Several people have asked me how is it to travel alone. In one word – great!

Technically yes, I’m traveling alone. But it doesn’t feel that way. I’m constantly meeting up with friends, meeting new people, making new friends and going dancing. I’m never lonely. I have never wished that there would be more people around me. In fact, sometimes I feel I need to get the hell out and away from people after I have spent too much continuous time with them.

Benefits of traveling alone is that I can stay out however late I want, I can decide to stay at home (especially if it has a fantastic view) and read all day, I can choose not to see the touristy stuff and instead hunt for the best coffee shops.

Its easier to meet new people if you are traveling alone. For example, while I was in Singapore exploring the botanical gardens, I had lunch at the cafe there. There was only one free table left. I asked the girl about my age sitting next to it whether the table was occupied. Of course it was free. Right after she started conversion with asking me: “Are you traveling alone?” She was traveling alone as well. She is from Belgium on her way to Australia to take a year to travel and work in farms. She quit her school to do that. She started with psychology, then switched to IT, but she didn’t like that either. So she decided to quit to figure out what to do.

If you travel with somebody its too easy to just stay comfortable within the other person’s company (The Lost Girls talked about it as well).

But most importantly, when traveling alone, it is much easier to practice being yourself and discover your true self. This is because you can take action on exactly how you feel without regard to the other people.

Of course, it would be useful to travel with somebody else as well, in order to learn different skills. For example, how to get along with people and make compromises. Another benefit of traveling with somebody is that there is somebody you can share your happiness with at the exact moment when you are happy. But I still believe that at some point in your life you should travel alone.

@ Ubud, Bali

I had just one day in Paris during this trip (mostly because I have been there before many times). It is interesting how one time I visit it I like it, another time I visit it and I don’t like it. This time I liked it. Perhaps by just randomly wandering around I felt more like home. Perhaps it was a less touristy part of town. Anyways, this is what I came across late in the evening: bunch of rollerbladers doing jumping tricks! Enjoy!

On Sunday (September 8th) I wanted to withdraw some cash but the ATM machine refused to comply. It turns out my debit card has expired. Whoa! I never thought to check the expiration dates of my cards before my trip. It never came up in any blogs that I read to prepare for the trip.

I called up the bank (Schwab) and they said they can send it to me overseas but first they need a letter of authorization from me either faxed or scanned and sent through secure messaging via their website. It would take two days to build the card and then they can send it to me to Singapore overnight (which is my next stop). However the customer service representative wasn’t optimistic and said it may take longer because it could get held up in customs or various other reasons.

I suppose I didn’t notice that the card is going to expire soon because most of my other credit cards are valid for way longer (some 4 years instead of 2) and for online shopping I only use credit cards and enter their expiration date.

The good thing was, I still had two other debit cards (plus credit cards from which one can get cash advance if really needed).

But not for too long..

At the Riga airport on my way to Munich I found an ATM and I wanted to deposit my leftover cash in my Latvian bank account. The ATM ate my card. 🙁 I entered the wrong PIN number. Actually, I don’t think I ever knew the correct PIN number as I got the card half a year ago and I have never [successfully] used it since. However I should have remembered about that at the beginning of my time in Latvia so that I could have gotten a new one.

So now I’m down to one debit card till I get the new one in the mail.

Even though I never get really upset at mishaps, traveling definitely has made me take things even more lightly.

So yea, check your debit card expiration dates before traveling.

***

The flight from Riga to Munich was two hours long but it felt like nothing as I just passed out and slept the whole time (even though I was sitting in middle seat, usually I get the window seat). Partying and sleeping just 4 hours the previous night would do that.

I landed at the Munich airport a bit after eleven in the morning. Time to have lunch! I did a very quick Google search for best coffee shops in Munich (using 30 min free WiFi at the airport, common Europe!, what’s up with the limits!), not much information, but I settled on the first – Zoozie’z. To get there, I first had to take the train to the main station (Hauptbanhof) and then a bus. Yeey for Google Maps with public transit!

