Minimum Life Traveling Baggage

If I look back at the most successful posts on this blog (and there are more than 500 articles published so far) they’re all emerged as part of interactions, not as standalone revelations or epiphanies. They became popular only when they were part of some challenge or response to other bloggers.

I don’t know if this is the rule on the internet, but it’s certainly true for this blog. For instance, 100 Ways To Live A Better Life, a blog post with more than 250.000 unique page views, was part of a challenge from another blogger. A quarter of a million people can’t be wrong.

So, I decided to take on challenges more often. Of course, I will apply some filters. I won’t engage in challenges I don’t like or in stupid link memes. But if there’s something that really rings a bell inside, I will follow. And that’s exactly what happened this morning when I read this blog post by Nina Yau, from Castles In the Air.

In short, it’s a challenge about your fundamental or non-avoidable luggage that you will be willing to take on a distant journey. I dig distant journeys. Been around the world twice, visiting Vegas, Japan, Thailand or New Zealand. Even came up with 44 tips for traveling long distance.

But enough with that. Let’s get back to the point. I split the challenge into 3 main parts. First one is about what I think it’s absolutely necessary to take on a journey. Things I can’t live without. The second part is what I call “nice to have”, things that would be cool to have, but not compulsory. And the third part is about what I will leave behind.

Unavoidable

Things I can’t really leave the house without.

Id papers

From a long experience I know these are fundamental. We live in a world which needs written proof of your existence. Without it, you’re not there. So, I usually take with me my identity card (in Europe I can travel only with that, I don’t need a passport), my driver license and my passport.

Money

In the form of the most used currencies (USD, Euros) or debit cards. I own only one credit card and I keep it topped most of the time, just as an emergency package. The debit cards are used to carry cash in a little bit more flexible way. Never used traveler checks so far.

Basic Digital Gear

By that I mean: laptop, iPhone, iPad. I’m a digital nomad and traveling without any of these won’t make sense.

Pens And A Moleskine

Again, from a long experience I learned that you need to fill in a lot of papers when you travel and if you don’t have a pen handy you will lose a lot of time. The Moleskine is needed as backup if any other digital method of storing information fails me (out of power, broken, etc).

Clothes

For maximum 2 days. A pair of bluejeans, two teeshirts, one shirt, 2 bandanas (I’m hearing my head shaved so I need a way to protect if from sun), socks and underwear. At any decent hotel you can find a DIY washing facility so you don’t need to carry any extra clothing in your luggage. But I still think I need to be covered with clothes for at least 2 days.

A Pair Of Shoes

Only one, and I prefer Caterpillars. They’re good on pretty much any terrain (urban or hiking) and they’re very resistant. I seldom carry more than one pair of shoes in my luggage.

Basic Self Care Stuff

Tooth brush, tooth paste, soap and that also includes some fundamental meds (antibiotics are hard to get in some countries, for instance, and a band-aid never hurts) and sunscreen. After getting burned a few times on some of the most strange meridians of this globe I decided I will never leave home without it.

Backpack

I have a Crumpler which went all over the world with me. But if I didn’t have one I would pick a backpack which can accommodate at least 2 days worth of me: clothes, self-care products and digital gears, and yet will be still easy to carry.

Nice To Have

Things that I usually take with me if I know where I’m going to or if the initial research gave the impression I could.

DSLR Camera

It’s a nice to have equipment but also requires a great deal of attention. So I don’t consider it a fundamental gear.

Local Phone Cards

Not necessary if you’re going there for the first time (and kinda hard to get it in advance) but if you know you’re going there at least a few times per year (like I do with New Zealand) it’s good to have one handy. Prepaid phone and internet cards.

Sun Glasses

I kinda hesitated if I should put it this under unavoidable, but I think you can do without it, and get one pair when you’re at your destination. But again, if you travel a lot and if you’re in some very sunny countries (New Zealand or Australia would be a good example) you need to have a very good piece of equipment with you. It can make a lot of difference.

Extra Clothing

A jacket, a pullover, stuff like that. Just in case the weather goes bad on me.

To Leave Behind

Everything that doesn’t really matters.

Furniture

In fact, all you need is a bed for the night and some tables and chairs every once in a while. You can get those at motels or restaurants.

Car

I did a few trips by car, but it proved to be more cumbersome than I thought. Now, even if I go pretty close, I do it without the car.

Garden

Of course, it’s impossible to take it with you. As much as I love taking care of my vineyard and my cherry tree and my flower garden, I am somehow relieved to leave it back.

TV Set

Of course. Who needs that, anyway?

Kitchen Gear

I like to cook and I do it quite often. But when traveling I’m again relieved to not take care of that.

Maintenance Tasks

These are not technically objects, but they do take a lot of our time and it feels good to leave them behind. Or at least I feel good to leave them behind.

The Aftermath

If you really look at the items you have when you travel, it isn’t that much. Life should really be a holiday and enjoyed as such.

Slow Carb Spinach

A week ago I decided to give a try to the “slow carb” diet that Tim Ferris is advocating on his latest book. Before diving too deep into the details of this, a few words about Tim and his books. I don’t consider Tim Ferris a fraud. But I also don’t think he’s as gorgeous as he’s portrayed by some of the major media outlets. He marked a generation of digital nomads, that’s true. But I confess I never read “The 4 Hour Work Week” to the end.

When you act in the same playground, you learn a few tricks. And I’m talking about the “self-improvement” playground here, one in which I have played really tough in the last 5-6 years. You learn how to discern between useful information and just shiny add-ons. And Tim uses a lot of shiny add-ons. If you take these nice and punchy lines off of his books, you remain with just a handful of common sense advice. Which is good and worth giving a try, but it won’t make me climb on the top of the tallest building and cry his name out so everybody knows how gorgeous he is. No way.

That being said, let’s get back to what I decided to get out of this “slow carb diet” he’s promoting.

Slow Carb Meals

There are only 4 rules that I decided to follow.

1. Ditch anything that’s white: cereals, bread, rice, potatoes, unless you’re less than 60 minutes after an intense workout, at least 400 calories burned.

2. Eat beans, lots of beans and vegetables. Meat is allowed, but only beef and chicken.

3. Don’t drink calories. Got rid of beer, which is kind of a big deal for me, and switched to a glass of red wine per evening, and also got rid of fruit juice, just raw fruits.

4. Have a “eat all you want” day. I decided this day will be Saturday, and I intend to make up for all the others day, that I can tell you.

There are also few other points that are worth considering.

- the “eat all you want” day may act like a metabolism regulator. If you keep the same type of diet for too long, your body will adjust. A sudden spike in calories intake may act like a regulator, keeping it alert.
- beans are very dense in calories and proteins, while vegetables are not. So there will be very different quantities for a beam meal as for a spinach meal, for instance.
- I also continued my running habits, even started to improve them. I now run about half an hour out of an one hour workout, which translates into 3-4 km and around 4-500 calories burned. That’s every other day.

