My Time as a Human

When you’re on the road your smart phone is a translator, currency converter, map and often your only contact with home and, potentially, rescue. Now that I’m a full time ultralight wanderer, it is one of the two most expensive items I own and very hard to replace. If you are even a marginally active traveler, by my rough count there are only five thousand ways your phone can be stolen, lost or destroyed while traveling. This hack eliminates at least four thousand five hundred of those.

On the road I collect stories. Countless fellow travelers lost their phones to pickpockets. Others simply forgot them somewhere, never to be seen again. One had a phone snatched from his hand, while he was chatting, by a guy riding by on a motor scooter. (This is actually a common technique in a lot of southeast asian countries.) I myself almost left it behind when it fell behind a seat, almost dropped it countless times, and may have avoided any number of pickpockets. Why almost? Because I heard enough stories before I started that I thought up this ridiculously simple solution. I didn’t lose the phone behind the seat because as I got up go, it tugged on me. The dropped phone swung down towards the ground and then lazily, and safely, swayed back and forth eight inches from the ground. I never even noticed the pickpockets and didn’t have to.

Easy for Me – Hard for Pickpockets

I thought about clips and locks but I wanted to be able to easily pull it on and off. This way I can quickly and easily pull the phone in and out of the loop, but for someone else to make the same gesture they’d have to get the thing out of my pocket, pull at my waist and yank a line way out, then slide the phone through… if they figured all of this out and then managed to execute it without my feeling it or knowing, I’d be amazed. Yes, they could use a knife (I never did find a good chain) but 1) I’d probably notice someone hacking at my waist with a knife AND digging into my pocket and 2) much more likely, and the most important rule of keeping your stuff safe as a traveler: you only have to be more annoying to steal from than the people around you. Just like running from a hungry bear. You don’t have to outrun the bear, you just have to outrun your hiking partner.

Why belt level

The belt loop lanyard is the way to go. I wanted it attached to my belt (instead of my neck) because it’s a lot more comfortable. No weight. The distance is also just right for getting to my ear, but just short enough to not hit the ground when it’s hanging after I’ve been stunned by a text message and dropped it. This also makes it really easy to drop into my pocket after I reel it back in.

iPhone Otter Box Lanyard Hack

In my case, I modified the already super tough Otter Box Defender case for my iPhone 3. (Link is for newer case.) You can see from the photos that by shaving a little slot in the edge of the clip on the bottom half of the case (using a leatherman file), I was able to put a keyring through the clip. This makes a really solid connection and I’ve, er, tested it in the field many times. Blundering for science.

I’ve actually gone a little crazy with this idea. I’ve leashed all kinds of things to my day bag or pockets. I love never having to worry about theft, drops, or forgots and it clears my mind to worry about other more interesting things. What if a tsunami suddenly sent a massive tidal wave over that row of trees and on top a huge blue whale was surfing towards me… could I get airborne fast enough as the wave slammed into me to catch a piece of driftwood and surf next to him?

Like Young Fang Kang in The One Armed Swordsman or General Pang Qingyun in The Warlords, I returned from travels a wounded warrior. My brain and body were weak from the poison; my knees, still struggling. I found an old house surrounded by dark woods in which to recover and a beautiful woman prepared warm soups for me. (In my case her strong and brilliant husband chopped wood and made soup too.)

Like Superman in his icy Fortress of Solitude this frozen land keeps me from the distractions and dangers of humanity. The solitude in this distant wilderness of the suburbs protects me as I am nursed back to health. My only visitors are passing deer, pausing to look up into windows, holding for a moment before moving on, knowing we are alone and safe from the hunter’s sight. The snow falls gently, filling their tracks behind them.

Like Huo Yuanjia in Fearless, the seasons pass quickly here as I recover. The thick snow and cold of winter blankets the earth only until the sun’s return brings the warmth and melting of spring… which is suddenly replaced again by winter who’s grey clouds rush back in before suddenly springing away again into… What the..?!

Like Linghu Chong in the Smiling Proud Wanderer I find strength in the study of music, and study Kung Fu alone atop this small hill.

On even days I awake to breathe my way through Ashtanga yoga. My balance grows steadily stronger. My headstands smoother and longer. I am, for the first time, beginning to feel myself float as I glide and exhale between poses.

On opposing days I run the elliptical. At first my knees could only handle five minutes before the pain returned. Slowly that number has grown and my breath grows more steady. I get ever closer to making it through a complete Chinese Pod lesson.