I like arriving at a new place and figuring out how things work, especially the public transit. In Munich it was easy enough and the ticket machine even accepted an American credit card without a chip (as opposed to France and UK). Though it turns out I got excited too fast, it was the only ticket machine in Munich that took credit cards, one other one didn’t even take coins, just bills.

Now while traveling through Europe, when I enter restaurants I’m still hesitant and probably look confused because I have used that in USA you always get seated by the hostess. This one was no exception.

This wasn’t quite a coffee shop and WiFi wasn’t working, but food and atmosphere was really good.

Soon after I arrived, a muscular guy wearing nice sports wear and matching bright orange-pink sneakers came in and sat at a table next to mine. In perfect American English (at least to my ear) he said to the waitress:

“Let me practice my German.”

So he ordered food and a drink in German. I was quite impressed, somebody has to be quite motivated to practice newly learned language in the wild.

The music in the restaurant was good and I can’t stand still when there is good rhythm so my shoulders automatically start moving. He noticed that and we started talking. It turns out he also is a dancer.

He had moved to Germany just week ago and is taking German classes for two months. He recently graduation from a MBA and just started working for an international company and his first rotation is in Germany. He was quite surprised that I had just landed in Munich and came straight to this restaurant which is quite out of the way the typical tourist area. Yup, that’s what I like to do, explore different areas and see how the locals live. Perhaps this is why I haven’t yet gotten tired of traveling.

We were sharing our impressions about Germany and he told the following story. His grandmother had asked him:

“So are you going to go to Germany, get a girlfriend and stay there?”

When he had retold that to one of his friends, his friend laughed and said:

“It’s hard to get close to German people to make friends, not even talking about having a girlfriend.”

Of course it’s a generalization, but compared to Americans this is quite true.

I asked him what has so far been his biggest surprise about Germany. After some thought, he said he was running along the river when suddenly he came across a nudist beach. There are so many rules and norms in Germany which people follow and then suddenly there are naked people in public (remember this is from Canadian/American perspective).

We parted our ways after lunch but decided to hang out later as well (I didn’t have anything better to do anyways as my friend who I’m visiting in Munich doesn’t get in till very late).

***

After lunch I took a walk along the river. So much green! I was very impressed. I was also very impressed by the bicyclists and bike roads. I also got inspired. I remembered my idea in college (inspired by reading a book for an outdoors class) to bicycle across United States. I should make that happen some day. Which means once I get back to SF I should get more serious about biking regularly. Aah, things that I want to do after I come back from this trip just keep piling up! On this trip I have acquired inspiration that will keep me in action for years to come.

I sat down by the river and decided to write up that letter of authorization that my bank requires in order to send me a new debit card (after weighting my chances of receiving it while I’m in Singapore – I’m feeling lucky!). It was about 4pm afternoon and that is still really early Monday morning in the USA so they should be able to send it out on Wednesday (after spending two days to make it). The letter needed to be either faxed, or scanned and sent via secure messaging. Since I had no access to printer and scanner or fax machine I decided to write it by hand. Then I took a photo of it, adjusted colors on my laptop and then later uploaded it to the bank.

I wasn’t the only one working on my laptop while sitting by the river, among others who were sitting, drinking and just chatting there was another person sitting with his laptop.

***

In the evening I met with my new friend and two of his female friends from his company who are also taking German classes. All of them are very international. They have grown up in various places and have studied MBA in United States.

While sitting there at the dinner table and chatting and sharing jokes it dawned on me that I can relate to them. We come form all these different backgrounds but we understand each other. It seems to me that there is a new mainstream layer of society developing (or more likely I’m just discovering it now) of young international people who have lived in several countries and traveled to a lot more countries. The same way I feel belonging to Latvian culture I also feel belonging to this group of international people who have lived or studied abroad. With globalization and all, I wonder if some day this will be basis of sort of a nation which will consist of ‘global citizens’.

