travel update from New Jersey USA
Hello Everyone,
Well folks, I am here and it is now. I am breathing in calm and breathing out smiles. Tehre are some places in this lovely planet where it is easier to breathe in calm and breathe out smiles. New Jersey is not one of them. This is not what one would call a calm mellow little place. It is quiete densely populated. Like one little city (suburb) running directly into the next. One big large urban sprawl.
If on the other hand you have grown up here and you know where to look, and if you have a car, there are many wonderfully wooded parks and recreation areas where one can take long relaxing walks or hikes and be far from the madness. Well, it is just my luck that one of my brothers (the younger) is very enthusiastic walker and knows many lovely nature trails where we can hike, some quite close to his home and others a short distance from here by car. I am most grateful that he likes to go to these places and he likes to take me along!
I come here to be with my family and to visit some old friends. I do not like to be here except for that. The chief characteristic about this place, one notices immediately, is TRAFFIC. The highways are always full of many many cars speeding along and manuevering in and around one another to try to gain a little advantage, to try to "get ahead".
Without a car, It is very difficult to get around here. USA is designed as a car country. "Without wheels you are nobody". Over the last several decades, the US Department of Transportation has been influenced greatly by big car companies and big oil companies and there is practically no affordable alternative to the car culture. In certain ancient African cultures a young man proved himself by going out naked into the wilderness with only a spear and hunting down a lion. Here the right of passage has to do with obtaining a driving license.
It takes about 20 or 30 minutes to get to Manhattan ,New York City, by bus. It costs $7.50 each way. The bus station is along the freeway literally miles from anywhere. There is no bus to the bus station. One must drive ones car to get the bus. Or get ones brother or sister-in-law to drive one. As I write this update, my passport and the relevant paperwork are at the Chinese consulate in Manhattan. I must return there on Monday morning ot fetch back my passport with its visa and then go to the Russian consulate and leave my passport there to get my visa from Russia.
The Firts two weeks I arrived in America I was staying in Boynton Beach. Which is located in South East Florida. This part of America is quite unique. It is inhabited by a vast minority of senior citizens. For about 30 or 40 years wealthy Americans from the Northeast have been purchasing "retirement homes" in Florida. They come there because they like the weather. Other than the weather it is a mirror image of New Jersey which is a mirror image of Los Angeles. Vitually impossible to get around without a car. Many 6 or 8 lane roads filled with cars. Here a huge percentage of the drivers are over 70 and many are in their 80s or 90s. These folks should not be driving at all! They are really scarey! But there is no other way to get anywhere.
People reading this from other countries will think I am esagerating but alas it is as I have described it.
I will be heading off to Europe in 2 weeks. If all goes according to plan I will have my Russian and Chinese visas and soon will be taking the trans siberian rail road from St.Petersburg to Mongolia. I will sppend the whole summer in Asia and hope to be back in Ecuador in December. I believe a new phase of my life is about to begin. But I never really know. I do not like to assume anything because nothing ever turns out like I think it will. But have no fear, I will keep you all posted! Here are a couple of quotes to ponder until the next update!
Peace and love,
Robert
"Never forget that life can only be nobly inspired and rightly lived if you take it bravely and gallantly, as a splendid adventure in which you are setting out nto an unknown country, to meet many a joy, to find many a comrade, to win and lose many a battle."Annie Besant
"It is preoccupation with possessions,more than anything else,that prevents us from living freely and nobly."Bertrand Russell
"My riches consist not in the extent of my possessions, but in the fewness of my wants."
J. Brotherton
Well folks, I am here and it is now. I am breathing in calm and breathing out smiles. Tehre are some places in this lovely planet where it is easier to breathe in calm and breathe out smiles. New Jersey is not one of them. This is not what one would call a calm mellow little place. It is quiete densely populated. Like one little city (suburb) running directly into the next. One big large urban sprawl.
If on the other hand you have grown up here and you know where to look, and if you have a car, there are many wonderfully wooded parks and recreation areas where one can take long relaxing walks or hikes and be far from the madness. Well, it is just my luck that one of my brothers (the younger) is very enthusiastic walker and knows many lovely nature trails where we can hike, some quite close to his home and others a short distance from here by car. I am most grateful that he likes to go to these places and he likes to take me along!
I come here to be with my family and to visit some old friends. I do not like to be here except for that. The chief characteristic about this place, one notices immediately, is TRAFFIC. The highways are always full of many many cars speeding along and manuevering in and around one another to try to gain a little advantage, to try to "get ahead".
Without a car, It is very difficult to get around here. USA is designed as a car country. "Without wheels you are nobody". Over the last several decades, the US Department of Transportation has been influenced greatly by big car companies and big oil companies and there is practically no affordable alternative to the car culture. In certain ancient African cultures a young man proved himself by going out naked into the wilderness with only a spear and hunting down a lion. Here the right of passage has to do with obtaining a driving license.
It takes about 20 or 30 minutes to get to Manhattan ,New York City, by bus. It costs $7.50 each way. The bus station is along the freeway literally miles from anywhere. There is no bus to the bus station. One must drive ones car to get the bus. Or get ones brother or sister-in-law to drive one. As I write this update, my passport and the relevant paperwork are at the Chinese consulate in Manhattan. I must return there on Monday morning ot fetch back my passport with its visa and then go to the Russian consulate and leave my passport there to get my visa from Russia.
The Firts two weeks I arrived in America I was staying in Boynton Beach. Which is located in South East Florida. This part of America is quite unique. It is inhabited by a vast minority of senior citizens. For about 30 or 40 years wealthy Americans from the Northeast have been purchasing "retirement homes" in Florida. They come there because they like the weather. Other than the weather it is a mirror image of New Jersey which is a mirror image of Los Angeles. Vitually impossible to get around without a car. Many 6 or 8 lane roads filled with cars. Here a huge percentage of the drivers are over 70 and many are in their 80s or 90s. These folks should not be driving at all! They are really scarey! But there is no other way to get anywhere.
People reading this from other countries will think I am esagerating but alas it is as I have described it.
I will be heading off to Europe in 2 weeks. If all goes according to plan I will have my Russian and Chinese visas and soon will be taking the trans siberian rail road from St.Petersburg to Mongolia. I will sppend the whole summer in Asia and hope to be back in Ecuador in December. I believe a new phase of my life is about to begin. But I never really know. I do not like to assume anything because nothing ever turns out like I think it will. But have no fear, I will keep you all posted! Here are a couple of quotes to ponder until the next update!
Peace and love,
Robert
"Never forget that life can only be nobly inspired and rightly lived if you take it bravely and gallantly, as a splendid adventure in which you are setting out nto an unknown country, to meet many a joy, to find many a comrade, to win and lose many a battle."Annie Besant
"It is preoccupation with possessions,more than anything else,that prevents us from living freely and nobly."Bertrand Russell
"My riches consist not in the extent of my possessions, but in the fewness of my wants."
J. Brotherton
posted by Rambling Robert | 6:30 AM
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