Internet in Cuba c. 2016

After my first day in Havana doing an Internet Drug Deal, I realized it didn’t have to be quite that difficult. The next day Jason and I went to the same area to see if we could repeat our internet deal, however this time there was no one on the ledge. We did figure out, however, that the Internet we were using the day before was being stolen from the hotel next door.

Simply walking straight into the hotel Saratoga and asking for Internet brought us to an official business room where someone sold us a 15 minute Internet pass for 4 CUC that we could use while hanging out in the very comfortable bar/lobby. And to think we got this same thing on the street the day before! People have since told us that was expensive, but we never bought Internet again….and it was a pretty nice bar.

Days later, I ran into a friend randomly in Havana. My buddy Will, who I met in Israel, had been traveling in Cuba for a month already. He told us about the Etecsa/Nauta cards you can buy officially from certain stores. You buy them with various time durations, and they have obscenely long numeric only codes for the username and password. Really good if you want to practice your memorization skills. If you’re in a place with Etecsa wifi, which is in random places like parks and plazas, then you can access the Internet after frustratingly fixing all your typos.

I never bought an Etecsa card myself, but I was told it was quite official and you need your passport to purchase one.

After all of this, I’m not sure what the point is. They still block all the websites they don't want people visiting. From reading a little bit of recent Cuban History, it seems that after Raul became president in 2008 he started slowly making some reforms, one of those being that people can access the Internet in these very controlled ways. Before then it was supposedly more like the drug deal we first experienced.

My experience is just one snapshot of a continually changing Internet landscape that’s accelerating every moment. I doubt it will be like this in the near future, with widespread Internet to soon be common like it is in most other developing countries.

The Cuban Drug Deal

When I went to Cuba people told me there would be no internet. It was true the airbnb did not have the internet amenity checked, and when I got there…definitely no internet. Walking around Cuba usually resulted in zero wifi networks available. However, people told me I could get it from some “guy in a park”.

The time in Cuba came where I wanted some internet, so I kept my eyes peeled for guys in parks. Sometimes I would open my phone at a park and see if the phone found any broadcasting networks, but nothing.

At one point I went up to 2 people who looked sketchy and they had a bag. I said “Wifi? Internet?” and they looked at me like I was crazy and didn’t understand the words. I shuffled away.

I told my travel buddy Jason this internet deal was probably going to go down like a drug deal, and I was looking forward to it.

Then I was walking down the street and I saw a girl sitting on a ledge at the side of a building, laptop on the lap. First time I saw a laptop outside on the dirty streets of Havana. Next to her were a few more girls all on their phones.

I thought, this must be the place of the Internet! Past the girls there were a few guys, I stopped and said “Wifi? Internet?” A few looked up and said no, one guy on his phone with headphones didn’t even look up.

I passed by them and checked the wifi networks on my phone. There they were! 3 unlocked wifis!

I sat down next to the quiet guy with headphones and pulled out my phone. Tried to connect to one of the networks and a login screen came up. I looked at the guy next to me and he had the same login screen on his phone. I leaned over and asked if he knew the login info so I could use it on my phone.

He looked at me and shook his head no, and looked back down. Then he leaned over and whispered 3 pesos with 3 of his fingers held out. I said sí. I tried to give him a 5 CUC bill, he said no. Then he wanted to take my phone. I was hesitant but allowed it. He typed in the code and was getting it to connect but we were out of range.

We had to stand up and walk a few paces. Then the notifications started rolling in. I tried to give him money, still he said no. Jason was hanging out near me freaking out about this sketchy deal, since the guy kept looking around to see if someone was watching.

I had to write my messages standing up with everyone awkwardly hanging out around me, and then the headphone guy put 2 CUCs in my hand. He had seen my 5 CUC bill earlier. I discretely pocketed them, got my 5 bill and did the sketchy handshake.

The transaction was complete.

We also later realized it didn't have to be this way.

One night, in Cambodia

Siem Reap is a great place to travel. Not only does it neighbor the ancient temple complex of Angkor Wat, but it's just a great small town that provides everything a tourist needs in walking distance while not feeling too touristy. If you want to see my post on exploring Angkor Wat, go here, because this post is only about the Siem Reap nightlife.

