World Cup

Four years ago, my brother, some friends and I went to the World Cup in Brazil. I then thought it extremely overrated and determined I would never go to a World Cup again. Yet, here I am, in Sand Point, Alaska, helping prepare a sailing yacht to cross over to Kamchatka and partake in the mayhem of the planet’s most important football event.

Internet is already quite unreliable and slow here on Popof Island, even at the local school’s public library, so these may be the only pictures I’ll share before the Mexico-Sweden game at Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow.

Nice as these pictures may be, they barely reflect the beauty of the Alaskan tundra.

The S/Y ‘Whakaari’, guarded by two bald eagles.

Saturday night at ‘The Jam’. Extremely talented local band playing, among others, awesome covers of Alice in Chains.

Sand Dollar Beach

On the morning of thursday March 29th, while chilling in my hammock and enjoying the view over Koh Phi Phi and Koh Maithon, I received a formal invitation to visit Kamchatka -that territory only familiar to those who play Risk.

The following day, the first awesome thing I did was to visit the Consulate of the Russian Federation in Bangkok. When asked for plane tickets to support the visa application, I answered I would go by boat. As for hotel reservations, I explained I would sleep on the said boat. The russkis were not impressed, and so suggested I take a seat while they discussed my case. I spent the next hour and a half observing how people lost their nerves, grasping onto my optimism. Very insightful.

The second fun-filled activity involves shopping for and packing all kinds of random stuff, including a gas mask, plenty of long underwear, ski pants and a willy-warmer.

Third, get drunk on the free flow of micheladas and margaritas at El Mexicano, while enjoying some sublime chilaquiles and cochinita pibil.

Fourth and a definite must: walk along the Great Wall of China!

Fifth, visit to the Benaroya Hall in Seattle, home to Pearl Jam’s most beautiful concert, in a state only possible in Washington.

And sixth, briefly walk outside Anchorage Airport for a glimpse of the weather and topography that will accompany the S/Y ‘Whakaari’ and her crew accross the Bering Strait.