The Void

Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe
15 April 2002

Me in flight, descending from 345 feet above the Zambizi River just below the Victoria Falls cataract.

The crowd shouts, "Five...four...

THREE TWO ONE...

BUNGEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!"

I squatted down a little, leaning forward, my hands came lightly away from the railings at my side and as I canted forward, the green canyon walls rose to fill my vision, and the brown river, flecked with white rapids, became a vertical wall in front of me. I leapt.

Somehow the human brain, through evolution, knows to block out sensations too alien or frightening to us, like circuit breakers. I never seem to remember the first second of any plummet I take, the sensory overload being too much for my conscious mind to grasp. And jumping off a bridge 111 meters above the Zambezi River certainly qualifies (to most) as incomprehensible and insane.

Somewhere in the distance I registered screaming (hopefully not me) and cheering as my truck mates watched me, the first of our group off the bridge, which spans the Zambezi River just below the monsterous Victoria Falls and crosses between Zambia and Zimbabwe.

The gyrating river and canyon walls gave me the only sensation of falling for the first moment. Then, I remembered my pre-jump thoughts and consciously tried to surrender to my inevitable death; not today but someday. For throwing oneself off a bridge can really only be considered as ritual suicide.

For a moment, my life and the world and everything I know, knew, or will know vanished. I felt free of all earthly encumbrance (excepting gravity) and plunged into a metaphysical void. In that passing moment, I sensed a timelessness and placelessness that can only be described as a rapture or grace. Like the Zen master said to the NY hot dog vendor, "make me one with everything."

Yet through that void, something tugged at me, some tether to the world of form and substance that we occupy beckoned to me. Time slowed, and sensation and conscious thought reappeared in a flash; the river ceased its mad rush at me and I decellerated to a stop, scant meters above the rushing deep. Slowly, the heavens sucked me back from my leap. I soared towards the sky (and the bridge - which I thought I might hit) and I noticed my friends taking pictures and waving, but why were they upside-down?. I waved back as I bounced yo-yo-like beneath the steel girders.

Failure on Kilimanjaro

18,000 feet, Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania
3 am, 7 March 2002

Me taking a rest break (and posing for The Thinker) among the volcanic rocks of Kilimanjaro, March 2002.

I failed.

I do not believe it.

My God, I, Michael Seto, failed.

I gave up. I surrendered. I allowed the specter of failure to defeat me. I turned around and headed back down the mountain, short of even the first peak, Stella Point, on Mount Kilimanjaro.

My guide, Salim, tried to urge me on, but the decision stood finalized in my head. For the last two hours, each step required a herculean effort, straining just to place one foot in front of the other; barely maintaining my balance with trekking poles in each hand. I carried nothing except my recalcitrant body and a few candy bars, Salim relieved my of my light backpack an hour ago. My head ached from the 17,000 feet altitude, drunken with hypoxia (lack of oxygen to the brain), and laboring under a blanket of fatigue.

At this point, I cared nothing for what my friends would say about turning back; I cared nothing for what I would think of myself for turning back. I could not even remember why I was here! What was I trying to prove? I thought of nothing in my reduced brain function; except laying down and sleeping, as capable and temperamental as an eight-year old child.

Defeat hung around me like the early morning fog on the mountain. Humiliated, I did not want to face the cook and my porters, who cared for me for the last four days, just so I could make this attempt up the mountain. I slunk back into Barafu Base Camp, where our summit attempt started, hours ahead of the other climbers, who undoubtedly reached the summit and were celebrating as I lay in my tent.

Failure and I share a long relationship. One of me always running from it's insidious shadow, which drives us toward it's brother, success, in a desperate way, grasping for it like a life preserver. Forever just a step behind me, failure stood waiting to pounce at the first sign of indecision, or hesitation or God forbid, weakness.

I felt its cold embrace upon me not a few times in my life. Yet, I feel that I have never stood face-to-face with failure in a real meaningful way, where my whole life might crumble around me if failure won. No, things have always seem to come easy to me: grades, friends, success, money, and happiness. So when I did face potential failure, it was always with a smug self-confidence, the notion that I still held an ace-in-the-hole; that I would outsmart and outmaneuver its deadly grasp.

For my entire life, I managed to get by without pushing myself to the limit, even in the Marines and on Wall Street. I managed to surmount any challenge with my physical, mental, and spiritual reserves untapped.