My first few nights were all spent on Pub Street. There are huge neon signs that lead you directly to this one street where virtually all the backpacker action is. There are tons of restaurants and bars to suit your needs, and all of them are plenty cheap. Draft beer can be as low as 50 cents a beer, so we'd go out and get drunk on a few bucks. ANOTHER ROUND!

Here I am eating some Cambodian BBQ. They had crocodile, snake, frogs legs, and of course, chicken. I think snake is the one in the picture.

When it started to get late and the restaurant only places started to close down, the entire street became the party. The biggest place was definitely "Angkor What?". It's so much fun to yell out that name. "Say whaaaat? Angkor Whaat?" It was always crowded with tons of backpackers, and it had a funny slogan:

It would often turn into a party down the entire street. They had this long rope that we'd use to either play tug-of-war or jump rope.

Anyway, that was a regular night in Cambodia. The last night I was there I gave my friend a call who I'd met earlier in Cambodia and it sounded like a party in the background.

"Come party with us! We're at Cambodian Pub Street! It's like the local version of the backpacker Pub Street," he said. "My tuk tuk driver took me here!"

I made my way over there in a tuk tuk and was dropped off in front of a quiet looking place. As I walked in there were two benches lining the entrance. They was one pretty girl sitting on one of the benches, so I started talking to her. It was quickly apparent that she didn't speak enough English for us to really talk, so I continued on to look for my friend. I find him in one of the walled in booths with his tuk tuk driver, both with girls under their arms. They're yelling and drinking and I'm quickly welcomed in and told about their girls...or should I say escorts?

My friend says that they come and sit and drink with you apparently for free. It seems obvious that they'll want more from you though. The tuk tuk driver asked, "Do you want a girl too?" Sure, why not. The tuk tuk driver called over the waitress and told her to bring me a girl. Ok, this is weird. Guess who she brings? The same girl I was talking to at the front haha. These girls seem to not speak a word of English, so the driver is talking freely about them without a second thought. He says that we can take the girls and go "boom boom" in the hotel next door. I don't plan on trying.

While we're hanging out there we're doing some serious drinking. We all have short glasses that are being constantly filled up by the girls with ice, and then filled with beer. We all clink glasses as we yell cheers in Khmer. "Chol Moi!" We all yell. Since the glass is filled with ice, there's not too much to chug, and it's customary to chug the entire glass every time we do a cheers. It also keeps the beer cold in the sweltering heat of southeast asia. You never let it sit long enough to melt entirely and make the beer watery. The beer here is even cheaper than on pub street! If I heard the tuk tuk guy correctly it was about 50 cents for an entire jug here. He picked up the tab on the entire thing, and we were drinking for a while. We continued to laugh, drink, and convince the waitress to drink with us while she brought us more beer, ice, and random snacks.

Now this whole time we haven't been paying the girls anything. Supposedly they're satisfied with the free drinks and company, but I can tell they're getting antsy. The tuk tuk driver wants to take us all to a club, and the great thing about hanging with a taxi driver is no worries about transportation! Things of course started to get hazy at that point, but the girls ended up disappearing and the tuk tuk driver was quite unhappy about that. My friend and I were unsurprised, and we decided to head to the club of our driver's choice.

On the way there, I realized that nearly all the bars in the area where we were had these 2 benches lining the entrance, and some of them had a bunch of girls sitting along them. I realized that these were probably all escort bars where people can pick up a girl as you walked into the bar.

We end up at a club that has seemingly more locals than backpackers. After a beer with my friend and the tuk tuk driver, I decide it's time to head to the dance floor since it's way too loud to hear anyone. On the dance floor I start rocking some moves. It wasn't long until some pimp was trying to sell women to me. It became uncomfortable quickly as I realized that the dance floor was literally full of pimps and hoes.

Perhaps the tuk tuk driver was just trying to make his share by bringing us to all these prostitution related places, but that was about the time I had enough of my evening.

