Ever since Facebook introduced email contact through fanpages, I’ve received a ton of them. Maybe you sympathize or despise my popularity, but what I normally do is delete these pesky messages. Typically it’s a spammer or some aggressive business demanding I ‘like’ their page. Thank god for that delete button.

About a week ago a woman named Andrea contacted me, asking some general travel questions. She’s starting to plan her own journey and was seeking advice.

I usually pay attention to these messages and answer them privately, hoping to help ease concerns.

Then a eureka moment sounded off in my head. I decided that answering her questions directly on the blog might also help others.

I’m not so advanced in this field that I believe questions of this nature are stupid. No question is stupid and it’s best to remember that at one time, I was an Andrea.

I had a wide range of questions and concerns, from safety issues to packing efficiently. The unknown of what a country can bring, plagues us along with the logistics. It’s only human.

So Andrea, this is for you!

Q: How do you deal with loneliness?

I think lonely has garnered a bad reputation. When I first started out in 2010, I did struggle with always being by myself, having to navigate everything solo. It can be exhausting. Once I settle into a place, being alone gives me the opportunity to reflect on my surroundings, even process what’s currently happening to me. The biggest bonus? You learn who you are intimately and realize the beauty of self-love and self-reliance. I think women aren’t allowed that opportunity, thus solo travel gave me this knowledge, which I carry with me as a second skin. To give you some practical answers, journaling is a great way to flesh out your thoughts. Seek out people in hostels, engage them in conversation and soon an invitation might spring from these encounters. If you’re a shy sort, taking part in day tours are prime circumstances to meet other people. These short friendships can sustain those lonely moments. Finally, I cannot emphasize this enough, maintain your close friendships with those who knew you before blogging or your travel life through Skype and Facebook. I regularly speak to my girlfriends who know me well and know my dirty secrets. None of you will ever meet them, by the way. Skype has a cheap plan that allows you to call any landline or cell phone, so if they don’t have Skype, it doesn’t matter! You can still keep in contact. And I don’t mean just your mother. You can’t vent or share in the same vein that you can with your besties.

Q:  How do you find medicine overseas, particularly birth control pills?

Dependant on what you need for medication, try to research some of the countries you plan to anoint with your greatness and see if you can re-supply at those spots. If you know you’ll be in a challenging country, try to refresh before you leave, so when the next stop arrives, you might be in a better situation to refill medication. When I went to India, I supplied up on ciprofloxacin in preparation for that pervasive Delhi Belly, but managed to find some there (usually through prescription though) without a problem.  Some medicines can be purchased without a prescription — India and Thailand are a bit flexible.  The perception that all developing countries are not medically advanced is inaccurate. I’ve had state of the art treatment in India and China. Also, countries like Thailand are well-known for medical tourism. Now, for birth control pills, that is more challenging.  Before your trip, investigate options like Depo-Provera shots (only required four times a year) and an IUD.  For example, an IUD doesn’t need insertion and can last 3 to 5 years.  Or visit a western European country if you really want birth control pills.  A good place to find them are at family planning clinics or even some General Practitioners might assist you.

Q: I have curly hair, what can you recommend for hair products? And do you have curly hair?

I don’t have curly hair, but I do have wavy hair, so can sympathize. Curly hair is a restless bear trampling over your camp ground and driving you up a tree. Or in real terms, trampling over your good looks if it goes frizzy. I swear by Lush products.  They have 830 stories in 51 countries.  Their Curly Wurly shampoo is good and the Coolaulin conditioner takes to curly hair well, according to online reviews. Their products are expensive, but have never misfired on me. Don’t pack a hair dryer and let your hair air dry.  You gain healthier locks and drop over processing. Over processing makes hair pissed off. Another way to control it is braid it wet and when it’s half dry, release your gorgossity. What really makes curly hair call a mutiny is over washing. Every two to three days is sufficient and helps your head build natural oils.

Q: Should I get medical travel insurance?

YES. Medical insurance is a must. It’s your back up plan, the best friend you bring along who’ll call your dad if you get in trouble.  I’ve used quite a few in my time, but let me highlight some here.