Eighty-five percent effort seemed to be all required of me to succeed. So I only gave that much, never red-lining my capacity, never stress-testing the machinery, never looking into the abyss without a safety line around my waist. I have been cheating failure most of the time.

Fear of failure constituted one of my primary motivations in a lot of my life. The fear of looking incompetent, or stupid, or clumsy; which would reveal my true unworthiness as a person to the world. The Emperor wearing no clothes, the real Wizard of Oz exposed. People would see what a fraud I am.

This made me strive for success, not so much for the sake of success, but for the fear and loathing of failure.

Our society worships success. Winners stand venerated, losers excoriated. Pressure to succeed weighs on the mind of all men (women too, I'm sure, but I can only speak for men...well, maybe just me.) This got passed on from the "must slay the woolly mammoth and make fire" days and evolved to "must get gratifying job, buy house, have kids, satisfy partner emotionally, financially, sexually, spiritually etc." Otherwise you are officially a failure; and as such means being humiliated, ostracized, and castrated (symbolic).

As we get older, our failures get more spectacular and public (Mars Explorer, Challenger, Milli Vanilli); yet like protagonist Rob says in "High Fidelity" to his girlfriend, "if you really wanted to mess me up, you should have gotten to me EARLIER" (emphasis mine).

The failures that stand out most in my mind took place when I was young, when my naivete and sense of omnipotence was greatest: Third grade - sitting with Tanya (the blond girl scout), my friend, and being set upon by a bunch of the guys, who pinned me down and shoved grass in my mouth, while I writhed helplessly as she watched. Impotent.

Sixth grade - getting beaten in a singles tennis match at our club by Anita Colonna, a girl, a year my junior. I thought I played tennis well. I was crushed. I cried all the way home. Pathetic.

Seventh grade - in a gym lineup of all the new 7th graders, by size of course, I was tail end charlie, smaller then the smallest girl, Shelly Scoggins. My XS gymshorts came to my knees. Loser.

Ninth grade - while working in the school garden over the summer (for brown nose extra credit) I got punched in the face after stepping into a arguement between my friend Tom, and school bully Phil Crone. I backed down and he walked away laughing. Humiliated.

As we get older, our ability to make various sundry excuses and rationalize "non-success" comes much easier: "well, I'll get that promotion next year," "she and I were not really compatible," "I did not really want that job anyway," and the simple but true, "that's life."

We get used to our impotence and incompetence, like water seeking its own level; and therefore being constantly reminded of it does not sting like it did when you are nine-years old. Maybe that's why we switch to sports like golf, where there is no clear winner or loser, its all relative, you play a little better or a little worse each time out. You begin to see things in shades of gray.

As I look at my adult non-successes, like my marriage, some bad stock calls, etc, these things seem more like REAL life; part and parcel to the trials of being an adult. Failure comes naturally the more you do. Its also easy to turn these into some life lesson. Note to self: "Well, XYZ failure was all for the best and what I have learned from this will make me a better person," or some nonsense like that.

This way losers can still be winners! Just like those kids soccer tournaments where we hand out trophies to everyone for playing...its a self-esteem thing. As though with enough self-esteem we can solve all the world's problems, but I digress...

So has failing to climb Kilimanjaro made me any less a man, or a person, or changed who I am deep down? I don't think so. And at some point along the way I realized that; or I just forgot why I chose to climb that bloody mountain in the first place. Then the sting of turning around and giving up diminished, and the comfort of just being myself took over.

What was I trying to prove to myself for the umpteenth time? I, Michael Seto, who led men in combat on the battlefields of Kuwait, who survived the battlefields of Wall Street, who became a better person through ABC and XYZ failures. What did I have to prove? What DO I have to prove anymore? So I failed to climb Kilimanjaro, so what

I spent much of my life running blindly from the vampire Failure, lest he drain the life's energy from me and my endeavors, tossing me into a heap of lost souls, the pit of irrelevance. I ran and ran towards the light of success in order to escape the dark abyss lurking below its heights, where one misstep might cast me.

But each misstep, each misadventure, however brief, into Failure Hell did not destroy me, or emasculate me. Instead, when I embraced the dark ghoul of failure I found him to be an instructive and wise teacher. One to be cautious of, certainly, but not one to be hysterically fearful of. I realized that he and his twin-brother, success, share a close relationship; and that I cannot have one without the other.

