A Midgett Blog » Videos

PVX: McDonald’s in Thailand

Arlo — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 09:06:33 +0000

We waited over a month to do our McDonald’s video for Thailand, knowing that if we did, we’d be able to wrangle our friends into trying it with us after they arrived. That was a long time to wait to try a Samuari Pork Burger, let me tell you! Was it worth the wait? You’ll have to watch the video to find out…

Not much to say about Thai McDonald’s that we don’t already say in the video. I will say that it’s darn difficult to find cover footage for editing when you’re shooting five people with one camera. See if you can may spot any editing tricks I might have used to avoid a jump cut!

Thanks again to Wendy, Dusty, and Sarah for helping out (we certainly wouldn’t have tried so many things without them!) We’ll eventually see them one more time when I put together a video about our shared experience at a Thai cooking school. In the meantime, be sure to read about their take on Thailand on their blog, Roam the Planet!

Thoughts on Thailand

Arlo — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 03:46:54 +0000

Out of all the countries we visited on our trip around the world, Thailand was the one in which we spent the most time. 61 days, over two visits. It has since gone down on our list of places we want to return to someday, but when we first arrived, we were not impressed.

We had been traveling fairly quickly ever since Africa and by October we were both ready for a break. While we were still in Russia, we planned out the last three months of our trip. In order to conserve money – we had just officially gone over our travel budget – we wanted to find a place to sit down and rest for a while. I sent out a request on Facebook and Twitter and asked our friends and followers for their recommendations in Thailand.

We received a lot of good advice, but ultimately had a hard time taking advantage of it because we were set on a month-long rental. We checked Craigslist and various vacation rental websites, but the vast majority of listings were only available in the largest cities or most touristy areas. We debated traveling out to the remote islands until we found a place to our liking, but ultimately took the easy way out. We spent just a couple days in Bangkok, recuperating from our jet lag, before flying to Phuket and following up on some leads there.

The first place we stopped was in party central, Patong. I can’t even remember why we chose that town, because foam-party nightclubs, seedy massage parlors, and plentiful weed are not on our list of travel necessities. Nevertheless, Oksana found us a cheap hotel away from the beach, and we stayed there a week.

Prices were low, as October is still officially the off-season. And no wonder – it rained hard just about every day we were in Patong. That didn’t bother me especially much because I had just come down with my first cold since leaving home almost a year and a half before. For the next week, all I wanted to do was lie in bed and sleep. Easier to do during the day – night were miserable… at least until I visited the pharmacist, a real life anime character, who prescribed me some heavy sleeping pills.

Unfortunately, just as I was about to get over my cold, Oksana picked it up. Most of our month off was spent battling head and chest colds.

Eventually, we left the Starbucks and McDonald’s behind by moving just four kilometers down the island to Karon Beach. The oceanfront was prettier, the tourists more family oriented, and both of those things suited us just fine. For about $19 per night, we stayed in a huge hotel room, venturing out once a day to the pool or to place an order at the on-site restaurant. We caught up on some internet stuff, rested our travel-worn feet, and worked on our tans.

Prices went up on November 1^st with the official start of the high season, but we didn’t mind. Our friends from Roam the Planet were due to arrive any day and, with our batteries recharged, we were ready to hit the road again.

Because of the record flooding that was going on in central Thailand during our stay, we didn’t get to see as much of the country as I’d hoped. Most of the things I noticed about Thailand came from the few places we did spend some time: Bangkok, Phuket, the Phi Phi islands, Chiang Mai, and Koh Mak.

Hello!

“Have you showered yet today?”

That’s apparently a colloquial greeting in Thailand. Kind of like, “Hey, how’s it going?” When our host in Koh Mak told me that, I had to get the full story. How in the world does “Have you showered yet today?” mean “Hello?”

He explained that it’s very hot and humid in most parts of Thailand and when welcoming someone into your home, it’s considered polite to offer them the opportunity to freshen up before socializing.

That makes sense, I suppose. Definitely more than “How’s it hanging?” or “What’s up?”

Bowing

You’ve probably seen the typical Thai greeting, or wai, in movies or on television at some point. Palms together, prayer-like, accompanied by a short bow. Not knowing what was socially expected of me, I usually just nodded my head in response and said “thank you” or “hello,” whichever seemed more appropriate at the time.

Reading up on it now, I see that there’s a lot of room for nuance in the gesture. How close the hands are to the face, how deep the bow goes. I guess if you’re being polite, you’re also supposed to perform a wai when asking permission to leave someone’s house. All these unspoken rules remind me of the warning to never point your foot at another person. Just another peculiarity of the Thai culture.

As an American uninitiated to their culture, I something think I must have been the equivalent of man swaggering down the street, middle fingers raised to shoulder height, belching and farting at everyone that passed.

Dancing

Can you picture a traditional Thai dance? The slow, undulating movements of colorful and elegantly dressed women? The lithe and gentle movements from the wrist and elbow, the tips of the fingers lightly touching and forming intricate shapes? I think of it as a “hand dance,” though I doubt that’s what it’s called.

We were discussing this dance with a couple from Oxford who happened to be traveling on the same bus one day. Zissy (I think her name was; wish we’d exchanged contact info!) wondered aloud if the slow and meticulous dance could be a result of their living in a hot climate. It wouldn’t take much to work up an unsightly sweat in Thailand.

What a fascinating idea! We started comparing other cultures’ traditional dances. Do colder climates have more energetic dances in order to raise the body temperature? I couldn’t help but think back to a cold night on an island in the middle of Lake Titicaca, where our entire Spanish class was pulled into a scene straight out of National Geographic. While the Quechua men got drunk and played their instruments, the women cut loose and dragged us onto the darkened city hall, their makeshift dance floor. Their dances were all energetic skipping in woven formations while legs and arms pumped up and down. The musicians must have been jamming – I swear each song lasted at least 15 minutes. We were dying from the altitude.

Anyway, I think Zissy might be on to something. There’s got to be a doctoral dance thesis in there for someone.

Photography

I learned to travel at the same time I learned to take pictures. I bought my first 35mm SLR just before going to Ecuador, which was essentially just my second trip out of the country. In hindsight, I regret that my eye for composition developed in Latin American countries. Why? Because I learned not to point my camera at people.

