About this blog

As I am sitting here in the IBIS hotel in Paris with sore feet and a full heart*, I realized I would rather have a dedicated page for my travels than to use the one exclusively for family. 

So what's with the title? Honestly, I couldn't think of any popular/snappy way to make my name fit somehow with Gulliver's travels and Robert Frost momentarily sprang from my sub-conscious to slap me when I went for a cliché. With a stinging conscience I went with my usual, unfashionable but meaningful Indonesian fallback. 

So. What it means to Ber. Most of you have never heard of "Ber-", while those of you who have sometimes find its explanation elusive. "Ber-" is an Indonesian grammar structure that acts as a prefix  (hence the hyphen) to a vast quantity of nouns, verbs, and adjectives, causing those words to mean, "To be, to have, to wear, to travel by, or to produce." "Ber-" also indicates a reciprocal relationship, refers to work, and causes a verb to become reflexive (where the verb does something to itself). I will not try to explain every, irregularity, or every possible meaning for all our sakes. Suffices it to say that "Ber-" performs a long list of grammatical functions. But most importantly, it causes a word to take on the property of some attribute to which the prefix is applied. 

I chose this as the title for my blog about my travels, because I find that whenever I travel, a portion of that place or culture becomes part of me. Ironically, one can't use the word in the way I am about to use it*. But for example, I "Ber-"ed Indonesia when I went there. I fell in love with many aspects of the language and culture where I served on my two-year LDS mission, thereby taking on many properties and attributes that personified the wonderful people of that country.

Travel does that to everyone in one-way or another. I strongly believe that one cannot immerse themselves in a new culture, new language, and new social setting without experiencing opportunities to learn and grow. I whole heartedly agree with Mark Twain's statement that, 

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime."

Also, I find that travel interestingly fulfills an injunction in my belief system to, "...study and learn, and become acquainted with all good books, and with languages, tongues, and people...[to] be instructed more perfectly in theory, in principle, in doctrine, in the law of the gospel, in all things that pertain unto the kingdom of God, that are expedient for you to understand...Of things both in heaven and in the earth, and under the earth; things which have been, things which are, things which must shortly come to pass; things which are at home, things which are abroad; the wars and the perplexities of the nations, and the judgments which are on the land; and a knowledge also of countries and of kingdoms..." (D&C 88:78-79, 90:15).

That being said, I will not push my personal opinions, beliefs, ideologies, etc. Nor will I purposefully attempt to stir up controversy or argument over currently hot topics through personal commentaries. This is an attempt to relate to fellow travelers, as well as all others who wish to keep up to date with my travels, how the experiences I have can help you to become better prepared for your journeys as well as how those journeys might shape you as they have shaped me. If someone or something has taught me a valuable lesson, I will record it here. That being said, I will not edit the accounts of my experiences to "sugar-coat" or create the false pretense that I don't make mistakes. If my mistakes provide a learning experience, then I will, however reluctantly, share it for all our sakes.

I will do certainly do my best to proof-read these posts but, because I would rather concern myself with experiencing new things than meticulously editing experiences I have already had, you might occasionally find some awkward verbiage and run-on sentences. I also might occasionally include the use of hash tags because of the nuance they can provide. For instance, today I walked for miles all around Paris in dress shoes. Instead of writing a whole paragraph about how purchasing the dress shoes at the thrift store, I could instead write, "#thesebootswerentmadeforwalkin #blisters #thriftshopfail" and you also get the idea. Though, in the event that a comment is just too long for a hash tag, I will just insert a snappy social reference like *even Macklemore would agree that was a bad idea*.

*I spent the day walking around Paris in a pair of slightly too small Bostonian dress shoes. Sure they look nice and they came at a meager price of $6 at Goodwill in Gig Harbor, WA, but they make miserable walking shoes for when you take a day to walk around Paris. If you decide to spend any length of time walking around cobblestone streets, be sure you have some pretty comfy kicks. 

*(in a mixture of Indonesian and English which my friends and I call Englonesian)