I didn’t start to measure anything exactly. Partly because I’m kinda sick about it, I did it a lot in the past and got really bored. And partly because I don’t want external sensors to tell me if I fell good or not. I just want to listen to my body, to see how much I work, how much I sleep, and how do I feel, overall. The only thing that I will measure, and even this one will be really rough, will be the shape of my body. My stomach is already flat, but there are also spots in which fat can accumulate, so I will watch those spots and see if there’s any improvement in the next few weeks.

The Slow Carb Spinach Recipe

But maybe the most important consequence of this experiment is that I started to cook. I cooked some raw meals before, but there’s a huge difference. Now I’m also interested in taste, if you know what I mean. So far, I successfully cooked beans and spinach. And that gets us to the point. Here’s what I tried the other day.

Ingredients: one medium onion, one clove of garlic, 2 carrots, 500 gr of chopped spinach, olive oil, two spoons of tomato sauce

How to: Cut the onion and the carrots. Peel the garlic but don’t cut it, unless it’s really big, leave it as it is. Pour two spoons of olive oil into a pan, heat and then add the onion and the garlic. Leave for 3-4 minutes, until they soften.

Then add a cup of water, the carrots and 2 spoons of tomato sauce and leave for another 3-4 minutes.

Add the spinach along with two cups of water and leave for 20 minutes to cook slow.

As you can see, I didn’t add any condiments, like salt or pepper, but you can do this after you add the spinach. Serve as it is, or with one or two fried eggs aside. From these measurements, I can eat twice. Remember, spinach is not as dense in calories as beans or meat, so you gotta eat more.

And if anyone asks why is this a “slow carb” recipe, I am pretty sure I will not know the exact answer. Maybe because the rest of my diet is comprised only by beans? Could be.

My Running Playlist

Since I started to run, a couple of months ago, several interesting things happened. First, I experienced a lot with my schedule. Started with workouts in the morning, then decided to move them in the evening. Also, I drastically improved my running gear. For instance, I invested in a pair of running shoes, replacing my converse-like and ankle-injuring-prone shoes I was using. I also got and installed on my iPhone Nike+ GPS, which is a great app. One of the things I like a lot about it is that it can put on one of my playlists every time I run. So, I created a “running playlist” in iTunes and downloaded into my iPhone.

1. Heroes del Silencio – Entre Dos Tierras

2. Depeche Mode – Enjoy The Silence

3. Yes – Owner Of A Lonely Heart

3. Survivor- Eyes Of The Tiger

4. Van Halen – Jump

5. Bon Jovi – It’s My Life

All in all, I get to play this twice during a normal workout, which means I run about an hour. So far, it’s working pretty good, but as things will go wilder, I will most likely update it. I already know a few nice additions. Do you have any suggestions?

5 Life Lessons From Kung Fu Panda 2 – The Movie

I’m a big fan of cartoons. I even find personal development lessons in some of them, like Dumbo, for instance. Or in a more recent Kung Fu Panda. Oh, that post was a fun one. Not to mention it was instantly picked up by social media, becoming quite popular. So, it goes without saying that Kung Fu Panda 2 had to find its place in my blog too.

Ladies and gents, without further ado, here are 5 life lessons I learned from Kung Fu Panda 2, the movie.

1. Your Past Doesn’t Make You Who You Are

The movie: Po, the mighty Kung Fu Panda warrior, finds out that his father, the goose, was not his real father. And that he was adopted. Suddenly, all he knows about his identity is blown away. Who is he, after all? What he is supposed to do in his life? In more technical terms, Po goes through an identity crisis. A big part of the movie is dedicated to this search for his lost identity. Eventually, he finds out who he is and a hurtful story, deeply buried in his unconscious mind, is finally revealed. Po is devastated.

But as he accepts that all that happened is part of his past, not his present, he also realizes a very powerful fact: in the end, you are who you choose to be. Your past doesn’t make you who you are. It’s your decision that makes you who you are.

The lesson: We all have our own personal history. Some of the things we did, or some of the things that others did to us, weren’t ok. We may have been hurt. Or we did some mistakes. Or we may have been humiliated or had to go through pain and reclusion. But that doesn’t make us who we are. We always have a choice. And who we are is not written in the past. It’s a constant result of what we do now, in the present.

2. The Biggest Victory You Can Achieve Is Inside You

The movie: The beginning of the movie features a very interesting scene in which Master ShiFu dances the dance of “inner peace”. In a surrealistic choreography, his moves are so smooth and balanced that he can receive a drop of dew from a tree leaf, move it along his arms without getting wet (or damaging the drop), and then leave it down gracefully on a flower. Po is puzzled and asks how he can do this. “By finding inner peace” answers Master Shi Fu.

Po truly believes that this “inner peace” thing is just another Kung Fu technique and not something that he can find on the inside. He pushes and pushes with his Kung Fu techniques, but he never seems to conquer his enemies. Only when he finds that inner piece (a place where forgiveness and acceptance are playing a big part) he’s able to release enormous amounts of force and dance the same dance as Master Shi Fu, only with cannon balls that he returns back to his attackers. Without being hurt, of course.

The lesson: The outside victory is a always consequence of the inside victory. Not the other way around. No matter how many skills we may have, no matter how much experience we may have, no matter how much we may know, if we’re not balanced on the inside, the outside will always be in the wrong shape too. It’s only when all the inner parts are harmonized that the outside can achieve that (apparently) unachievable goal.

3. The Hurt Is The Source Of The Healing

The movie: During his multiple fights, Po is blinded by some signs his enemies are wearing and he remains without reaction, putting himself and his teammates at risk. The more he is exposed to that sign, the weaker he become. Po may have the choice to ignore that spot and keep on fighting. But something pushes him not to. Instead of ignoring it, he chooses to confront it and start to follow it, until it slowly begins to understand what’s behind it.

As the story unveils, we learn that the sign was the royal sign of his childhood realm. It was one of the few things that he could clearly remember about his (deeply buried) childhood. And it also became the key opening the gate to his lost memories. The hurtful point, once confronted, empowers Po with knowledge, identity and an enormous force.

The lesson: We all have a sensitive spot. Every time we’re facing it, we lose focus. This is the hurt, the confusion, the unknown. Most of the time we chose to ignore that hurting spot inside us. But the longer we ignore it, the weaker we become. It’s only by confronting what’s hurting us that we can truly heal.