In most of Latin America – South America especially – it’s considered rude to take someone’s photo without asking. I can understand why. If you’re a photogenic, traditionally-dressed Peruvian living in, say, Cusco, you’re going to have a lens shoved in your face every day of your life. It’s like being famous – stalked by paparazzi! – without any of the perks.

So as I was learning to use a real camera, my subjects were ruins and landscapes. I always felt guilty when I tried to take market photos and saw all the vendors turn their heads and hide behind upraised arms. Sure, I could buy something from them first, or give them a “tip,” but I wouldn’t capture anything spontaneous or candid if I did.

In Thailand, I noticed, everyone liked having their picture taken! At the Festival of Lights, we’d get right up close with our cameras and they would actually stop what they were doing and pose for us. As we walked alongside a parade, you could tell the participants on the floats would actively seek photographers out. They’d lock eyes with you, through the viewfinder, and then nod and smile after you lowered the camera. It was a novelty for me.

(Oksana, by the way, is much better at people photography than I. I would guess that she took most of the people photos you’ll find in our photo albums.)

Language

Let’s get this out of the way right now: There’s no standardized way to spell Thai words with the Roman alphabet, but place names with a “ph” in them are most definitely not pronounced with an English “F” sound. The “h” in “Phuket” is pronounced as a tiny puff of air, hardly said at all: “Pahoo-KET.” So, no, you can’t have much fun with the name of that island. Don’t worry. We’ll always have Koh Phi Phi.

I thought it would be Africa or Eastern Europe that would have tripped us up, but Thailand was the first country in which we really had difficulty communicating. Just like anywhere else, there are plenty of people who speak English circling around the tourism industry. It was when we left that protective bubble that we were in trouble.

In the Thai language, simple, monosyllabic words can be have different meanings depending on the tone in which they are said. The five basic tones are easy to remember. They are rectus, gravis, circumflexus, altus, and demissus. Ha ha, just kidding! They’re also called mid, low, falling, high and rising.

Think of it this way: The word “mai” can mean either “wood,” “silk,” “burn,” “new,” or “not,” depending on how you pitch your voice when you pronounce it. I remember a story my uncle told me about learning the language in a classroom (he lived in Thailand for a couple years in the early 70s.) His whole class was driven crazy by a single, tone-deaf student endlessly repeating the instructor’s words in a flat monotone. Thai would be hard (for me) to learn. I can hear the different tones; I just can’t keep them straight in my head.

If you’re at all interested (and like having your mind blow), watch the first minute of this video on Youtube (decide for yourself if you want to continue after that; it only gets more confusing as you go!)
Thai Language Lessons: Tone Rules Explained

In all honesty, it was even difficult for me to speak English with Thai people. For one thing, it was almost literally impossible for them to pronounce my name.

“Arlo.”

“Aaah-ro?”

“No. Ar. Lo.”

“Arrrooo?”

“Close. Ahr. Lho.”

“Allll rrrro?”

“Okay, sure. Let’s move on.”

(I didn’t take offense; I couldn’t pronounce their names, either.)

Just listening to the musicality of the language, it seems to me that Thai is all about the vowels. Words flow into sentences very smoothly and consonants are rarely harsh or abrupt. Because our own languages influence how we learn others (which is why practically everyone has an accent when they speak in a foreign language), Thai people can be especially difficult for an American to understand, even when they’re speaking English.

I once stopped in at an airport McCafé to grab some drinks to take to the gate with us. I asked for a mango tea and a caramel macchiato. The girl behind the counter looked up and asked, “Aaah oh eye?”

“Excuse me?”

“Aaah oh eye?” she repeated.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.” I looked quizzically at the other girl standing behind the counter.

“Aaah oh eye?” they said in exasperated unison. “The macchiato. You want it aaah or eye?”

“Oh, ‘iced!’ Yes, I’d like it iced please!” Hot or iced. I was blushing in embarrassment as I paid for the drinks.

Apparently, this is a common problem. The next time I tried to order something in a McDonald’s, they slid a big, plastic, picture menu across the counter and asked me to point and what I wanted.

The only other interesting tidbit I have about the language is that people in northern Thailand are able to speak with people from Laos. I asked the woman who ran our hostel in Chiang Khong if it was the same language. She said it wasn’t, but explained that Northern Thai (there are four distinct Thai dialects) is about 90% the same as Laotian… or at least the Laotian dialect they speak right across the border.

“Wat,” did you say?

I always thought the word “wat” meant “temple” in Thai. Turns out, it means “school.” Which makes sense, when you consider all those temples are actually monasteries.

I don’t know much about Buddhism, monks, or wats, but I enjoyed taking pictures of those monasteries. The architecture Thais use in their places of worship is so colorful and ornate! Plus there are dragons and elephants and demon warriors!

Food

How can I write about Thailand and not mention Thai food? Looking over my notes, it’s surprising how many things fall into that category.

I assume most people are already familiar with Thai food. I’ll just say that I was surprised how much better it can be in the country itself. When their curries and soups are made with fresh local ingredients, it’s like everything I had before was a shadow of what it could have been. Plates are cheap (though portions are small by American standards) and we tried everything from seafood to chicken to pork and beef. Overall, Thailand is a delicious country in which to find oneself, but that doesn’t necessarily mean everything is good…

Oyster Sauce

What exactly is oyster sauce? It’s on every table in Thailand. Is it for oysters or made from oysters? You know what? Either way, it’s not for me.

Mayonnaise

There’s not a lot of mayo in Thai food, but we were living there for a month and there were certain things we stocked up on. One was mayonnaise, or whatever that creamy white stuff they call mayonnaise is over there. Sorry, but mayo shouldn’t be sweet.

Dyed Food

When we first arrived in Thailand, both Oksana and I noticed some unnaturally bright and colored foods in the markets. Inky wet fruit that looked like it would stain your clothes, candy-green mussels spread out on ice, eggs and lettuce that were a shade of green I’ve never seen in nature before.

At first, I would have sworn up and down that they’d been dyed to make them look more appealing on display, but after two months in the country and seeing the same colors in different cities, I’m starting to wonder if that might not be the case. Who knows? Maybe the colors are just brighter over there!

Fruit

I thought the jungles of South America had the best, most exotic fruit in the world. I was wrong.

What fun we had touring the fruit markets of Thailand! Our favorite fruit there, hands down, was rambutan. I’d never seen it before a trip to Ecuador a couple years ago and introduced Oksana to it in Zanzibar last year, where they called it mshokishoki. The red and yellow fruits are covered with soft spines and contain a seed inside, surrounded by sweet white flesh. You pop them open, eat the flesh and spit out the seed. Rambutan are nature’s gummi bears.

