be weighed down by excess baggage, literally and figuratively.  You value flexibility and adaptability in your daily life.  You’re strategic and bold.  Green is incredibly versatile and pairs great with most colors and shades.  It looks wonderful with navy, burgundy, pink, and so on!  Green also says you’re rather analytical and calm.

I didn’t find anything about the meaning of the contents, so I will let you analyze my contents and come to your own conclusions.

Unfortunately, the pictures that I took have the bag looking more grey than green, so I stole some from the Cabin Zero website.  Even theirs don’t all look the same, the color is called Georgian Khaki.  Not important, but I am going to tell you anyway, I also have in this color from Cabin Zero, a 2L bum bag, an 11L crossbody (this is usually the bag I pack if I am going away for a weekend), a 28L, 36L, and 44L backpacks which all have a laptop pocket.  I am well prepared for all travel scenarios.  Now on to the contents.

I will start with the back pocket.  I wasn’t even sure what was in there.  It had three towelettes for cleaning glasses/screens, one cloth eyeglass cleaner, a partial pack of allergy/sinus pills, three loose Ibuprofen, and six towel tablets.

These are handy for traveling.  They are about the size of an Alka-Seltzer and when put in water, expand to a towel about the size of a washcloth.

I was clueless about the front pocket also.  It only held a pack of tissues (which I replenished with a new pack) and Chinese Tiger Balm patches.

The inside main compartment I had a good idea of what was in there, although there were some surprise wadded-up receipts. The main compartment holds my wallet (which had a fifty zloty bill I didn’t know I had), my reusable cloth shopping bag, an empty container, and the three wadded-up receipts.

The inside pocket without the zipper contained four more towel tablets, 2 lipsticks, a flosser, a small tiger balm, a folded-up receipt, a hair tie, a pen, and an almost empty bottle of patchouli oil.

Finally, the inside zippered pocket.  It held my passport, my eyeglass prescription, a prescription for an anti-inflammatory from Bulgaria, a one-dollar bill, another towel tablet, a one Euro coin, and a spare T-Mobile sim card.

There you have it – What’s in My Handbag!  I didn’t find anything exciting, although it’s always fun to find extra money.  I will also add that I have room to put my mobile phone in when I go out.  If I am traveling or just want to have it with me, there is also room for my Kindle.

That’s all folks, see you tomorrow.

Lucky thirteen and they give me a lot of leeway with “ten” favorites.  In March of 2021, I did a foodie post called “Wendy Eats World with Due Respect to Jimmy Eats World”. I am going to borrow a few things from that post, but I have added several countries to my travels since then.  My favorite foods often coincide with countries I have visited.

Itinerant:  a travel lover who has a gypsy soul.

Foodie:  a person who has an ardent or refined interest in food and who eats food not only out of hunger but also due to their interest or hobby and is passionate about food.

I guess that makes me an itinerant foodie.  I took my first trip of a mere 350 miles when I was 3 days old and rumor has it that as a baby/toddler, I ate anything put in front of me.  My palate was not picky.  Then came the pre-teen/teen years.  Can you believe I would eat spaghetti/noodles only with butter and I didn’t like pizza?  I had taken an aversion to tomato sauce.  That isn’t an issue today, although I still don’t eat raw tomatoes.  My love of travel has stayed with my gypsy soul and my palate has become more sophisticated.  If you have followed my journey, you might say I am eating my way around the world and there are not many things I haven’t tried, at least once.  Being a social media whore, many of you can probably predict several of my favs.

It’s highly unlikely that I would ever be vegetarian and even less likely a vegan.  Since I’m in Poland let’s start here.  My top dish in Poland is not pierogi.  As crazy as it sounds I have maybe eaten Pierogi 10 times in 4 years.  Maybe I ate so many 水饺 jiaozi (dumplings) in China that even though they aren’t the same, they just don’t have the appeal for me.  Now, give me a plate of steak tartare and I am in heaven.  Although it is said to be a French dish and I often eat it when in Paris, tartare is served at most Polish restaurants.  It is a dish of raw ground (minced) beef.  It is usually served with onions, capers, mushrooms, pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and other seasonings, often presented separately, to be added to taste.  It is often served topped with a raw egg yolk. Side note, I don’t eat mushrooms so those never get mixed in.

I also took a walk on the wild side in Krakow and tried horse tartare.  While it was tasty because of the spices and add-ins, I found the texture not to my liking.  The only way I can describe it is chewy or rubbery.   I think I could eat steak tartare daily, but I haven’t braved making it at home even though I can buy the tartare meat at my local market.