So while I do not seek out Failure's company, when he does arrive unannounced at my door, he is welcomed at my table, for I know he bears wisdom for me; and I should be wont to listen.

Patagonian Paralysis

El Calafate, Argentina
February 8, 2002


Contemplating my navel in a non-descript hostel room, anywhere in the world. Photo by Michael Seto

I got a haircut (actually a head shave), dropped off my laundry (dirty from five days trekking) and ordered a burger and Coke for lunch. After that, I could not decide which shoe to tie first.

Both this week's flights to Bariloche are full the travel agent, Sabrina, told me. Shit. Now what? She started suggesting alternates, fly thru Rio Gallegos, or take a one of several buses, or there is a 4-day 4x4 trip up Route 40. What about a day trip to the Moreno Glacier, or up to El Chalten for two days and ice walk up there. No more suggestions I plead!

My original plan of a few days in Bariloche, a ski-resort in the Andes, then off to San Martin, another quaint little mountain town, lay in tatters. Uggggh. What to do? What to do? WHAT TO DO? Sabrina saw my indecision and took a phone call as I left, mumbling about how I would be back later, after I think things through. Yeah right! Don't hold your breath.

I felt like a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest. Too many options is as bad as none. Analysis paralysis!

I wander up and down the three blocks that make up El Calafate, back and forth, past restaurants (all meat BBQs called parillas), past chocolate and ice cream shops, past artisan shops (did I mention Calafate is a tourist town) selling postcards, film, fleece, and t-shirts. I do this for THREE DAYS!

In between walks, I retreat to my hotel room and watch TV...there are 40 channels, but just 3 in English; nevertheless, ever ten minutes I surf through all of them (ten always seem to have soccer!). I watch old Ally McBeals, Boston Publics, Dark Angels, and the Simpsons, the latter in Spanish, but I have seen them all and know the words, so I laugh aloud. I see Die Hard, Die Hard 2, The Replacements (twice), and the Replacement Killers (in Spanish).

I hole up in my single room, though I lately have been in dorm style bunk rooms in hostals to save money. I take a single room this time because I don't want other travellers to see my weakness, my hesitation, my indecision, MY TRAVEL BURNOUT! 'Cause hey, this lethargy infects slacker backpackers faster than dysentary in an Afghani refugee camp.

The voices of a chorus of advisors debate my dilemma: You should be ashamed! But why should I be?! Huh, if I am tired then I am tired...so what! Yeah, leave him be, let him recuperate. He'll be fine, just needs a couple days. But look at what he is missing! Its a beautiful day, he's in Patagonia for God's sake! Get off your ass!

Shit. I was a Captain in the Marines..."rush the machine gun on the left, or charge the machine gun on the right;" a Vice President at Morgan Stanley..."buy high, sell low, or was that buy LOW, sell high"; surely I can make a decision. I can, and don't call me Shirley (oh yeah, I saw Airplane on TV too.)

So I try to do what my teacher/guru/faciltator taught me: sit in the tension and let what will be manifest itself and be known. So I sit...and sit. I meditate. What is my soul telling me? Where am I being pulled? What is my destiny, my karma? I meditate more...center...breathe...but don't TRY to breathe...think...wait, don't think! Breathe and follow your breath...wait, what is on TV?

So I do some yoga...but wait, what's on TV? I surf again. I nap. I surf. Maybe I should work-out. I do my prison workout...you know, pushups, situps, squats, then Ally McBeal comes on again. I wonder what is on the other channels.

(Mom and Dad, close your eyes.)

Make a fucking decision, goddam it! Jesus fucking christ! What the fuck is wrong with you?! Fuck. Fuck. Fuck, fuckity fuck! Yes, in a way I am imitating (that being the highest form of flattery) Dave Eggers' stream of consciousness style in "Staggering Work of Heartbreaking Genius." I hope you are flattered, Dave.

(Ok, you can open your eyes.)

I picture Eisenhower standing in front of his HQ window, it rains outside but a possible lull is forecast for the next day. He contemplates for a moment then turns and says, "OK, let's go." The next day, 6 June 1944, becomes D-Day. If he can decide the fate of the world, why can't I figure out if I want to see a stupid glacier or not?!