Oksana sampled everything. There were dragonfruit, which was kind of bland, but looked like cookies and cream flavored ice cream on the inside. Tamarind grew in long pea-pods, but dry and brown like a giant, segmented peanut. Inside were sticky red seeds surrounded by a network of ropy red veins reminiscent of that alien fungus in the latest War of the World’s remake. Lycee was like rambutan’s less flamboyant sister, while Longan fruit was its dull, earthy brother. And of course, there’s durian, which smells as bad as you’ve heard, but actually tastes better than you’d expect. Kind of like a citrusy-banana-y kind of thing. I never tried sugar apples nor purple mangosteen, but Oksana said they were both good, too.

Bananas, pineapples, papayas, coconuts, mangos, guava, melons, jackfruit, oranges, pomelos, starfruit (carambola), and strawberries: Thailand also has all the things we’re already familiar with. It’s a fruit-lover’s paradise!

Bread

Throughout our travels, Oksana and I have made it a habit to seek out decent bakeries. I enjoy stopping by in the morning and grabbing a quick and inexpensive breakfast to go. At some point we realized that we hadn’t come across a single bakery in Thailand.

I’m sure they exist, but it’s rather surprising how little Thais use bread in their cuisine. I got to wondering why that is and realized that it probably has something to do with rice.

When we flew into Bangkok, I remember looking out the window and seeing nothing but miles and miles of flat land, endless fields filled with nothing but water and rice. Seeing all that stagnant water, I couldn’t help but think about snakes and mosquitoes and how we skipped our Japanese Encephalitis vaccinations. I wondered why Thailand didn’t raise a less water-intensive grain…

…and then I realized I had it the wrong way around. The heavy monsoon rains that hit Thailand every year mean that rice is the only thing they can grow. So maybe a lack of wheat is one reason they don’t have much bread in Thailand. Or it may just be that all the noodles they eat fulfill the same dietary requirements. At any rate, we wouldn’t find a decent bakery again until Laos.

Drinks

The drinks in Thailand – the soft drinks and juices and such – are amazing. I don’t know what they are, but they’re amazing.

The cooler section in the stores are filled with dozens (if not hundreds) of varieties of drinks. I wish I could tell you what they all were, but often they didn’t have any English on the label. Those that did were often meaningless. “The Original Soy Peptide: Peptein!” What do you suppose that tastes like?

Oksana and I experimented a bit the first month we were there, but when our friends arrived, we recruited them into sampling some of the crazier stuff with us. We recorded a video of the drinking game we played.

Aphrodisiacs

If, despite the ubiquitous prostitutes, go-go bars, and seedy erotic massage parlors, you somehow missed the fact that Thailand was a sexually liberal country, all you’d need to do is check out the coolers in the local grocery stores. Sprinkled in among all those crazy Thai drinks are a huge variety of liquid aphrodisiacs. Granted, many of them are probably just energy drinks marketed toward a different crowd, but still. Would you want to be seen sipping on a tiny vial of something called “Hang Foreplay?”

Straws

Every time you buy a drink at the store, whether it’s a soda or a juice or an iced coffee, the cashier will hand you a straw. They have tons of them up by the counter. Makes me wonder about the sanitary condition of the lids – we definitely found a few cans of Diet Coke with crud smeared all over the top. We felt safe drinking from the plastic bottles, however.

Beer

Thailand doesn’t have a lot of variety in its beer. You’ve basically got three big brands to choose from: Chang, Singha, and Leo. To me, a micro-brew only kind of guy, they all taste about the same. Bad, that is to say. Except that, on a really hot day, and when the beer is really cold, they somehow transcend their badness and become pretty good.

But that’s neither here nor there. What surprised me about beer in Thailand is that they often serve it over ice. That’s just weird.

Service

When Oksana and I ate out together, I’d say there was a 50/50 chance we’d be served at the same time. When we ate out with our friends, it never happened. In Thailand, they serve food when it’s ready and the cook doesn’t make much of an effort to time the dishes so they hit the plates at the same time. This often resulted in four hungry people waiting for the last person to be served while pointedly ignoring the delicious, cooling food in front of them.

Eventually we made a pact. Forget being polite; eat when you’re served. Besides, Thai food is meant to be shared around the table anyway.

Cinemas

I’ve been in some good movie theaters in my time, but nothing like they have in Bangkok. I’d trade every Cineplex and IMAX I’ve ever been in to have a good Thai theater near my home. They’re amazing.

Oksana and I only had the opportunity for one high-end cinema experience, when we watched Contagion in a Nokia-sponsored “Ultra Screen” in Bangkok. It cost us $45 USD just for just the two tickets, but that was okay, because it was almost a religious experience.

First, we were given the option to relax in a comfortable lounge where an usher promised to escort us to our seats just before the previews and commercials ended. Our seats were leather recliners paired off and separated from the other 20 seats in the room by a semi-circular divider. There were even pillows and blankets, if we wanted to get more comfortable.

One thing you have to do in a Thai cinema, however, is rise for the national anthem that plays as a music video just before the movie begins. “Long live the king!”

I get the impression that Thais really get the cinema experience, too. They’re very respectful during the movie. They don’t talk or use their cell phones. Hate to say it, but I think I value their cinema culture even more than the U.S.’s.

May be a good thing we don’t have many theaters like that in the States, though. I’d blow my paycheck every weekend.

Shoes

Everyone takes their shoes off when they go inside. Everyone.

Surprisingly, even the hotels and hostels we stayed at contained two pairs of flip-flops so no one would have to walk around barefoot. In that respect, it was a lot like Russian homes.

But in Thailand, they take it to extremes. All of the temples (sorry, wats), as well as most of the smaller businesses – dentists, doctors, offices, dive shops – request that you to leave your shoes at the door. Fortunately, restaurants and supermarkets had no such rules.

“No shirt, shoes(!), no service!”

Fingernails

In Thailand, it’s not uncommon to see a man with a pinky fingernail grown out to ridiculous lengths. Having grown up in the 80s, all I could think was “cocaine user.” That couldn’t be it, though.