“Without noodles, there would be chaos and darkness”, author unknown.  I could lump all noodles together, but that would be doing them a disservice.  Plus, if I treat them as individuals, I can cover four of my favorite foods.  First and foremost in the noodle category is 兰州拉面 Lanzhou LaMian.  It is said that Lanzhou, China has three local treasures, “auspicious gourd and beef noodles, and sheepskin raft like warship”.  I have no idea about the auspicious gourd or the sheepskin raft-like warship, but I feel I am an expert on Lanzhou LaMian.  One of the oldest beef noodle soups is the Lanzhou hand-pulled noodle. To identify the ingredients and the dish, it is suggested preparing the soup by the following five steps: “One Clear, Two White, Three Red, Four Green, Five Yellow” (一清、二白、三红、四绿、五黄).  First, the beef soup should look clear; Second, the radish slides should be crystal white; Thirdly, the color of the chili oil should be bright red; Fourth, the green cilantro leaves and garlic shoots should be jade, and, lastly, the noodle should be smooth and bright yellow.

I ate this soup probably a minimum of three times a week when I lived in Dong’e.  I even had the noodle guy try to teach me to hand-pull the noodles…unsuccessfully.  No matter where I am in the world I search out a Lanzhou noodle shop.  I even jumped off a bus in Istanbul after we passed a sign that said, “Uygur” restaurant…ding, ding, ding…this meant Lanzhou noodles. I had a nice hearty bowl for breakfast and then continued on to the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia.

I guess I will stick with noodles and move on to a dish I ate Every.Single.Day in Vietnam, Pho.  It was either Pho Bo Tai (beef) or Pho Ga (chicken).  There is nothing like eating Pho on a street corner in Saigon sitting on a small plastic stool and watching the world go by.  I have a favorite pho shop in Saigon, it is a couple blocks from the hotel I always stay at.  I kid you not, I do eat it every day when I’m in Vietnam.  I prefer the pho in Saigon over Hanoi and other places north.  However, I found a fresh market in Hoi An that the pho was phenomenal.  Pho is considered Vietnam’s national dish.  There is a population of Vietnamese in Warsaw.  After trying several restaurants, I have my favorite shop and I used to have it delivered several times per week.  Now I probably have it once every week or two.  Only because I am cutting back on my Uber Eats habit.

“Peace will come to the world when the people have enough noodles to eat”, author unknown.  What can I say?  I collect quotes from noodle shops I have been to. Bali Indonesia…stole my soul and gave me mi ayam.  Mi ayam is a common Indonesian dish of seasoned wheat noodles (mi) topped with diced chicken meat (ayam).  In simple terms, chicken noodle soup, but with a kick because it isn’t complete without some sambal (hot sauce).

It is derived from Chinese cuisine.  In Indonesia, the dish is recognized as a popular Chinese Indonesian dish, served from simple traveling vendor carts frequenting residential areas, humble street-side warung to restaurants.  I found a favorite Warung not far from Kenari House and I was there so much that I didn’t even have to order.  I sat down and my soup appeared.

“Noodles are life”, Wendy Marvin.  My personal quote, I would never give up noodles in my life.  Number five on my favorite food list is ordinary spaghetti, especially my mom’s.  Her homemade sauce was delicious, and she made it at least once a week for dinner usually with meatballs.  Anytime I am back in the States for a visit, I love going to Mount Carmel Church with my friends Bill and Bobbie for the church’s Sunday spaghetti dinner aka, St. Spaghetti.

I can’t talk about pasta and not mention eating a giant bowl of Bolognese, carbonara, or cacio e pepe in any city in Italy.  To dine on pasta al fresco in Rome or Florence with a glass of wine and not a care in the world is truly one of life’s greatest pleasures.

It’s a good thing I ate a breakfast tortilla with bacon, egg, cheese, and lutenica before starting this or I would be powerful hungry right now.

Next up, is the simple avocado.  Avocados are one of my favorite foods.  I can make avocado toast, put them in my tortilla, on a salad, or make guacamole.  They pair nicely with beef carpaccio (a fav).  I can open an avocado, remove the pit, add a little salt, and eat it with a spoon right out of its skin.  I had to give a nod to this yummy fruit.  To eat an avocado, picked fresh from a tree in Bali, that was almost as big as my head, the avocado, not the tree, well, not quite, but you get the idea, is heaven on earth.

Let’s head back to China.  A dish I love and have been able to recreate is a vegetable dish, gān biān sìjì dòu 干煸四季豆 or dry-fried green beans.  A vegetable dish, but like many “vegetable” dishes in China it is prepared with ground pork.  It is a classic Sichuan dish with an interesting flavor combination: aromatic, umami, spicy, numbing, salty with a hint of sweetness.  It does require some specialty items like Ya Cai (Sichuan preserved mustard greens) and Shaoxing wine.  I do miss Chinese food.

