The story today takes place somewhere out there, 107 countries later... Blog

Nungwi to Kedwa Zanzibar: Long Walks on the Beach

Nungwi to Kedwa Zanzibar: Long Walks on the Beach

Nungwi to Kedwa Zanzibar: Long Walks on the Beach. Dec 16 It was time to see something as I feel like I am living in a beach corner of the world, so I went for about t three hour walk today.  I find walking along the beach to be very meditative.  I can iron out some things in my mind that are eating me.  I need to get out of here.  I talked to Mark in Taiwan last night and...

Nungwi Zanzibar: Chalk the White Guy

Nungwi Zanzibar: Chalk the White Guy

Nungwi Zanzibar: Chalk the White Guy. Dec 15 It rained here today.  And it rained a lot.  It rained all through the night with crazy thunder that woke me at 07:00 and then it rained all day into the afternoon.  There is a lot of water laying everywhere.  The village is nothing but puddles.  But it is hot, and it is so nice to be here.  It is no problem to handle rain in the heat! I went for a...

Nungwi Zanzibar: A Head of Exotic Follicles

Nungwi Zanzibar: A Head of Exotic Follicles

Nungwi Zanzibar: A Head of Exotic Follicles. Dec 14 As I went for a walk, I heard a local girl say hello to me from a great distance.  I could just see that she was wearing an orange dress.  I was gone for about an hour and when I came back, she was sitting with a couple of local gentlemen on a step close to where my guesthouse is located.  As I came by, she was saying hello again and...

Nungwi Zanzibar: Mr. HQP

Nungwi Zanzibar: Mr. HQP

Nungwi Zanzibar: Mr. HQP. Dec 13 I woke up at lunch and went to the beach at Nungwi Zanzibar for the afternoon.  I spent a couple of hours laying in a hammock watching the tide come in and out and then went to sit in the sand.  A local tout came and asked me if I wanted to go for a ride in a boat for the afternoon.  I told him about my night last night.  He had big eyes...

Zanzibar, Tanzania, net fishing

Local Night Net Fishing in Zanzibar

Dec 12 I was tired, but I got up in time for the guesthouse breakfast in Nungwi, Zanzibar.  It is a free meal, and I need to think about money more than sleep.  As I was eating, James, my Tanzanian friend, came to find me to tell me that he had been at the fish-market this morning and he talked with one of his friends who said that they would take me out on the fishing boat to work with...

Stone Town to Nungwi - Worlds Last Open Slave Market

Stone Town to Nungwi – Worlds Last Open Slave Market

Stone Town to Nungwi – Worlds Last Open Slave Market. Dec 11 Free guesthouse breakfast, check-out, and head to the Anglican Christ Chruch Cathedral which is the former site of the worlds last open slave market.  Legend has it that that alter of the church now sits above a tree where slaves were whipped to show their strength and hardness.  There are holding cells for the males and for the females under the church.  Slaves from central and east African...

Stone Town Zanzibar - Being Uncool

Stone Town Zanzibar – Being Uncool

Stone Town Zanzibar – Being Uncool. Dec 10 I basically worked on my website all day to get it ready to spring out.  And with technology, I had a lot of help from my friend Rob who is two continents away.  The modern world…  I am using my little hotel room as an office and I am sure that the guys running this guesthouse think that I am lame, and wonder what I am doing in my room all day...

Frankfurt to Zanzibar Tanzania - African Touchdown

Frankfurt to Zanzibar Tanzania: African Touchdown

Frankfurt to Zanzibar Tanzania: African Touchdown. Dec 9 I was lucky on my red-eye flight and I had my seat and the one beside it to myself.  Yeah!  I am flexible enough that I can sleep curled up on two seats and get a real night of rest.  I woke up somewhere over Africa and about 45 minutes before we were to land in Zanzibar we passed Mt. Kilimanjaro in Kenya.  …From the window of my plane as we flew...

Potential country music superstar

Country Music Superstar Hillbilly to London Rock and Roller

Country Music Hillbilly to London Rock and Roller I wish I had learned two languages growing up…. I am not talking spoken word. I am talking music.… It would be difficult for me to have come from a cooler life and cooler place in the world. I am super proud to be from Big Beaver, Saskatchewan, Canada, population 55. It made me. It is so unconventional in comparison to anyone else I have met in my travels that it makes...