1. Budget travelers have been known to use World Nomads, they are cheaper and supposedly offer extendable plans.  But they’ve gotten a few negative reviews.  I haven’t used them myself, so cannot comment on any negativity.
2. I used Atlas America (HCC Medical Services).  Their plans are higher than World Nomads, but I made a number of claims after my India trip and was paid out without much fuss.  It was also easy for me to extend the plan during my travels.  I simply clicked a few buttons on their site and a new card was emailed to me.  I printed it off and was set for another six months.
3. Another option is IMG. I’ve heard great things about them and they offer a wide range of medical insurance, from student insurance to adventure insurance.
4. A last one is Travel Guard. They’ve been in business 20 years and were even recommended by Rick Steves.

Medical insurance is something you shouldn’t scrimp on, it is your health after all!  In ranking order, I’d review Atlas, IMG and then Travel Guard as possible choices.

Andrea, I hope these answers made you feel more comfortable and excited about your trip.

And if the rest of you found this post useful, I’d be happy to answer questions again.  Just email me through my contact page!

Once upon a time I was a zero.  Just a faceless office drone making fresh pots of coffee, typing out minutes of meetings and filling staplers with little pieces of metal.

Then bout’ three years ago I came up with this unbeatable idea: BE A STAR ON THE INTERNET!  Okay, let me reverse that a bit.  I actually decided to sell everything I owned to travel this wild, quirky, unexplainable world.

My cherry red couch became a cherry red backpack, then I finally chose to become an Internet force.  This blog was birthed to share my honest thoughts on being a mature woman who travels a lot and alone.

As I began to navigate this crazy Internet existence it became clear to me that I had to adopt some kind of brand.

Be something.  I looked around at this idea of image and soon enough, I found myself making connections.  My image was making friends with other images.  People I may never meet in person, but when I do there’s always a tangle of nerves in my stomach.

Will they be the same in person as they are online?  Will I be?  Did they post a photo of themselves from the neck up for a reason?

A few interesting reactions I receive have to do with my height.

“I thought you’d be taller.”  Dripping with surprise, a hint of disappointment. Freaking sorry to not be a WNBA sized woman.

Or my nervous tension will interrupt someone as they’re talking, “Tell me, it’s true, isn’t it?  I’m wayyy more funny in person than on my blog.  Right? Right?”  Once they say ‘yes’, I’m satisfied, but devastated that my blog is right up there with funeral marches. Goth poetry.  That movie The Crow.

After these encounters, I always ponder investment.  How much do I invest in my Internet ‘face’ over how often I step away from the computer to round out my life?

Is the blog me or am I the blog?

Marketing experts will often emphasize image building.  Crafting a certain set of precepts to ensnare readers, but to also keep them.

Remember Gay Girl in Damascus?  It was a transfixing blog by a 35 year old Syrian-American lesbian living in Syria during the political uprising of 2011.  A litter of reasons existed to love this blog.  It was written by a woman, a voice not often heard from in that part of the globe.  Her openness about her sexuality in a conservative culture won her numerous fans and her participation in the revolution brought more admiration.

Amina Abdallah Arraf al Omar was her name and at the zenith of her fame, she disappeared on June 6, 2011, allegedly nabbed by security forces.  The netsphere ramped up, pleading for her to be safely returned.

Then it all fell apart.  Amina was really Tom McMaster, a 40 year old white guy living in Scotland.   A bloody heterosexual.  Calling himself a Middle East activist, he claimed that creating an Arab woman gave him freedom to discuss political issues on the region without that stigma of Americanism.

I can’t help thinking of the author — Tom.  Would he carry around her words in his head, speak like her sometimes, adopt her gait?  Get so caught up in what she gave him to quit?  She gave him media interviews, numerous accolades, a lesbian lover from Canada, an entirely separate world from his own.

Amina was an intriguing personality to live in.  A homerun.