OK, why am I here. Out comes the list of reasons I wrote down about why I travel (in no order): see the world, learn about myself, meet hot local chicks...OK, that's enough of that. I figured learning about myself is most important...like, I've learned that I am a quivering, spineless jellyfish! Well, I kinda knew that already. Don't they have strap on spines now, like those girdles they give to guys who lift heavy stuff? Fedex me one.

OK, decision time. Let's have it, Eisenhower. "OK, I'll go." Wait, go where? Why, to Buenos Aires stupid! I will head off to BA and spend the next two weeks there, exploring that huge metropolis and learning to tango. Yeah right.

I plop down my Visa and tell Sabrina-the-travel-agent to book me the next flight to Buenos Aires, leaving tomorrow at 3pm. Done. Decision made. I return to the world of vertebrates. So what if I miss the Moreno Glacier, and Bariloche, San Martin de los Andes, and Iguazu Falls?! After all, you can't see it ALL, right? I step off to my hotel to pack... and to see if Ally McBeal is on.

2001 - A Travel Odyssey

La Paz, Bolivia
December 28, 2001

Grabbing a hot spring dip at 12,000 feet in the 40 degree air of the Bolivian Altiplano.

It's been quite a year, this 2001. From the exhilaration of seeing man's technological triumph of a space shuttle launch; to the horror of man's cruelty in flying an airplane into a building.

Encapsulating this year for me will be difficult, but I am going to try briefly. I can't remember who said this, but: "forgive me, I do not have the time to be brief."

For me, 2001 really began to get interesting on 25 Jan, when both John Mack and I left Morgan Stanley on the 25th. I spent seven years working for the venerable firm and left friends, clients, and a large part of my identity - that of swashbuckling Wall Street dude and all the attendent caricatures - behind.

This hiatus gives me my first time away from an occupation of some type since 1988, when I finished college and went on active duty in the Marines.

Waking at 10am, 5 hours later than customary, I found New York to be a different place: people wandered all over the streets, Starbucks and Barnes & Noble were full of browsers...didn't these people have jobs to go to?! (Or maybe they are all former dot.commers!) I enjoyed meandering the city, delving back into my old hobby of black & white photography. I played computer games and surfed the net, I read books and the Times daily. I watched movies and just vegged around my flat. I went out and played a lot of golf! I think the life of luxury suits me.

Becoming a non-productive member of society took some getting used to. I shaved my head and grew a goatee, trying for some Bohemian look and lifestyle which Wall Street did not afford me. I stayed out past my work bedtime of 11pm, like a teenager breaking a curfew.

Rediscovering the depth of my non-work personality offered endless insights and humorous moments. I realized my anal-retentive nature (no doubt recognized by my work colleagues long ago), and penchant for (over)organizing things. It took a while before I felt less guilt lingering over a cinnamon roll and coffee and a book at a sidewalk cafe. My natural need to do or accomplish something kept whispering in my ear. Shaddup already!

In June, the road beckoned and I began a the mother of all roadtrips, across the continent. I traded in my Boxster for a more practical Pathfinder - which held my golf clubs and then some.

Armed with the Rand MacNally US road atlas, I proceeded to run up 15,000 miles and four months of road time - longer than the 6-8 weeks I anticipated. My opera and U2 CDs got the most playing time, though I grew to cherish silence, except for the wind and road noise. I pondered bits and pieces of my life, pictures and emotions plucked from the haze of memories long gone. Amazing how one can recall things in an enviroment of peace and quiet (and sheer boredom after 8 hours behind the wheel)!

My Pathfinder worked like a time machine, moving me back in time as I reunited with friends from long ago in my drive across the US. All those cities harboring folks from my past, which I never visited due to the ubiquitous "didn't have time" excuse which is the mantra of modern day life; became key destinations. I saw friends from high-school, the Marines, and Hong Kong in such far flung places as Nashville, Minneapolis, Charlottesville, and Jackson.

The chance encounters with fellow golfers as I played 30+ rounds across the nation provided some of the most interesting strange bedfellows. From Al, cigar chomping, swearing, former-Marine turned marshall on the RT Jones trail in Alabama to Dan, the senior circuit competitor at Dancing Rabbit, Missouri (also the strangest name for a course). The love of the game displayed by everyone I ended up playing with reflected my own deep fascination with golf as a metaphor for life.