It turned out this place was pretty close to my hostel, so I decided to just walk home. As I neared my hostel, there was one dark street I had to walk down, and it was covered in stray dogs just hanging out. Dogs in foreign countries are always a little scary since they're so unpredictable. I made it past them, but not without some of them barking pretty viciously. Maybe the hunger keeps them from being friendly, but dogs in the darkness are no fun!

And with that, another night survived in Cambodia.

Developed or developing? English speaking or not? Which is the best?

Many people have asked me whether I enjoy traveling more in developed or developing countries. This isn't really a fair question, since it doesn't take the culture differences into account. For example, Australia and Japan are similar in development, but so different in culture and the experiences I had that they're not really comparable at all.

Aside from the cultural aspects, as a traveler I've observed two main differences between the developed and developing countries; price and comfort. 

Developed country: high price and high comfort.

Developing country: low price and low comfort...or, as I'll explain later, a medium price and medium to high comfort.

I consider a country more "developed" mainly if it's just more organized and people seem to have a high quality of life. For example, Brazil has a very high GDP, but it has favelas(slums) all over Rio and has people scared about crime, so I wouldn't list it before many other countries. One cannot judge based on the GDP per capita since all of those Asian city-states like Singapore and Hong Kong would be at the top of the list.

Of course, this post and all of my opinions are based on the specific 15 countries that I visited and my own experiences there. I'll order those countries from most developed to most developing, based on my own experiences of the country, nothing official here: 

Developed - Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Argentina, Brazil

Developing - China, Peru, Thailand, Vietnam, Bolivia, India, Cambodia, Laos

Now back to the two big differences of price and comfort. Developing countries are by definition cheaper places to live and travel. Especially if you come from any developed country, your exchange rate is going to give you heaps of buying power. The glory of this cheapness, however, is contrasted by the quality of the amenities throughout the country, especially in public. The government probably won't put much effort into maintaining things used by the public, so you never know what you're gonna get with roads, police, and the like.

When dealing with a private establishment, however, even though you're in a developing country, capitalism still reigns supreme in our global world and you get what you pay for. In the developing countries with a large class divide, you can still see prices that would be the same or greater than what you would pay at home, but the quality is on par. India has a large class divide with really only the rich and the poor. You can get food on the street for a fraction of a dollar, and then you can get food in a nice restaurant for $5-$15 dollars. The nice thing is that you'll get great service for your money, and still pay only half the price of the equivalent in the USA or Europe.

Many hostel dorms in China have a going rate of about $7-25 per night now. I stayed at a place that was at the top of that range ~$25 per night, but it was an amazing place. Soft fantastic mattresses, free towels that were absolutely huge, free breakfast, just a great fun and clean atmosphere in general, and it was outfitted from a traditional Chinese hutong home. This is the same as the going rate for a regular hostel in Australia, but I got much more than I would ever get in Oz. They nickel and dime you there for towels, internet, breakfast, etc. I wouldn't call this living like a king on a dime, but it shows that you can get a lot for your money if you don't go too cheap, and you can afford it!

Because of these two differences of price and comfort as well as the culture, it's cheaper and you get more bang for your buck in a developing country, but I can't say it's more enjoyable.

A better question to answer would be, "Is it more enjoyable traveling in a primarily English speaking (usually Westernized as well) country?" This is different from asking about just a Westernized country, since even in a Westernized country in Europe there are many cultural and language differences to experience albeit a higher price. I'm not going to answer the Westernized country question since it's not really applicable to this trip.

Australia and New Zealand are primarily English speaking Westernized countries (that I'll refer to now as "Australasia"). A huge factor in my experiences there depended on their English proficiency and familiarity to my home country of the USA. Soon after I arrived, I felt like I was home...but not really.

Everyone drives on the opposite side of the road, it was winter and not summer in June. I was still traveling, but it was almost too easy. Everyone spoke English, there were a gazillion tour brochures and companies trying to get you to go on their expensive tour. The overwhelming familiarity of all the choices was back, it was almost like a reverse culture shock. I had gotten so used to everything being off and going wrong, that I wasn't sure what to do. My free Internet was gone and all the hostels were huge with heaps of people. It actually wasn't until the mid-writing of this blog post that I realized I had that reverse culture shock.