***

Since my friend whom I was visiting in Munich didn’t get back from Italy till late I decided to go salsa dancing and meet him afterwards. My new friend also joined me. (His friend said she would join as well as it turns out she had danced salsa for 9 years, including in the same places in Boston that I had, but unfortunately in the end she wasn’t able to make it). He doesn’t really know how to dance salsa so we took salsa classes before social. We learned some nice footwork, for somebody who doesn’t dance salsa he followed along really well.

Dancing was lot of fun (it was at Unilounge), there were some good people and some really good dancers. One guy was especially good (later nicknamed as Justin Timberlake). His style was slow and smooth and he was listening to the music (by which I mean he was incorporating musicality in his dance).

After dancing I met my German friend and we hang out the next day (Tuesday). I love this aspect of my trip that I get to see my old friends, catch up face to face and strengthen friendships.

***

Bookstore!!! (yup, it really warrants three exclamation marks!) On Wednesday morning I was wandering around Marienplatz and saw a bookstore. I automatically went in, but then I stopped: “Wait, I’m hungry. I will want to spend here hours so I should get breakfast first and then come back.” I wandered around some more and found a small Italian coffee place where I had breakfast and then went back to the bookstore.

I love hanging out at bookstores. Especially at international ones. The books that they carry usually are the most popular and important ones to read as they have made their way over there all the way from other countries and translations. This bookstore was huge, six floors. On the top floor there was a cafe with great views of the Marienplatz. I think I spent some 3 hours in that bookstore and its cafe.

***

By lucky coincidence my new friend also happened to be in Marienplatz so we decided to get lunch. I told him I went dancing the previous night as well and he asked was the Justin Timberlake guy there. I froze for a moment and tried hard to remember how Justin Timberlake looks like, but he probably meant the guy who danced really well so I said “You mean the guy that danced really smoothly?”. Yes, he was there and I had lots of fun dancing with him. Afterwards I looked up some pictures of Justin Timberlake, and indeed, in pictures where he has a beard or stubble, they do look very similar. Yeah, I really need to get going on seeing all of the IMDB Top 100 movies and then some. Can’t have a conversation with an American without them referencing a movie or an actor.

We had lunch at a pizza place near Marienplatz. We didn’t finish our pizzas and he wanted to wrap his left over slice for taking home. They kindly did it, but the foil in which it was wrapped looked quite flimsy and he pondered whether the sauce or oil would spill in his bag. I told him that in Europe its actually really rare to wrap food to take home. He replied “Ah, that explains things.” Apparently yesterday he had been to an Indian place. After he had been done he asked whether he could take home the leftovers. The waiter said no. He pressed further: “But I bought it, its my food.” The waiter still said no. In United States it’s such an indisputable right to be able to take leftovers home from restaurants (that, and have free water served at every meal).

***

After lunch I walked some more and then I was off to the airport for 7pm flight to Singapore through Istanbul. I was planning to read and watch all these movies, but I slept pretty much the whole 10 hour flight to Singapore. I’m either getting more comfortable at sleeping on the planes or I just have to keep dancing and not sleeping much the previous night.

This begins the Asia leg of the trip. I have never been in Asia before so I’m super excited to explore the unknown.

If you missed from my Google Plus page, here are pictures from the west coast swing dance camp in a beach town in south of France.

Here are videos from the open strictly competition at Sea Sun Swing. This competition format means that partners are chosen beforehand and are judged together as a couple.

Here are videos from Jack and Jill competition. In this competition format the partner is assigned at random and you may never have danced with that person before. In the preliminary rounds each dance you dance with a different partner and you are judged separately. In Finals you get a new partner and dance with the same partner for all songs and are judged as a couple.

Every night of social dancing had a different theme. With my carry-on that I’m traveling with I wasn’t able to bring extra clothes according to the themes, but some other people really made an effort! Here is me dancing with a cookie monster.

I used to be the last person in the world to strike up conversations with strangers. If they started first, I would enthusiastically participate, but I would never start.

I wanted to fix that. If over many years I have been able to develop the ability to walk up to the hottest guy on the dance floor and ask them to dance (which actually usually doesn’t require talking), then I’m sure I should be able to do this. About three months ago was the first time in my life (that I can remember) I started conversation (outside of a dance floor, networking event or party) with a total stranger. It was a cashier at the local grocery store. It was Friday evening and I said something like “Any plans for the weekend?” and it worked, we had a short conversation! I was so happy, I think I skipped on my way home (thank god, that grocery store is really close to where I live!)