Turns out, it’s most likely a symbol of social status. People who have to do hard, physical labor for a living are not able to grow their fingernails out. If, on the other hand, you have a nice white collar job (or whatever the equivalent is over there), then I guess a well-manicured pinky nail is something you can devote your time to maintaining.

That and, the internet tells me, they’re good for extracting boogers and earwax.

Personal Safety

There are plenty of rundown neighborhoods in Thailand, but Oksana and I never felt threatened walking through them. After awhile, we lost a bit of our street paranoia because we just didn’t feel like we were ever in danger there. Granted, there are plenty of places in the seedier parts of Bangkok or Pattaya where stupid or drunk tourists are involuntarily separated from their money, but we didn’t frequent those places.

The biggest crowd we ever wiggled through was during the Festival of Lights in Chiang Mai. It was chaos. Five of us spent two or three hours wandered around the river, most of our attention focused on our cameras settings. I worried about my backpack, constantly being bumped and nudged, and my shorts’ pockets filled with wallet, iPhone, and GPS. Nothing was lost. We discussed it later and decided that none of us felt like there were any pickpockets lurking around at all. Except for the fireworks exploding around us, the whole night felt quite safe.

(We also realized that hardly anyone was drinking! A huge, city-wide celebration and only a handful of obnoxious British hooligans to spoil the mood.)

Transportation

Traffic, in many ways, was different in Thailand, but there were some similarities to the way we do things in America.

First thing you notice is that they drive on the left. (Well, I guess that would be the first time you’d notice if you were coming straight from the U.S. After 31 countries, we’re thoroughly confused. I can no longer remember which countries drive on which side of the road.) The second thing you notice is that the direction of travel is really only a suggestion. We saw plenty of people nonchalantly steering their scooters into oncoming traffic.

Traffic in Bangkok is predictably bad. Often the best way to get around is on a tuktuk, or motorcycle taxi, if only because they can sometimes weave between the cars and buses. In an effort to alleviate traffic, Bangkok has built up miles and miles of giant cement overpasses. Huge, eight-lane freeways act as arteries into the city. Rush hour is so bad, they actually change the direction of travel on these freeways throughout the day! In the morning, lighted signs indicate that most of those eight lanes are one-way streets into the city. In the evening, they flip them around so that there are more avenues out to the suburbs. I have no idea what you’re supposed to do if you’re driving down a lane when it switches!

Our first hotel, the Amari Atrium, was like most other large businesses in Bangkok and had hired a man with an orange safety vest to stand at the end of the driveway. His job was to step out into the street with one of those lighted, handheld, airport-runway batons, blow his whistle, and stop traffic for anyone needing to leave the hotel. Otherwise, you’d never get out.

Scooter Culture

Outside Bangkok, scooters rule the road. There are thousands of small-engine motorbikes in Thailand and a culture has sprung up around them.

Lots of people conduct their businesses from motorcycles. We saw all manner of creative examples (like the cable company motorcycle with a 12-foot bamboo ladder strapped to the sidecar), but by far the most popular were the food carts. At first glance, they could be a simple tin shack or canvas tent with a kitchen-counter-top flat area, complete with charcoal grill for cooking or displaying whatever they had to sell. Above their heads might be some shelving or a sign with the business name. Look closely, though, and you’d invariably find the whole thing was welded onto a scooter. They’d simply drive up to a curb for the dinner rush, then drive back home after selling off a few hundred kabobs or pancakes.

Most gas stations in Thailand are small mom-and-pop businesses and they can be found on practically every street corner. A “big” enterprise might be two fifty-gallon drums hooked up to a manual pump. The gasoline is pumped up into a clear cylinder so that you can measure the amount before it’s drained into your gas tank. Seeing them in operation, with the Mountain Dew-yellow tinge to the liquid, reminded me how infrequently you actually see gasoline in the States.

With a scooter, sometimes all you need is a single liter of petrol. Most of the smaller “gas stations” were nothing more than a set of shelves propped up outside a convenience store or someone’s house. Rows of 1-liter glass bottles line the shelves with a big, bold price printed above: “Gasoline! 40 baht!” Driving by, you could almost be forgiven for thinking they were Corona ads.

Highways

With all the differences, I found it surprising that the highways in Thailand were like their counterparts in the United States. The roads were in good repair, making it possible to keep speeds up. Sometimes there were toll booths along the way. Some big gas stations along the way had restaurants, convenience stores, and even separate (free!) public bathroom structures.

But just when you begin to marvel at how things are like you remember them, all the little differences remind you that you’re still in a foreign country. The “gas” that’s being pumped into the tanks is actually natural gas. They have a vacuum seal on the nozzle for safety, but even so, it’s against regulations for you to stay in the vehicle while they refuel. Our minivan driver, more often than not, wandered around the convenience store and bathrooms with the rest of us while we waited. When the station attendant was finished, he would jump in and move the driver’s van out of the way for the next vehicle in line. I can’t imagine people in the States being comfortable with that.

Hotels

I guess because tourists tend to leave the air conditioner running when they leave their rooms, most hotels in Thailand have little credit card-like slots next to the light switch by the door. Usually you get a card (or thick slab of plastic) attached to your key ring and the first thing you do when you open your door is slide that card into the slot. Otherwise, no electricity.

We went on to see these in practically every hotel and hostel in Southeast Asia. I guess saving money on electricity is very important in those countries.

I get why they do it, but it’s still annoying. I’m the kind of guy that always turns off the lights. If we’re going out all day, I’m okay turning off the AC, too, but when you need to head out into the heat of the day for just a half hour? It’s nice to come back to a cool room.

There were also times I wanted to leave my computer on (to upload photos, for instance), but 10 seconds after you remove the key ring, all power to the room is cut off. It was frustrating enough at times that we started to experiment by putting other things into the slot. Who would have thought a Costco membership card would be useful in Thailand?

Franchises

If you ever look around your neighborhood and think, “Where have all the 7-Elevens gone?” well, the answer is Thailand. There are 7-Eleven franchises everywhere. Like the joke about finding competing Starbucks directly across the street from each other, we routinely saw 7-Elevens placed the same way.

I was surprised, too, to see the franchise image is mostly unchanged over there. Big selling points were hot dogs, Slurpees, and cheap morning coffee. Many drinks were spread among half a dozen different cooler cases (including beer and wine.) About the only thing that was really different, I’d say, is that they devoted one whole aisle just to Ramen and Cup o’ Noodles.