One example is that I had been traveling with a roll of toilet paper in my bag nearly my entire trip, but once I got to Australasia, I almost never used it since every public bathroom actually provided these amenities...and it stayed in my bag all the way home.

It wasn't long before I got used to the new familiarity though. I enjoyed the ease of travel where all the travel agencies told you exactly where you should go and all of them gave you the same expensive price (which meant there was little gain to haggling or looking for the lowest bidder). I had a great time meeting interesting people too, who were mostly people from other English speaking countries. UK and Irish travelers especially love to travel to Australasia, constantly complaining about their crappy weather and how much better it is in Australia (even though we had some bad rain in Oz, and NZ was cold and rainy most of my time during my winter travels). There were still out of the ordinary crazy travel experiences, but they were usually packaged up in a tour, there were no more cultural epiphanies.

It was fun though to pick out the differences between Australasia and the USA, mostly with the English language. I love the accents, but I can't really describe that without going into highly technical language specifics like diphthongs, so here's just some fun words that I encountered off the top of my head:

Australia & New Zealand:

• Arvo - Afternoon
• Boot - trunk of a car
• Mate - like when you say man, buddy, etc. (ex: Hey there, mate!)
• Candy floss - cotton candy
• Return - round-trip (so you buy a ticket return instead of a ticket round-trip)
• Tog - swimsuit
• Brilliant - cool, sweet, awesome
• When they saw something like "no," "saw," or "idea" it sounds like they add and "er" sound to the end of it so it sounds more like "noer," "sawer," and "idear." Of course it's more pronounced in certain people, but it's definitely there.

Australia only:

• Barbie - BBQ
• Thongs - flip-flops
• G-Strings - thongs

New Zealand only:

• Jandals - flip-flops
• Sweet As, hot as, *some word* as - Very sweet, very hot, etc.
• Choice - cool, nice sweet. "Hey man I traveled around the world." "Choice, dude"
• The Maori people (native NZ islanders) like calling people bros, everyone's a bro to them

With that said, I can conclude that a non-English speaking country presents you with more to discover and experience, which is what traveling is really all about. Being from an English speaking country, I'm glad I broadened my horizons and went out of my comfort zone. Take a leap, don't just go to another English speaking country that isn't that different from your own.

Uncle Brian's Fun & Falls

The other day I went on a tour of the rainforest and waterfalls from Cairns, Australia called Uncle Brian's fun and falls. This was probably the best tour I've ever done, and not even because of the places we went, but because of the way the tour was run. This could've been a highly uneventful day where a bus takes you from one place to another, but instead it was full of random fun and stories so there was never a dull moment.

Immediately after driving off with all of us, our guide Cousin Rohan talked about the bus, who was personified into Gus the Bus. There were all sorts of stories with Gus the Bus, his other car loves, his feelings, and Rohan would honk and make the bus bump around using the clutch if Gus didn't feel like doing anything. Later in the day we couldn't find Gus' girlfriend and he cried by cleaning his windshield. We would also wave at people down the road just for fun, which was always a good time. We waved at everyone, but mostly street workers. Always good to brighten people's days like that. :)

And of course the places we went weren't too shabby either.

The first place we went to was a place called Babinda Boulders. Not much there actually, just some dangerous plants, a nice view, and some cold water we could swim in. They did talk a lot about all the danger signs that littered the place. Many people had not followed the signs in the first place and died in the falls, since a few places look like a great place to swim but you get stuck under the water. The water was pretty cold, so a few of us got in for a bit but didn't stay in too long.

Babinda Boulders

The second place we stopped was called Josephine Falls. This was the best place since there was a natural water slide to hang out on. You could go down the rock where there was only a little bit of water or a crazy rushing rapid. Head first, sideways, you name it, we did it.

The third place we went to (other than stopping for lunch on top of the tablelands) was Milla Milla falls. This place was cold. By the time we got there it was all in shadow, so it was hard to get in the water, but most of us did, since Rohan was talking about sticking your head in the water and flicking it up to get a nice effect. Guys could even do it as long as they stuck their whole head under water and flicked it up. Here's my try.

