Livable it was. Munich and Germany have something the United States does not. Age. And That simple fact makes everything about an American city and perhaps American culture different. I’ll write more about that when I get back though.

Like a moron I booked a train to Frankfurt while the German team was playing Slovakia. The previous 24 hours in Munich had quickly confirmed that the country had a singular focus: World Cup Füsball. Vehicles and buildings were adorned with German flags, and every time i stumbled across a park or open space in the city I found a giant screen for the public to get together and watch games. Every conversation I heard was about the cup (Germans use the phrase “world cup” rather than the German language counterpart). So that I missed the chance to watch the Germans huddled in a Munich beer garden was my first real critical mistake of this trip. Oh well.

The three hour train ride further confirmed that the Germans are football crazed. The game was broadcast on the train radio and literally every passenger plugged headphones to listen. That my german was not quite up to speed was irrelevant; I relied on mass facial expressions and group sighs to follow the game. Loss 1-0.

Florian picked me up and we quickly sped me off to a public viewing screen to catch the second half of the US versus Slovenia. Beer, foreign snacks, and great soccer bombarded my senses. Man was I glad to be in Germany. After the tie Florian and I drove to Klein Garau to meet up with Bettina, his wife and my friend. Over some local dark beers we loosely planned my three days with them. Everything revolved around the world cup. That night we drove to Meinz and strolled around town. Churches from the 1300’s, pedestrian walkways littered with beerhouses and cafes seemed to be the norm there. So too did soccer. We walked to the famous Rhein river. Cafe. Beer. Pretzels. Lawn chairs. Sunset. World Cup overlooking the water. Check. When it got too cold we walked 100 m over to a fine dining restaurant. Seats. Wine. Big screen. World Cup. Check.

So went my weekend and I loved every second. During the day we would watch soccer, explore, and eat; at night we watched soccer and drank. Florian and Bettina kept checking to see if I was OK with the level of football we were watching. I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Here is how Saturday went down: we had Bread, cheese, and sausage for breakfast. We then drove to Heidlberg via the autobahn. We visited some friends of theirs and chatted about soccer. Then Florian and I hiked up to the castle in town which was overlooking the Rhein. Bettina hunted for a soccer viewing spot in the plaza. And that was it. By 3 pm it was world cup time and for us the rest of the world stopped. We watched the game in a cafe hovering over some recovery drinks overlooking the main plaza in Heidlberg. We zipped off to a small town to meet some of their friends – Roger, Nicole, and their son Johan. . Two beers later the next game started. At halftime we kicked around a soccer ball in the courtyard with Johan. More soccer, more beers, and then schnapps of Sam Buca. Whoa. 3 am finally hit and I couldn’t stay awake any longer – I was starting to think I wouldn’t make it az a German afterall.

Sunday we lounged and watched füsball all day. Bettina convinced me to blow up an air matress in front of their tv. And that is how I watched all three games. At one point Florian leaned over and asked, “Sausage?” I grabbed it and remarked, “I feel so German right now.” What a day. Caught the over night train to Munich. Plane to London. Plane to Cape Town.

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I wrote this on my phone, so please excuse any egregious errors. No computers in my life since HK.

Also, next time I do find a computer I will be removing my blog from facebook. They never include my photos or videos in my posts (+ their privacy controls suck) so goodbye FB. Add my blog to your RSS reader or simply check back on occasion. Thanks for understanding.

Similarities with the mainland are quite prounced as well, hence the “Diet China” label. Language, smells, density (people + spaces), and food were quite familiar despite the border crossing.

Hong Kong had diverse opportunities that, quite frankly, surprised me. On day two Anthony led us outside of the city for a hike in the mountains. What, mountains? Hiking? Dragonsback was grand in every way. Only photos could properly convey the beautiful beaches, oceans, and the exotic plant and wildlife that we saw. I’m writing this post on my phone in the airport sans Internet – so I’m not sure – but I think such photos can be found over on my photographicas page. Utter wilderness in such close proximity (read: no suburbs) was unexpected and so too was a mile long series of escalators with what seemed like hundreds of western style restaurants off of each side. We indulged in those restaurants with more enthusiasm and joy than I expected from myself. We had one Chinese meal in hong kong, our first, and it was also our last.

Hong Kong was expensive too. It hurt the pocketbooks, but worth every penny. The cab rides, beers, tram rides, hotels, and restaurants all provided top notch service. So too, did the people. And the land – magnificent views.