Ultimately, as a friend likes to say, life's importance revolves around your personal relationships, friends and family. I could not agree more. Yet I have chosen to leave both behind in a search for...something. I tell people I travel to learn about myself, and this could not ring more true. As I slowly shrug off the compulsive, check-list focused travel, trying to see all the "must see sights," I find more time to just be.

Ranier Maria Rilke wrote: "What is necessary, after all, is only this: Solitude, vast inner solitude. To walk inside yourself and meet no-one for hours - that is what you must be able to attain."

Overseas, I delighted in meeting and spending time with like minded travel folk. I don't fit the younger grunge backpacker set, those 20-somethings identified by dreadlocks, tattoos, tie-dye shirts and body piercings. Neither do I fit into the Yuppie Conde Nast group, on some Abercrombie and Fitch tour; though they probably are closer than I like to admit. Yet the thirst for adventure and hunger to explore the new and untried ties all of us together. The inimitable human spirit of growth.

Yet, I also relish my time alone, for reading, meditating and just pondering. Of course, sometimes I am soooo bored out of my skull that I search high and low for a hostal with cable TV, so I can get my fix of CNN, Seinfeld, and the Simpsons! One cannot keep one's head in the clouds all the time. Once in a while, I even succumb to my desperate need for the Big Mac #1 meal at Mickey D's...yes and SUPERSIZE that baby!

Just over seven months on the road thus far, three of those outside the US. My Central and South America legs raced by faster than I preferred, given some external time constraints, but I don't regret one moment. After all, you can't have everything...where would you put it?

I think that I visited about 40 countries thus far in my life, 9 in the last three months. I might cover about 70 when all is said and done...sometime in 2003...out of 180.

What have I learned? Hell, I don't know, and if I did, I don't know if I could quite put it into words. From moment to moment I may craft some interesting blurbs for these Travelogues, but the meaning of it all still eludes me. Yet, I continue to chase after something, that intangible Holy Grail, the meaning of life? How about I settle for just the meaning of MY life?!

I suppose my trip will end when I find it, or run out of money, or get bored and return home. Part of me knows that what I search for resides right here inside me, inside each one of us. You don't have to circle the globe, climb Everest, or meditate in a cave for ten years. I think life just implores us to be present, for every precious moment, as best we can. May you live in interesting times.

Best wishes for 2002 and I hope to see you somewhere out there.

All About My Mother

Machu Picchu, Peru
December 19, 2001

Mom and I stand in front of the Palace on Wheels after the "holi" festival of color in India.

Mom on the Palace on Wheels, where we train traveled through Rajastan, India in early 2003. Photo by Michael Seto.

"It's OK, Mike. I'll just sit here and rest a minute."

My mom patted the rock supporting her and smiled.

"Fine. I'll rest too. Just remember to take it slow, we're up pretty high." I stood to the side of the trail and drank some water from my bottle.

"Don't worry about me, I'll be just fine."

I worried anyway. After all, my legs burned and my lungs heaved trying to pull oxygen from the air at 7,000 foot. If I felt knackered, surely my 62-year old Mom MUST be tired! We sat about halfway up a steep hill set just behind Machu Picchu, which overlooked the entire site. A restored Incan building of some type clung to the hill another 600 vertical feet above us.

My mom flew in from the US earlier this week, always wanting to visit the mysterious Incan city of Machu Picchu. Now we stood here together, enjoying our second day at the city, tucked away on a hillside so remote it lay undiscovered until 1911.

She studied Spanish for the last nine months and her vocabulary well exceeded my "travel Spanglish." Incan and Mayan history fascinated her, so she spent time learning about their cultures, traditions and history; peppering our guide Claudio with amazing questions yesterday.

I enjoyed my mom's company, as nearly three months passed since I departed my childhood home in San Jose for Mexico.

She stood up and said, "OK, I'm ready." We worked carefully up the dirt and rock switchback trail, hewn into the nearly vertical hillside.

I stood balanced below my mom, positioned to catch her and arrest any fall. A foolish notion given my own tired state, but my chivalrous nature did not allow for any deterrence. This was my MOM for goodness sake.

Each time she caught me doing this my Mom would admonish me, "I'm fine Mike. If I can't make it, I'll just stop."