Woosh kahhhhh

The last place we went to was a big lake. No rivers ran into the lake, it just caught all the water from the nearby mountains and ended up being very clean, clear, and calm. There was a tree by this lake that grew outward in a certain way that made it easy to walk over and jump into the water. By this time I was done with cold water, but I got peer pressured by my friend Heledd into jumping. She jumped first, now it was my turn. I climbed the tree...damn it felt high. When I got to the jump point, I was scared. The guy with the camera was ready, and I said 1, 2, 3, and jumped. Whew that was a hard one, I got a shot of adrenaline when I jumped off, and I have to say I think I was less scared before I skydived out of an airplane than when I was jumping off this tree 15 feet above the water. But of course I landed with a splash and was fine, and with all that adrenaline I wasn't cold at all! The pic was on Heledd's camera, so I'll post it here after it eventually comes up on facebook. Once was in the lake, I realized it was really nice, and we swam around a bit. It was a good workout not touching the bottom for about half an hour.

With Gus the Bus and Cousin Rohan

We actually went to one more place after getting back on Gus the Bus; platypus hunting! There was one place where it was very common to see a platypus right at dusk, and so we all ran around by this river and caught a few glimpses of the popular Australian mammal/fish/whatever.

On the drive back, we had the most epic singing and dancing session, we had red and yellow lights than Cousin Rohan would flash and yell "disco lights" while the song was playing. We went back on a road that wound down a mountain for a very looong time, so it was good we were occupied instead of getting car sick. My favorite song was when we did "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" and did row alternating head bobbing to the chorus haha.

Overall, highly recommended tour that everyone going through Cairns should definitely do! I haven't said everything, so there's still plenty of surprises if you were to actually go on it.

The Whitsundays Islands

The Whitsundays Islands in Australia, named because it was Sunday and a holy day when Captain Cook arrived there. Wikipedia says that they had a timekeeping problem and it was really a Monday...whatever. I went out with a tour where we sailed around to some of the best spots around the islands. I barely knew what I was getting into, but it was a fantastic experience.

The first afternoon, after mingling and sailing a bit, we had our first snorkeling adventure. Now I've played around with snorkels at home in swimming pools and such, but nothing was like this.

We arrived at a little cove next to an island, and they pointed to a section of the water that supposedly had some things to see. After putting on a stinger suit and getting a mask and snorkel that hopefully wouldn't leak, I was the first to jump off the boat and start swimming to the reef area. At first, I swam way too hard and started to tire myself out. A little ways away from the boat, I looked behind me and no one else had jumped off the boat yet! Also, the small dingy motorboat that Liam (one of our guides) was gonna take out for help wasn't even unhooked from the boat yet. I kind of started to freak out a little bit. I put my mask and snorkel on and started to look at the ocean floor, couldn't see much, but mostly I was thinking about the lack of air I was getting, since I was already panting from swimming too hard I couldn't get enough air through the snorkel.

Looking back to see that I was still the only one out, I decided to stop freaking out. I realized that I could stay afloat while treading water much less vigorously, and got my breathing down to a normal pace. Now I tried to put my snorkel on again and went under. Wow. I'm not sure if I floated to a different place than before or just wasn't looking before, but what I saw was amazing. This is the first time I've seen a reef like this with my own eyes. Colorful algae, colorful fish, everything alive and in its own natural habitat. I was able to breathe deeply through the snorkel and I was off exploring the reef from the surface! Before I knew it everyone else was around me and the motorboat was going around to anyone who asked.

While exploring happily on the surface, I was suddenly hit by something from below, oh wait it was someone! My childhood pool snorkeling skills came back to me, and I realized I should be diving down right next to all the corals and fish! I started to breathe in, dive down to take a closer look, and then come up and blow the water out of the snorkel with my breath out. The closer looks were even more amazing than exploring it from above, no aquarium or video footage prepared me for this. The only bad part about the diving was that I couldn't seem to depressurize my ears, so it felt a bit uncomfortable going down very deep. Before this I hadn't really had a strong desire to go scuba diving, but this definitely changed my mind.

After leaving this cove we went around to an anchor spot and spent the night there. We watched the sun fall, ate some delicious dinner, and drank the night away on the mighty Boomerang.

