Annett and I started our first full year together like it would be our last (probably a good relationship approach come to think of it), packing in months of travel and adventure at breakneck speed. I made this graphic to show the travelling we did in 2008 (click on it to see it full size, it’ll open in a new window then you might have to click again to zoom).

In total we’ve spent half the year on the road (literally, we’re not lets take a few weeks by the beach travellers, for some reason). Even more surprising Annett and I still talk, sometimes we are even known to embrace. While it wasn’t always jelly and birthday cake, it was hardly ever ‘I’m going to kill you in your sleep, you fucker’ so that’s a big success.

Highlights of 2008

Travels
- Bus ride from Vientiane to Vang Vieng. I don’t know what happened on this bus trip, there was no reason for it, yet 6hrs on a rickety old bus full of the kind people of Laos, driving on mainly dirt tracks, snaking our way through to Vang Vieng a warm glow washed over me, this intense feeling of euphoria. Either it was the surreal nature of the setting, the feeling that I’d escaped whatever I felt I wanted to escape, or they were putting LSD in the water again, I don’t know. Previously I called these Leipzig moments, this was a 6hr long Leipzig moment and it’s a feeling I’ve been searching for ever since we arrived in NZ, but haven’t been able to recreate. Whatever the reasons, and no matter how strange a high point for the trip, I can still remember it vividly.

- Yellow Mountain, China. Beyond Surreal. The only people we saw climbing the mountain that snow filled day, eerily, profoundly quiet as we climbed and climbed and climbed and climbed wearing our snow shoes and trying with all our might, not to fall to our deaths.

- Great Wall of China. Just a hilarious fun filled day spent with our two new Korean puppy dog friends. Probably laughed the most that day, amongst breath-taking scenery in a place so unlike home (wherever that is) that almost everything that surrounded me was a reminder of just how lucky I am.

- Full moon vista from the balcony at the Bay of Islands, New Zealand. The view that night was possibly the most beautiful feast my eyes have had to devour. A whole weekend with good friends and great scenery, my first fishing trip. I wrote a blog post about the weekend in my notepad but never wrote it up, I’ll hunt for it and it might better describe what I’m fumbling for here…

- Australia. Thoroughly enjoyable and dead easy to travel in. Snorkeling the Great Barrier Reef in 35′c heat on Christmas Day was as polar opposite to a normal Christmas as you could hope for. Might just be here on the list as its the most recent trip so freshest in the memory, not sure.

- Working. The last few jobs have always been publicizing something that’s already been created. This one was creating something from scratch – from the concept, name, functions, price, building VMobile while often frustrating has been great fun and a challenge, lets hope we can finally get the thing commercially launched.

I’ve been lucky enough to read, watch and listen to a fantastic amount of art this year. While we were on the road I had little else to do and was averaging a book every three days. Its been a great year for me culturally with plenty of time to enjoy the following and many more. I’d highly recommend any of the following.

Books

I don’t keep books, so unfortunately I can’t remember most of them (esp the fiction ones), but here are a few still lodged somewhere in my brain:

Any book, Augusten Burroughs – Non- Fiction. Memoir. The opening chapter of Magical Thinking is as funny as the written word gets. My favourite discovery of the year, I’ve now read everything the guys ever written bar a shopping list or two.Unforgettable.

Brainwashed, Dominic Streatfield – Non- Fiction. Mental Illness. Full of interesting anecdotes and stories. Gripping.

When you are engulfed in flames, David Sedaris, – Non- Fiction. Memoir. A bit like August Burroughs.

The Game, Neil Strauss, – Non- Fiction. Pick-up Artists. Not brilliantly written but a fascinating book I couldn’t put down.

Status Anxiety, Alain De Botton – Non- Fiction. Philosophy lite. A bit wanky, but something to think about on everything page.

Then we came to the end, Joshua Ferris – Fiction. The most entertaining ‘futility of work’ ‘.com boom’ ’silicon valley’ satire.

Gang Leader for a day, Sudhir Venkatesh – Non-Fiction. Drug-Dealing/Economics. Full of interesting insights on ghetto living

Ugly Americans, Ben Mezrich – Non-Fiction. Memoir/Financial Markets. Not too challenging, very interesting and lots about Japan.

The Logic of Life, Time Harford – Non-Fiction. Economics/Social Science. Well written and entertaining even if there are too many books like this.

Films

Great year.

Dear Zachary – If you watch this movie and don’t cry or run and hunt down and hug to near asphyxiation all of your loved ones you’re broken, or a man.

Slumdog Millionaire – Brilliant storytelling and as good a tourist brochure for India as I can imagine, alive from the first frame to the last.

The Song Of The Sparrows -  Lovely low key Iranian melodrama about the mishaps of a poor (in the financial sense) family.