4. Everybody Has A Mission, Even If He’s Not Aware Of It

The movie: There is a prophecy about a black and white warrior who’s gonna save the world. Po’s lifetime enemy, the royal pawn, knows about it, (that’s why he killed all the Pandas years ago). A clairvoyant sheep knows about it, and even do a little bit to help the prophecy to become reality. The only one that doesn’t know about it is Po.

And still, he is drawn on his path by uncontrollable forces who are pushing him closer and closer to his destiny. Little by little, he realizes that all the small pieces of his life can be arranged in a bigger puzzle. In the end, he realizes that he does have a mission and he has to fulfill it.

The lesson: Even if we don’t know, we’re always on the right place, at the right time, fulfilling our mission. We may feel at times that we’re drifting (and Po felt that a lot) but the closer we get to our true core, the clearer our mission will become.

5. Laugh Is Powerful

The movie: Along the entire story, Po is telling jokes almost incessantly. He keeps on laughing, although he’s ridiculous. Almost nobody in the movie laughs as much as Po. Not even his teammates. And when you finally hear other character’s laughter, it’s a freaking, horror-like one.

Somehow, laughing become his defense weapon. He answers to almost everything with a joke. And it works. Just imagine how the movie would have look like without laughing. Like a deep, true and very serious story. Sort of a drama. Also boring.

The lesson: one of the most powerful weapons that we have doesn’t come in the form of a weapon. It’s laughter. And it’s incredibly powerful. Especially when it’s used against yourself. If you can’t make fun of yourself, if you can’t truly and openly laugh at yourself, at least every once in a while, your last chance to evolve was just lost.

Being A Digital Nomad. The Workshop

When people ask me “how can you do all that stuff that you do, like writing on your blog, writing iPhone apps, traveling and so on? When do you have time for this?” I usually answer “How can you NOT do EVERYTHING you want to do in this life?” And, depending on the other person type, this answer usually ignites a new sparkling and fulfilling conversation, or pretty much ends the relationship.

One of the things that are allowing me to “do” a lot of stuff is that I don’t have a fixed job. I didn’t say I don’t provide value I said I didn’t have a fixed job. That’s a very big, and important, difference. With all due respect to people who do have fixed jobs nowadays (especially since it’s so hard to find one) I find this type of creating value a little bit obsolete. I know, there are many areas in our social life that are depending on this model. I don’t think our current society can function without the “job” concept, anyway.

But I also think that if the society would rely only on this type of value creation, progress would be really difficult, if not impossible at all. Breaking up with the norm, testing new boundaries, experimenting new lifestyles, that’s what creates progress. And living a life off the grid, as I tried (and pretty much succeeded) to live in the last 3 years is very different from having a job. In the process, the status-quo is challenged, of course, but that’s life.

Before getting to the real topic of the article, let me tell you that I did have jobs before. I’m not one of those unemployed guys who are taking pride in dodging the system and just surviving without being “enrolled”. I find this quite stupid, to be honest. Not to mention the fact that I really want to enjoy many material aspects of this life, which usually requires significant amounts of money.

As I told you, I know what it takes to have a job, because I was managing my own company for 10 years, until I sold it. And managing your own company is one of the toughest jobs out there, believe me. I was making hundreds of thousands of dollars per year and I know how a million in the bank looks like. But at the same time, I was deeply frustrated and I was living a very sad and limited life.

Introducing Digital Nomading

So, after selling my company, almost 3 years ago now, I decided I won’t go back to that lifestyle anymore. I will do something different. Something that will involve creativity, freedom and flexibility. I didn’t know from the beginning that this will be called “digital nomading”. All I knew was that I want to build a blog and a business on top of it.

The rest was just work, but not the way I used to do it. I like to think that it was intelligent work. Anyway, almost 3 years after selling my company I know split my life between Romania and New Zealand, spend around 80-90 days per year abroad and don’t have any rigid schedule or fixed office. And yet, I manage to live a very relaxed and fulfilling life.

So, because everything must have a name, I named this lifestyle “being a digital nomad”. My first article on this topic was written a few months ago and it sill gets a few social media mentions each week. Which means it’s moderately popular. But it seems that not only the article was popular, it seems that this type of lifestyle is becoming increasingly interesting for other people too. By the way, I’m pretty sure “nomading” is not really a word, but I’m sure you know what I mean.

So, two months ago, a guy from my social network asked for a meeting with me. He was interested in opening an IT company in New Zealand. We met, spent a couple of hours talking about the matter and split up as friends. A few weeks ago, after a presentation I held on an Ignite event in Bucharest, one of the guys in the audience, who also happens to be seasoned business man, asked me the same.

Why not putting together a small workshop about what it takes to be a “digital nomad”, I asked him. And he agreed. In just a few days the workshop was ready. I had an incredible audience, around 30 persons. To my surprise, I didn’t know almost anyone of them. Which means the topic is really hot, it’s not just my imagination.

After the workshop, a few people came to me and asked to do a sequel. After a short conversation with the owner of the place, I agreed to do three more workshops, based on the same material. I will be back in a few days with more info about this.

Until then, feel free to download the 4 keynotes which made the last workshop. I know that some of the slides won’t mean much without the words, but maybe that would be an incentive to come to the next ones.

So, without further ado, here’s the archive: Being A Digital Nomad Workshop (458).

Enjoy!

5 Lessons Learned From Getting My First Tattoo

A couple of weeks ago I was in Christchurch, New Zealand. Yes, I was there just days before the earthquake, but I’m not gonna talk about that in this post. While I was there, I had the urge of getting a tattoo. If you want to know why, well… I don’t kinda have an answer to that question… . I gave it some serious thoughts myself and, after a few days and nights of pondering things out, I decided that I got a (Scorpio shaped, if you really want to know) tattoo, just because I wanted to. Period.

I didn’t have a tattoo before and I knew little about the whole thing. Everything happened really fast. It took roughly two hours, in which I stayed pretty much like a stone on a chair, having my skin sewed with an electric needle which punched me 300 times per second. But I’m very happy with the result. Not only because I got a very nice piece of work, but also because, as always, this new and apparently out of nothing experience, taught me a great deal. If you’re curious what exactly I learned from this, well, just read on .

1. Pain Is In Your Head

If you’re a normal person, getting a tattoo hurts. By normal person I mean one with a regular nerve and skin structure. There are people who are not able to sense pain on their skin and for them, getting a tattoo is like brushing their hair. For me, it wasn’t. I’m a normal person and my skin nerves are performing exactly as they should do: informing me of every aggression that might happen, by triggering pain.

The moment I felt the needle on my skin I knew it’s going to be harsh. But I wasn’t prepared for that harsh. After the first minute I had the urge of telling “OK, got it, enough”. After the second minute I had the urge of just running away. And after the first 5 minutes I really wanted to punch the guy. In his face. Repeatedly. Until he’s down. And then kick his face. Repeatedly. Ok, I think you got the idea.