Oh, and all the chip flavors were like “Spicy Crab Seaweed.” That ain’t American.

(In fact, I just learned 7-Eleven isn’t American, either! In 1991, a Japanese corporation took a controlling interest in the franchise.)

Also, besides the ever-present McDonald’s, KFC, and Subway, Thailand also has a bunch of Sizzlers (of all things!)

Copy Culture

This idea, which I’m calling “copy culture” for now, isn’t specific to Thailand. The idea has been percolating in my head for awhile now and it just started to coalesce while we were there.

In Chiang Mai, a vendor set up shop in the Sunday market. A sign above their cart proclaimed “ONLY banana wrap in Sunday market! Accept no imitations!” There was an air of desperation about it, as though the proprietor were saying, “I had the idea first! It’s not fair! That other guy stole my recipe!”

Let me paint you another picture, before I get to my point: Walking down the street in Patong, we came across a store selling paintings. Obviously, this was an “artist-in-residence” or “artist-as-owner” sort of place, not an art gallery. There were large, frameless canvases covering every vertical surface. The usual Thai themes of sunsets, palm trees, and tigers were represented, but the piece that catches the eye is a painting of Heath Ledger, as the Joker, with his head out the driver’s side window of a speeding police car. It was a scene from The Dark Knight.

Okay, nothing too weird about that. It was a competent painting; someone might buy it. Heath’s former agent, perhaps. We continued on down the sidewalk.

The next store was also a painting shop. And the next, and the next, and the next. All the way down the block, small stores filled with dozens of paintings.

You want to know what every single one of them had? A painting of Heath Ledger, as the Joker, driving a police car with his head out the window.

It’s like one guy got tired of painting tigers and decided to work on a passion project… and it sold! All his jealous artist competitors said, “Well, I can do that!” So they all paused their DVD players in the same place and got to work.

You see the same thing with trinket and souvenir vendors all over the world. How many stalls sell the exact same crap as the one right next to them? Why is it that every tagua nut store has the same few animal carvings? How is it that the exact same pottery can be found for sale all over East Africa? It’s because someone became successful and everyone else is trying to recapture the magic.

Two things about the painting shop tableau jump out at me.

Firstly, entrepreneurship. I remember a professor once gave our business class a scenario to think about. “Let’s say a guy opens up a hot dog stand on in the middle of a long stretch of beach,” he began. “He’s immediately successful, and you decide there’s room for some healthy competition. Where do you set up your hot dog stand?”

He gave us a minute to think about it. “Place it at either end of the beach,” most of us thought. “But which end?”

Neither, it turns out. We should have set up our shop exactly adjacent to his hot dog stand. Why? Let’s say you set up at the far end of the beach, thinking you’ll get half the beach’s business, right? Well, not exactly. Take the case of the hungry customer that’s in the exact mid-point between both hot dog stands. He should be the only indecisive customer, as he has to walk the same distance in either direction to buy himself a dog. Theoretically, everyone on one side of him will come to your shop – because it’s closer – but everyone on the other side of him will go to your competitor, because his shop is closer.

Better to set up shop right next to original hot dog stand. That way, at least everyone on one side of the beach will encounter your stand first.

Is that why developing nations always have a “shoe street,” a “muffler street,” and a “gallery street?” At first blush, it seems like sound reasoning. If you set up shop next to your competitor, you could capture half his business. But what happens when there are seven competitors in the same location? Shouldn’t you then think of moving across town, capturing that whole market for yourself?

While we’re still on the subject of entrepreneurship… In the U.S., we’re taught that we can make a name for ourselves – get rich, climb the social ladder! – if only we can come up with the next great idea. Maybe we can invent that one niche product that no one else has thought of, yet everyone needs. The ShamWow, the Snuggie. Red Bull or Twitter. If our ideas are unique and we’re the first ones to market, we’ve got it made!

I don’t think most American’s first reaction to someone else’s success is to copy it for themselves. I think our first reaction is more along the lines of, “Why didn’t I think of that? Oh, well. Back to the drawing board.” It seems to me that perhaps the Thai attitude is more along the lines of, “I’m pretty sure I can do that better than he can.”

Which brings us to the second thought I had: Copyright.

The U.S. has some of the most stringent copyright laws in the world. We value our intellectual property so much that we have made the unauthorized duplication of digital media a criminal act. How much of an impact – good or bad – has copyright law had on our businesses?

People don’t make a living selling bootleg DVDs and software in the U.S. It’s big business in Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia.
People don’t sell paintings of scenes from movies (at least not on a large scale), lest they be sued into financial oblivion. Artists don’t have to worry about that in Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia.
Artists and inventors in the U.S. set their sights on patenting and securing their ideas, to ensure a lifetime of royalty payments. I wonder if Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia even have patent offices.

Personally, I think some aspects of our copyright system are hopelessly broken. I respect the idea that artists and businessmen should be able to control their intellectual works; in fact, I think the protections we afford them are vital to their ability to profit from it. That banana-wrap vendor in Chiang Mai: What legal recourse did he have? None.

On the other hand, I disagree that Disney should be able to sue someone 70 years down the road for using one of their cartoons in a Youtube video. Or that shadow corporations should be able to buy up software patents and make a killing suing Silicon Valley startups out of business.

But does that mean the developing world has the right of it? No, I don’t think so. I don’t know how a society pulls itself up out of the “copy culture” mentality and replaces it with a rule- and regulation-heavy entrepreneurial culture, but that might just be one of the (many) things that has to change in order for it to become a first world nation.

PVX: Thai Drinking Game

Arlo — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 05:16:59 +0000

00:00 – Introduction and Rules
03:52 – The Reveal
06:31 – First Round
16:23 – Second Round
26:22 – Credits and a Dare

The first time I walked into a 7/11 in Thailand, the sheer number of drinks in the coolers blew my mind. There were dozens of brands and flavors and I because couldn’t make heads or tails of their swirly writing, I had no idea what most of them were. I wanted to try them all…! but with my luck, I knew I’d end up with something like “Shrimp-Mussel Juice.” Sampling a random drink in Thailand would be like Russian Roulette, only my taste buds would be at stake.

Knowing that our friends were on the way, Oksana and I decided to wait for them before playing “Thai Roulette.” I mentioned the idea to Wendy and Dusty (from Roam the Planet) and their friend Sarah. They were game!