On this trip I’m constantly trying to push myself out of my comfort zone and try to start conversations with strangers. I have learned a phrase that has worked for me without fail so far. It is:

“Is anybody sitting here?” 

There are of course variations (and probably grammatically more correct!): “Is this chair free?” “Do you mind sharing the table?” On airplane/train/bus: “Excuse me, I have the window seat.” (Remember, I used this phrase on my way from SF to Frankfurt with great success.)

Even though the seat is obviously empty and there is nobody sitting there I still force myself (now, it comes easier and easier) to ask.

Here is the event that caused me to write about this.

Wednesday night there was no salsa in town so I decided to check out a very popular bar in Riga where I hadn’t been to. I was alone so I thought I would go there, get a drink at a bar and read a book on my kindle.

I got there, scanned the room for layout. There was a bar on the left, high tables on the right, lots of sofas all around the perimeter of the room, and a small stage at the back of the room. There were two people sitting at one end of the bar table, a girl and a guy, and two more guys sitting in the middle of the bar table. The only free chair was next to those two guys. I decided to go for the chair at at the bar. I purposefully asked the guy sitting next to the empty chair:

“Is anybody sitting here?”

He replied:

“No, it has been saved exactly for you!” 

Soon after I got settled in, he started a conversation with me as he saw that I paid with a card without a chip (that’s really rare in Latvia). Turns out the guy was a barmen at that bar and friends with the guy who was working at the bar that evening. So I ended up talking with them the whole evening even though initially I had planned staying at the bar for just an hour.

The night was fun and we talked about whole bunch of things. Inevitably it turned to work, that I’m a software engineer. They were not the techie types, but pretty much anybody in their youth in Latvia has dealt with computer hardware. One guy told a story how he literally drilled holes into his laptop so that it has better ventilation. Worked for him, but apparently not for his mom who complains to him that the laptop often overheats and turns off.

For the first time (as far as I can remember) I truly felt comfortable being alone and chatting with new people. Isn’t it usually so uncomfortable arriving at a party and not knowing anybody (at least for introverted people) and then being forced to do small talk, or eating alone, or on the first day of school or work? That was me. That feeling of being completely comfortable with coming alone to a bar and having made new friends marked an internal victory. Now, I can see that with lots of practice and pushing myself out of my comfort zone, some day I could potentially become the kind of person who is the life of the party.

It is just one simple sentence:

“Is this seat available?”

Try it!

September 9, 2013 @ home in Latvia

Here is another entry on my thoughts and quotes that resonated with me the most from a book. This time it is The Lost Girls by Jennifer Baggett, Holly C. Corbett and Amanda Pressner. It is a travel memoir of three girls taking a year long trip around the world.

Writing

For me this book was more of a study of how to write about traveling than the travel story itself.

I liked how they took turns describing their trip. Sometimes certain events were retold by two or all three of them. It was very interesting to see different perspectives about the same event.

I liked that they wrote about their troubles with boyfriends that they left at home, feelings, and inner thoughts. One of the reviewers (a guy) on Amazon didn’t like that. I suppose that’s why books have different audiences and not every single person will like a particular book.

I always have wondered how real are the stories are in these kind of travel memoirs. In epilogue they explain: “Many names of people and places have been changed and some of identifying details altered to protect the innocent – and not so innocent – but the characters and stories themselves are entirely authentic.”  (Location 8167 in the kindle.)

The prologue began with a scene from the middle of the trip, probably the most emotional scene of the whole trip where they got initiated to be part of a tribe in Kenya. It was very moving and emotional, I teared up a bit. I hope some day I will be able to write like that. The prologue definitely was a hook into reading the whole book and finding out what exactly lead to that moment.