But none of these actions were available at the moment. I just wanted to have my tattoo done and if that meant I had to go through that pain, well, I had to just stay there. So I just stayed there. And started to shift my focus from my pain and the needle that was sewing me to my breathe. I do this all the time when I want to calm down or just take a break and refuel with energy. Inhale. Exhale.

To make a long story short, after the first half an hour I had my pain under control. The tattoo had to be outlined 4 times (it’s a green Scorpio with a red outline, a little bit of a color symbolism there) and one of the outlines had to be filled with color. So it was a lot of hurt. But after detaching myself from it, I was ok. Like really ok. When I got down from the chair, two hours later, with a fantastic green-red Scorpio on my arm, I could barely step. I was really, really sore. But not in pain anymore.

2. You Attract What You Are

This is something that started to happen after the tattoo was made. And I admit I wasn’t prepared for that either. So, in order to explain this, I would have to ask you a little question first: what’s the link between a Malayesian owner of a small malayesian restaurant in Auckland, a Chinese lady operating a shop at Victoria Peak in Hong Kong and yours truly?

Well, the Malayesian owner and the Chinese lady both seen my tattoo and felt compelled to start talking to me. Both Scorpios. And both pretty similar to me. They both admitted it was a very nice piece and they felt quite familiar in engaging in a social interaction with me, despite the racial difference. The link was made at another level.

The tattoo was visible all the time. Why I wasn’t approached by somebody else? A Gemini, perhaps? A Virgo?

My green-red Scorpio was like a lighthouse. It attracted human floating vessels with a familiar signal. “Hey, look, you recognize this? Let’s connect”. A tattoo is a very “in your face” signal. A very big lighthouse. But it was a very precious reminder that we do broadcast signals all the time and those signals are shaping our interactions.

3. You Become What You Say You Are

Or in other words, what you paint yourself as. After I made the tattoo, a subtle reinforcement vibe started to appear. Seeing the Scorpio on my arm all day long made me more aware of it. And of the fact that I am one with it. That I am it. I think it works a bit like visualization.

If you’re constantly in contact with something, you are adapting, you are adjusting, you are eventually becoming one with that something. There is this saying that you are, financially speaking, the average of the first 5 persons you spend most of your time with. And I do tend to believe that.

If you project yourself in a certain context, sooner or later you become one with that context. Either by changing yourself to fit in, or by attracting some favorable circumstances. Fact is, this is really working. I’m not going to say that I’m a better person because I have a green-red Scorpio tattoo on my arm.

But the whole process, getting it, melting it into my daily visual field, well, all of that made me more aware of who I am and how I act in this world.

4. Everything You Do Matter

Or in other words, it has consequences. Sometimes we don’t see them, but that doesn’t mean they’re not there. But a tattoo, a picture that will stay on your body for as long as you’ll have that body is a great reminder that your actions are leaving a trace.

Every time I wash my tattoo – and it doesn’t disappear – I realize that it was my decision. And that I cannot change it now. I cannot change the past or the consequences of my actions. I can only accept them and learn to live with them.

Sometimes we’re trapped into a strange remorse carousel. Especially if we’ve been through some pain, we want to reverse things to “how they used to be before”. Well, this can’t happen. The past is in the past and all we have to work with is in this present moment.

Of course we can change our lives, if we really want to. But we cannot change the consequences of what we already did. We have to work with what we have and make the best out of it.

5. Just Do It!

This is not technically a lesson, but rather a reinforcement. If you really want to do something, do it while you got the chance to. Do it when you want to. Because if you postpone too much, you may lose it entirely.

Just two days after I made my tattoo in Christchurch the whole city collapsed in a huge earthquake. My tattoo parlor may not even be standing. It really makes you think when you see stuff like this.

I think it’s better to proudly wear the traces of your adventures than to slip through life in an endless avoidance dance. I do wear my tattoo with pride and satisfaction.

I just did it. Like a ton of other things I did before and I’m going to do from now on.

Christchurch – The Experience

Later edit: after I wrote the article, a few hours ago, more replicas of the initial earthquake have been reported and right now the situation is much worse than I initially depicted it. There is a huge demand for helping people trapped under collapsed buildings, for bringing in supplies and for starting the recovering process. I left the post published in the initial form only to keep the beautiful image I was able to see during my trip alive in the minds of my readers, but my heart is going with the people of Christchurch right now. They need help to rebuild the city in the form I was able to experience it in this post.

***

Author’s note: As I write this, reports from a second earthquake in Christchurch are coming in. This one was even bigger than the last one in September. The city has many more buildings down this time. But, as one who has been in Christchurch just two days ago, and experienced its peaceful and joyful side, I know they’re going to build it back again. They’re great people and they deserve a fantastic city. What you’re going to read relates to my pre-earthquake experience of Christchurch, as many parts of the article were wrote a few days ago.

I always wanted to go to Christchurch, on the Southern Island of New Zealand. In fact, I always wanted to go to the Southern Island of New Zealand and, since Christchurch is the biggest city on the Southern Island, it always made sense. So, here I am, boarding on a JetStart flight from Auckland to Christchurch (129 NZD, including a checked in 20kg luggage). I checked in online but I still had to go through the counter, to check my bag in. It didn’t take long, though, and after I passed over the security control, I was ready to go.

The domestic terminal in the Auckland airport is pretty neat, although I wasn’t quite impressed about the quantity of liter floating around. As a matter of fact, I think that terminal was the most dirty one I saw in years. It doesn’t go like this in any other area of the airport, or of Auckland, for what matters, but this is how it was.

After around half an hour, I boarded an Airbus 320 and was ready to fly. In a matter of minutes, we were up and flying over Auckland. The scenery made up for any bad impression I may have had.

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Once in Christchurch I made a short phone call to the motel I previously booked, just to confirm and ask for some directions. and then took a shuttle to it. I learned that in most airports shuttles are a way more convenient way to get to your hotel than taxis or buses. They’re small, fast, and usually cheaper than a taxi. Sometimes, if you travel in small groups, they may be even cheaper than a bus ticket.

The Aotea Motel

Once I got to the motel, I tried to check in. It took a good quarter of an hour to the owner to make his appearance, despite the fact that I conscioulsy rang a few times. To make a long story short, in just a matter of minutes I was checked in, in a small one bedroom unit (their name for a one bedroom apartment), unit that I will have to share with my travel buddy (ironically called the same as me, Dragos). The motel was pretty standard, but clean and relatively large.

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We made a short stop to eat at a local restaurant (quite an expensive one, but apparently a very old and well established one too) and then we walked downtown.

From this moment on, I started to have short, unexplainable deja-vu sequences. We had two ways to go downtown (both were involving walking, not buses) and we took the one following the local river, Avon.