We decided to film the whole thing, because it seemed like it might be entertaining for you to watch us taste all these mystery drinks and because Wendy and Dusty had just brought us a new point-and-shoot camera (to replace our ailing Panasonic Lumix.) It was a Sony TX10, which boasts 1080p video. Since they had the exact same model, we shot with both cameras to see if the footage would match well in editing. It was also a good test for me, to find out if our new camera could double as a camcorder in a pinch. (Answer: No. You can read my thoughts on that after the jump.)

During one of our first meals together, I laid out the ground rules for the little drinking game I’d created in my head. Then we hit the stores, buying our drinks in secret, and then revealed them to each other later that evening. Unfortunately, when we did, it was raining outside our hotel and the cameras picked up a lot of street noise while we were recording.

This video turned out much longer than I expected — close to half an hour! Now, I could spend many more hours whittling it down to just the funniest parts, but that goes against my self-imposed guidelines for these “Postcard Valet Extra” videos. (Also, it sounds like a lot of work!) So I left pretty much everything in, including some awkward jump cuts and blurry video. On the plus side, if you stick it out, you’ll get to see every little grimace as we sample 10 crazy Thai drinks. If half an hour is too much of a commitment, feel free to use the time markers above to jump to the section that sounds most interesting.

The Sony TX10

There are some things about the Sony TX10′s video recording that I liked, but for the most part, color me unimpressed. I do like that you can zoom in while recording — that’s a feature we missed on our old Panasonic Lumix TZ5. On the other hand, the start-up time is terrible and the auto focus is all over the place. It’s quite nice to have a small camera that can track a subject that moves toward or away from the camera, but in my experience, this model has trouble staying locked onto subjects and, as you can see in the video, the focus tends to roam while you’re recording.

The audio recording isn’t that great, either. Both cameras we used picked up the background whine and amplified it. At least you can still hear what people are saying.

After a few months with the TX10, I have to say I’m mostly unimpressed. I will admit that I found one fantastic use for it, however. Slap a mini-GorillaPod on the sucker, drop it to the bottom of the ocean while snorkeling (it’s waterproof to about 16 ft), and you can get some fantastic video!

PVX: McDonald’s in the United Arab Emirates (Dubai)

Arlo — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 13:08:02 +0000

You always feel like you’re getting short-changed when you’re only in a country for a day or two. We had only 17 hours to spend in Dubai, but I’m surprised how much we got to see and do. We wandered two gigantic malls, went snow skiing, walked the base of the world’s tallest building, road around the city on a tour bus, and of course we ate at McDonald’s for lunch!

Most of the menu in Dubai’s McDonald’s was the normal fare; the stuff that wasn’t was almost exclusively vegetarian. We tried the Veggie Burger, spring rolls, and a McPuff! I could have trimmed this video down a little more — it’s one of the longer McDonald’s videos we’ve made — but there are a couple funny moments that I just didn’t want to cut out. (Plus there’s a bit of background on that whole Orbitz fiasco thing we went through. I forgot that by this point, we still weren’t sure if we were going to get reimbursed for our new plane tickets; we eventually did!)

PVX: McDonald’s in Russia

Arlo — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 12:47:08 +0000

Going to McDonald’s in Russia was almost and afterthought for us. We spent our first week or so in St. Petersburg without stopping by one, and then, a day or two before we were set to hop on a train to Irkutsk, we realized that we might not get another chance. I wasn’t sure there was a McDonald’s in Irkutsk, but I knew for sure there wasn’t going to be on on Kamchatka. We’d already eaten at a Russian McDonald’s in 2006, so it wasn’t like missing it this time would bother me. Still, we weren’t making videos back then…

So, while we were on our way to buy a new pair of hard drives, we decided to stop off for lunch. I remembered to bring the video camera, but it turns out I forgot to bring a battery for the microphone. The on camera mic did well enough, even if it did pick up a bit too much traffic noise.

Couple notes about the video: I guess we finally found an acceptable answer for why all the McDonald’s managers have been so adamant about us not taking photos. Copyright infringement, which I think is a pretty silly excuse in this case, is a party line I could see the franchise enforcing. At least it’s an answer; we usually don’t even get that.

We never did go seeking the rumored “fake McDonald’s of Russia. Would have been fun to order a Big Mec, or whatever, and see how close it was to the real deal. Next time! Also, as you may have figured out from watching the video, we didn’t “get” the Chicken Shake because we didn’t find the curry powder until after we’d finished eating. I guess you’re supposed to pour that in the bag with the chicken and shake it all around. Maybe they even have different flavors.

PVX: McDonald’s in Estonia

Arlo — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 18:00:42 +0000

Okay, I’ll admit it. Sometimes recording these McDonald’s podcasts gets old. After doing so many, back to back, I feel like they’re all the same. Boring. The last few visits we’ve tried to saying something new in each one, even if that’s just in the intro on closing. Hopefully that’ll come through as we move forward.

Keeping to a weekly posting schedule has almost caught us up, too! After this one in Estonia, we only have Russia and Dubai to edit. However, by the time we get through posting those two, I’m sure we’ll have a recording for Thailand, too.

Back to this video: As an intro, I tried to list off, from memory, the 25 different countries where I’ve eaten at a McDonald’s. Fell three short because I forget Venezuela, Costa Rica, and Puerto Rico. Also, yes, I know that Amsterdam is a city, not a country.

Don’t know if you know about it, but we have a page where we track all this: McDonald’s of the World.

Finally, we probably shouldn’t have tried to record this video outdoors on a day with such fickle weather, but the area was beautiful and I wanted to incorporate as much of old town Tallinn into the edit as I could. Filming outdoors has its own set of challenges, however. Have you seen the video yet? Did you, like me, think you were hearing a horse trotting down the cobblestone street?

PVX: McDonald’s in Finland

Arlo — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:00:37 +0000

We only really had one opportunity to eat at McDonald’s while we were in Helsinki and neither Oksana nor I were hungry at the time. Unfortunately, I think that sort of shows in the video. Hunger being the best spice and all that.

Anyway, we made a big deal about how incomprehensible the Finnish menu was for us, but we actually had a very helpful person taking our order. He was an older gentleman with perfect English. When I told him I’d have the 1955 burger, he nodded and said, “Good choice. You’ll like that one, it’s very good!” I’ve never had a McDonald’s cashier validate the deliciousness of my order before!