 

As you may be noticing, my favorites are savory.  Although my number eight is sometimes sweet, I prefer a savory version with lots of gooey cheese.  Before ever visiting Paris, Tom asked me if I thought I could make Clătite.  Clătites are crepes in Romania.  He liked them with cream cheese and blueberries.  I became fairly good at making them at home and even purchased a special crepe pan.  While I thought mine were good, nothing can compare to eating a warm crepe (if you read day ten, even better in the rain), from a street vendor in Paris.  Living in Paris, I eventually became attached to a one crepe shop in the Latin Quarter near Shakespeare and Co. Book Store.   I still try to go there every time I am in Paris for a warm savory crepe fromage.

Number nine, simple, diverse, and delicious is the pickle. While I enjoy all types of pickled fruits and vegetables, for my top ten list I am sticking with the pickled cucumber.  I say simple, but maybe not when you consider the diversity – dill, sweet, bread and butter, kosher, gherkins, spicy, and so forth.  I personally never came across a pickled cucumber I didn’t like.  We usually have a jar of spicy ones on our kitchen counter here in Warsaw.  I’m just going to leave number nine at that and say pickles make my top ten list.

Finally, it must be pizza.  I make homemade pizza here in Warsaw every Friday night.  Sometimes pepperoni, sometimes margherita, sometimes pickle, and sometimes all three.  My mom made pizza quite often when we were growing up, but I also loved Carmen’s and Warren Baking pizza in Warren, Ohio.  Not to forget Sunrise Inn of Warren, but I didn’t start eating that until my late teens.  Probably when my brother started working there as a busboy.

Sunrise Pizza has met me at the airport when I have returned to the USA from China and other places.  It has been delivered to me in Paris, France, and eaten on the steps of the Sacre Coeur.  It has even made it to Amsterdam.  When I lived in China, I learned that Papa John’s, Dominoes, and Pizza Hut were acceptable because that was all that was available.  Of course, again, nothing beats a fresh pizza on the streets in Italy.

That rounds out my top ten.  As I continue to “eat my way around the world”, I have tasted amazing dishes in every country I have visited.  I’m looking forward to new and exciting cuisine as I take off next year to lands unknown.  Where I am sure I will find unique and amazing dishes and may have to update this list.

As Anthony Bourdain said, “Food is everything we are.  It’s an extension of nationalist feeling, ethnic feeling, your personal history, your province, your region, your tribe, your grandma.  It’s inseparable from those from the get-go.”

First, I would need to play the lottery to win…I don’t.   Second, how big is this lottery?  For this blog, I will assume a life-changing amount not a hundred bucks on a scratch-off ticket.

I’m going to guess that most of us have thought about what we would do if money wasn’t an issue.  Would my life change drastically?  I’m fairly certain that for me it wouldn’t be a drastic change.  I’m debt-free and own a car.  I have a condo I have only spent two months in. My passion is travel.

 

The first thing I would do is buy a ticket to China and visit all the places I lived.  I would see if I could locate any of my former students and enjoy eating big bowls of Lanzhou LaMian and all the other food I miss.  After an indeterminate amount of time, I would head to Bali for about six months and just chill at Kenari House and probably spend some time at Yayasan Widya Guna.    While I am in Bali, I will make an around-the-world travel plan.

Currently, I work teaching English to supplement my travels.  If I won the lottery, I would continue to teach English around the world, but it would be on my own terms.  I wouldn’t “work”.  I wouldn’t have a schedule I had to adhere to long-term. When I say I wouldn’t work, I would volunteer.  I would plan my around-the-world travel based on WorkAways.  A WorkAway is an opportunity to use your skills be it teaching a language, gardening, helping at a hostel, or working at a winery, etc. in exchange for room and board.  When you find a host in an area you would like to visit that needs your skill(s), you make contact and arrange a date to arrive.  Most WorkAways would like you to stay a minimum of two weeks.  In my perfect travel plan, I would spend 2 weeks to 2 months at a given WorkAway with some independent travel in between.  I spent two weeks at Bright English Medium School in Tanzania and wish I had planned to stay longer.  I spent 6 weeks in Bedulu, Bali Indonesia at Yayasan Widya Guna volunteering at a school for Balinese special needs children.  I wouldn’t hesitate to repeat that experience.  I would also like to spend 2 months in India.  Part WorkAway, part independent travel.

