Funeral English style

My 100 year old grandmother died a week ago and I gladly attended the funeral of this remarkable woman. We were very close. One bonus was I got to see cousins, uncles and aunts I hadn't seen for more than 25 years, in some cases.


The crematorium where the funeral service was held. My father, mother, and uncle spoke about grandma. It was very moving. She was very loved.



My elder brother and our next door neighbours from when we were growing up. We've known this couple for our entire lives.



The majority of the family and some family friends. It was a great reunion, especially for seeing cousins again who are around my age but I haven't seen since they were children.



My brother and has wife outside their house.


Photo above is my mother, my cousin Linda, me, and my auntie Sheila (Linda's Mum).

Around the World .... again (this time the whole thing, not just 2/3 of it)

Only 2 weeks after returning to LA, after my 2/3 of the way round the world trip, I couldn't stand being at home anymore and decided to repeat the trip. This time I would circle the globe completely instead of going 2/3 around then 2/3 back (actually more miles for the astute readers out there). I will fly (or take train) from LA to London to Hong Kong, to Beijing, to Mongolia, to LA. There could be some changes to the itinerary. I may swap Mongolia for Bangkok. Or just stay in Beijing. I have a 3 week flexible timeframe in China. I may or may not take the train from HK to Beijing and then Beijing to Ulaanbaatar (capital of Mongolia). A lot depends on the cost difference between train versus plane and my tolerance for boredom. Each of those train trips is more than 24 hours. The plane more like 2 to 4. Big difference. I'll just have to price shop when I get there because you don't save much money by booking ahead on internal/local flights and trains.

Truthfully, the trip happened so soon after the last one because my 100 year old grandmother died in England. So, because I wanted to go to England to attend the funeral, I thought I might as well go round the world again. I mean, who wouldn't? Given time, money and opportunity? I plan to revisit many of the friends I met the first time. I will also hopefully meet many long lost relatives at the funeral. Some I haven't seen for over 25 years.

I am only on the very first stage of the trip, so I plan to add photos and text updates as they occur. Or certainly within a few of days of the events. I now have a new Macbook notebook computer to update the blog with.

My photos show: my lovely passport and chinese visa, just to prove I'm not making this all up, and various stages of the journey. Bus and plane. I should have gotten photos of the train but sometimes you just forget to whip out the camera as often as you should.

I took the bus to from my place in Hollywood to LAX airport to save a little bit on taxis. This trip is expensive so I have to try to cut costs wherever possible. Using public transport is definitely a moneysaver and can earn you a "free" night in a hotel. It cost me $4 on the bus to the airport. It would have been probably $40 in a taxi. I chatted to a fun family from Mexico on the bus. These really are my people. I know more people from Central America than anywhere else now, and my Spanish is "muy bien".

Then I took the Virgin Atlantic plane to a rainy London. It's a fairly painless 11 hour flight. The plane was almost full but I met some cool people to talk to. I talked to a young american woman who moved to London to work in the fashion industry. I seem to know quite a few people in the fashion industry now. Fortunately, the heavy-set woman in the photo next to me moved to another seat so I had a little extra elbow room after she left. She was an English woman returning from a vacation with her family. I noted how British women are getting bigger and bigger, but are quite American supersized yet. Except for Hollywood and West LA, where people are almost unusually drop-dead gorgeous.

The underground train from Heathrow airport to London St Pancras railway station was full. Hmm, I'm seeing a pattern here. I chatted to some Australian girls (one was quite gorgeous) who had just come from Hong Kong. "Hey, that's where I'm going next!" I announced in an excited manner. We discussed the socio-pyschological benefits of a night in Lan Kwai Fong, the Hong Kong, ex-pat bar/club district.

The train from London to Sheffield, where my family lives, was full too. Hmm. A big football game had just finished in London (Derby versus West Brom) and I met some cool people again. Mostly good-natured Derby fans who were happy Derby won. It was standing room only on the packed train, for 2 hours. For the last 1 hour of the journey when the Derby fans left, I invited Jean, a female student from Taiwan studying in Sheffield, to sit with me. We had a nice chat about Taiwan/China relations and other fun topics. She was gorgeous. "Be still my beating heart" -William Mountfort 1705.

A personal note: I used to be so shy when I was a much younger traveller. I only talked to people if they talked to me first. Which means in England you would probably never talk to anybody. Now I just come right out and start conversations with almost anybody. I almost never regret it. Occasionally, I will be met with almost complete silence or a one-word, leave me the hell alone, answers. But, in the vast majority of cases, I have pretty rewarding social interaction. Better to have tried to start a conversation and fail, than be forever wondering what might have been. I am influenced in this line of thinking by the famous poem:

I hold it true, whate'er befall;
I feel it, when I sorrow most;
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all. -- Alfred Lord Tennyson 1850

The poem applies to love and romance, which I am a big fan of and participant in, but I apply it to many things in my life.

the blahs in LA

It is ironic that so many people want to come to Hollywood. I have been here more years than I care to mention. All right, twist my arm, it is 22 fucking years in the Los Angeles area. I'm tired of it and need a change of scenery. I think you could live in the best place on earth and eventually you would need a change. It is basic human nature.

There's nothing essentially wrong with LA. Other than people are really physically toned and have a pretense of being cool and indifferent. So what do I have to offer that is any different? But, the cool and indifferent part is something I don't care for. I prefer places where people are genuinely interested in other people. Where there is nothing wrong with asking a stranger where they are from.

So, I'm just tired of it. Most of my friends have moved to London or China. I think I have just one genuine long-term friend left in Southern California. However, he lives 3 hours drive from here. So, frankly, I've had enough. I'm looking at business opportunities in Asia and, if the worst comes to the worst, I can always work in visual effects on movies in London.

All I do is hike and go to the gym and dream of Asia. The hiking is nice, the gym is nice, but lack of a social life is killing me. Tomorrow (Sunday May 27th) I leave for London, Hong Kong, Beijing, and possibly Mongolia. Almost a four week trip. Tomorrow can not come soon enough ......

two thirds of the world trip

Around the world (or 2/3 of it) in 21 days.

I went on a fast trip around two-thirds of the world. Starting in Los Angeles, I flew Air Canada to London to spend a couple of days in Northern England to see family. Pictured is me outside the Sheffield railway station. The classic granite facade is really attractive and ornate.

Then I flew Air New Zealand to Hong Kong. Took the train to Beijing, flew back to Shanghai for a couple of days, then back to Hong Kong for one night, then to London, and Los Angeles. The last part of the trip was a nightmare of flying everyday for more than 12 hours per day.

Unfortunately, I lost most of my photos after my camera was stolen in Shanghai. So I'm trying to recover some photos from friends that I met. It's a long drawn out process. This is what I have so far.



This is my father, sister, and I outside my parents house. Note the stylish and classic brick built homes.

Then flew on to Hong Kong for two nights of craziness in Lan Kwai Fong.



Afterwards, I took the 25 hour long train trip to Beijing, where I spent the majority of my time. It wasn't this train but I had to add a train photo. This photo is actually on the Hong Kong airport to downtown train. But what the heck, a train's a train, right?

The people in the image below are my old and new friends at a rock festival in Northern Beijing. It was pretty good.

Then we concluded the evening with tons of sushi and drinks for the monumental price of US$4 per head. It doesn't get much better than this.

If you'd like to see more photos, it would be quicker to just go to my photo webpage:
http://mfoster.smugmug.com/gallery/2814193#150395856