Earlier this year a friend asked me to consider what many would call a crazy proposition: to join him on a two week trek across India. On a tuk-tuk. When I say that many would call it a crazy proposition, I am implying that I waited to finish my beer before giving him an emphatic YES! So on the 9th of September we will board a 16 hour flight to Mumbai and then head to Goa, the starting point of the Autumn 2009 Edition of The Rickshaw Run.
This rally functions under some really basic parameters: First, there’s the two stroke, single cylinder, air cooled, ultimate driving machine, otherwise known as a rickshaw (and to some as the tuk-tuk) that you must drive; there’s a starting point, which as I’ve mentioned is somewhere in Goa (on the SW coast of India); there’s a finish line in Pokhara, Nepal, which is all the way up on the NE, at the foot of the Himalayas; and finally, the trek must be completed within two weeks, give or take a day or two. Other than that, you are free to do as you please. You can go whichever route you please: North, South, along the coast, right through the heart of India, etc. You can stop wherever you like for however long you’d like (within the given timeframe). You are also allowed to have as many teammates you wish to have. So if you think you can cram 10 people inside your tuk-tuk, then cram on. (My team started off with three guys and now we’re down to two which is about an average sized team.) Basically, for two weeks in September, I will be taking part of the real-life version of The Wacky Races.
The event is not purely for sport. It’s also a massive effort to raise funds for charities in India and Nepal. With 64 teams competing (at least originally, me thinks the total is a bit lower now) and the minimum amount you are required to raise set at £500 per charity (roughly $750), there will be lots of funds being generated… which reminds me, we still have a long way to go with ONE of the charities and every bit of help is incredibly appreciated. =)
Since my teammate and I are both naturalized citizens that would do a convincing job as foreigners in our own countries (regardless of the fact that we are both fluent in our native languages), we came to the conclusion that the only fitting name for our team was Team America: World Rickshaw Runners.
We have also sorta, kinda been keeping a blog which we will try to keep updating regularly during the trip. There, you will be able to find a lot more details and information regarding the event. Feel free to CHECK IT OUT.
First, our newly confirmed Supreme Court Justice, Sonia Sotomayor is deemed a racist, and now this:
I don’t think one can say this enough, but the folks at Fox & Friends are terrible! After Beck certifies that Obama is indeed a black supremacist, Kilmeade once again shows the world his total lack of grasp of the issue of race.
A while back I caught a mention of a blog about beer in South Florida over at Rick’s spot and for whatever reason I kept said blog in the backburner and never got around to checking it out… Now I deeply regret it. I missed a weekend of Dogfish Head at Abraxas!!! (Among many other things that took place right around the corner from me.)
It’s not like you have to wait for him to blog about something, he’s got a beer events calendar right on the sidebar that comes in very handy.
No doubt SFBB has been bookmarked, del.icio.us’d, facebook’d, rss’d & twittered.
It was hot (down right muggy), bright, mesmerizing and loud. The Collabo Show was overall a very satisfying experience even though they ran out of beer rather quick, something that didn’t go well with the sweltering ambiance of the locale.
My ears are still ringing from all the drumming/banging/crashing/whatever-you-wanna-call it is they were doing that was so overwhelming I couldn’t even look their way… although it could have been the bright strobe light, illuminating the inert, stuffed feline, lying belly-up on a table in their general direction.
I couldn’t help but become fixated on the jelly fish in the water tank under the blue light, as well as the hot air paper balloons that gloriously burned over the Little Haiti skies. (With the couple of exceptions where they burned either just prior or right after being released.)
Honestly, I don’t know what it all meant but it was a lot of fun and as torturous as some of the work looked (e.g. putting together the live piece in the suffocating confines of their installation), it was the artists who seemed to be having the most fun.
This one is even better than the last one. Mayday! performing ‘Last Resort’ at their Technology EP (available online, for free) release party at Transit Lounge:
“people tell me i’m white, and i believe them because i’ve never been arrested in my foyer”
@StephenAtHome (Stephen Colbert from the Colbert Report’s tweeter account when he’s home) reacting to Harvard professor, Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s arrest in Cambridge this past week.
For an even better, more detailed quote regarding an issue that is being immensely overlooked in this mess, check out this entry at PostBourgie.
I was gonna make this about how the landscape of the music business is changing and how these big name bands (Radiohead, NIN, Coldplay, et al) are bucking the system by sidestepping labels and connecting with their fanbase directly online but I’d just rather post a list of albums available for free on the internetz (most of this stuff has been available online for a minute but I’ve just become privy to it):
Naturally, I’m hoping someone actually reads this and maybe gives me a heads up on other groups getting in on the act. (Weren’t Oasis and Jamiroquai following up on NIN & Radiohead?)
This is probably the nicest live video footage of Mayday! I’ve seen. It’s but a sample of type of energy you get outta one of their shows. Watch Gianni (percussion) & L.T. (drums) tear it up at the end.
I just got back from a 40 day trip to Peru in which I toted my trusty DSLR (a Canon Xti) along with two lenses (a wideangle and a prime). I lost count of how many photos I took but I’ve started up a photo blog on tumblr where I’ve been posting & plan to keep posting up these and any other photos that might come along from now til whenever.
I still have a ton of photos left from Cuzco, Arequipa, Lima and even Mancora, where I made a worthwhile effort to leave the camera on lockdown. I’ll definitely end up posting stuff from around Miami and anywhere else I may find myself (hopefully India in a couple of months).
It gets to be a big mess when you’re trying to keep so many things going at once: twitter, flickr, this blog, now tumblr and God knows whatever else I’ve got out there constantly having to keeping tabs on. I don’t think I’ll be canning this blog anytime soon, if anything, I wish I could post more often but for now, my spot @ tumblr will be fairly busy. Check it out:
Posted by R. 
Posted by R. 
Posted by R. 