Would I contribute money to a cause?  I’m not a huge fan of giving money to charities or organizations without knowing their mission, needs, and goals.  I would first of all contribute with my time and my talents.  After being involved/volunteering with an organization I would consider financial support.

Like I said earlier, I don’t think my life would be all that different, it would just be easier.  I’ve used this quote from Mother Teresa before, “I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples.”  I hope I have created ripples in my life, if I won the lottery, I would be able to cast more stones.

I have been a book lover for as long as I can remember.  Lately, I haven’t been reading as much as I would like to.  Not for lack of time, I can make plenty of that.  I’m in a reading slump and when I come out of it, there is a good chance I will read several books in a week.  I go through cycles like that.  Sometimes I read every day, sometimes, I don’t.  My mom told me that even as a baby, my dad read to me almost every night.  Since I can’t seem to come up with one “best” anything for any of these posts, you will have to bear with me as I break my favorite childhood book into life stages.

The first stage, being a toddler. Now you might think that being named after a character from the book “Peter Pan”  which by the way was originally titled, “Peter Pan and Wendy”, that it would be my favorite.  Sure I loved Peter’s adventures in Neverland but, as soon as I saw this topic, the first book that came to my mind was, “The Cinnamon Bear” by Alice Hanson and illustrated by George Bakacs.  It was part of the Tell-a-Tale series of books.  The Cinnamon Bear was on the cover, and he was “fuzzy-wuzzy”.  It tells the story of a small bear who runs away from the circus to have some fun and cools off in the river.  Of course, the circus people find him and take him back for the show.  I’m not sure, but I think this book may even have been a hand-me-down from my aunts, Pam and Jill.

Books were a big deal at our house.  We often received them as gifts, and I couldn’t wait for the book fair when I got to school age.  I don’t remember a time I didn’t have a library card.  Saturday trips to the library, checking out as many books as I could carry was something I looked forward to. It wasn’t just library books.  We had bookcases and bookshelves in our house, so they were always within reach.

Most nights after dinner, my dad would lie on the floor and work on the crossword puzzle that was in the newspaper or read his National Geographic.  As a child, I often joined him, or sometimes laid on his back and looked over his shoulder so I could “read” the Nat Geo too.

 

After “The Cinnamon Bear”, I have great memories of reading Dr. Seuss’s books.  I think we belonged to a book club and received a book regularly.  Plus I had a few hand-me-downs from Pam and Jill.  I’m going to call the next stage of my reading life, the early elementary years.  With all the reading at home, I was able to read when I started kindergarten.  Now while the Dr. Seuss books were loved as were the Little Golden Books like “Pokey Little Puppy” and “The Little Red Hen”, my favorite book which is really a set of books, was “Childcraft – The How and Why Library”.  The series consisted of 15 volumes with each volume focusing on a specific topic.  The edition we had included the following titles:  Poems and Rhymes, Stories and Fables, Children Everywhere, World and Space, About Animals, How Things Work, How We Get Things, What People Do, Holidays and Customs, Places to Know, Make and Do, Look and Learn, Look Again, About Me, Guide for Parents.  My favorites were: Poems and Rhymes, Children Everywhere, World and Space, and Places to Know.  I think I read those books cover to cover several times throughout the years.

Okay, on to the pre-teen/teen years.  There was E.B. White’s “Charlotte’s Web”, Judy Blume books, and “Dr. Doolittle”, but I was most captivated by Carolyn Keene’s “Nancy Drew” series.  I had the whole set, and my brother had the “Hardy Boys” series which I also read.   I even downloaded “Nancy Drew and the Secret of the Old Clock” to my Kindle a couple of years ago.  I think every young girl who read these books always wanted to solve a mystery of their own.

No one book stands out in my high school years.  What does stand out is the way our English classes were designed.  During my junior/senior year, we had English mini-courses.  We could choose the courses that we wanted.  My favorites were Poetry Reading, Novel Reading, Comic Books, and Science Fiction.  Needless to say, I read a lot during that time.  I even was a co-editor for the school’s literary magazine, the Cauldron which was founded by Earl Derr Biggers who went on to create the Charlie Chan character of books and movies.

I can’t wrap this up without mentioning “Le Petit Prince” by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.  It wasn’t a childhood favorite, but as an adult, even though it is considered a children’s book, it is one of my favorites.  So much so, that if I happen across it during my travels, I buy it in that language. One of my journals is also based on it.

 

I’ve enjoyed writing this blog so much, that I am thinking about re-reading a Nancy Drew Book, “Charlotte’s Web”, and “Le Petit Prince” since they are all on my Kindle.

I will leave you with words of wisdom from Dr. Seuss, “You can find magic wherever you look.  Sit back and relax, all you need is a book.”