Quotes and thoughts

“We were searching for answers, but as we’d learn along the way, the ones you uncover are rarely those to the questions asked.” (Location 155 in the Kindle) I can absolutely relate to this. I wanted to get certain things out of this trip, but I so far I already have gotten out way more than I expected.

One thing that I learned from the book: “Age 28 is Saturn return.” (Location 304 in the Kindle). Turns out it is a concept from astrology, it means Saturn orbits around the sun in approximately 28 years and returns to the same planetary position as at the time of your birth. It thus signifies end of a period – the first time – end of youth. Recently I heard somebody mention the Saturn return as well, now I know what it means.

“”Regardless of your religion, your most important duty on this earth is to find your true self, and yoga’s regime of self-discipline can help you get there,” Swami said. “Only once you know yourselves are you able to know God, because the two are not separate but one and the same””. (Location 5194). Recently I have come across the idea of finding and being your true self more often and often. It seems that knowing your true self helps in life in many ways. For example, Gretchen Rubin said that self-knowledge is the key to happiness. She said the two questions to ask yourself is “Whom do you envy? and why?” and “What do you lie about?”. Here is the talk, highly recommend to watch it.

I wonder, is it just twenty somethings that are trying to find themselves and eventually in their late thirties most people have figured it out, or are there still lots of people in over thirties who are still finding themselves. The book The Defining Decade: Why your Twenties matter-and how to make the most of them now by Meg Jay suggest that it is in their twenties when people develop the most and are in the process to find themselves. However, there are also so many self-help books out there for all ages which makes me think that some people past thirties are still finding themselves.

Along the way they met a “soft-spoken Brit who was on sabbatical from an engineering job.” (Location 6264). Like me! except the Brit part, and perhaps soft-spoken.

Pretty much all of the time all three girls spent traveling together, but there were few weeks where some of them traveled alone. “Earmarking a few days for mandatory self-exploration might, in fact, make me a stronger person.” (Location 6276) While I was preparing for the trip and reading other people’s blogs, it seemed that the biggest question of all was whether to travel alone or travel with somebody. In my case there is a third option – travel and practice your hobby everywhere you go. Thus you can instantly make friends. Dancing is a great hobby for this.

“The funny thing is, travel had taught me as much about my own country as it did about the ones I visited – mostly because it let me see what Americans looked like through foreigners’ eyes.” (Loc. 7535) I can absolutely relate to this. While in college in United States, I studied French and took one class on French culture. In that class I learned more about American culture than the French culture. Me being European, I already had ideas about the French culture, but seeing them taught from American perspective taught me more about American culture.

Summary

It was a good read, interesting, entertaining and it was hard to put it down. My rating of this book in usefulness is 3 – a good read if travel writing interests you.

My rating system:
5 – a must read, absolutely everybody should read it
4 – a good, useful read
3 – an ok read, but for specific audiences
2 – meh, there are other, better books on this topic
1 – don’t read, a waste of time

One of the reasons why I wanted to write this blog is to get more comfortable with writing, including writing emails. And it really is working!

For the first time I was able to get through my inbox (well, one of them) and reply to all messages without much discomfort. Before it would take me forever and more likely I wouldn’t get through all of it. Now I was even able to reply to people whom I hadn’t responded for months. Before it required tremendous amount of willpower and cajoling myself into doing it. Now I dealt with them quickly one by one. Victory dance!

I have wondered for a while why I have so much aversion to email. I think it goes back to college where I believed that writing emails was not an efficient use of my time. Homework wasn’t getting done that way, projects weren’t getting done that way, so I de-prioritized email to the very bottom. Since I had so much to do I never got to responding to emails, unless it was very urgent.

Now of course I have a different perspective. Work runs on email. I also recognize that friendships and connections are very important to me and email (including other written communication forms, like FB messages) is one way to re-connect with people. Also, a tremendous value can be created by introducing two people, which nowadays often happens via email.

Also, over time I recognized that it takes time to write emails and I have to schedule time to do it. However this – being emotionally comfortable at writing them – was the final bit to overcome aversion to writing emails.