I’ve been following Erika Napoletano, also known as Redhead Writing. She spins herself as a no nonsense branding coach.  Author, Speaker, Motivator.  With nearly 10,000 Facebook fans trawling her page, I’d say that’s a successful haul.  The woman is hilarious, no doubt, with a likeable personality.  She’s been featured by Forbes, among other publications. Her crowning touch is simple — the F-bomb.

She uses it to great affect on her fan page, all over the place really.  For example, “Fuck Yeah” Friday has been a popular campaign.  There’s something charming about a stunning redheaded woman hurling out vocabulary used by sailors.

I can see her now.  F-bombing the clerk at her grocery store, throwing F-bombs at her two dogs, telling her mom F-this and F-that.  I really wish she was my F-ing best friend.

Come now, let’s not be naive.  She can’t really be like that on a daily basis?  I’ll pause now to shrug, because she could be.  But something tells me, no.  Certainly not every minute, or in every conversation she has.  Even she would say herself, it’s a smart branding device to get noticed and stay noticed.

My meandering point is the notion of duality.  There have been times I’m depressed, feeling very unmotivated to share those true feelings.  Or periods of intense happiness and I’m sometimes willing to hit ‘publish’.

The duality I’m talking about is the division between persona and presence.  I never want to be that person who sells you false advertising.  Who portrays a radically adventurous life when in reality I’m an adult woman living in my parents dank basement, working a dead end job, spending my nights with Doritos and Oreos while watching the NatGeo channel to get ideas for this blog that you read so religiously.

I’d write this damn thing if nobody read it.  Maybe that means this blog is serious at times.  Or aggravatingly boring.

Persona only takes you so far.  It’s presence, committing to living with consciousness, doing things that make you smile — inside and out.  What you read is still my essence, even if I’m bragging about that tubular skydive in Prague, and don’t you want to be me and have my life?

That’s the game I try to bring.  Oh, and the occasional F-bomb.  Gotta get those Google hits.

Every content creator from bloggers to businessmen have their tools.  Lately I’ve become wildly enamoured with Instagram.

There is something exotic, almost inexplicable about a moment.  How it trickles into being.  A surreal sense that something is happening to you, part of your brain is watching it happen and then your memory fires to capture it.

That’s Instagram.  It’s the kind of tool that’s a revolving map to those collective moments.  How they all add up to where you are and what you’re experiencing.

I recall many a time when I’d encounter a person or a scene, turn to the air and ask “Did you just see that?”   The stubborn air always kept silent.

Now you can see it.  Share it. And ‘like’ it.  Instagram may seem narcissistic, a venue for bad photographers to look capable or full of pointless dog photos, but I enjoy its immediacy.

As a traveler, events accelerate so quickly for me that it’s comforting to know when I’m decrepit and my mind is fading that the things I experienced are archived.  That they did exist.

As for the company itself, creators Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger launched Instagram on October 6, 2010.  By day one, there were 25,000 users signed up.  By February of 2011, Instagram was valued at 25 million.  Their product kept growing as Twitter and Facebook users uploaded the play-by-play of their lives at an exponential speed.

Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook had been watching them since the beginning and always anticipated the two companies melding together.  By the time Facebook was ready to buy, 30 million iPhone users were using the app.  I highly recommend reading a Vanity Fair feature on the inception and denouement when Facebook finally purchased Instagram.

On a deeply personal note, I follow certain people who take freaking stunning photographs or tell a story or simply prod me to take better photos.

The five I love right now…

1. Sarah Mica – Photographer

Sarah is a Boston based portrait photographer who seamlessly captures the human figure or leads me through the city she loves. Beantown.

Her feed: instagram.com/sarahmica.

2.  Marie-Eve Vallieres – Travel Blogger and Photographer

Marie has the ability to make me ache all over.  Her timeless photos of Paris allow me to relive some intimate moments I’ve had with Parisian architecture.  She bewitches by beautifully documenting whatever European city or town she’s in with style and a loving eye.

Her feed: instagram.com/mevallieres.