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Christchurch is a silent place. It also exhales a feeling of space and well-being. There are a lot of tourists going around downtown, but they are usually polite and relaxed. Being so far away, Christchurch is selecting his visitors using a very simple filter: money. It’s really, really difficult to get there if you’re not having enough money to spend just to go to a silent place.

As we walked down, signs of the recent earthquake were visible everywhere. But it seemed that not only the locals were quite used to those quakes, but they’re also expressing their feeling towards it with a lot of humor:

the building is affected, but the church is fine...

you call that a quake?...

Downtown Christchurch

The city center is formed by a large cathedral surrounded by a generous square, surrounded by hotels, shops or cafes.

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The square is pretty animated, with fairs or other entertaining activities (I saw a huge chess game going on and some comedians too). There is also an old but completely functional tram line which encompasses the whole area. In fact, the tram line is a little bit bigger than the square, and the entire area surrounded by the tram line is formed by small shops, restaurants or cafes. Nothing has more than one level, because of the earthquakes, I presume, but the overall feeling of this center is very pleasant.

On one side of this area there is the Avon river, filled with small boats. You can actually rent a short ride on Avon, if you want to, in one of the gondola-like boats, slowly pushed by people dressed like one century ago. The overall feeling is of people having good time and enjoying life.

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One thing that you cannot ignore is that Christchurch has a much more unbalanced population, in favors of locals. I rarely experienced the same street race mix I experienced in Auckland, people were overwhelmingly on the white side.

Eating Out

You can find pretty much everything you want, from Japanese to Chinese, from Italian to Greek and from fast food to more exquisite restaurants. I tried a few of them, including a small Chinese eatery and a much more classy restaurant near the upright zone near Avon. Everywhere food was delicious and served reasonably fast.

If you’re not into eating out, you can get your food from one of the many supermarkets around. Each neighborhood seemed to have a small Chinese shop every few blocks. The problem is that you cannot always get a receipt there and you may have quite a difficult time making yourself understood.

Earthquakes

Christchurch is sitting on a long fault formed by two huge plateaus. So, the earthquakes are pretty common here, In fact, when I arrived, last week, the September quake was still spitting replicas and I actually felt a couple of them. First one came while I was sleeping, the second while I was in the shower.

Both times I felt like I was on a child swing, only I was standing. I actually didn’t know about the first replica, it was Dragos that warned me. It was like 8 AM and I was sleeping like a baby when I heard Dragos asking if I felt the quake. “They may bring in the mother of quakes, I will continue to sleep”, I said. I may have said it only in my mind though, that’s how sleepy I was. The second replica, in the shower, was almost pleasant. Just a few shakes and then nothing. It wasn’t serious enough to damage the water system or anything.

Just two days after I left Christchurch there was a really big earthquake. So big, that the cathedral tower was torn apart. Many buildings down, airport closed and phone lines closed. As I write this, they don’t yet know the real extent of the damages but it seems there are no human casualties. I feel from the people there and I also admire their courage and determination.

Activities

Back to what you can do in Christchurch – apart from living a great life as a local, that is – there are plenty of outdoors activities. First of all, there is that gondola thing. If you’re into sight seeing from a slowly sliding boat, then this one is for you. There is also sky diving and ballooning, if you really feel the need for a short shot of adrenaline.

But these are more like on the tourist side. To be honest, you can do sky diving pretty much everywhere in New Zealand, provided that you’re in a tourist area (and pretty much the entire New Zealand is a tourist area). There are some things which are part of Christchurch unique location and lifestyle culture.

One of them is surfing. You can do surfing pretty much all year round. In winter, you can also do a ski session in one of the close by mountains and then get back to city and do a surf session. I think this is something extremely rare to find.

Another thing you can do pretty much all year is paragliding. There are a few flying spots around Christchurch and a few paragliding schools, all of them pretty active. I did a tandem flight too while I was there. Needless to say it was a life changing experience (just read that blog post).

The Overall Impression

The moment I started to walk on Christchurch streets I had a very intense feeling of deja-vu. Also, I thought that somebody went very far away just to find heaven, found it, packed it up in a container, loaded it up in a plane, flew all the way up over here, unloaded it, unpacked it and gave it the name of Christchurch. Yeah, I am a little bit biased, I admit it, but the you got the main idea.

Christchurch is an incredible place to stay. As a matter of fact, despite of the recent massive earthquakes, I’m seriously considering changing my base headquarters for my future New Zealand stayings to Christchurch instead of Auckland. It’s true, Auckland is a little bit more cosmopolite, vibrant and noisy. Sometimes this mix may be motivating.

But it’s equally true that living in a city with all the modern amenities, with great food, with almost everything within walking distance, with silent surrounding and with a plethora of outdoors activities can be even more motivating.

Can’t wait to get back there. Honestly.

Learning To Fly. Literally

So here I am, in the middle of Christchurch, New Zealand, in a place called Cathedral Square, trying to find my way into a city I barely came in, a day ago. It was around 11 o’clock in the morning and the square was filled with people visiting a trade fair. Comedians, little things for sale and a vibrant atmosphere of good time.

One of the things I planned to do in Christchurch was paragliding. Back in Romania, before I left, I made a list with all the potential paragliding companies I could work with. Among them there was one called Nimbus Paragliding. After five minutes of watching the crowd in the Cathedral Square, I decided to enter in the Visitor Center (something like the Tourist Center you can find in every decent city).

Setting Things Up

I sat in a queue for about 15 minutes. A lot of people were hunting activities and they seemed to have quite a hard time picking up the best one. Eventually, I came in front of a middle age lady called Jan.

“I would like to do some paragliding”, I said, “do you know a company called Nimbus?”.
“But of course, she answered” and she picked up a phone. She rang the guy in charge and asked if he can offer me a tandem flight today. Apparently, the guy was free. After a few more questions, Jan filled up a voucher and asked me to pay for the ride.

“He’s going to pick you up at 1:30 PM form the tram station, be there on time” she said and that was basically it.

I still had a good one hour to spend before 1:30 so I returned to the motel and left all my heavy belongings there. My laptop and all the chargers, for instance. Instead, I took a sweater and some sunscreen. From my previous visits to New Zealand I learned that every time you go out in the wild, sun screen is a compulsory item to carry with you.

At 1:20 PM I was in the tram station in the same Cathedral Square. There were a lot of vans already parked, waiting for their passengers. None of them was from Nimbus though. “Excuse me”, I asked one of the drivers, “do you know if this is the place for Nimbus vans too?”. “Of course, mate, it’s right behind us”. In the second row of vans, a little bit hidden by the crowd, I saw a white, little and kind of an oldish van with the Nimbus sign on it.