Another unexpected side effect of writing this blog is that I’m not afraid anymore of sharing my thoughts and ideas. I suppose I was afraid that my thoughts and ideas were not good enough and it is better to not share them so that I don’t have to find out that in fact they are not good. Now it does not matter. My thoughts and ideas are part of me, and I’m completely happy with who I am, so now I don’t care whether other people like my thoughts and ideas or not. If they don’t like them because of snap judgement or feelings, that is their problem not mine. 🙂 Though, I always welcome thoughtful criticism as it is a way for me to learn and grow.

This shift in my thinking is going to be huge (for one, it allowed me to write such an open blog post like this)!

Already a third of the trip has passed. Unbelievable how fast the time flies!

Something that I wasn’t expecting is getting sick. I get sick really rarely so it doesn’t usually strike me as a possibility. But I guess when traveling, the body is exposed to all sorts of new germs. I got a cold sore bump, sore throat, and got bitten by something, probably a spider. The cold sore was just annoying. The cold seemed pretty bad at a time, but looking back at it, it wasn’t. My throat hurt whenever swallowing. I noticed it on Wednesday evening. Shorena fed me tea and some medicine. I slept in on Thursday, then around noon got up to go to pharmacy and to get some food (I was hungry! That’s good, that means its not gonna last long!). It felt like the longest walk ever as my back was hurting as well (but in fact it was only 15 minutes).

I thought, great! Now is the opportunity to practice the mindfulness meditation exercise described in the book Search Inside Yourself. (This is me finding a bright side in everything)! One of the chapters describes how to deal with distress. One of the steps is to know when you are not in pain. This was an useful reminder for me. I didn’t feel pain all the time, only when swallowing. Another step is to not feel bad about feeling bad. I could have had thoughts about how it is stupid to be sick while having the most awesome trip ever, but I didn’t. I rationalized that getting sick is probably because I’m exposed to more germs (and probably I should really start using hand sanitizer), and probably it was a stupid move on Monday after salsa dancing and being all sweaty to go outside on the street and wait for bus in the cold.

At pharmacy they gave me some lozenges with ibuprofen and honey and lemon. They were super effective! I felt better around 15 minutes after. Yeey for modern medicine! I slept for the rest of the day till about 4pm and then I felt much better. Then I was able to read and write. I stayed in that night and the next day I was back in business 🙂

Shorena asked me what has been the worst thing so far on the trip. I said getting sore throat. She had seen me sick and said that it wasn’t that bad. She was right.

Otherwise I feel super lucky to have so many friends and acquaintances all over the place in Europe. It is great reconnecting with them. I’m happy and inspired. Quite often I just walk on the street and I have a huge grin on my face. People probably think I’m weird, but isn’t it also sad that being super happy is considered weird?

Next I’m in Berlin till Friday, then Warsaw for Bachaturo salsa festival till Monday. Then don’t know yet, but definitely by Aug 29th I will in Latvia.

So I would like to try out something here.

I read quite a few non-fiction books and read some reviews as well. Most of them are describing what the book is about. However, sometimes I wonder what people got out of it, did the book inspire them, did they take any action because of it, how much impact on their life the book had? In short, is it worth reading that particular book?

So I would like to share my thoughts on books I’m reading and maybe somebody will find this useful. So this will not be a regular book review. It will be a personal one and I will pick out certain thoughts and things that resonate with me the most and how it relates to my life at this point in time. This is my first try, so feedback is very much appreciated.

Here it goes.

The full book name is Get Lucky: How to Put Planned Serendipity to Work for You and Your Business by Thor Muller and Lane Becker, published in 2012.

The book explained one phenomena about which I have been wondering about for a while. I like flying. The reason is that it is time without distractions (most notably internet) when I can read, think and brainstorm. I always take a notebook with me and I get a lot of ideas on flights. So I wondered why. One, of course it is that airplane without an internet connection is a much less distracting environment, which is refreshing. However the book showed another possible explanation.

It is called construal level theory (CLT). “The premise of the theory is that our minds represent things – objects, events, places, people – differently depending on how psychologically distant we perceive them to be.” (Location 1349 in Kindle). One way of how to be distant is to be physically distant, like in an airplane going somewhere else from your daily life and routine.