Elite Squad – When the Brazilians get is right, they really get it right. Awesome street cop movie in same league as City of God

I think we’re alone now – Mental illness and stalkers. Fascinating if not a little exploitative.

The Counterfeiters & The Wave – Two of the very best from those lovely Germans. Both show fresh spins on a very worn out chapter of history.

Kenny – Funniest film I saw this year.

Surfwise – Unconventional living at its most entertaining.

Kabluey – Cute little gem.

I should also mention my great love of this year, The Wire. I have no idea how I’d not heard of this show until this year. Undoubtedly the greatest television show ever made, we’ve been thoroughly engrossed through all 5 seasons of it this year, watching the final episode and knowing you have to leave that world for good is really surprisingly painful.

Music

Not been the strongest year, some outstanding tracks but whole albums? Nah, but here’s some I did like all of

Port O’Brien, All We Could Do Was Sing -  Total surprise, I was indifferent to there first few albums, this nautical masterpiece blew me away and compliments my salty old sea dog lifestyle here in the city of sails.

Frightened Rabbit, Midnight Organ Fight – Depressing, but every track a dark, passionate gem.

The National, Virgina EP – The National know how to write a b-side just as much as I know how to write an a-side.

Erik Hallden, Memories, Oh The Memories – Just great fun

Bon Iver, For Emma – Not really 2008 and I was already banging on to some of you about it in 2007, where it would have made this list as well but probably my most listened to of the year and officially released this year.

The Mountain Goats, Heretic Pride -  If you like old Mountain Goats you’ll love this, if you don’t you wont. San Bernadino, Heretic Pride and Autoclave are the strongest back to back album tracks of the year imo.

Entire Cities, Deep River – Not pretentious, not even long, not even really an album but consistently good.

Plans for 2009

So I guess this was the year of travel and adventure. All good things have to come to an end though, and rather than sipping occasionally from the hedonists cup, I’ve gulped it down like a drinking contest at a frat party, rushing to be the first to put it upturned on my proud head, like a crown, for a buffoon.

The result has been the normal numbing that follows excess. Travel wise its not easy to excite me like it used to be. Most men are walls of indifference, at the start of the year I was more of a little white picket fence of indifference, something you might build to keep the neighbours dog out. Big, but still small enough that experiences could occasionally hurdle it to come crashing through the patio doors of my person.

All the places we’ve been and seen have added height to that picket fence. The more spoilt I’ve become, the harder it is to appreciate the freedom and sights that I’ve got to see. Gone is the picket fence, in its place a wall, a big wall, the sort of wall you’d build across China, to keep out the Mongolians. I no longer get excited by looking at things. Its too easy to compare one waterfall with other waterfalls, one beach to another beach, one country to another country. It’s just not giving the same buzz that it used to, I’ve over-indulged and now I’m spoilt. So this year will be something different. Much less travelling, and only travelling to see people or for work, I think I’ve done all the recreational backpacking I want to do for a wee while.

Annett and I have been planning our 2009 while we were in Australia, once its all sorted I’ll let you know about it here in a later post, but there will be big changes.

I have just a few goals for this year, they are:

- Self-Employment & Career Suicide. This year I’ll do all the things I want to do work wise, and not the things that make $ sense.
- More time with friends and family
- Japan (I’m coming for you. You’ve eluded me for too long, oh small island of technologically advanced weirdos)
- Write more, procrastinate less.

Amazingly, even after travelling that long I’m not in debt, my bank account is healthier than its even been (who would have thought $0 could be someones record high thanks to a great job in NZ and the side income from the websites my debt is clear. I’ve just invested big time in Tee-Junction, almost ripping it up and starting again, with the plan that it could support me through further periods of unemployment, so while I’m earning a wage I’m ploughing back into the sites with a view to them paying for me to take some of the later part of the year off again. Lets see how that works out.

Whatever you’re planning for your ‘09 I wish you all the best and hopefully you’ll stick around to follow mine on the zig.

Possibly related, hopefully entertaining other posts:

• Look out for the little guy
• Running a design contest pt.1 – Review of the OLP
• The Zig goes England!!
• Staying in a Japanese Love Hotel
• Maori Placenames

The end of the Vietnam had my favorite moments of the trip so far (Cu Chi tunnels and the Mekong Delta), the Mekong Delta turned out to be photo gold. Now I have photo folders and stuff you can jump directly to just those if you like:

All of Vietnam

Just Mekong Delta

I guess thats about it for now. I’m in Siem Reap looking at Angkor Wat, next on to Bangkok and exploring Southern Thailand.

Possibly related, hopefully entertaining other posts:

• Look out for the little guy
• The Optimist EP
• If I could be any musician
• Sods Law
• So what happened to the zig?