Boomerang was the name of our sailboat. It was built in 1987(same age as me!) and won the world record for fastest sailboat in 1988. After a life of races, it became a charter boat for the Whitsundays around 2002. When it was a racing boat it didn't have anything below deck since all the action happened above with people trying to make the boat go as fast as possible, but now it was decked out with about 28 beds, captain's quarters, a galley(kitchen), and a few tables. This meant it was not built for comfort, so on deck there were just obstacles anywhere and no real place to sit and hang out, but we made do hanging around the grinders. People just got hit in the head a few times haha.

The next morning we went straight to another dive spot that the guides said was even better. It was in fact even more amazing than the first. This time the reef area was farther from the sailboat than before, so Liam took us all out in the dingy and we jumped out of the small boat into an even more colorful reef with schools of fish going right past us. Sometimes he would throw food into the water and all the fish would come to the surface so we could get a closer look. So much variety too. A few of the fish were really big, like the size of my thigh, just roaming around in the reef soaking up the sun shining through the water. I tried to reach out to a few but they moved too fast and would always know when I was reaching out to them! It's those eyes on the sides of their head!

Liam lent me a waterproof iPhone case while out here, so I took a few pics.

After our second snorkel, we made the long journey to Whitehaven beach. It was time to put up the sails! Putting up the sails was hard work, since it was a pretty big boat and a pretty big sail, we all had to work on the grinders together to raise the heavy sail. It was a bit easier to raise the front one. The crew said that the sail itself would cost nearly 1 million dollars to replace. Wow, no wonder boats are so expensive. On the way over there we got to see some whales as well. It wasn't the cliche whale jumping out of the water, but we definitely saw some blowhole spouting and some tail flips out of the water.

Finally we made it to Whitehaven beach. This beach has sand of 99.9% silica, which means it's the purest sand in the world. NASA supposedly uses it to make telescope lenses. We stopped on a little cove and hiked over to see the views and hang out on the beach for a bit. After a few hours chilling and playing some sports(American football and frisbee wooo) we headed back to the boat and anchored for another sunset evening. Oh yeah another sidenote, they call American football Grid Iron here in Australia. Grid Iron? I had never heard of that one before.

The rest of the trip was quite uneventful, just some sailing...except for the last bit on our way back to the harbor. There was another boat called Slap Me that apparently isn't very good. It's more of a budget option and the boat is slower and maybe the tour isn't as good? Anyway, our crew said they usually try to pass them to show them you get what you pay for haha. And they don't just pass them once, they do it twice.

Once we got close I realized the boat also has a big red handprint on the back of the ship. Quite appropriate for a boat called Slap Me. We passed them once, the crews exchanged insults. We were smiling and laughing, but I'm not sure if they were haha. One guy mooned us. Then we slowed down, let them pass, and did it again! This time we passed them into the distance at 7 knots with the mighty Boomerang and made it back to port well before them. Now we were back in the small beach town of Airlie Beach, ready to take on the evening.

Leaving things in taxis

I have 2 stories now of leaving things behind in taxis. You'll have to read more to discover what happens, but both are fun stories.

Story #1

The first time I left something behind was in Beijing, China. I was headed back to Beijing just for one night to catch my flight to Japan, after having already been to Beijing for a week before. I got in a taxi to go to my hostel from the airport, and there was a little TV screen on the headrest of the seat in front of me, bright and in my face. I couldn't turn it off or turn the brightness down so I took my bag and lodged it over the screen so it wasn't blinding me. Anyway, I just got out of the cab without it since it wasn't on the seat where my stuff usually is, and walked up to my hostel. After knocking and waiting for answer, I looked at my stuff and realized my lapse. I looked at David, the owner of the hostel, as he answered the door and told him I left my bag in the taxi as I covered my face in disbelief. He logically asked if it was still there.

Then the gears started turning and I realized that we were in a hutong (alleyway) in Beijing and the taxi couldn't go that fast through it. Even though it had been maybe 2 minutes or so, it might still be in the Hutong! I left everything the care of David and took off running. I round the first corner and see a car far off in the distance. I can't tell if it's a taxi or not, but I continue running. This is a longer alleyway that you might think, so I was running for a good minute or so. I see the car in the distance now waiting at a light for the main street. As I get closer I realize it is a taxi...and probably my taxi! I get closer and closer, and I hope that the light stays red as long as possible, but right before I get there it turns green.