I went straight to the driver: “Hi there!” The 50-something, still green looking (like pretty much everybody in New Zealand) driver smiled at me and answered: “Hi, mate! You for the tandem flight?”. “Yeap”. “Hop in, we’re going there now”.

The Meeting

As I was hopping in the left chair (they drive with the steering wheel on the right in New Zealand), the first impression of the van being oldish, well, just vanished away. It wasn’t oldish. It was a wreck. But, surprisingly, this observation didn’t have any impact whatsoever on my decision. As I sat on the chair, I had my first stomach butterfly: “Shit, I’m going to really do this…”.

He started the engine and we left the parking behind us.

“Where are you from, mate?”
“Born in Romania”, I answered, “but travel a lot”.

The guy frowned for a second, like he was trying to remember something. Then he smiled and as he turned to me he said: “You’re the first person from Romania I ever met”. “You sure, mate?”. “Of course. I’ve never met anyone else from Romania in my entire life”.

As we were getting out of the city area of Christchurch, we started to chat a little bit more. It turned out that the guy was a programmer too and he was quite proficient in PHP. “That’s my second job, you know, I build websites and stuff like that. But I like to fly so much. I keep programming on the second place, but I don’t know for how long”.

At this moment I think I had the second butterfly in my stomach because I heard myself asking: “Is this paragliding thing safe?”

Steve (will call the guy Steve, for the moment) looked at me and answered in a quite relaxed voice: “Well, flying is perfectly safe, it’s the crashing that may be dangerous.”

The next moment I felt like the car windows are going to blow away, that’s how hard I laughed. And, from that moment on, the butterflies in my stomach went away for good.

The Place

In ten minutes we arrived at some sort of a mountain. The road became narrower and we started to face quite a bit of steep curves. We were going up pretty fast. There was no protection on any side of the road, but, somehow, I didn’t feel the need for one. The valley walls were quite steep and if the wreck we were into would fall over, well, that would have been really bad. Somehow, I had the distinct sensation that this won’t gonna happen.

Eventually, we arrived at a point with a little bit of a parking space and two small billboards confirming that you reached a paragliding take off place.

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From the parking space there was a hill going down really slow and I knew that this was the place from where we’re going to take off.

As we parked, I saw a guy resting 30 meters down the hill. “Do yo know him?”, I asked. “Yeap, he flies too”. The guy approached and started to talk to Steve in a respectful voice. The language they speak in New Zealand has little to do with English, although it’s still advertised as such. Although I know they’re talking in English, I somehow have an incredibly hard time to understand what they’re really talking about. That was one of those moments.

I don’t think I understood more than “flew for two hours”, “a little bit of thermal” and “cool”. I asked Steve to translate this for me. “Well, it seems that there isn’t enough wind. If there’s not enough wind, we can’t take off. Are you in a hurry?”. I wasn’t, so we decided to wait a little, just to see if the wind will straighten up.

Meanwhile, the other flier started to prepare his glider. “Good, let’s how he does, and if he’s taking off, we’re flying too” said Steve.

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The other flier seemed to do a good job, but Steve wasn’t impressed. “He’s not taking off”, he said. It certainly looked that he was taking off to me. A sudden intuition made me ask: “What is a thermal?”. “Well, when the sun heats certain spots, the air becomes hotter, creating ascendant currents. If you hit one of those spots, it’s like taking an elevator. You take off”. Now I understood what he meant my taking off. Although the flyer was certainly doing his moves, he wasn’t higher than 50 meters. “No thermals today?” I asked. “Nope, not too much”.

In 20 minutes the other flier landed. At this point Steve told me: “Look, I’m going to do a solo flight, to see how it’s up there. I’m going to the end of the valley, hopefully the wind will be more powerful there. Then I’ll be back to tell you if we can fly or not. Hopefully.” he added with a smile.

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The Preparation

After Steve landed I went straight to him and asked if we’re going to fly. “But of course, get ready”. So, it was finally happening. Steve started to unpack the tandem flying glider and gear.

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In a few minutes I had a helmet on and my own harness. Steve put me in position, which was basically head down to the hill. “Now, I will be staying at the same level with you, only with my back on the hill. I will lift the glider up. When I’m saying: 1, 2, 3, you run two steps and then you get back another two. That’s because you’re going to create tension in the glider. It will pull you back. You understand?”

“1, 2, 3” I thought, it’s not that bad.

“After that, I will rotate with my face downhill too, right behind you, attach myself to your harness and tell you to run. When you hear me ”run, run“ you go downhill with all your power, chest forward and try to jump into the valley. Don’t worry, you won’t fall down. When you feel the lift-off, pull yourself back into the harness seat. Hopefully, we will be up and flying at that moment. Everything clear?”

Didn’t looked like rocket science to me. “1, 2, 3 and then run, run”. Easy.

“Ok, let’s do it!”.

Flying

He stayed next to me, with the face back and with the hands on the gliders controls. “You ready?” “Yes”.

“1, 2, 3 now!”

I made three fast steps and then I felt like a hurricane was pulling me back. “Back, back” yelled Steve. I did 2 steps back. As I looked over my shoulder I didn’t see the glider on the hill anymore. It was up.

“Good, yelled Steve, I’m getting behind you now.” In just one move, he was behind me, attached my harness to its harness and started to yell “run, run”. All this didn’t take more than a second.

I pushed myself forward as far as I could and started to run. It felt like I had to carry a huge weight and like I wasn’t making any progress. After the first two, three steps it suddenly started to feel easier. Three more steps and then I heard Steve: “push yourself back into the seat! Feet up! Feet up!”.

Instinctively, I followed. At this moment, I watched how my feet were loosing contact with the ground. There was a huge second in which I didn’t realize what’s happening. There was a fantastic tension lifting me up but at the same moment my entire history as a walking creature was pulling me back to earth, in a desperate attempt to find comfort. I’m a walking creature, I don’t fly, my entire body seemed to scream.

I tried as much as I could to lose the tensions in my muscle and to avoid looking down to my feet. As I did this, I literally felt a huge part of me going slowly down, over my feet and into the ground. At this moment, what was left of me was flying.

That was a feeling I will never forget.

From that moment on, my history as a flying creature started to unfold incredibly smooth. I was watching the valley behind us and was feeling the wing above floating and carrying me. I had an incredible sensation of safety and deja vu. Like I did that before. After we had like 20-30 meters of altitude, Steve started to teach me how to steer the glider.

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We were doing small “walks” on the sky, just like the other flier did, at 50 something meters high. When we reached the end of such a “walk” we usually lean to the left or to the right, and the glider was following. We were using the wind to help us turn around and change direction.

After 10 minutes of doing this, Steve yelled: “There aren’t many thermals here, let’s go to the end of the valley and hopefully we will find some.”

