2013 New Year Progress Update #1 – Travel Goals

Travel:

Map_45things_jan 2013
Place I visited between 10/2012 and 1/11/2013.

Since my last progress update in September 2012, I have visited Jersey City (NJ), New York City (NY), Chicago (IL), Charlottesville (VA), St Louis (MO), Philadelphia (PA), Dallas (TX), Miami (FL), and Norman (OK). However, those were all states that I had already been to before, so I couldn’t take any states off my 50 states list (Goal #1 – visit all 50 states).

The good news is, I will be going to Portland (OR) for the first time next week before driving up to Seattle (WA) for a library conference. Although I will only be in Portland for less than 24 hours, I am already look up local restaurants to try and maybe even a yoga class at Yoga Pearl.

I’m thinking about trying this place, Pok Pok, :


Any other recommendations?

At this point, I still have 15 more states to visit to achieve the goal:

  • Alaska
  • Delaware
  • Idaho
  • Iowa
  • Kentucky
  • Mississippi
  • Montana
  • North Carolina
  • North Dakota (possibly in the fall if I present at the South Dakota conference)
  • Oregon (soon!)
  • South Carolina
  • South Dakota (possibly in the fall for a library conference)
  • Utah
  • Wisconsin
  • Wyoming

In terms of Goal #2 – Set foot on all 7 continents, I went on a wonderful yoga retreat (more on that later in another post) in Tulum Mexico over the new year period, and then visited Mexico City (and went on a couple of awesome tacos tours). My knowledge of geography is so limited that I actually had to look up which continent Mexico belonged to (it’s North America). So, no progress on this goal. But it was a fun fun fun trip:

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About to climb the Pyramid of the Sun at Teotihuacan , Mexico. (1/6/2013)
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Taco tasting in Mexico City.

I still have 4 more continents to visit:

  • Africa
  • Antartica
  • Asia
  • Australia
  • Europe
  • North America
  • South America (likely in the summer)

Some promising news for goal #4 – See a football match at Estádio do Maracanã, Rio, Brazil. The stadium is under major renovation right now, and I was really worried that it would not be open when I go there this August. (I AM GOING TO RIO THIS SUMMER!!!, for a sensory science conference). I just read that the stadium is slated to be the venue for the Confederation Cup in June. Phew. Now I just hope that there will be matches there during the week of my visit in August.  

Why do I want to go to that particular stadium? You see, when I was a football mad kid, The amazing Zico was my idol. I wanted to be him. I wanted to go to Brazil because of him. He played for Brazil (a key member of the brilliant 82 World Cup team that didn’t not win the tournament) and Flamengo, which both use Maracana as their home stadium.

Zico at his mesmerising best:

How could I go to Brazil and not go see a football match? Just look at the atmosphere!

Since I am going to Brazil anyway, I am seriously considering making a short trip to Buenos Aires and take a few tango lessons, and perhaps even a Milonga outing or two. On one hand, this is a great opportunity to accomplish my Goal #3 – Tango in Buenos Aires, on the other hand, Argentine Tango is a dance I’d really love to learn, and I have always dreamed to spending a consider period of time in Buenos Aires to learn it probably. Taking just a few classes would not really do it justice. So I am still on the fence about this one. It would be great if I could start learning the dance now and then I could get much more out of it there, except that there isn’t a single tango teacher with 60 miles of  Manhattan, KS! I need to come up with a plan soon, as learning to dance is going take some time (especially for someone like me!) , and my goal #20 is to be comfortable at at least one ballroom dance!

In the meantime, a couple of lovely tango scenes from Sally Potter’s 1997 film, The Tango Lesson: