Traveling: part 1

when I thought about writing a blog, I had to think what to write about. had no idea of course. but knew what I didnt want to write about. It shouldnt be me complaining about something i dont like and it shouldnt be about trying to convince people to think like me.

It should be funny and make people think at the same time. Easy to read, and to understand. not so long and not so smartassly written

sex, religion, politics? still a bit taboo and chances are, if you're reading this, you know me and you know my views already.

my daily life? ok here we go: woke up at noon, ate some rice, went for a walk. done.

love? not sure what it is or how it works, I know how oxytocin works; but that doesn't sound very romantic..

peace and happiness? yeah, that sounds good. that's what people need at the end of the day, no matter where you're from, where you are or what you think; we all just want to be happy. So that's soemthing that brings of us all together. We all want to love and be loved, we want affection and kindness.


that could work.


Some years ago, while in china, I found myself in front of a class, lecturing on business for some reason. Sometimes more than 50 university students per class.
So my lectures were usually about marketing, negotiations, customer service or stuff like that.


I always prepared thoroughly, and tried to make it fun, but I found out that it didn't really matter what i said on the lecture, when I ask them if they had any questions, either during or after the lecture; the questions will NEVER be about business.


Questions would be something like: *Can you tell us something about your travels? *Have you ever been to africa? *Have you been to other countries in asia? *How many countries have you been to? *What's your favorite country? *Where are you going after China? How can I make money to travel? How much do you spend while you travel?


Of course there was always some odd ones too, like: *Do you have a girlfriend?/*How many girlfriends have you had? *Do you like chinese girls? *can you sing a song for us?  *Why are you not wearing trousers?


But usually, most of the questions were about traveling. My students were not interested in business at all. They just took business english because they thought would help them get a "good job" and that way they could save up some money to travel.


That made me realize I had much more in common with my students that I thought. We all just wanted to be free, travel, and be happy. And the reason why they were taking that class, was the same reason why I was teaching it in the first place!
I also couldn't care less about bussiness, but if I got into the rat race for a few months I would be rewarded with some freedom tokens that could be later exchanged for leisure time.

I was lucky that I seldom got a curriculum and was usually told to do whatever I wanted as long as the students were happy, THEY didn't care about business, and I didn't care about business, so we usually ended up talking about travels or silly stuff for the rest of the week.


to be continued