This is backed up by a following experiment (its just one of experiments) by researchers at University of Bloomington. Students were told that they are participating in a study in which they have to come up with as many modes of transportation as possible (car, bus, skates, jetpacks, etc.). Half of the students were told that the study has been developed right there at their university and half of the students were told that the study was developed by individuals in a study abroad program in Greece. It turned out that such a small detail made a difference. “The participants who believed the study was developed in Greece reliably generated more examples and more original ideas than those who thought it was developed locally. Simply adding the perception of distance improved the creative output!” (loc. 1331)

Furthermore, when we perceive things more distantly we think about them more abstractly (the book of course goes into detail and fascinating experiments and the scientific evidence behind it). “It’s in this [abstract] form that we can more easily link the idea to all kinds of other concepts floating around in our minds, allowing us to cast the original idea with new meaning.” (Location 1357 in Kindle).

Finally I have come across a scientific evidence of why traveling is good for you. 🙂

One of the ways to get lucky is to get in motion – break out of routine, run into new ideas. For me that’s dancing, traveling, reading books, especially slightly related books about similar topics, going to conferences, meet-ups. Will definitely keep doing that and more.

Another topic that the book explores is geek mind – the insatiable curiosity. “Logic will get you from A to B, but imagination will take you everywhere” by Albert Enstain (loc. 1302).

The book talks not just about personal life but about organizations as well. One great example of how to encourage serendipity in organizations is that of Steve Jobs. When he built the new campus for Pixar in Emeryville, California he insisted that it is a big round building with an Atrium in the middle. All services like cafes and post office are in the middle. This creates opportunities for people from different departments, like engineers and designers to run into each other and have informal conversations while on the go as going through the atrium is the shortest path to go the other side of the building. Plus there is mixing and mingling at the cafe and services.

In the book I also got reminded again that sharing things in public is valuable (loc 3871). Maybe somebody will read it and one may set other people’s associations with one’s purpose.

Also another reminder that people want to find things and people to believe in (loc 4092). I guess that’s why religion works so well. It does not seem logical but fundamentally people want to belong to something.

To sum up, it was useful for me to read Get Lucky. I learned some new theory and research on how brain works which seems to explain some of the phenomena that I have observed. It reminded me of some things that I already knew. It encouraged me to “get in motion”. And it was one of the reasons why I decided to write a public blog while I’m on this trip. Who knows what serendipity it will bring. Actually, it already has. Through sharing I have found people who now live in places that I’m traveling to (instead of me thinking that they live in their previous location).

I came up with my own rating system:
5 – a must read, absolutely everybody should read it
4 – a good, useful read
3 – an ok read, only specific people should read it
2 – meh, there are other, better books on this topic
1 – don’t read, a waste of time

My rating of this book is 4.

Again, this is my first time writing up something like this, so please let me know in comments or in an email what you thought of it!

Couple months ago I met a woman who is quite similar to me, but a decade older. I asked her what is the best thing about being in her thirties. She said it is being sure of who you are and having fully accepted your strengths and weaknesses.

Another friend who is traveling around the world told me that the most valuable thing that she has learned in her travels is to be herself. When traveling it is just you, no obligations, no society expectations, you don’t have to put on any masks, you can just be yourself.

At this point in my life I think I know who I’am but I allow for possibility to be convinced otherwise. This is slowly changing. By traveling, talking to other people, living in the now and noticing how I feel and acting accordingly I’m becoming more confident and more sure of who I am.

I’m also inspired. From combination of seeing castles, reading books, hanging out at bookstores, listening to a symphony orchestra performance, visiting historical places, talking to people, dancing, having time to slow down and think. I also feel very lucky about my life back in San Francisco and I’m super excited to get back to work after my travels.

I’m also becoming more comfortable with being uncomfortable. It is a great feeling! Among other things having conversations with strangers is becoming way easier than it used to be.

August 16 @ CB1, the oldest running internet cafe in the world, in Cambridge, UK.