1939 Chevy

1939 Chevy and Telephones in the 1950’s

1939 Chevy, My First Truck -Transcript by my father, Milson Harris, b. 1936. [su_dropcap]I[/su_dropcap]t was a 1939 Chevy.  Yea, I do not know, dad made the deal for it.  I don’t imagine he paid very much for it.  It was pretty bad.  But yea, we were in the garage when we heard this noise in the yard and there was the truck sitting there, kind of in the middle of the yard, and the steam was rolling out all over...

If I Knew Then What I Know Now

The If I Knew Then What I Know Now Bullshit Spiel

The If I Knew Then What I Know Now B.S. Spiel The If I Knew Then What I Know Now and the If I Was Your Age guy is filling you full of bullshit, even though he may not know it.  I have encountered the ‘If I…’ man many times in life and normally take heed of what he has to say.  However, I recently spent three months in a sort of time reversal to have an ‘I know what I...

Vimy Ridge – Photos and Facts of the Battlefield

Vimy Ridge – Photos and Facts of the Battlefield

Vimy Ridge in France is where the Canadian Corps won in a battle against the German Sixth Army on the 12th of April 1917 of the First World War.  The ridge had been under German control since October 1914.  Our guide Grégory, a man who possibly knows more about war history than any other human alive, broke down the events that took place and explained the battle to us.  I am not much of a nationalist, but I felt a...

Moroccan female meltdown

Reverse Roles Damage Control

Reverse Roles Damage Control Xavier told me that running a hostel in Marrakech brings up hostel-cultural issues in the Muslim country that do not apply in most of the rest of the western world.  For example, hostels often have mixed dorm rooms, but in Morocco, it is illegal to have a Moroccan male and a Moroccan female sharing the same room.  A different set of rules applies to the locals.  But, being that it is a hostel, crazy things happen...

Magic Mushroom Girls

Magic Mushroom Girls

Magic Mushroom Girls My friend Mick used to manage a hostel in Amsterdam.  He told me that one evening he was at reception when two cute girls came down to the desk, completely naked.  He said he could see by their eyes that they were really high on something and guessed that it was mushrooms.  They were asking him questions about the hostel or Amsterdam and he pretended like they were not naked and tried to have a normal discussion...

The thong

The Thong

The Thong Alessio had been working in the hostel in Valencia for a while.  He told me that they had an older Colombian cleaning lady who had a great body.  He said she always wore thong-underwear that stuck out above her pants when she was bent over.  One day she was cleaning the bathroom and when she shut off the vacuum cleaner, she could hear a sound coming from one of the stalls that sounded like someone was masturbating.  Eventually...

Storage Room Hostel Sex

Storage Room Hostel Sex

Storage Room Hostel Sex. My friend Kate has been managing hostels for years.  I asked her for her best story.  She told me this: “There were three girls lined up at the reception desk to check-in.  I can not remember what time it was, but people had not checked-out of the rooms from the night before yet, so I guess it was before 11:00am.  Behind the three girls were three guys, and the three girls and the three guys kind of...

Skydive Interlaken, Switzerland

Skydive Interlaken in the Swiss Alps

Skydive Interlaken in the Swiss Alps ‘Stairway to Heaven’ and a ‘Skydive’ seem to reflect opposite directions, but for me they will now be forever linked… I was showered, up for breakfast, packed and ready for my hang-gliding adventure when I arrived with my backpack at the front desk of Balmer’s Herberge in Interlaken, Switzerland.  The wonderful staff told me they had bad news and that my hang-gliding experience had been cancelled.  They tried to get me a spot paragliding. ...

Porn is Killing Sex

Porn Is Killing Sex

Porn Is Killing Sex I was a young child in the 1980’s that grew into my teen years in the 1990’s. It was an era where having a quality VCR (Video Cassette Recorder) showed status. The VCR our family eventually bought to keep up with the neighbours and society was a thing of luxury at the time. It was in 1990, and it had a feature on it called ‘Timer Record’ that would actually record your TV shows for you...

The Camden Monarch

The Camden Monarch

The Camden Monarch The Camden Monarch is musical art.  Unfortunately, not enough of this art is created anymore.  The potential loss of this culture and rock and roll is a sad future. Sunday in Camden, London, England, is the most consistent best night of the week…in the world.  Now, that is a very strong and opinionated statement, but it certainly holds a lot of accuracy.  If you are looking for a good time, any and every Sunday of the year,...

The Power of an Old Crush

The Power of an Old Crush

The Power of an Old Crush. I had not seen her in about 10 years.  I used to have a massive crush on her 19 years ago when I was growing up.  I have been away for nearly a decade and recently returned for a spell.  We became friends on Facebook.  Then, two days ago I received this message from her: ‘Umm…Just FYI, Your Facebook pages tell me that you might be the coolest. person. ever. 🙂 Just want I...

