Thoughts for the Road Warriors

‘Tis the season to travel. For a lot of us in the CNMI, a visit to relatives is a multi-thousand mile proposition. So, in the true spirit of the road warriors, here are some thoughts for enduring the journeys.

The first thing I notice when I’m away from my humble headquarters here is the spooky feeling of isolation from my email account. Happily, there’s an easy solution for this. Web sites such as yahoo.com, rocketmail.com, and hotmail.com, offer free (yes, free) email. The email works through a series of web pages, which makes it slow and cranky and not as convenientas normal email. The virtue, however, is that as long as you have World Wide Web access, you’ve got access to these free email accounts.

This trick won’t do you much good unless you’ve got access to the email address of those you need to communicate with on the road. I’ve surmounted this problem by spending some time setting up an address book in these accounts, just like my normal email accounts have. The secret here is to set up the address book before you find yourself in, say, a cybercafe in Kota Kinabalu where the revelation strikes you that email is no good without and address to send it to.

I’ve begged, borrowed, and maybe even stolen Internet access from folks on the road. Believe me, it’s a lot easier to maggot some Internet time from a stranger than it is to ask to use his private email account to send some messages. Which is, of course, yet another advantage of the web based email systems.

Turning from communications to comfort, have you noticed a surge in the number of screaming, shrieking brats on airliners? Your average three year old boarding a plane in Seoul can shriek at 125 decibels in an octave that could probably shatter glass. And they can do it non-stop for eight hours.

The obvious solution is to attach a taser (those high voltage stun guns the cops use to fry crooks with) to the private parts of the kids’ parents. This is a remarkably efficient way to express your displeasure, gets you totally around any language barrier problems, and–if you use sufficient voltage–will sizzle the reproductive organs and prevent the perpetrators from breeding any more ill-mannered brats in the future. Sadly, using tasers in airplanes is frowned upon by most airlines, though I’m told the Darwin Society may be lobbying for a change in policy.

You can still keep your peace and sanity, though, through the miracle of foam ear plugs. You roll the little buggers up, stick them in your ears, and the brat-factor is neutralized. Safety 1stSytems, on Middle Road, sells the plugs for 50 cents a pair. One is well-advised to wait until the plane has leveled off at altitude before using the plugs, and to remove them before the plane descends, so that changes in cabin pressure don’t have any painful effects.

Ah, the joys of travel. It’s easy to forget how isolated we are here until we find ourselves going somewhere. And there’s no better feeling than returning to Saipan Airport, getting a glimpse of the Christmas lights they’ve lit up, and remembering we’re fortunate to live in a place that a lot of people pay a lot of money to be able to visit.