MY WORLD TRAVELS: VIA INHERITANCE AND YOUTUBE

Kulas(Kyle Jennermann) is BecomingFilipino, a YouTube Celebrity Among Filipinos

The much-maligned internet, including under-heavy-fire Facebook or Meta, as Zuckerberg may soon rename it, is my information highway.

It's been years since I sat through a single television program, but instead I've been traveling the world via YouTube and using Google as my personal encyclopedia/dictionary.

Shortly after Nena died, I received a small inheritance from a great aunt in Santa Clara, California.  I was the second eldest among 70 or so recipients, all receiving the exact same modest allotment.

Rather than integrate that money into my personal expenses, using it for a Pizza Hut here or Church's Chicken there, I quickly earmarked that money for some sort of world travel, symbolically clutching it as if it were the keys to a Boeing 737.

Cuba was my first destination choice.  I'm not a Communist, but I'm intrigued by the ingenuity of a country economically blockaded for seventy years, repairing and repainting their '56 Chevy or Buick, not to mention the architecture and rum.

Besides, I know enough Spanish to order in a restaurant or explain to la policia what I'm doing or not doing there.

Then, I got sidetracked by Thailand.  "JC," a vlogger who once lived in a boat in Portland, Oregon, was beckoning me to visit Thailand.  

But, when I saw that JC, who'd been in Thailand seventeen years and spoke the Thai language, was misunderstood when he used the incorrect octave, I backed away.

Then Reekay from the Philippines got my attention.  Reekay was actually Enrique, an Hispanic from California, but his vlog quickly enamored me with the Philippines, where most everyone spoke English, as a second or third language, but spoke it.

My life changed dramatically in the Philippines as I met Ana.

A two week courtship before a proposal is not for everyone, but I have only one skill, explained to me by Kip Thrasher in high school.

"Jim, you make people nervous because you see through them.  You know what they are inside."

After explaining myself to me, Kip and his buxom girlfriend died two weeks later in a head on crash on the Benson Highway between Kent and Renton, Washington.

But, back to Ana.  

For a week at her home in Bugo, a suburb of Cagayan de Oro, I watched her interaction with her neighbors and how they respected her.  

She knew the loud fishmonger, pulling a cart of fresh blue fin tuna behind his motor scooter, would wake me up at 5:30 AM, so she had a hot cup of hot Instant Folgers waiting for me at 5:45.(Folgers Coffee is cost prohibitive in the Philippines, a pricey import.)

Marrying Ana was a no-brainer, but, while she's working nights at the hospital, I'm back exploring the world through YouTube.

Harald Baldr, a Norwegian, has traveled the world for twenty years.  Fearless, he always goes where the white man should not go, recently joining the Masai tribe in Africa, adopting their dress and eating their food.

Sabbatical, a young man from New York, who calls himself "Tommy,"  can assimilate himself anywhere.  

A genius linguist, he can be conversational in an African language within two weeks.  While in Mexico, he learned the Nahuatl language and tried it on Mexico City residents, finding that only 1 in 20 could answer him back.

A certain calmness, combined with raw courage, allows him access to the most dangerous locations in the world.  

Now accompanied by his Ugandan girlfriend Josie, an effervescent young woman with a sizable split in her front teeth, Sabbatical always goes where he shouldn't.  

He drinks beer with Nigerian gangsters, but walks out, giving them a tenth of the bribe they demand, immeasurably aided by Josie's personality and cleverness.  

Sabbatical shows off the resourcefulness, intelligence and basic goodness of the residents of the countries he so respectfully visits.

But, I'm currently fascinated with Bald and Bankrupt, Benjamin Rich, a 47 year old native of England

Benjamin took Russian in high school and is fluent, currently crossing Siberia on the Trans-Siberia Train.

Like Sabbatical, Bald and Bankrupt is without fear. 

Recently, he walked into Chernobyl, passing all the radiation warning signs erected by the former USSR.  15 kilometers into his walk, he met an old Russian woman, living by herself, trying to get by.

Below is a video of Bald and Bankrupt in his second visit to the old Chernobyl woman: