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Shitbox in Kep |
AWOL Geordie
Early Retirement in Cambodia.
Thursday 4 July 2024
Answer to nobody
Monday 15 April 2024
Decadence
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Kampot Seahorse |
- 2 years in Kampot
- 18 years in SEA
The last two years have been chilled af - effortless - living the dream. Contrast that to 2009 where I was slogging it out in a Trang government school, full time, for $780/month. Mostly hungover. However, I thoroughly enjoyed the time there and even saved enough of the pitiful salary to buy a Honda Phantom which ended up taking me to many Thai nooks and crannies few foreigners get to see.
Tuesday 27 February 2024
Conceived in Liberty
Sunday 21 January 2024
Satisfaction
Sunday 19 November 2023
The Big Five Oh
Thursday 31 August 2023
ER2@48 - a year in
So then, aye, a full year of early retirement in Kampot. Has it been everything I'd hoped? Spose so aye. Can't overstate the gratitude I feel to be unencumbered by the trivial and mundane. Free of petty managers, mono-dimensional colleagues and insipid grind. A visa not contingent on thumbing-in-and-out of a prison. No longer a number on a ledger. A whole year. Free.
Thursday 15 June 2023
17 years, Man and Boy
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Bokor Sunset |
Tuesday 25 April 2023
Rotting in Kampot
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Lotus pond sunset |
- 1 year in Kampot
- 17 years in SEA
Sunday 5 February 2023
The Xi'an Glimpse
It may have inadvertently started when a Manc septuagenarian began to (randomly) recite passages of Othello while downing cans of Black Panther. Auld Dave's as tough as they come having spent decades as a boxing coach. The last thing I was expecting was a broadside of Shakespearean prose as I scoffed me pie n chips - tremendous.
Monday 2 January 2023
Don't go chasing Waterfalls
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Kampot-time flashes by whereas Saigon-time wades, waist-deep, through putrid sludge.
How? Simple. Physics tells us that time dilates depending on an observer's relative velocity and/or location within a gravitational field. Clearly, Saigon must be orbiting a massive black hole at incredible speed giving rise to its lethargic clock.
Was grateful to visit TWO waterfalls on the back of antipodean Simon's AirBlade - like shit off a stick that thing. He rented "The Pumphouse" back in the day before escaping to Kep. A most convivial companion - perfect for splodging up jungle streams and clambering over slippery rocks to reach the refreshing áž‘ឹកធ្áž›ាក់ážœាលពួáž….
Saturday 19 November 2022
49 times around the buoy
Friday 14 October 2022
Kampot Capers
Hunkered down in my $70 room sheltering from Typhoon Nora. On Wednesday the 28th of September it slammed into Danang after killing 6 in the Philippines a few days earlier. It reached the peak classification of Violent Typhoon with wind speeds of 255 km/h. Like most of SEA, Kampot was caught in the wash. The half dozen water buffalo roaming around outside the room bore the brunt of it, poor buggers.
Monday 5 September 2022
ER2@48 - pulling the trigger.
Starter
September 2022 and I've only written two entries this year. Shocking. Saigon literally extracts the creativity from your soul. Meanwhile, I'm stunned to see the hit count approaching 500,000 ... quite something considering this blog is essentially the aimless ramblings of an eccentric loon.
Monday 27 June 2022
Saturday 26 March 2022
Retire@39 fail. Retire@49?
Sunday 26 December 2021
Amor Fati - Luxury is weakness
Sunday 31 October 2021
You never know what's round the corner
Friday 3 September 2021
For this too shall pass
HoChiMing had already been locked down for 3 months when they decided to bring the Army in. We can't leave our homes - not even to shop. If the coof doesn't get you - starvation and depression will. Welcome to the planet's most draconian lockdown.
Monday 26 July 2021
Lockdown blues
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In lockdown - bad.
HCMC has entered the mother of all lockdowns whereby we're only allowed out to the nearest grocery store. Given that I live in a windowless bed-n-bog, I've been eating anything that doesn't need cooked.
Dreams of clean mountain air in Dalat quickly evaporated leaving a residue of ham sandwiches and youtube.
Friday 11 June 2021
15 years in Asia
I was 32 then. 47 now. I didn't plan to stay away this long, it just happened. Let's take a peek through the murky telescope of history at this roller coaster.
Saturday 5 June 2021
20 types of western teacher in Asia
Friday 4 June 2021
21st Century Diogenes - a tribute
Sunday 21 March 2021
Pedagogical BS
Flow
I haven't written much lately. Working 50hrs/week impedes the flow of creative juices. Weekends are for recuperation. Additionally, there's not much here to inspire a man with an adventurous soul. This is hardly the Himalayas, Borneo or the Mongolian Steppe. This is Ho Chi Ming - a chaotic city of 10M souls. Why would humans willingly subject themselves to this much noise and depressing concrete? Is the gr$$n stuff really that powerful?
Friday 1 January 2021
Celestial Maneuvers in Mui Ne
Saturday 14 November 2020
Sunday 30 August 2020
Megalopolis
Monday 20 July 2020
Batshit in Battambang. Vacuous in Vietnam.
Monday 4 May 2020
Why I'm celibate and teetotal
Monday 23 March 2020
Early Retirement and Minimalism in Southeast Asia
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Not a twatpacker to be seen - they must be visiting the bat caves or something. Motionless palm trees remind me I'm in the tropics - mint.
The coffee's minging though - like mud.