Noooooo!!

The taxi starts moving and I go to a full sprint to catch up with him in the middle of the intersection as he turns left. I banged on the window and got him to pull over so I could take my bag out as I panted. Whew, that was close. I walked back to find David patiently waiting and checked in while I panted the whole time from doing such a long sprint.

There was nothing even that important in the bag except for a camera battery and some earbuds, but it just wouldn't been inconvenient to lose those and the bag.

Story #2

So I'm in Sydney, Australia and I have to catch a 6:15am bus to a surf camp called MojoSurf at Arrawarra Beach, a place they dub Spot X. I take a cab at 6 or so to the central station, and while in the cab I handed my phone to the driver so he could look at the text the bus driver sent me. I must've just put it down on the seat and forgotten about it. It was still raining at 6:10am when we stopped at the station, so I jumped out, grabbed my two backpacks and ran for the covered area on the sidewalk. The taxi drove away pretty quickly, and I realized too late that I didn't have my phone. I ran after it for a few moments, but the cab was going way too fast for that. After searching my bags quickly, I was sure I had left it in the taxi.

Now I'm freaking out, because not only is this phone expensive, it is my only link to the bus I have to catch in 2 minutes and all the other people I've just met and all the other notes I've just written. Even though the taxi is definitely gone, I have a few ideas before I give up. First off, this was a taxi I had the hostel call for me, which means that the taxi company probably knows who they dispatched out to me and I can call them.

Fortunately, I have my iPhone from America, and even though at the time I had no roaming data for it, I had no choice. I pulled that out, got the hostel number, called them. No answer. Then I realized I could just call my phone...of course. But wait, I didn't know my new Aussie number! I had taken a picture of it when I first got my phone, but I switched memory cards a few days back and no longer had that quickly available on my camera. Still rushing as I can imagine the taxi driving farther and farther away, I frantically find the other memory card, pop it in my camera and get my phone number. I call it...it rings...no answer. I'm pretty sure it wasn't on silent. I call again...nothing. I call the hostel back...nothing.

Now that I've exhausted all of my options, I really start to freak out. I think by this time it's after 6:15am, and I haven't really moved from the place where the taxi left me and I have no idea where the bus is supposed to be because all I have is a text (on my lost phone) that says central station.

I now start to try and get ahold of the bus so I can find out where it is and maybe hold them off a bit. I pull out my voucher and call the numbers listed on there...no answer. The guy who's awake and on the bus doesn't have his cell listed on the voucher!

After standing there wondering what I'm to do for a few seconds, I see a bus that says OzExperience on the front, and MojoSurf along the side. Well hot damn that's my bus! I run over to it waving my arms, bang on it a few times, but it passes me by without anyone noticing. Another few seconds of failure pass over me, and I look the other way to see my taxi driver behind the bus with my phone in his hand! I run over and take my phone and give him a hug. That takes a huge weight off my shoulders. He tells me that's my bus. I agree, get my stuff, jump into the cab, and shout what I've always wanted to say after running into a cab, "Follow that bus!" Really I probably want to say follow that car but it's close enough.

Now that I have my phone I realize I've had some missed calls and texts, obviously from the guy on the bus. I call him back.

Me: Hi, it's Dylan.

Ross: Yeaah. You missed the bus.

Me: No, I'm in a taxi following you. All you have to do is stop for a minute and I can jump on. I see you turning left that's you right?

Ross: Yeah, that's us. 

*talking to bus driver or something*

Ok, we'll stop in a few minutes. See you soon.

Almost immediately the bus pulled over in an extra lane, and I jump out of the cab and onto the bus. By the way it's been pouring rain this entire time. I'm soaked, stressed, and I have so many different things in my hands from looking for my phone in the first place still that I'm worried I'm going to lose something else. But finally, I'm on the bus with everything I own (except for a charger I later realized I left at my hostel dorm, recovered later by a friend bringing it to Spot X), and I made it to Spot X that evening with no other problems. Whew.