But then we arrived in Fuzhou, Fujian, China (population: 7,000,000). Fuzhou is a site like no other. As far as I could tell the sidewalks in Fuzhou are just extra roads for which any sort of traffic can and will navigate. As we walked the avenue just outside of the main train station we started seeing some exceptions to the norm we had adjusted to in Taiwan. Scooters leapt onto the sidewalks, often heading against traffic straight at us. No big deal, they all seemed plenty competent as they honked incessantly, encouraging pedestrians to move before they ran them over. But then I saw my first car on the sidewalk and I started to consider that my personal safety might be in jeopardy. That thought was short lived however as I saw a bike roll off of the curb into oncoming traffic. To her credit, the lady kept her course on the white line in between two streams of cars that were releasing a chorus of honks. It was then that I realized that NO ONE was safe. Had I stayed any longer in Fuzhou, I have no doubts that a nervous twitch would be in my future.

Our cab ride to the south train station brought our 24 hours stint in Fuzhou to a fitting end. Our ride was twenty minutes and our cabbie had his hand on the horn for at least ten of them. He used sidewalks, curbs, shot across multiple lanes of traffic and had a feel for the road that I didn’t know was possible. But when he opened up the throttle on the empty road south of town, Jay commented, “I think I prefer the traffic”. Agreed. And the great thing about the drivers in Fuzhou – all of this is normal, no one makes funny facial expressions, when someone gets cut off they don’t yell, they expect it and they’ll do the same to you if they can.

500 km or so north east the world is more serene. With a population 1M less that Fuzhou, Hangzhou (population = 6,000,000) has the same amount of traffic but much more courtesy. They use fewer horns and have way more bikes. Yes people take advantage of any open space before them, but I have yet to see a car on the sidewalk or scooters running each other down. In fact, the driving is a bit more like Taiwan here.

That raises the question – Who cares? Right. The differences in driving are obvious differences between two Chinese cultures in relative close proximity. But what are the subtle differences and I am missing? Thousands, I’m sure. Not speaking the language puts me at a severe disadvantage for doing one of the things I love most – observing. Hell the standard way we order at a restaurant is by pointing to random chinese characters. We have never received the same thing twice. Oh well, I’m going to keep on trying. China is pretty rad, Mao and all.

After escaping Taipei via a three hour train ride we (Kristen, Taylor, Jay & I) landed in Hualien a town on the eastern coast of Taiwan. Five minutes after arriving we were already settling in nicely at the closest hotel to the train station. Ten minutes later, free of our packs, we went on a search for food. Fancy that, thirty meters around the corner we stumbled into a darling little place called Cafe Bosondo, a place we would fondly call home for the next two days. It was there we could get the usual – steamed dumplings and udon noodle soup – at all hours of the day.

On with the scooting though. Back in Taipei we had heard rumors that scooters could be rented for as little as NT$150 (USD$5) per day. The sign directly across the street from Cafe Bosondo confirmed that fact. We quickly learned, however, that that rate was only for individuals lucky enough to hold a Taiwanese license. Every rental shop we asked kept pointing us towards one shop that was only a few doors down from our hotel. We finally trotted back to the suggested shop. After only a few minutes of negotiating we had managed to sequester three scooters for mere NT$400 (USD$13) after only leaving Jay’s high school degree as collateral. That night, we spent a few hours dinking around before dark getting our feel for the devices, making sure we were prepared for the adventure we had planned for the next day: scootering Taroko Gorge National Park.

Having our own scooters granted us the abilty to explore more town with less effort. And so to start our third day in Asia we decided to stray from Cafe Bosondo. Twelve or so right turns later we landed at random joint with several locals inside. Perfect for breakfast. “Ni Hao” “hello” “Ni Hao” are the words we used to greet the people at the restaurant. And when I say restaurant, it’s not what you might think. The restaurants here are 90% open front shops with two or three tables and the kitchen right there in front of the tables. So at this place I knew we were in for it when Taylor ordered some omelet looking thing (picture menu) and the proprietor reached into a big freezer, unwrapped the item and slapped it on the grill. Same happened for the rest of our order. Oh well, you win some – you lose some. Luckily the whole meal only cost us NT$230 (USD%7).

After that we headed to Taroko Gorge. It was about 15 km away and we made good time as we cruised along the coast. Eventually we had had to turn west into the mountains where we followed a winding mountain road for a few hours (have no fear mother, we proceeded with extreme caution). We ran into numerous buddhist temples, countless breathtaking views, and tons and tons of cyclists. It was a ride I would have loved to do on my bicycl with brother at my side. Needless to say, the day was a rocking good time, full of laughs, new experiences, and dumplings. Somehow, I don’t think the dumplings will ever get old.

Of course you can see them all over on my photo page: http://ryanroth.net/photos.php.

Kristen and I took different flights and arrived one hour apart. Public transport (bus & train) delivered us to our hostel by 8 am; the train was more crowded than I have ever seen before.

