With everyone writing about the Olympics I couldn’t help but remember the very strange experience I had backpacking through china.

courtesy of Birger Hoppe

There are many amazing things to see and experience, if you need some recommendation try this post. I just  can’t shake the memory of a full local bus. As we backpackers are often on a budget we get to see some of the aspects of the real lives in Rural areas and the bus experience had an honorary place among all else. When you’ll be there you’ll get what I mean.

The toilet experience is another thing to write home about, some of the public toilets have no doors so all the women sit side by side doing their business. It certainly took some time getting used to.

The food lodging situation in many of the villages is again something that you should think about if you like the to visit the small untraveled villages and meet local people. At the small out of the way places there is usually one place that offers lodging so just go with the flow.

The last thing is the staring, there is no problem for an entire village to stare at you and it can be really annoying at times.

After saying all that just know that it is really a great experience to travel China, you can decide how native you want a be and choose tourist friendly locations, the main attractions are usually more accommodating.

If you’re the hardcore backpacker you won’t be scared by the conditions and after the initial cultural shock you’ll come to love every minute of your trip.

It is always a great advantage to speak the local language while traveling, everything is easier, you get to talk to people and experience situations that you couldn’t have any other way.

Still if you travel a lot like I do you can’t learn all the languages, well maybe if you’re my friend Sharon you can - she has an exceptional talent for foreign languages that she doesn’t really has to make an effort to speak freely with the local population.

If you are less talented and have to make a serious effort to speak a language than whatever effort you are willing to make would still prove very helpful.

When you travel long periods in the same state or area, or decide to stay at the same place for sometime not knowing the language becomes a barrier. I’ve read the post on Viator.com and could see the difficulty of mastering a new language or being the one that forces everyone to talk English so he can fit it.

I guess I could only do my best even if my best only goes so far.

I never could afford Japan but a couple that I’m fond of are traveling there soon so I started to search interesting information for them to help them plan their trip,

As they are quite capable to find flights, hotels and transportation info without my help I’ve done what I do best check blogs.

There are few nice blogs of Westerners living in Japan or traveling for longer period of time that can offer real assistance for those of you who try to understand Japan and I found it to help minimize the cultural estrangement.

From my experience if you travel to a strange country after seeing it from the eyes of other people that love it you’re going to have much easier time to connect. It’s a psychological thing.

Anyway if you plan a trip to Japan too you might want to prepare yourself with the help of these blogers:

Quaisi.net

Japan Visitor Blog

To the other blogs I’ll refer later on so you’ll have time to check one separately and off course when I’ll have updates from my friend’s trip I’ll put them here.

I’ve traveled all around the world in the last 20 years and the more confident I became about traveling alone with on other purpose than to really be and breathe in other cultures, places, energies and just the world I felt more and more at ease to stop acting like a tourist.

There is a lot to be said about stopping at guest houses or hotels it depends on the budget and the connection to the place that you’re trying to get but there is also a lot that can be said about home lodging.

I never used guides as the one that I found here but they are actually a great idea if you have a plan (which I usually don’t).

Whenever I reached a destination I used to ask other tourists or local people, cab driver etc, about nice cheap places to stay. The adventures were endless. I even remember getting into the train booking office asking for a ticket to a nice place as far away as possible.

Sure you have to be a little crazy or with no schedule to travel like I do. Sometimes other travelers that bothered bringing their Lonely Planet books told me where are the recommended places and I used them as a safety net.

Next trip I’ll use the online guides but only a day or two in advance and only if I’m on a relatively “modern” environments.

If you just trust the world many options open and you just let yourself travel with a trust that you’ll always be safe and guided. It is like getting lost on purpose knowing that safe places are a phone call away.

I was planning to recommend the Yosemite Blog for sometime now and it is just bad luck I guess that I finally do it when the fire threatens the entire ares .

I love the Yosemite area very much and it is hard for me to see it burn. As a resident of California I feel that fire is doing it best to ruin many of the beautiful places that I use to travel too.

I can’t believe that after the giant fire was finally controlled after ruining some of the most beautiful forest areas in California now there’s a new fire at Yosemite area.

I guess that nature would eventually rehabilitate itself from the distraction but seeing all these magnificent trees burn is something that I find really hard to cope with.