3.  Jenny Gao – China Food and Culture Extradanoire

I love food, saviour every succulent morsel that enters my mouth, but I think you know this blog isn’t a foodie source.  I toss words, not salads.  Since I’ve been in China, I’ve faithfully followed Jenny.  She was born in Chengdu, a well of gastronomy.  Her passion is how food and culture connects all of us.  My dormant foodie lives vicariously through her feed and her photos on Chinese life always fascinate.

Her feed: instagram.com/jingtheory.

4.  The Life Escape - Travel Bloggers and Photographers

I just started following Denis and K.T., a couple who left the financial world to travel for at least a year.  While it seems a tiresome story (including my own).. Escape the chains of a sealed office existence and burst onto the globe with exuberance!!!  With yet another travel blog [sighhhhh].. Their photos are laced with discovery and there’s nothing wrong with that.  It forces me to drop my shell, that cynical outer self I tend to cart around unchecked at times.  They use really interesting angles that feel realistic to me.  I tend to view a structure about a kazillion meters taller than me from strange angles — almost sideways sometimes.  I like their perspectives on architecture.

Their feed: instagram.com/thelifescape.

5. Kristin Lajeunesse – Vegan Food Blogger

Okay, so perhaps I really am a foodie wannabe, but here’s my deal with food.  I sooo relish eating it, despise preparing it.  If I had a food preparation officer at the ready, my culinary experiences would be wide open.  Since September 2011, Kristin has been living in her van from donations to fulfill her mission — to eat at every vegan restaurant in the U.S.  What amazes me about her photos is the food in them are meat and dairy free (sometimes gluten too!), but always, always look mouthwatering.  Some of the dishes she shares have me wagging my tongue.  This blows chunks at the idea that eating vegan has to be tasteless and dull.  Her on-the-road images are also adorable.

 Her feed: instagram.com/wtfveganfood.

If you want to follow my feed, go here: instagram.com/nomadicchick.

Who are you following on Instagram lately?  And why?  Feel free to share their link in the comments.

Editor’s note: any photos used to depict each Instagram feed are not owned by me whatsoever, but by each photographer featured here.

I last left you with street art in Wuxi and Shanghai, promising to write about the commercial art galleries in Shanghai.

Known as 50 Moganshan Lu or M50, I had expected a small collection of galleries.  After rallying her and her to join me for a wander, it became obvious M50 is an extensive creative park.

How apt that the map of the property also calls it a ‘creative park’.  The art galleries that were once factory spaces are a labyrinth, offering a variety of artistic styles — from oil paintings, to mixed media, pure photography or sculpture installations.

I sunk back into this environment with surprising ease, after being permanently scarred all those years, carted around by my ex as his art ‘wife’.

For a change, art and I were alone, without the pompous airs.  We lit candles to set the mood and held hands, which allowed me to make new discoveries about modern art in Shanghai.

Contrary to misconceptions about Chinese censorship, there seems to be a lot of freedom to express oneself.  M50 is accessible by taxi (not really metro) and prepare to spend a few hours walking and unearthing some hot and happening work.

My friends and I searched by instinct.  If an exhibition seemed worth a look, we went in.  You can also gauge a map for what might interest you when you arrive or research online.  There’s certainly no correct way to savior art, no matter what those pedantic art critics say.

I’ve chosen a few pieces and styles that really spoke to me.  Hope they do for you!

Portraits

From an exhibition called “We Are All Bachelors”, artist Wei Yi captured an ethnic minority group of men from a village in western China. The village has an interesting dilemma, there are very few available females in comparison to single men, which has left many males without wives or children at 40 + years of age.  Considering that all the buzz in China is about leftover women or  shèngnǚ, it was unusual to find spinster men. Wei captured their place in time and history with a haunting brush.

Wei also completed full size portraits of the lonely bachelors.

Wei Yi’s other work are in-depth perspectives on the daily lives of migrant workers and their families   How they exist, where they toil, and the sacrifices they make towards the urbanization of China.

Sculpture

As you wander around M50, you’ll notice various pieces of sculptural art.

Like this very industrial looking rhino:

Or this ambitious large scale one — gigantic man.  Mind the gap in his belly.