My mom loves to travel. Before I departed home, she covered our dining table with brochures, Conde Nast magazines, and guidebooks, comparing itineraries and destinations. Already an accomplished traveler with probably 45 countries under her belt, Mom relished the opportunity to go to Peru, just needing a travel companion.

My dad, he loves to watch TV. His favorite vacation is a nice long cruise with four buffets per day - preferably Chinese food. So Mom works hard to bridge the gap and design suitable vacations for both. She jumped at the chance to join me in Peru for Cuzco, the Amazon jungle and, of course, Machu Picchu. Dad was finishing up his last semester teaching engineering at San Jose State and said he'd stay home and take care of the cats.

For me, it offered a chance to spend a week with Mom, a family vacation. Something I had been absent from since my 1983 (I was 16) childhood trip to Hong Kong and Hawaii. Seventeen years without a true vacation with any one of my family. My rebellious college attitude combined with the Marine Corps ensured my exile.

So for a week I will get to stay in nice hotels (with hot water) and get transfers to the airport and a private guide to show us around. OK. I just hoped my independent "finding myself" nature could handle 170 hours (Ok, I forgot about sleep) with one of my parents. Having Mom show up to PTA meetings, award ceremonies, graduations and weddings was one thing; eating, sleeping, flying, and everything else together was another.

Being away from home from college onward, never allowed me to color my parents in-between the lines, to learn more about them as people. To see them as I now exlored myself, searching for a meaning to my life and the world around me. What did they discover? What did they dream about? Fear? What were their joys and disappointments? I never knew any of these things, as a child and even still as an adult.

This vacation allowed me to see my mom as a REAL person. Some friends of mine possess amazing relationships with their parents, treating them like best friends or soulmates. Me, brought up in the best Asian tradition, gave them loyalty, fealty, and respect (though no grandkids yet). For the longest time of my life, I only saw my Mom and Dad as my Mom and Dad; not real people with their own hopes, dreams, fears, insecurities and faults.

A child, for good reason, sees parents as omnipotent beings for many formative years; and this often carries over even through the rebelliousness of adolescence. College and the USMC took me away from home and for years I failed to enlarge the picture of my parents, my understanding of them, my empathy for them.

Prior to this, I only received glimpses from afar, like spotting an animal in the jungle. A rustle here, a phone call there, a letter or email. A jumbled mosaic, which I can try to interpolate. I could try and analyze my parents, try and figure out in neoclassical "lay-down-on-the-couch" psychology who they are and why I am who I am.

I could try to figure why I was an overachiever. What weakness did I hide through academic honors? What vulnerability hid behind the facade of the Marine officer? What insecurity bred behind the Wall Street material success? What drives me to seek something by travelling around the world?

But I don't do that. I don't feel any particular need to do that. Not right now. Perhaps I squander a chance that may not present itself again. Perhaps not.

I know deep in my heart that I love my parents (and my sisters)...unconditionally. They may feel different sometimes, but I know that they know this.

I love them just the way they are. For they are just like me.

"Ahhh, finally," Mom breathed a sigh of relief. Setting her pack to one side, she sat down and drank some water. Sitting on the edge of a cliff, we looked over the ruins of Machu Picchu 1,000 feet below us. The sun shone through the late morning clouds in golden rays, illuminating parts of the mountains surrounding the mysterious Incan city.

Now I saw Mom as an explorer; teaching and learning about the world, always helping others, compassionate, understanding, and deeply philosophical, though she may not describe herself that way.

I realized I am just like her.

She gazed at the sun striped valley below us, "Boy, isn't that just beautiful."

"It sure is, Mom. It sure is."

-----------------

Postscript

Don't think my Dad didn't travel either. He and I share noodles in a famous Hong Kong diner, Winter 2002. My Dad loves to spend time in Hong Kong, where he grew up.

Bulls and Ladrons

Quito, Ecuador
December 9, 2001

A bull's carcass get dragged out of the ring in Quito, Ecuador, where bullfighting still draws a big crowd. Photo by Michael Seto

Ssssshhhhhhhhhhhhh...the entire crowd in the stadium shushed and the hubbub dropped to an unreal silence given all the people watching. The crowd took in a collective breath and waited. The matador stood in front of the huge bull, sword in his right hand, held parallel to the ground, the deadly tip pointed between the horns. His crimson cape, hung limp in his left hand, half on the stirred up dirt of the ring.