He steered the glider straight forward to the end of the valley. We were actually sailing this time, using the wind to push us forward. In a few seconds we flew like 500 meters in straight line. Once we reached the end of the valley, Steve tried again to put the glider under the wind, in search of some thermal ascendant current. As I was looking down to the bottom of the valley I saw a few abandoned cars. “Stolen and abandoned” explained Steve.

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After a few “walks” on the end of the valley we finally catch a thermal. In fact we catch a few thermals and we started to lift off, but the higher we were going, the stronger the horizontal wind from the sea was becoming. We were starting to experience some strong bumping. To be honest, I quite enjoyed this. Apparently, Steve didn’t. We were like flying horizontally and then, all of a sudden, we were receiving a push from the bottom. The glider was actually stretching our shoulders up. But at the same time, these very ascensions had the tendency to switch the glider on his vertical axis. I could feel Steve fighting really hard on the controls to keep the glider steady.

“There is a combination of directional and ascendant wind”, he told me after a few minutes. “We’d better find a place to land”. “We’re going back?” I asked. “Nope, we’re landing here. You see that horizontal part?” “The one in front of me? Like right here?”. “Exactly. Hold on and run when you touch the earth. Don’t stop until I say so.”

In just a few seconds I saw the earth coming towards me. Steve was steering the glider down. I had some mixed feelings squeezed in those 2-3 seconds: my flying creature part was not agreeing to this, but my walking creature part was suddenly waking up, making me move my feet in the air, in the anticipation of the contact. The glider went ahead and down just like an airplane when it lands and then my feet started to move on solid ground. We were down.

“Run, run!” I heard Steve. I continued to run until I felt the tension from my shoulders going down to the point it disappeared. The glider was on horizontal position behind us. We landed at approximately 1 km from the place we were taking off.

That was it.

I left Steve packing his gear, and started to climb up the hill, with my own harness. It seemed so difficult to do this by walking. Only seconds ago I was flying over these hills. Now I had to walk my way up.

The rest of the day went ok. Once we were downtown, I had a short cup of coffee with Steve and chatted a little about business, blogging, programming and alike.

We parted ways as friends.

That was my first lesson of flying. The first from a long line. That I can tell you for sure.

Taming Monkey Number Two: Done

There’s a very good chance that I’ll be in Christchurch when you read this. For the last week I’ve been in Auckland, as part of my second attempt to tame some inner monkeys. If you don’t know what I mean by this, you can learn more about why and how I ditched my New Years resolutions and also how I partially failed at taming my first monkey.

Back to my New Zealand trip. Some of you may already know that I intend to live in this country, at least partially. In the process of moving to New Zealand, a couple of years ago, I set up a company here. But I never got it to get my full focus. Sometimes I had some personal issues that I had to focus on, sometimes there were other real problems that I have to deal with and sometimes I admit I simply let it slip away. Fact is this company was never developed to its full potential. And that’s what I call a monkey.

Taming Complete

So, here I am, in Auckland CBD, trying to get a hold of what I have to do in order to move things in the right direction. For the last week I’ve been swamping myself in meetings, projections, scenarios and other funny things you do when you want to make a company move forward. And, to my real joy, almost all of these were successful.

Right now I am ready to file my first annual tax report. I also have all the financial tools required to manage the company remotely. There is one more thing needed, and that would be getting a International Tax Number, because there will be an increasing flow of business coming from US this year. That I hope to solve it somehow by the end of the month, because it doesn’t really require my presence here in New Zealand.

Not to mention that, as little as it was, this company already received a little bit of a cash, mainly from my iPhone apps business channel. It’s not like I’m going to get instantly rich from it, but it will be enough to support at least two more visits to New Zealand this year. Each visit being at least one month long. For the record, this visit has half financed by the money I already have it here. It’s the first time I’m spending money made in New Zealand for New Zealand.

Anyway, if I look at this company now, I don’t have any feelings of “monkeyness” whatsoever. The taming is complete.

It May Be Simpler Than It Seems

And that brings me back to what is to be done when you want to tame a monkey. Sometimes, all you have to do is to get up, take a plane, fly to the end of the world, solve what is to be solved and call this a tamed monkey. In other words, get up and do what you have to do.

Every “monkey” is different. The first one was pertaining to things I never lived up to. Unfulfilled promises (to my self, in this case). Incomplete commitments. The second one was not as much about lack of fulfillment, but about finishing up. Tidying up things a little. Shutting up and do stuff. As a matter of fact, during the last week, I was extremely quiet. My Twitter timeline was extremely sparse and my Facebook updates were consisting mainly on two-three pictures. Sometimes all you have to do is to step out from your natural environment and fix stuff by yourself.

I wish I had more things to write about this second monkey, but fact this this one was much simpler than it looked. Of course, I had to fly 28 hours, book a hotel, set up meetings and attend to them. But I didn’t find it complicated. Or hard. It was actually fun and relaxing.

A Little Bit Of Life In Between

Having my job done for the whole month, it’s time to think at the fun part too. As I already mentioned, this whole downshifting / downsizing thing I’m embarking into has a “compulsory” part. And that part is to still have a life while getting things done. Which, by the way, is the main goal of my productivity framework.

In fact, today starts the second part of the trip, the “pleasure” one. I’ll be heading to Christchurch in a few hours, stay there for three days, and then fly to Rotorua. After one night there I’ll be heading back to Auckland and from there I’ll fly to Hong Kong. I always wanted to visit Hong Kong and I admit I’m really eager to get there. After three more days in Hong Kong, I’ll finally head back to Bucharest.

Where, from what I read in my email messages, there’s plenty of work to be done.

5 Things Avatar Taught Me About Self-Improvement

I’m not a hyper when it comes to movies. On the contrary, I wait a lot before going to see a big blockbuster. I saw Titanic 3 years after the launch. Matrix 2 years after the initial hype. But last year I took the plunge and went to see Avatar.

In short, I liked it. A lot. I saw it in IMAX, 3D and all. Didn’t had any motion sickness, although some of the people around seemed to be uncomfortable with those 3D glasses and some of them even left the movie after a few minutes. I don’t know if it was the 3D experience, the stunning imagery, or the story, fact is Avatar was definitely a milestone in movies. At least for yours truly.

But since we’re talking (mainly) about being brilliantly better on this blog, in today’s post I’ll not give you a movie review (as much as I’d want to). Instead, I’ll try to outline some of the self-improvement tricks Avatar either taught me for the first time, either confirmed to me again.

