I bought my daughter a pair of counterfeit Converse sneakers.
Nobody died. I do feel a bit guilty knowing that there was no name brand corporation ostensibly overseeing the labor conditions and the environmental impact related to the creation of these less than marvelous replicas. I have read about lots of instances where real brand name products are produced without much regard for these concerns.
Counterfeit medicines have killed people. Counterfeit auto parts could conceivably have killed people.
In the wake of all the recalls from China it’s important to note that there will NEVER be a recall on any counterfeit product that you buy, regardless of the risks it may pose.
I am presently living in a country that has a flourishing counterfeit market. I am going to be very diligent about a few things that might pose a risk to my family, such as toothpaste and makeup. I am not going to lie to you and say that I will never again buy a fake pair of shoes.
With fuel costs breaking new records everyday, lots of people are considering curtailing their driving. For some people, this may involve putting a car into storage for months or longer. I was considering it and I realized that there are probably a few things that I should do to the car if I want it to stay in the condition that it is in. Here are a few links with helpful information:
AAA has advice that seems to cater to people with really nice cars.
After moving in 2005, we went carless for a whole year. It can be done. I consider my 1990 Skoda to be a time saving device. It is not a necessity and it is not a part of my identity.
So, I just had a random thought that travel writing might be a good direction for me. One of the first things that I found when I began researching this possibility was dissuasion.
Tim Leffel used the promises of a scammy course as his jumping off point for an article about how hard it is to make a living as a travel writer. It sounds hard. I don’t think I have had any jobs that were easy. Freelance Travel Writer is probably a job that should be done in tandem with Superhero. If flight was one of your superpowers, you could save a lot on airfare.
Blogging during a long flight may soon be commonplace. Several airlines are looking into the idea of offering wireless service to its passengers. At the moment it will be limited to email, instant messaging and Blackberry services. If the level of service that they are talking about becomes an industry standard, I would expect developers to create applications that piggyback on the enabled services and allow you to do more. You can already send blog posts through email with some services. I have never done that because I have never needed to do it.
Imagine pulling up to a gas station in a strange town and stepping out of your car to find that the display on the pumps includes a local map from Google with directions to some key points of interest. That sounds pretty cool. Lots of people are reporting on how cool it is. Some people, me included are a little lukewarm about this. Apparently to initial version will allow the owner to choose the points of interest based on their own criteria. You can expect directions to various places that want your money. You might not get directions back out of town.
I have read a few travel books in recent years. I am glad that I don’t live in an area that has been written up by Rick Steves. He is a trusted source of information for American tourists who want to learn to be travelers. He has regretfully tipped the masses of to many undiscovered places that became overcrowded tourist stops in the span of just a few years. We suspect that there are a few places that he doesn’t write about because he is scared of spoiling them.
His model of a single trusted source making a life’s work out of figuring out the tricky stuff for tourists so their one chance to visit a region can be a great experience works well. A totally different tack is taken by Rough Guides. These are generally written by people who live in the regions about which they write. For some of the authors, it may be the only travel guide that they ever write. I think this model can work too, but I suspect that they vary a great deal in tone, and in accuracy.
You don’t need to ask the question “How do they get away with stuff like this?”
The 18 or more people who were arrested in a sting operation did not get away with it in the end. I have to wonder about what kind of big ‘holes’ exist in overall airport security for these guys to think that they can carry out this kind of operation.
Back when I was a blue collar plant worker, I had a coworker who had recently been convicted of defrauding video gaming machines. He had a fantastic story about having had a conversation in the courthouse hallway with some other ’scheduled to appear’ dudes. He told them in detail what he had done. Weeks later he saw in the papers that they had been caught in an attempt to replicate his crime. Shouldn’t they have given more consideration to the fact that he had been caught?
Hopefully the drug trafficker who was able to convince all these New York guys that they wouldn’t get caught is sharing a cell with them.
I live in a tourist area that enjoyed a nice increase in visitors this year. It cannot be a complete coincidence that a bargain airline had just recently moved into the market.
I was a bit surprised when the CEO of the airline actually took credit for the increase. I was not surprised when people in the local media were very generous with their choice of words when they put his comments in perspective.
I have been on four flights with this airline and I have a few more booked. I had one very frustrating delay. The departure gate was become like the set of a reality show. In the end he left very late, but not late enough to mess up my connections. The savings over the major airline are so huge that I am happy that 75% of my flights left on time. If there were two low cost airlines flying the routes that are important to me, then it would be a different story.
Get off your butt for a moment and go have a look at the luggage that you have stashed under your bed or in your closet or garage. How thick is the dust? Now take your index finger and use it to write the following words on your suitcase:
I NEED A HOLIDAY!!!
Leave that where you and any other decision makers in the household can see it.
I haven’t been to every beach on the planet, but my less than random sampling leaves me with the impression that beaches in Southern Europe are more relaxed and quieter than what people can expect elsewhere. HolidayHypermarket.co.uk specializes in packages getaways to spots like the Bulgaria golden sands.
This travel website now features an application that lets you design you own package so it will fit you preferences, your budget and your schedule.
“If you are coming to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you are coming because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.”
–Australian aboriginal woman
This quote has been republished in many different places. I thought it was a pretty interesting viewpoint. I discovered a business model yesterday that captured my imagination. It was a niche travel services company that served the unique needs of missionaries. It was specifically for Christian missionaries. I can imagine that other companies exist that work primarily with secular charities and possibly missionaries from other religions.
I guess the primary difference in focus with these travel agencies is that they take people into regions of the World with no functional tourism industry. There are lots of areas with an overlap, in that a thriving tourist and hospitality trade can exist in shockingly close proximity to poverty.