I felt sorry for the bull, chased around the 80m diameter dirt ring by six or seven toreros (other matadors) who hid behind wood barriers when he charged. Only the lead matador stood his ground in the middle of the circular ground. Even the bull´s horns appeared to have been filed down to dull knobs.

Five minutes earlier, one of two picadors, or horsemen stabbed the bull between his shoulders with a long lance, drawing first blood. Then while the bull chased one matador, a Banderillo sneaked up upon him from behind it and triumphantly plunged two barbed staked into the neck and shoulder, close to the first wound. These flopped around as the bull continued to make futile charges at the other matadors.

Worn down by these charges, the bull, shoulder covered in dark red blood, dripping onto the dry dirt of the ring, his white coated tongue hung from his mouth. The animal stood ten feet from the matador, head bowed.

The matador lunged forward and sidestepped the bull´s raised horns and his hand shoved the blade into the flesh up to the handle. The bull ran in a few tight circles before its front legs collapse and his head plowed in the dirt. Eight hundred pounds of flesh and muscle froze momentarily before lumbering over onto one side, blood pouring from its mouth. The bull attempted to raise its head fruitlessly several times before one last gout of blood sprayed from its mouth. A torero stepped in close and deftly jammed a six inch knife into the top of the skull, a coup de grace I hoped.

The eight hundred pound carcass was unceremoniously dragged off by three horses and groundskeepers scrambled with brooms to cover the blood with dirt and prepare the ring for the next of what would be six bulls sacrificed today. The other deaths followed the exact same pattern and after two more hours, we left, feeling sorry for the bulls

The next morning, we arrived early at the airport for our 8am flight to the Galapagos. Waiting at Tropiburger (Ecuador's Wendy's) we worked at greasy ham, egg and cheese sandwiches while we commented on the Spanish language MTV blaring from the TV. The place filled with locals and other passengers.

I glanced down a moment later at my foot, where my backpack sat. Nothing. Hmmm, I thought I put that right here. I stood up.

F-CK! I've been robbed!

My mind sensed rather than saw a person just walking out the glass doors to the street. Three large steps took me to there and I exploded through the doors, eyes instantly scanning the sidewalk and parking lot, a shape, a man, I yelled, "HEY!"

There a man walked away with a black coat hanging from his arm. He turned as I shouted and dropped my backpack from inside the coat as I sprinted right at him. He turned and ran through a taxi rank as I grabbed my pack, seconds away from disappearing forever.

The doors behind me burst open again as my friend Dan crashed into the street a second behind me and saw me. I gave him the 'OK' signal as he asked what the hell was going on. Everyone stared at us as we walked back into the restaurant, "Nothing like a little excitement in the morning," I said. A couple cops walked by on the sidewalk a minute later and I explained briefly to them that some ladron, or thief, tried and smash and grab a minute earlier, but I was fine now. Like, where the hell were they when all this went down?

This was my first near disaster with thieves and reminded me how much I needed to be on guard. Having a friend from New York in town and having partied with another friend in Quito, I let my normal guard down, since everything seemed like my old life in New York, where I never feared something like this. Well, important lesson learned, fortunately at no cost.

Sometimes along the trip, I felt so paranoid about the locals that I became overly defensive and likely came across at best, standoffish, at worst, the typical arrogant foreigner. Its tough to tell the good from the bad sometimes, and with everyone out to make a buck (especially a US buck), it has been easier to shoot first and ask questions later. But this also has kept me from getting closer to some of the locals where I am traveling since I am worried about being conned or worse.

Gordon Rocks

Gordon Rocks, Galapagos Islands, Ecuador
December 3, 2001


My dive buddy Dan (left) and I horse around for a photo - this one from the much warmer Red Sea - where he came out to scuba dive with me yet again.

Just don't puke.

Please don't puke, I told myself.

A wave tossed me two feet off the boat's side and clammy sweat broke out all over my body. My face felt flushed and I could not cool off.

Little wonder since 10mm of neoprene covered nearly my entire body. I wore a 5mm full suit and a 5mm shortie to add more insulation for the frigid waters, about 58F. My tank pulled the vest into my shoulders and I looked like an ICU patient with hoses sticking out all over my torso.

I sat perched on the transom of a 24-foot motor dive boat. The deck rose and fell 4-5 feet on every wave, tossing unpredictably on the rough waters of the Galapagos, where the cold Humboldt is just one of several currents that converge here.