Some other first impressions from a two hour walk. 1%-2% of people wear flu masks. Residents don’t say hello – well, at least not yet. Food is cheap. We had great dumplings for < $ 0.30 USD. Not as many cyclists within the city as I expected, and far more motor bikes than I anticipated.

Another five hour hike around the city helped settle some of my initial thoughts. But first, it is hot here! Between 29 & 33 degrees Celsius all day. Humid too – as we passes the ministry of communications and weather we saw an electronic sign with Chinese characters and “66%”. I can only assume that it was referring to the humidity.

Just like in the states – most people are nice here, a few aren’t. We got some dirty looks from the fashion police while on the train; everyone else treated us kindly, tolerating our hideous attempts at Chinese.

Peace park was awesome! The trees, the water, the tai chi were all magnificent. Tomorrow we’re heading for the coast!

Link to the video

In other news, I have been fortunate enough have more than one school accept me for next year. As soon as I decide, I’ll write a few posts with what has transpired over the last few months. I hope all is well with you guys out there. Cheers, Ryan.

But the reason for this here post is simple. Push America, the organization I have been volunteering with since the year 2000 is in the midst of a no holds barred Facebook shootout. If they get enough votes to win the Chase Community Giving challenge they’ll win $1,000,000, which as you can imagine, will help them serve people with disabilities that much better. Currently their operating budget is somewhere around $1.5 million. Take that to $2.5 million and the sky is the limit.

So if you have a FB account, please click here and vote for Push America. Your vote will help us make a world of difference.  (http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/charities/227903)

If you don’t have a Facebook account. Please, please, please…

1.)   Set up a new account www.facebook.com
2.)   Search “Chase Community Giving” and become a fan
3.)   Vote for Push America!

More soon.

Those of you that know me well know I like to run. Those of you that know me really well know that I like to run everywhere. From the porch to the bus stop, from the bus stop to class, from class to class, along the curb, over rocks, you get it. The running is not usually intentional either. Most of the time it just happens without any conscious decision – running just seems to be a part of who I am. 

So here it is Fall. Boulder is beautiful and I was bouncing to some music like I was stuck in an iPod commercial. I was sort of running slash skipping from the bus stop to my physics class when I ped stepped in front of me. This is no strange occurrence and I’m usually pretty ready for it to happen. Naturally, I side stepped off the sidewalk without missing a stride. Of course until my toe caught the lip of the sidewalk on my way back from the grass. Turns out I was going to miss my stride after all.

0.02 seconds later I found myself horizontal to the ground bracing for impact. Impact I did, with twenty curious people all turning their heads to look at blur that just thumped into the ground. Embarrassed and immediately reminded of the time I ate it on my longboard at the same very intersection, I bounced up, put my hands back on my backpack straps and kept on running. 

Just another day in the life – but that made it kind of interesting.

The race would be from Lyons to Boulder, and naturally on Friday I found myself attempting the first ride of the year on the course route. A doozy 10.7 miles – hilly for the first half and then a slight incline to the finish. I made it, but that was never really a question in my mind. The question was, how fast? There was a decent headwind so I didn’t quite know if I could compare my time or not, but I was definitely slower than I would have liked.

I showed up a half hour before the race and popped on the bike for a brief warm up. I got a few miles in, stretched and felt as ready as I’d ever be. I rolled on over to meet MIchael and his parents. Yep, that was a bit awkward. “Hi, I’m the 26 year-old who challenged your 12 year-old son to a bike race.”

His parents were downright cool and we chatted a bit – mostly about my qualifications for such a hare brained adventure – since it was very clear that I’ve won approximately zero national championships. His dad, Professor Dan Dessau pointed out Michael had a bit of an equipment advantage. Sure enough, I looked a little closer and saw that he had aerobars, a racing helmet, and covered rear wheel. Hmmm.

The race started without much commotion. Michael sprinted off, and I hopped on his tail. We settled on a nice smooth pace through the hills. There was zero passing, both of us were simply pedaling away, sucking down the cool mountain air.

We exited the hills together and Michael began to pull away. Simple as that. I couldn’t cut the headwind nearly as well as him. I kept him in my sights the entire way, but in the end – I LOST. 

I couldn’t help but laugh as I crossed the finish line 37.9 seconds later. I was greeted by Kristen, Professor Franklin, my buddy Nick and his friends, and of course Michael and his parents. I think Nick was in awe, not quite digesting the fact that I had lost the race. Soon thereafter he was indeed laughing. And believe me, many people got their laughs in on Monday afternoon as my noble effort was announced in front my physics class on Monday. All I could do was sit there and shake my head. 