Still Life

I’m not one for this type of work, some have captured my eye in the past, but mostly I’m fairly neutral on this style.  But I quite fancied these!  They were sparse, yet evocative.

Post-Modern

I was absolutely enthralled with Qiu Shengqian’s oil paintings that fuse the futuristic with classic Asian images.  I was thrust into a new dimensional world of space alien geishas, punk rock emperors and ebullient Buddhas who mocked more than forgave.

A bit of mixed media action for you, this piece involved reclaiming old Chinese books and reforming them into a modern statement.  The exhibition –  ”Heritage” by Chen Linggang.

This one felt bizarro.  I kept picturing The Hanged Man card of a tarot deck.  This exhibition is “Tree of Man” by Mao Yu.

In divination, The Hanged Man can symbolize a life in suspension, which describes China’s face at the moment.  A country that has yet to complete its future.  Though the red ribbons imply blood flowing down.  What do you think?

Ceramics

I had no idea China had such a selection of ceramics.  Shows what I know.

These richly fired vases are from artist Liao Liao.

China has a sense of humor!  Pull the string and see what happens.

I envision a classy Chinese lady buying these as her wedding setting.  Porcelain with a blue pigment of cobalt oxide that’s generally applied by hand — very delicate looking.

Classical design.

These made me giggle.  Artist Dong Tao’s Chinglish tells us why she created these [typed as seen with spelling errors intact]:

“Everyone have their memories about the childhood.  The dream is the wonderful fantacy from maker, she desired to be companyed with huge rabbit, go around the world, to sence the beauty of nature.  Perhaps the innocent dream of childhood, is the realest about inside.”

I’d buy a rabbit based on that description alone!  But they go for 1,280 RMB, so maybe not.

Everyone should get their own Shanghai fan for 128 RMB.  All the hep cats are doing it!

Before you conclude that Chinese art is merely calligraphy and ink strokes of plum blossoms, Shangri-La mountain ranges and willowy women, visit Moganshan Lu to open your eyes.  You’ll find yourself reeducated, permeating with that art glow.

Glad I got mine back.

“You have to look at it as a piece of artwork.” — Twist, on graffiti

In art, there’s nothing if not drama.  After I revealed my tale of art woe…  The great love, the loss that tore my heart to pieces, until I finally recaptured the flame.  The time came to move towards bigger waters.  Shanghai.

I ventured on a rainy Friday afternoon to 50 Moganshan Lu, or known as M50, to feast on more artwork.

If you’re unaware of M50, it use to be an industrial area along Suzhou Creek, in the downtown district of Jing’an.  As the millennium unfolded, several Chinese artists found the large factory spaces and cheap rent appealing.  Today, the quarter of M50 is flooded by international visitors and locals, and was named a must-see part of Shanghai to visit by Time Magazine.

However, before I got to explore the commercialized art of M50, my curious nature couldn’t help noticing a series of spray painted walls.  Some of these walls housing nothing more than junk, replete with junkyard chickens.

Droplets of rain didn’t deter me from walking for several yards back and forth capturing some inventive street art.

You wouldn’t think such a nondescript street would have this, but as usual, China continually surprises me.

The street:

The chickens:

The art:

Either a Matrix tribute or Psy of Gangnam Style fame.  Since the damn song is played everywhere, it has to be the latter.

This one pulled me in by the collar.  What is it?  Can I go there and experience it?

Close encounters:

This piece reminded me of what all edgy graffiti artists do, tag to mark their territory and cement their fame.

A rich, multi-layered painting.  It was brilliant, masterful and spoke volumes about the exploitation of Chinese culture and the Panda.

I was so impressed with this work that I had to find out the culprits.

Go to Moganshan Lu, but also pay attention to the bubbles of inspiration at street level.  Creation is valid, whether gallery approved or not.

Me?  I’m a rebel.  You’ll always find me hanging with the downtown chickens and seeking new avenues of inspiration.

Will the gleamy art galleries of M50 deliver?  I was doubtful.  Stay tuned to find out!