1. Limitation Is Only In Your Mind

When Jake Sully arrives on Pandora, he is just a paraplegic ex-marine. He is taking on a job he doesn’t know anything about. He doesn’t really like anything about this new world. And nobody seems to like him either. He’s just used in a strange communication program in which he’s taking on the body of a local Na’vi male, his so-called Avatar. But as the story unfolds, it turns out the Jake Sully is much more than everyone around him sees in him. He’s even more than he thought he can be. At the end of the beautiful story, instead of a paraplegic ex-marine we find a truly inspiring leader, a man in love and a powerful warrior. And all he did was to literally get rid of the old self and become a completely new person.

Every once in a while life brings you into places which may seem harsh and impossible to overcome. But the word “impossible” holds true only in your current context. So, change it. If your current self can’t handle the job, become somebody else. Like Jake did.

2. If You Want To Get To Planet A You Have To Completely Leave Planet B

As a spy in the Na’vi world, working for the greedy corporation in search for “unobtanium”, Jake Sully discovers a new universe. He expected to meet “savages” but instead, he finds compassion, knowledge and real feelings. Compared with his cold and dark military life, the free and sparkling life of the Na’vi, as dangerous as it may get at times, especially when male rivalries are at the stake, that life, well, it’s simply a miracle. A miracle which attracts Jake so much, that he is willing to get rid of his old existence and become a true Na’vi. But he soon discovers that he can’t live in two places at the same time. He has to make a tough choice. Leave behind everything that was familiar and start anew, literally reborn.

The same approach applied to every situation in which you want to drastically change something in your life: your current relationship, your income level or your lifestyle. You can’t just wear this new avatar every once in a while, pretending you’re rich and happy, only to wake up in your own bed in the morning, broke and miserable. You have to become your own avatar.

3. Disappointment Is Part Of Life

This may be a little hard to chew. When Jake Sully comes into the life of the Na’vi people, all he wants is to screw them. That’s his motivation. He comes there by curiosity but also by the promise of hist captain that, if he provides enough “intelligence on the field”, he will get back his legs. But once in the field, Jake realizes that he’s on the wrong team. And that he’s in love with Neytiri. Only it’s a little bit too late. What he started cannot be stopped. The chaos is unleashed and the Na’vi are almost destroyed. Neytiri rejects him and he has to leave. If Jake would have stopped at this level, his only outcome would have been disappointment. Fortunately, he doesn’t stop. But the disappointment he created is still real.

We may hit disappointment. We may disappoint others or others may disappoint us. What really matters is to raise above our own limitations. This is exactly what Jake Sully does when he decides to tame Toruk Makto and to become the new leader of the Na’vi.

4. Pick Your Team Carefully

Just after he arrives on Pandora, Sully teams up with a military guy. In exchange of the information Sully would give from the field, using his avatar, this military guy promises Sully to give back his legs. In his “real” life Sully is walking in a wheel chair. As a former marine, this is one of the scars he wears. The information acquired by Sully will serve for the commercial expansion of Pandora’s conquerers. But, sometimes during his new life, Sully discovers that his former team was playing him. That he was just used in a bigger, more violent plan which will ultimately leads to the destruction of Pandora’s world. And he also discovers that the new world he is discovering is purer, nicer, simpler than his initial one. Oh, and it’s also filled with love.

The world is changing. Your values are changing. Your priorities are changing. Make sure you’re always in sync with what you really care for. Make sure you’re playing on a team which supports you in a genuine way, which respects you, which cares for you. If not, go for the next team that does this for you.

5. The Only Thing Worth Fighting For Is Love

As an avatar of the Na’vi population, Sully gets to know Neytiri, the daughter of the Na’avi leader. She becomes his guide on this new world. Sully learns the Na’vi way of life, their traditions and their values. He goes into a rite of passage where he learns how to fly a dragon. At some point, Sully falls in love with Neytiri. But the gap between those souls is huge. He is not what he seems to be. Even more, his actions are casting a wave of death and destruction over this world. His love is worthless without action. Hurt and disappointed, Neytiri rejects him. He almost gets killed in the conflict. But is the same love for Neytiri that makes him reach to the sky and tame the biggest bird on Pandora, Toruk Makto.

You know it’s love if you’d be willing to do everything, and I mean, everything for it. Reach to the sky, tame the biggest beast on the universe and bring it to the feet of your love. Everything else is just an illusion (including fight itself, if it’s without a purpose). The only thing worth fighting for is love. And when the love is won back, forget the fight all together.

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Ok, now it’s your turn. What’s your take on this? What Avatar changed in your life (if anything)?

Life After Twitter And Facebook

You know those apocalyptic strategy games, where a huge catastrophe strikes Earth? And everything is dark and sad, you don’t have any resources left and you gotta make it by yourself? Well, let’s imagine that for a second. But instead of all the Earth being hit, let’s pretend that only two major things are hit: Twitter and Facebook. Lets try to imagine our life after the sad end of Twitter and Facebook.

1. Instead of being happy when somebody is following you all of a sudden, you just start asking yourself “why”. Especially when the following is taking place on a dark alley.
2. When you really like something, you just smile. You don’t look desperately for the “like” button.
3. When you meet someone new you don’t get automatically in your mailbox a letter promoting his latest hugely discounted ebook.
4. You finally start noticing that trees are actually growing around you, not inside computers, when you press that tiny button called “Farmville”.
5. If a guy promises to retweet you if you do the same for him, you suddenly decide to cross to the other side of the street. From where you can safely shout at him: “You dirty pervert!”.
6. When they’ll want to stalk each other, people will revert to the old fashion way of using private investigators.
7. Some of the unadapted will start talking out of the blue in short, witty and somehow cryptic sentences, not longer than 140 chars. They will be called “Tourettes” and usually avoided at parties. When they’re not the party attraction, of course.
8. Historians will be puzzled by the unexplainable extinction of an entire species, called “social media expert”. Much like the dinosaurs. No living proof of that species will ever be found again.
9. If friends will want to send you photos from the last barbecue, they’ll send you photos from the last barbecue. They won’t tag you, that is.
10. Poking someone you barely know will usually trigger a lawsuit.

Many years after the complete extinction of Twitter and Facebook, a brilliant (yet strangely unadapted) student, dumped by his girlfriend, will want to show to the whole world that he’s not as bad as he looks. Of course, he writes a web app for that. The app eventually explodes into an incredibly popular site. Student becomes billionaire. Hundreds of millions are using the site. In an old, dusty chronicle, a historian finds out that it was a prophecy about that web site. Many years before, an entire civilization, in a desperate act of survival, left a cryptic message. Within weeks of hard work and thousands of super computers involved, the message is finally decrypted: “Social media is not dead, you idiots. And it’ll never be”.

Of course, a small faction of historians will give a completely different interpretation to the message, claiming that the first ones used the wrong decryption mechanism. For them, the message will look like: “A venti latte, please. With sugar on top and lots of cream. Presto!”.