Just for fun, here’s the official Finland McDonald’s menu (at least for the Helsinki restaurant we visited.) Can someone tell me what a Tuplajuustohampurilaisateria is?

PVX: McDonald’s in Bulgaria

Arlo — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 17:00:09 +0000

Who would have thought Bulgaristan would have had one of the most interesting McDonald’s menus we’ve encountered so far? Not me!

We only had two days in Sofia, the capital, so we made sure to hit McDonald’s for dinner the night we arrived. We saw so many things on the menu we wanted to try that we went back again the next day. Because this is a double-shot of food sampling, it’s a slightly longer-than-normal video.

Also, this is where we learn that Oksana has been lying to us! After I turned off the camera, she made a face and said she really didn’t like the Zorba.

“What?!” I asked. ”Why didn’t you say that on camera?”

“I don’t know…” she replied.

We ended up swapping burgers, so I didn’t even get to eat my McMenu Shrimp Lemon Burger! I have to admit, too, that the Zorba does whatever the opposite of “grows on you” is. By the end, I had to force myself to eat the last bite. Oksana was right on one point: That cheese was really salty!

And don’t worry. Oksana has since vowed to be more honest on camera. Let’s hope she doesn’t start doing spit-takes!

PVX: McDonald’s in Turkey

Arlo — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 17:30:33 +0000

Guess what? We ate at McDonald’s in Turkey, too.

Not much to say about this one except that we used the trip to McDonald’s as an excuse to go a little farther from our hotel in Sultanahmet. We rode the metro to the Kanyon Mall and planned to take in a movie, too, but the ticket prices were pretty high and nothing was starting soon, so we just did our McDonald’s thing instead. The restaurant was so crowded (and obviously trendy) that we weren’t sure we’d even get a table at first.

And dang it! This is the third week in a row I’ve posted a McDonald’s video with audio problems. It’s a really good thing this sort of stuff doesn’t bother me. This time, it wasn’t the fault of the video camera; what you’re hearing is what it picked up in a very noisy restaurant. No, the fault lies in that little microphone you can see on the table with the red record light. The red record light that lets us know it’s recording. The red record light that has nothing to do with whether or not the recording will eventually be saved to the micro-SD card inside. It’s only happened once or twice so far, but sometimes the mic (a Zoom H1) “crashes” (for lack of a better word.) Oh, well. At least I don’t have to type up subtitles this time.

PVX: McDonald’s in Israel

Arlo — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 17:00:44 +0000

We really only had one day in Israel, so of course visiting a McDonald’s was high on our list of things to do! My goal was to go to one of the few kosher restaurants, but they were all closed for Shabbat; we checked. We lucked out because there was one in the airport and we hit it on the way out, but it didn’t have the infamous “blue arches,” one of the only logo changes McDonald’s has ever approved (supposedly.)

Anyway, we dragged our friend, Michal, to McDonald’s in Tel Aviv with us. Turned out to be a good thing, as most of the menu was in Hebrew…

Oh, and I think the mic on Oksana’s point-and-shoot is toast. No idea what happened (raindrop, perhaps?), but this is the second recording where the audio is just horrible. Good thing we have friends bringing us a brand new Sony TX10 in a few weeks!

PVX: McDonald’s in The Kingdom of Jordan

Arlo — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 17:00:21 +0000

I have to admit that recording this video — even asking to stop at a McDonald’s on the way — felt a little awkward. I’m self-conscious enough recording videos in a restaurant; doing the same thing with two strangers in the car? A little odd. After it was over, though, Tina said I sounded very natural, so maybe it doesn’t come across that bad.

Exercise for the viewer: See if you can spot the continuity error!

PVX: McDonald’s in Egypt

Arlo — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 17:25:23 +0000

After a long Big Mac dry spell, we finally made it across Africa and found another country with Golden Arches: Egypt! We ended up eating at McDonald’s again and again before we left the country if only because we kept stopping in for the AC and vanilla cones! Egypt is hot in August!

This is the first video we didn’t shoot in the restaurant itself. I find it ironic that we chose not to because the environment wasn’t conducive to good video, but look at the problems this video has! The florescent lights in our room wreaked havoc with the image; sorry about that. We weren’t planning to shoot another review, but when we saw the sandwiches on display in Aswan, I had to try one. We only had Oksana’s point-and-shoot camera with us, however, and it did a horrible job with the audio. (Not sure why, either, because we shot practically the whole Ecuadorian Jungle video with that little camera!) These issues bother me, but I’m trying to remind myself that these McDonald’s videos were never intended to be perfect. That comforts me somewhat. It also helps when I think about the mayo that both Oksana and I had stuck to our faces in the first segment…

Speaking of awkward food review moments. Boy, when you’re on camera, the time between taking a bite and swallowing it so you can talk again seems like an eternity. I should watch the the Food Network and take notes on how they do it.

PV017: Diving in Zanzibar

Arlo — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 17:00:03 +0000

View the same video in high-definition (720p) on Youtube.

There’s not much to say about the video that we didn’t already say in the video, but I’ll give it a try:

We spent a little more than a week on the island of Zanzibar, near a tiny village named Bwejuu. We spent the majority of that time very near our lodge, but we did manage to get out of our hammocks long enough to do a 2-tank dive with the Rising Sun Dive Center. Glad we did! The diving staff that worked there were great and we saw or did something new on each of our dives!

Technical stuff:

In some ways, I wish we could reshoot elements of this video. For instance, our underwater footage is overwhelming blue — so close to monochrome that my normal trick of color-correcting some red back into the imagery didn’t work at all. In all fairness, I expected this would happen as soon as I learned we would be diving at a depth of almost 100 feet. Water filters out the colors of light and red is the first to go. Besides that, it was an overcast day, and the sunlight wasn’t that strong to begin with. We could see just fine down there, but our point-and-shoot camera can only do so much… (Too bad we can’t travel with diving lights, too!)

We also recorded our voice-overs outdoors, at the lodge. The tropical scenery behind us is quite fitting, but the wind noise was something we couldn’t avoid. Not to mention the birds.

Still, even with these minor problems, I think you’ll get a good sense of what our dives were like when you watch this video.

Notes

Rising Sun Dive Center
Breezes Beach Club and Spa
Our tour review of the Rising Sun Dive Center

The following is a transcript of the above video for Google’s benefit (ignore it, watch the video instead!)

