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Indonesia and Malaysia 3.1 - Back to Bogor ... and the blog.

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So after many years (8+ !!!!! Yikes!), I learned that my Google account gives me access to to my long neglected travel blog. Good timing too cause after many years I made a return trip to Indonesia (19 years) and Malaysia (12 years) a little over a month ago. The next few posts are the account of these trips in "Indonesia and Malaysia 3.1" to "3.2". I'll valiantly attempt to get them all out in short order while I still have something resembling a fresh memory of the trip. ---- I left Denver on July 13th, 2019, for Bogor, Indonesia to take part in the, Workshop to Enhance Collaboration Between US and Indonesia in Biodiversity and Conservation Research (unfortunately the link is hijacked or something. It redirects to a weird page). The goal is to bring together researchers from both countries in an effort form new and lasting collaborations around biodiversity research. The project involves people from numerous institutions in Indonesia. Specifically, IPB Unive

Tibet 1.10 - Epilogue - Feeling the need to stop being selfish with the memories.

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On June 11th, 2009, I left Chicago for China and my wonderful trip to Tibet. A trip that was chronicled here on my travelblog. Now, some two years later, I'm feeling the need to wrap up my telling of the adventures of this trip so I can begin to use this blog for its intended purpose. There are many stories from Tibet that never made it onto my blog, but only one that is currently prepared, and I would be remiss if I failed to share it with the rest of the world. Anyway, before I begin this story, I must say that the last two years have flown by and I have missed many opportunities to share blog-worthy events. Completing my first marathon, a trip to Edinburgh Scotland for IMC9, another trip to Edinburgh (but this time in Texas) for my first job interview. Instead of having these events scream by as if they were images I glimpsed from a moving train, never to be viewed again, I am feeling the need to blog again, if just to keep a snapshot of the moment for posterity. But I

Tibet 1.9 - Lhasa at last - June 3rd 2009

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FYI: click on any photo to view it in more detail. Three weeks after leaving Kunming and a few small misadventures, we arrived in Lhasa. I have been reading Peter Hopkirk’s book Tres passers on the Roof of the World and I couldn’t help but put myself in the shoes of many of the western explorers Hopkirk writes about. Almost all of the western travelers in Hopkirk’s book never made it to this enigmatic city. It remained a mystery to the western world until Francis Fitzgerald “invaded” the city on a diplomatic mission involving a british arsenal and several thousand soldiers in 1904. This was all under the guise of establishing free trade with the Tibetans, but it was actually fueled by the paranoia of assumed (falsely it would be revealed) diplomatic ties between Russia and Lhasa and that such a conspiracy would put Russian soldiers perilously close to British India in mysterious lands just to the north. The sad truth however is that the Tibetans were (are) a tragically private pe

Tibet 1.8 - The Mystic Valley (July 1 2009)

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I love the forested parts of Tibet. Here we are so high, the forest looks like it is on fire with all the clouds clinging to the mountains like smoke. Yesterday we landed next to a beautiful alpine lake. The lake is fed by glacial waters and as a result is completely turquoise in color. On the lake is a small island on which sits a buddhist temple. Prior to our arrival, Jun referred to this area as a hidden treasure. Well hidden it is no longer. They (the Chinese government) has expanded and paved the roads, built a parking lot for cars and tour buses, and are building a large visitors center in order to charge tourist who come into the area. From what I can tell, admission to the area is pretty much limited to visiting the temple on the island, yet from what I understand, newly built footbridges too the island. Anyway, we are staying at a ‘resort’ of sorts. I share a little cottage with Jun, Jackie and Sue. There is a nice front porch where we can hang out on and watch all th