Travel

26 Posts

The Addictive Betel Nut

While in the South Pacific, I tried Kava, a legal drink made from the Kava plant and which has mild effects on the nervous system.

Instantly, upon drinking it, my lips began to tingle and then feel numb and a warm calm came over me. The taste is dreadful, sort of like muddy water, and it doesn't help that you drink from a dirty coconut shell that is shared by others.

You get Kava at Kava Bars, which usually open when the sun goes down. They advertise themselves with a single, dim roadside colored lightbulb, usually green or red. Here's a Kava bar in daylight in Vanuatu:

Sign for Sano's Kava Bar, Pango Village, Vanuatu

A woman I befriended on the island Efate had a husband who died of liver failure due to his addiction to Kava.

I was reminded of the drink today after reading about Betel Nuts, which I'd never heard of before: This addictive nut is driving record rates of cancer – yet millions continue to chew it. Fascinating.

Here's Drew Binksy on it:


Road to the Sea

Road to the Sea is a travel / nomad / sailing blog by a literal couple who've been on the road or water since 2011.

We have been full time land-based nomads since 2011. We became nomads separately at different times and in different places. In 2015, thanks to close friends, we met on the road, fell in love, and have been traveling together since. We have been all over the United States, parts of Canada, up to Alaska, over to Hawaii, and as far south as the tip of Baja. After eight years we decided to expand our travels and took to the sea. With no experience or knowledge about sailing, or boats in general, we were starting from scratch. We knew only two things when this all began; the style of sailboat we wanted, and that we wanted to sail. 

They're currently in French Polynesia. Follow along!


Spain — September 12, 2017

This post is part of a longer project, Distant Diary — Spain. All entries are gathered on this page, along with an explanation and some background.

DAY 8

Freedom.

Mentally untethered to the possibility that my host may eat my beating heart, I wake early and start walking south along the shore. I find myself in Denia, though amazingly do not make it to the mountain I spotted a few days earlier.

While I walk, I listen to David Whyte's What To Remember When Waking.

In it, he reads his poem Todar Phadraic. It is not my favorite of his works, but its genesis interests me as it's the first I hear of the Tuatha Dé Danann, a mythological race of people who lived in Ireland. Uninterested in battle, they "turned sideways into the light and disappear into the originality of it all." Whyte describes this event as them "no longer wanting to have that conversation." This interests me because I know that if I do not expire on the Mediterranean, I do not wish to return to the place and life that I left behind exactly one week ago.

It is the tedium of modern life that chisels away at me, and it is that which I hope to dance around while tricking it into thinking I'm dancing with.

I recall what Scott Rosenberg taught me in my 20s: give it a name, so I Christen it the time-rich life. Simultaneously, Jim James puts his lips to my ear: "Tryin' gets nothing done."

As always, I walk.

Sardines are cheap at the Super Mercado. A different breakfast for Nina.

I close the day sleeping with the bedroom door open.

52KM.

I wake a few hours later with a full bladder. Raised by women (mother, aunt, sisters, grandmother), I've always peed seated. Tonight's no exception. Sitting there, I feel something soft against my calfs. Blanche sidling by. I bend to stroke her and rise bloodied.


Spain — September 11, 2017

This post is part of a longer project, Distant Diary — Spain. All entries are gathered on this page, along with an explanation and some background.

DAY 7

Joe picks up Arianne. They're off to the airport.

I decide to branch out from the Playa and head to and beyond the city proper. There are orange groves between us and a ton of loud guard dogs, most of which are behind fences. I find a "mountain" with a portion of castle atop it. Looking down from the other side you can get a good look at the whole of Oliva.

Oliva, 2017

I don't yet know the cities beyond, but vow to get out to them.


Spain — September 10, 2017

This post is part of a longer project, Distant Diary — Spain. All entries are gathered on this page, along with an explanation and some background.

DAY 6

There's a stray cat on the property who had kittens a couple weeks before I arrived. Arianne calls her Nina. I get along with her much better than I do with Blanche, my charge.

For a late lunch, I discover Ca Fran. Civilized portions of local foods. Solid Vermouth. I teach the young barkeep to make a martini. Mid-day, I'm the only customer and feel comfortable bringing out my keyboard to do some writing.

When I get back, Arianne has packed and is ready to go, despite there being another 16 hours before Joe picks her up in his taxi, she sits on the couch, hands folded in her lap, waiting.

I decide to press my employer on her past. I find out:

  • Though fluent in the language, she's not Spanish, but Maltese
  • She was a school teacher
  • She retired early after selling her house
  • She left Malta to "get away from some people"
  • Those people have found her

She never explained what they were after. Why they'd be following her.

When I ask why Abu Dhabi, she says it's been a lifelong dream. I ask, why, then, are you only staying 4 days. An answer in Maltese comes. When I ask what that means, she stares.

In fact, each time she speaks to me, I feel she's trying to gauge whether I can be trusted — not with the house, but with her answer.

At that moment, I know something very bad is going to happen. Don't know where or why.

After the sun sinks, wild dogs can be heard fighting and barking through the night.


Spain — September 9, 2017

This post is part of a longer project, Distant Diary — Spain. All entries are gathered on this page, along with an explanation and some background.

DAY 5

Last night as I tried to sleep — the house is a two bedroom — I could hear Arianne. She was mumbling to herself while pacing. At least that's what it sounded like. I heard her rifle through the kitchen drawer and imagined her choosing a butter knife with which to finish me. I fall back asleep.

I'm an early riser but she even took that away from me by being an earlier riser. I wait until I hear her leave and then get up and head out myself.

Sunrise on Playa Oliva

I walk the beach and surrounding neighbourhoods and wonder how lunch with the landlord-cop is going to go.

I stop at La Botigueta and get some terrific veg, including the best carrots I've ever had. But when I return home, I find that Arianne has already done all the shopping and seems slightly perturbed about my purchase.

She's making rice and fish. As she stirs, she stares out the window. "He's the one that's doing it," she says. I look over her shoulder. In the distance, maybe 400 feet, I see another house. No people. Does she maybe mean the dog?

I change the subject, ask how often she gets to the beach. Does she like the area? She confesses she rarely leaves the house. "Not one more minute in this town," she says.

Mateo arrives and we quickly hit it off. When I tell him I sell records, he immediately starts talking music. I hate talking music but humour him. I also help him with some phone stuff — he's having issues and maybe I know how to fix them. He's no longer concerned about who is going to be staying in his house.

We exchange numbers and when he leaves, I ask Arianne if she wants to buy her plane tickets now. She says we will have to use my phone. I say that's fine, as long as she doesn't use my credit card. Not even a smile.

She explains what she wants: Spain to the Maldives, stopping in Abu Dhabi for four days. Only wants to fly in one direction, no flight longer than six hours. No layovers.

Takes me four hours to figure it out. The fastest I can get rid of her is two days from now. An eternity when your host is armed with a butterknife.

I ask again if maybe she wants to show me around. She declines, muttering a word in a language I don't recognize under her breath.

Along a path I sense someone ahead of me in the bushes. It's Mateo. I say Hi and he walks along beside me so I stop. He needs to talk to me. He points back at the house, saying, "She... what is the word..." He points his finger at his head and swirls it through the air, the universal symbol for scrambled brains.

"Paranoid," I say, and Mateo stabs the air between us.

"That's the word! Paranoid!"

"Yes," I say.

"You'll take care of my house?"

"I'll certainly try," I say.

He nods, offers his hand. We shake and go our separate ways.

Of course, I walk.

Love the colors of the buildings here.

Toronto would have a collective aneurysm if someone painted a building that color.


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