Pink Floyd Tribute Band

Magic Mushrooms, a Potential Quadriplegic Orgy, and a Pink Floyd Tribute Band

Magic Mushrooms, a Potential Quadriplegic Orgy, and a Pink Floyd Tribute Band It was the night before the concert.  He was at work in a factory but I was in his hot-rod garage hanging out when he sent me this message; ‘Should we eat magic mushrooms for the Pink Floyd tribute band?’  Holy…. I was not ready for that.  I wrote back; ‘Whoa.  I have not done something like that in about five years.  I am not sure if I...

Strange Twist of Dates

A Strange Twist of Dates

A Strange Twist of Dates Feb 3 Life is just so freaking strange sometimes.  It is just a strange twist of dates… Right now in my life, I am at the farm in Big Beaver, and I am trying to get all of my journals moved from paper books that they are and typed out on my laptop.  I have 17 journals that I have written every single day for the past 10 years, and it takes me about four...

Making Music in a Senior Citizen's Home

Making Music in a Senior Citizen’s Center

My father was hanging out with me in the basement, and then he began getting his band equipment together to haul upstairs to load into the car. He told me that he had a gig to play at the senior citizens’ home in Coronach, the next town over. My father is a very youthful 78-years-of-age. I asked him if he needed a roadie for making music. He was happy to have another set of hands to carry equipment, so I decided that I would join him for his performance. Once we got everything into the car, we had a quick sandwich in the house. As we were about to run out the door one of my brothers called. I knew we were short on time but my dad was too polite to say so and he talked to my brother as I watched the anxiousness build up in him as time was ticking by. Eventually, dad got off the phone and we jumped in the car to race the ordinary 15 minute drive from the ranch to town.

Cuban Scooter Heist

The Cuban Scooter Heist

The Cuban Scooter Heist Jan 15 Bean and I are a lot.  That is becoming clear… Bean says that we are the guys in the books that everyone else is reading about here on their vacation.  That is probably a very accurate assessment. The day really began when we were trying to track down a car to rent at Starfish, our resort.  We walked into a tiny air conditioned shack in the resort parking lot where a man was leaning...

Edmonton Oiler fanatic

A Struggling Edmonton Oiler Fanatic Junkie

My name is Stephen Harris, and I am an Edmonton Oiler fanatic. I feel like making that statement is similar to a line made by someone attending alcoholics anonymous.  I really am addicted to a terrible hockey team, and it is difficult. This is how it came to be… I was born in 1979 and when I was a little boy of the age of five or six, I knew of the Edmonton Oilers.  I remember being at a house...

Fleetwood Mac Review

Fleetwood Mac – Rexall Place, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada – 15 November 2014 Ironically, as I was trying to think of a way to scheme a way out of work for the night my boss sent me a text that said we would be taking this nightshift off.  Unreal luck!  I have had this date on my radar for a couple of months. Fleetwood Mac was in town…  So, I scrounged up a floor ticket on stubhub, twenty rows from the...

Edmonton Oilers 1984 Stanley Cup Reunion

A Night With Our Heroes – Edmonton Oilers 1984 Stanley Cup Reunion

A Night With Our Heroes Edmonton Oilers 1984 Stanley Cup Reunion Sometimes the stars align just right.  My childhood hero hockey team decided to have a 30 year anniversary of their 1984 Stanley Cup Championship when I was in the area, and beyond that, my best friend and I who grew up bonding over the team were able to attend the reunion together.  As I said to him, “If I was in Auckland, New Zealand right now, and I knew...

The Postcard

The Postcard Barrel

The Postcard Barrel 18 September An amazingly cool thing happened today.  Well, it all goes back a couple of months.  Today ties to a day in late June when I was on Isla Floreana in the Galapagos.  I wrote this from that time….   “The post office ‘barrel’ has existed since the 1800’s and it is where ships used to leave mail they wanted delivered.  If you stopped at the beach where Bahia Post Office was located on your way...

Waskatenau – Finding a Job But Wanting a Statue

Waskatenau – Finding a Job But Wanting a Statue

Waskatenau – Finding a Job But Wanting a Statue. September 17. I awoke this morning to a man calling me to give me job.  That is bittersweet.  I need to job as I need to make money and have enough to get out of the Canadian Freezer before the cold swallows up my will to go on, but jobs just do not really suit me….  They say that a man should never do what he is good at for free,...