Postcard Valet Travel Podcast
Episode 17 – Diving in Zanzibar

Off the coast of Tanzania, is the island of Zanzibar. We decided to spend a week out here on the beach, relaxing and enjoying the green-blue ocean and the white sand beaches.

While on the island, Arlo and I went diving with Rising Sun Dive Center. The dive center is located at the Breezes Resort.

The Breezes Resort is really nice. They’ve got a pool, a nice restaurant, bars everywhere…

It is a very nice property and we were quite happy to have a chance to visit it.

A few hundred yards off the shore of Zanzibar lays a reef. You can see the waves breaking out there even though it’s not really worth swimming out because the water’s very shallow up until you get to the reef. Just beyond lays deeper water, and that’s where we did our dives.

Our first dive was incredible; it was our first drift dive. And after descending to about 28 meters – fairly deep – the current just carried us along. Once Oksana and I got used to it, we had a great time.

It was out first time diving in the Indian Ocean…

The Indian Ocean has a huge variety of life, and near Zanzibar, it seems like it’s more a micro world than a macro world. The variety of coral was amazing. Everywhere you looked, there was something different to see and it was the same with the fish — every one that you looked at seemed different than the one before.

There wasn’t a lot of large marine life down there for us to see, and it was a little bit difficult as we tried to get close to the small stuff, because the current was very strong.

The current even impressed our divemasters—

We didn’t find out until we actually finished our dive that it was quite an incredible drift dive.

When we came up and checked the GPS, they were amazed to find that we had gone over 3 kilometers underwater. Not a problem. The boat was there to pick us up because, when we were at our safety stop, they inflated a balloon to let them know where we were.

And that was something that was nice in this dive: We didn’t have to keep tabs on the boat; the boat kept tabs on us.

The highlight for the trip, personally for me, was seeing the dolphins.

Between dives, we got to see a pod of dolphins swimming by, and on the off-chance that they were going to get close enough, we slipped into the water with just our snorkeling equipment.

And we stayed in the water for about 10 minutes just looking at the dolphins and it was really neat to see them under water.

Our second dive was a little bit shallower and the coral was a little bit more colorful because of that.

I really wish it was a slightly sunnier day because I would have really liked to see all the colors of those corals.

On the second dive we saw more fish and more varieties of fish. We saw a very colorful blue and yellow eel, a small moray that I got close to… Neil, one of our divemasters, was so excited to see a couple baby sharks sleeping under a ledge. Apparently, they’re very rare in this area and when we came up and talked to the divemasters, they told us that this was quite the sight to see.

Another thing we saw in the water, frequently, were a huge variety of jellyfish. There was one long thing which I took for some sort of egg sack, but they told us later that it was actually just a jellyfish that was floating by.

This was our first time diving in the Indian Ocean and both Oksana and I had a great time with Rising Sun Dive Center.

The divemasters were really fun and enthusiastic. I think overall it was a really nice dive; I’ve enjoyed it quite a bit.

If you find yourself relaxing in Zanzibar, and you want something to do…

Even if you’re not staying at the Breezes Resort, give the Rising Sun Dive Center a shot. They’re good guys!

Postcard Valet: Episode 17
Diving in Zanzibar

Postcard Valet is a travel podcast by Arlo & Oksana Midgett

10 July 2011
Zanzibar
Tanzania

Be sure to visit:

Rising Sun Dive Center
http://www.risingsun-zanzibar.com

Breezes Beach Club and Spa
http://www.breezes-zanzibar.com

If you enjoyed watching this, the best thanks you can give us is to show it to someone else!

Want more Postcard Valet?
We upload a ton of photos to www.facebook.com/arlo.midgett and www.facebook.com/o.midgett

And we post often on Twitter at www.twitter.com/rlomidgett and www.twitter.com/o_midgett

You can “Like” our Facebook fan page at www.facebook.com/postcardvalet

Love it or hate it, we always appreciate honest reviews of our podcast in the iTunes Store.
And sales from our SmugMug prints go directly into our travel budget!

Full disclosure: Rising Sun Dive Center offered us a 2-tank dive for the price of fuel only.

PVX: McDonald’s in South Africa

Arlo — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 17:00:11 +0000

The audio isn’t great in this one — we found ourselves in a McDonald’s that was packed full of screaming kids — but I think you can still understand what we’re saying. I suppose we could have recorded another McDonald’s session; we were in South Africa for over a month, after all. But honestly it takes a lot of effort (and a sort of public performance bravado we have to psych ourselves up for) to whip out a video camera and talk about what you’re eating with people all around you. Once we’ve got it “in the can,” we’re much less likely to go for “take 2!”

A couple mistakes I noticed in editing:

1) The McRoyale isn’t a renamed DOUBLE Quarter Pounder, it’s a renamed DELUXE Quarter Pounder. (Big diff, I know.)

2) I say that the BBQ sauce on the McFeast is the same that’s on the McRib in the States. That may or may not be true, but I wish I hadn’t referred to it as “BBQ sauce,” but rather “Braai sauce.” I didn’t see the burger box copy until later:

BRING ON THE BRAAI
The summer’s always here with the two quarter pounds of pure beef and the unique taste combination of smokey South African Braai sauce and tangy mayo.
Let the good times roll.

PVX: A Crash of Rhinos

Arlo — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 08:53:56 +0000

When I put together the African Big 5 Safaris video, there were a few things left on the cutting room floor. This little story, about a rhino encounter we had on Day Two, was one of them.

It happened right after our first cheetah sighting, on our way back to camp. The gates close promptly at 5:30pm, so we were hustling to make it back in time. When this herd of rhinos blocked our path, our guide, Marcel, started to fret.

The gate was closed when we eventually drove up (at exactly 5:39pm!) Fortunately, we weren’t the only late ones, and we slipped in with the rest of the cars in line. Even so, we were prepared with an excellent excuse: My photos’ timestamps proved that we had spent exactly nine minutes behind those rhinos!

The main reason I left this segment out of the original video was because the edit was already running long. There were other, technical, hard-to-edit-around problems with this video, too. Oksana and I were both shooting, but we’d framed essentially the same shots with our cameras. Our exposures were wildly different, with hers over-compensating for the deepening twilight. You’ll see when I have to jump-cut between them. It’s like night and day; pretty jarring.

No worries, though. Quality issues like that may have kept it out of the first Safari video’s final cut, but I’m much more lenient with our Postcard Valet “Extras!”

Notes
African Big 5 Safaris