Richard, the dive master, got my attention, giving me a thumbs up. I flashed a thumbs up back to him, shoving my regulator into my mouth and taking a couple test breaths. Fine. On three, I looked up, leaned back and a kaleidescope of grey skys flashed to a view of my fins as the 45 pounds of gear I wore pulled me over the side of the boat.

I hit the water and felt instant relief from the nausea that threatened to make me the "chum-master" a moment earlier. (Little did I know that everyone else on the boat succumbed and took Dramamine earlier - except me.) The boat carefully but promptly moved off, making sure none of us were near the props. Richard gave the thumbs down gesture, dive, so I released the air from my vest and descended slowly.

The first descent into the water never fails to exhilarate and I forced my concentration to my buoyancy. As I sank into the cold water, I took in several things at once: my ears popping, the cold water in my suit, the visibility of the water, the location of my dive partners, and the slow leak in my mask! I added some air to slow my descent.

Air compresses under the water pressure so more air is required as a diver goes deeper in order to maintain ideally neutral buoyancy, where one neither sinks nor rises. This is a delicate procedure and requires constant adjusting as one changes depth, adding on descent; and more importantly, releasing air on ascent, or the air expands rapidly in a chain reaction, pulling the diver towards the surface - possibly inducing the bends - where nitrogen turns to a gas in one's bloodstream. Not good.

Our group of four divers sank through 30 feet, headed to 60 feet. I saw Richard pointing calmly. Turning my head in that direction, I strained to see in the dark water (the overcast day cut visibility) and made out a dark shape which materialied into a hammerhead shark. Below us, three spotted eagle rays moved in a line, looking like three black spades with long tails.

Holy shit.

Dan, my dive partner, still floated a good 15 feet above us, apparently having bouyancy problems. As he regained control and reached our depth, I tried to catch his eye, pointing out a marine turtle swimming toward us. He (they always look like these wizened old men of the sea) came right at me, moving with surprising grace despite a microwave sized body and just four tiny fins. Circling Dan and I, the turtle accelerated and disappeared into the gloom.

Swimming along at 60 feet, the water took on a strange look, like the shimmering off the asphalt of a desert highway. The thermocline, where water of different temperatures and/or salinity formed a semipermeable barrier. We descended through the layer, emerging into clear and VERY cold water below. A shadow crossed my peripheral vision. Above us...there. A solid shadow moved across the sky 20 feet above us, wings beat slowly, a manta ray with 8 feet wingspan swam, straining plankton.

We kicked against the current, weaker and calmer down here, compared to the three to four foot chop on the surface. Around us, we spied more turtles, stingrays, powerful Galapagos and black tip sharks, and the majestic manta rays.

But we came here to this famous site for hammerheads, and we would not come away disappointed. With just 750 lbs of air left...the dive profile called for us to head up at 500 lbs...I saw Richard pointing animatedly ahead. We hovered between the two semicircles of coral that made up Gordon Rocks, a volcanic cone built up from the sea floor over the past 20,000 years.

There! Equally prehistoric, several dark shapes approached, about our depth, then more, the more. At least ten. The shapes became more defined, turning grey from black, fins and tails solidifying. The distinctive head draws the eyes and attention, as though viewing a deformity which captivates by its abnormal shape. Hammerheads. Where one expects a sleek bullet shape for cutting through the water instead one finds a thick wing, mounted just above the mouth, like the fins on a submarine. One either end, a black eye stares out at us.

We float, suspended in blue water, with no coral nearby for reference. I feel myself thrashing at the water, wanting to pull myself up onto something solid, but at 50 feet, there is nothing but water. I take a quick glance at my depth guage, holding steady. Without any visual clue, I have sank deeper into the ocean while my attention was focused on sea life...like these hammers.

The shapes undulate and move closer, heading right for us. I pull my legs up instinctively as they pass six feet below my fins. I slow my breathing and calmly watch the dozen or so hammerhead sharks slink by below me, each one 7-8 feet in length. Wow. It really does not get any better than this.

Ten minutes later, we stand around the deck, holding on to any stanchion to keep from falling as the boat heads back to Puerto Ayora, 90 minutes away.

As with any amazing dive, we are all smiles and shout about the incredible things seen on the dive.

Our seasickness is forgotten.