…

A few weeks ago he was lecturing on angular velocity and momentum, when out of nowhere he made a strange statement that went something like this: “I have a friend who’s son is the national time trial champion for cycling”. “In the twelve year old category”. No one really oohed or aahed, so he felt compelled to tag on this statement: “And I bet he could beat anyone in this room in a race”.

Before my hand could shoot up, my voice shouted. 

“I’ll race him!”

This is in front of my class of 165 people, 162 of which I do not know. Professor Franklin turns to me with a look of surprise, clearly not expecting a challenger. “What?”. “I’ll race him”, I said. I couldn’t let him get away with such a statement in the cycling capital of the country…

We bantered back and forth for a bit in front of the class until he determined I was actually serious and then went back to physics. About ten minutes later he turned to me and said – “Are you willing to put something on the line? I’ve got to motivate this kid somehow.” To which I replied, “How about twenty bucks?” He looked at me kind of confused so I offered up, “Is that not enough? I’ll bet more”. “No, no that’s plenty”.

Meanwhile, somewhere in the back of my mind I was trying to do some calculations…

1. Clearly I can wrestle three of my circa 12 year old cousins to the ground at one time.
2. I used to bike like a crazy man in the mountains of Colorado.
3. But oh yea, I had hip surgery one year ago and have ridden my bike about 30 times since.
4. I have ridden ZERO times since October 2007. 

That’s not looking so good for me is it? Well the race is potentially going down on Sunday. Better get that flat tire fixed eh?

Soon after that photograph, we were driving back to their house. Deep in a discussion about soccer, the sport they all claim as their favorite, something came up about running. I posed a question at Charlie who was, as always, smiling slyly in the back seat.

Me: “Charlie – do you like to run?”
Charlie: “No! I don’t like running, I like eating chocolate!”

And that was that. We laughed the rest of the way home. Moments later we were engaged in a battle of epic proportions in their front yard, 2 on 2 soccer, Charlie and I vs Joey and Sam. And gosh darn’t Charlie looked like a mini Ryan of 18 years ago. A monstrous slide tackling, uber-skilled machine. Ya, I was pretty damn good at soccer, but Charlie is gonna be better – no doubt about it.

“I’m the number one artist in the world right now. I want you to document this right here, what I’m saying right now. I am the number one human in music. That means that any person that’s living or breathing is number two. Because I’m number one now… You are in the presence of the champion. Bow in the presence of greatness…”

Damn, I thought. Damn, that must feel good. And then I started laughing out loud, which is not the optimal position to be in when running up a machine of steps at level 212. But then I got to thinking anyone can say that, and then anyone can feel good.

So go do something totally obscure and strange, say the 25yd butterfly, no goggles, one eye open. Then get out of the water and say to they guy in the next lane:

“I’m the number one no goggle mono-eyed butterflyer in the world right now. I want you to document this right here, what I’m saying right now. I am the number one human in no goggle single eyed butterflying. That means that any person that’s living or breathing is number two. Because I’m number one now… You are in the presence of the champion. Bow in the presence of greatness…”

Then laugh out loud, and feel good. It feels good to feel good.

Non rocked it out to the double doer, Canyonlands National Park and Arches National Park. And boy were they dandy. Since I’d never been to Canyonlands before I got a little camera happy. Did you know that Utah was covered by ocean 300 million years ago? Me neither. Apparently some of the leftover salt helped create the land formations in the area. And brilliant they were.

Kristen taking a jog

Danielle karate kicking things

Sunday John, Kristen, and I paid another visit to Arches. Being both pretty and fun, to say our eyes were pleased would be an understatement. Jittery, yeah – that’s it.

photo by Kristen French

John McGarry, an Ohioan

I hated my job. So I quit. Since that point I’ve stumbled over a few ideas, but have struggled to really find who I am. I couldn’t find work that was meaningful nor do things outside of work that excited me. The crux of all of this is that a few months ago I finally realized that there is no way in hell I want to be a software engineer the rest of my life. I like people too much. That’s the bottom line. I like talking to people, meeting new people, learning from people, and teaching people. My computer, while doing a variety of tasks rather efficiently, teaches me nothing, and I teach it nothing. As I carefully proceeded through the life cycle of major injury, I met many incredible people that do incredible things. I began to admire the work and desire that my friend Reed has for helping people. I started to appreciate what my father does more. I started thinking about getting involved in health care. And as I started thinking more and more – I decided I needed to act or I’d end up in continual purgatory.

Thus, in anticipation of change, I re-enrolled in school. This semester I’m only taking one class while I further evaluate the possibilities of my future. But I feel positive, I feel energy, I feel excited like I haven’t in the past. Ya, I’m not sure what the future has in store, but it’s different, and I’m encouraged.

~R