Traveling Lightly

I'm flying home for the holidays and with each passing year I bring more gear. I could travel lighter but since I go straight from being dropped off at the airport to being picked up from the airport and staying with family the whole time, traveling heavy isn't too big of a worry.

This year I'm bringing the following:

• Lenovo Thinkpad laptop computer + power brick (for serious work and writing code)
• Full-size mouse (see: serious work)
• Ultra-mobile PC (Samsung Q1) (for photos, games, internet access, and watching movies)
• Cell phone + charger
• Headphones
• Canon Digital Rebel XT SLR camera
• Canon 24-105mm zoom lens
• Canon 50mm prime lens
• Apple iPod Touch 8GB
  
• Canon PowerShot S70 camera (small camera for when a big one is too big)
• Flash card reader (quicker to dump photos to other computers)

What's more amazing is that all this gear fits into my backpack and in my pockets. Going through security at the airport, however, is quite an ordeal. Despite all the electronics, I spend most of my time visiting people (with my trusty camera at my side).

In the Chilean News

They made the front page in Chile, yet only made it to page A7 in the local paper. What's neat is that a few national news agencies have been calling and leaving messages on the answering machine requesting interviews. Good Morning America interviewed them too but another couple was featured instead.

Saved Before Abandoning Ship

"I saved a memory card of all photos except last day == 2 gigabytes. Backed up my diary to flash memory two days before." They lost everything else (their luggage, their camera, and even a laptop).

A Sinking Feeling

My dad is in Antarctica and is having a had a great time, with one exception: his ship hit an iceberg and is sinking. I think he accidentally signed up for the "Titanic Experience" package when setting up the trip. Fortunately everyone was evacuated safely to another ship. (What a deal -- two trips for the price of one!)

Read all about it at the New York Times. There are good photo galleries at the New York Times and ABC News too.

Update Fri, Nov 23:

Subject: We're okay
Date: Fri, 23 Nov 2007 15:56:33 -0800

You may have heard by now that we had to abandon our ship, the MS Explorer this (Friday) morning. We are now okay and are at a Chilean base in King George Island near the Antarctic Peninsula. If all goes well we will be evacuated by air tomorrow to Punto Areanas Chile. I heard a bump and then water leaking this morning at 12:30. Felt water on the floor. We gathered things up. Put on our heavy winter coats and went to muster station. We abandon ship at 2:30. Spent 2 hours in life boat. Fortunately weather was "good". We were picked up by the ship NordNorse and deposited here. We're coming home as soon as we can.

Update Sat, Nov 24:

Subject: RE: We're okay
Date: Sat, 24 Nov 2007 07:11:37 -0800

We just got word that a plane has punta areanas. We hope to leave today. If not tomorrow. Lost all our luggage. We we given clothes on boat. She has only her wellingtons to wear. dONT EVEN HAVE HOUSE KEY. fortunagely we have passports and a credit card. this is a bad connection.

Update Sun, Nov 25:

Subject: Punto Arenas
Date: Sun, 25 Nov 2007 05:52:26 -0800

We are now alive and well in Punto Arenas.

This whole thing is surreal. Things like this only happen to other people. In the Chilean base I gave phone interviews in Spanish (a trying experience) and English to a paper in London. Here have given an interview to Toronto Star.

We wont' get off until tomorrow at earliest.

I saved a memory card of all photos except last day == 2 gigabytes. Backed up my diary to flash memory two days before.

Today we go shopping for clothes.

Looking forward to coming home. We're leaving on the 4 pm flight for Santiago,Chile. Save newspapers and magazine articles for us.

Bill and Me

This morning I met former President Bill Clinton after his speech. I reached my hand out in a sea of other hands and got a handshake back. A girl next to me wanted her photo with the President, who was gracious enough to pose with her, and I tried to take a photo with her camera. It didn't work so I quickly used my camera. The President looked at me and started to speak just as I was about to take the photo.

"Please hurry up. I'm getting late," he said.

Yes, I'm proud to say that I managed to annoy the President.