Each day I add a little bit more of my chosen Kung Fu style, Ziranmen‘s, 身法。（Shēnfǎ : Body method). For now my upper body briefly rolls and flows through the movements, a little bit each time. As my knees grow stronger I’ll be able to add more and more of my body, completing the ripple from heel to fingertip.

There was one thing I was told more often than any other in China. I heard it from teachers, fellow students, Kung Fu brothers, my master and even people I met on the street: 慢慢来：(màn màn lái : go slowly). I got frustrated with my Chinese language progress. I pushed my body to the limit every day in Kung Fu training until I broke. My 师父 （Shīfu : master) says each day of training is like laying down a piece of tissue paper on a slowly growing pile. Progress is the weight of it over time.

Màn màn lái. Go slowly. Now I am stacking tissue paper here, day by day. 谢谢为汤妈妈和爸爸。(Xièxiè wèi tāng māmā hé bà ba : Thanks for the soup mom and dad).

Having just written a less encouraging view of China, I want to follow immediately with a discussion of one of the things that makes me so eager to go back.

The number one reason to spend time in China is something that cannot easily be put into words. I’d love to find some foreign word that we don’t have in English like, “Fahrvergnügen” or even “Je ne sais quoi” (ironically) that perfectly describes it, but I want something that fits a little better, something that gives a real sense of the buzzing, buoying energy of the place, that magical charge that infects some foreigners for life.

Huángshān

Years ago my friend Vince Zappa and his wife (Americans) spent the first half of their honeymoon visiting some fellow Americans who were teaching in a small village in China. She had a decent time, but when the second half of the honeymoon arrived she was ready to head down to the resort in the Philippines. He was, however, entranced and had no interest in leaving a dirty little town to go to a fancy resort. Vince couldn’t get enough of just being in China. He got ripped off at a restaurant he liked and decided he didn’t care enough to stop going, that instead he’d just be more careful. He was willing to put up with hardships in this weird new place because something captured his heart.

When I first visited China many years ago, it was only for a few weeks but that was enough to trap me. Before we went I liked spending time around my Chinese friends in college and being around Weíshí’s parents and relatives. Weíshí’s second aunt taught me how to play Májiàng and I learned the numbers and directions. I liked the sound of the language, the beautiful characters, and the endless (and I do mean endless) “old Chinese sayings”. But something different happened when I arrived in Běijīng and later visited Xī’ān and Huángshān. I was hooked. I couldn’t get enough of the beautiful mountains, the scrappy street venders, the peach orchards, and above all the endlessly chaotic nature of everything around me. The magic hook is somewhere in that chaos and the way that people are so energized to make things happen. The Chinese people of today don’t bother with safety or laws or aesthetics: they charge ahead and build and make and haul and try.

When Weíshí and I visited the Great Wall we walked the whole length of the top of the restored wall. As we reached the far end, we heard grunting and whispers somewhere on the other side of the large stones that surrounded us. The sounds continued and got closer. The section of wall we stood on was a huge distance from the ground. We walked over just in time to see a hand grasp for the top. I leaned over and saw a series of people standing on each others’ shoulders and the person on top struggling to pull themselves up. Mystified, I grabbed onto his arm and helped him over the wall. He breathed heavily for a moment, then reached inside his jacket as a few more people pulled themselves up behind him. He fumbled a bit more and then, like a magician pulling flags from his sleeve, began heaving out pile after pile of “Great Wall” t-shirts. He immediately tried to sell me one. Apparently there was a fee to sell things on the wall, and they were either too poor or too scrappy and cheap to pay it.

Of course in the midst of this scrappiness and chaos there is still a swirling undercurrent of ancient history spinning through the signs, bricks, buildings, language and culture. It’s all still there, like the old tent that holds the circus. Something in the beauty of this whole mess is the China magic, the magic that entrances, lures, and captures the hearts of people like me.

This is another very simple but extremely useful system, especially when keeping all of your things in bags or a backpack. In my case, after lasik I still sometimes get very dry eyes in the morning. I have to fumble around in the dark, or in a bag, and somehow manage to find a bottle and pour whatever’s in it into my eye. It would generally be better for my happiness and the sleep of those around me if it wasn’t a bottle of shampoo or glue. The cool hack is to wrap the bottle in tape, and put a predetermined set of folds into the tape. You can easily grab bottles and, by feeling for the folds, know by count if it’s a bottle of shaving oil or the lifesaving drops.