I’m not sure how many of you are familiar with some of my costuming choices but I’m a big fan of scotland and more so of havin some fun. In the past I’ve gone a little roguish and let myself go back to wild man status – see EX 01

I’ve even taken to wearing my kilt out to social events (always a hit)

So it should come as no surprise that when given the chance, my brother Alex and I teamed up with a group of our friends for some real Ren Fair fun.

With some blue paint, a few yards of cloth, 3 hours figuring out how to pleat, and a ton of spirit, we headed to the ren fair, and by the time we left, we’d already secured some lucrative job offers.

From Swords to painted leather masks, the renaissance fair is a place that exemplifies the best of the renaissance while leaving out the horrors of living in the middle ages. Its a great community of artisans and folk who just like working with their hands and crafting. People longing to return to times when they could create and sell something original and not manufactured by the millions.

If you get a chance give it a go. There are a plethora of great acts, both comedy and straight athletic performance. From acrobatics to musical instruments, you can find it there!

Well, In december Devil Dancesport hit up Clairemont college and left a swath of dance destruction and good will behind us:

Waltz

Latin

Devil Dancesport

Well, after competing in December at the Claremont collegiate Ballroom Dance competition and medaling in every category, My Latin dance parter Chelsie and I furthered our relationship and took on the Phoenix Challenge on February 20th! Needless to say, we were stoked!

It is so darn difficult to find a non blurry dance foto!

As a general guide
S=Samba (Brazilian dance)
C= Cha cha cha
R= Rumba
J=Jive (YouTube this and you’ll understand why its evil)
W= Waltz
T=Tango
F= Foxtrot
VW= Viennese waltz (also a YouTube Candidate for vicious leg killing dance)
SW=East coast Swing.

Competing in back to back dance categories (each of those letters are a style of dance done in succession for that category (maybe 30 sec. in between) we placed as follows.

Heat 14 [12:35PM] Semi-final Round Silver Intl. Latin (S/C/R)

_6_ AC-A 192 Kyler Yi Katie Yin
_5_ AC-A 303 Alex Diekmann Kalie Heideman
_4_ AC-A 302 Jeff Liao Chelsea Knutson
_3_ AC-A 307 Justin Alexander Yang Lacie Forde
_2_ AC-A 332 Britt Braden Cindy Vana
_1_ AC-A 324 David Berger Chelsie Hancock

Heat 19 [01:07PM] Gold Intl. Latin (C/S/R/J)

_4_ AC-A 302 Jeff Liao Chelsea Knutson
_3_ AC-A 327 Anthony Schubert Phoenicia Falcon
_2_ AC-A 324 David Berger Chelsie Hancock
_1_ AC-A 332 Britt Braden Cindy Vana

Heat 23 [01:43PM] Quarter-final Round Silver American Smooth (W/T/F)

_5_ AC-A 324 David Berger Chelsie Hancock
_4_ AC-A 173 Sebastian Meyjes India Chilton
_3_ AC-A 190 Patrick Wilcox Karen Wagley
_2_ AC-A 332 Britt Braden Cindy Vana
_1_ AC-A 317 Adrian Lomeli Michelle Graell

Heat 31 [02:50PM] Gold American Smooth (W/T/F/VW)
_4_ AC-A 324 David Berger Chelsie Hancock
_3_ AC-A 190 Patrick Wilcox Karen Wagley
_2_ AC-A 310 Aaron Steele Corrie Vandervlugt
_1_ AC-A 332 Britt Braden Cindy Vana

Heat 36 [03:56PM] Quarter-final Round Silver American Rhythm (C/R/SW)
_8_ AC-A 173 Sebastian Meyjes India Chilton
_7_ AC-A 327 Anthony Schubert Tricia Dawson
_6_ AC-A 302 Jeff Liao Megan Gjersvig
_5_ AC-A 318 Antonio Lomeli Alyssa Garcia
_4_ AC-A 307 Justin Alexander Yang Lacie Forde
_3_ AC-A 324 David Berger Chelsie Hancock
_2_ AC-A 332 Britt Braden Cindy Vana
_1_ AC-A 200 Elijah Armstead Marla Gonzales

Heat 43 [05:09PM] Quarter-final Round Open Salsa – Adult/Senior
_6_ AC-A 330 Rennie Rosen Cecilia Torres
_5_ AC-A 332 Britt Braden Cindy Vana
_4_ AC-A 200 Elijah Armstead Marla Gonzales
_3_ AC-A 324 David Berger Chelsie Hancock
_2_ AC-A 184 Bret Navarre Alexandra Grunwald
_1_ AC-A 317 Adrian Lomeli Michelle Graell

Heat 51 [05:53PM] Gold American Rhythm (C/R/SW/M)
_5_ AC-A 315 Osvaldo Altamirano Kendra Lomeli
_4_ AC-A 302 Jeff Liao Megan Gjersvig
_3_ AC-A 327 Anthony Schubert Phoenicia Falcon
_2_ AC-A 324 David Berger Chelsie Hancock
_1_ AC-A 332 Britt Braden Cindy Vana

Now You’ll see the names in these placements of Anthony, Jeff, Britt, Elijah, and I and our partners. We’re all ASU dance students who practice and compete together as a team to represent, each competition we have different amounts of ASU dancers who can participate. ASU’s Devil Dancesport team is a coalition of hundreds of students and dancers who come together with our own passion for ballroom to accomplish something great. We wouldn’t have been able to place in this competition without the support of the rest of DDS!

Now, You’ll be hard pressed to find an event where we didn’t dominate either in placement or in pure cheering power. We’re the team, supportive and you’re darn sure to hear us chanting our fellow competitors numbers, and remember our characteristic enthusiasm. We cheer off the floor and heck we cheer each other on when we’re on the floor. These competitions are about fun and skill, but also pure enjoyment of the music and experience. We compete to show how much we enjoy dancing together in a common athletic activity.

For each of these categories you’ll see LATIN, STANDARD, SMOOTH, RHYTHM. Standard and Latin are international styles of dance. They’re different school figures and dance patterns as well as a different understanding of the beat and movement with the flow of the music. Smooth and Rhythm are their American style counterparts.
Congratulations to our fellow dancers!

Next up San Diego March 6th! UCSD!

A lot of thoughts running through my head. I’m on my way to work tonight. Taking a little time to sit down and actually do some writing. Its been a while in coming. My poor journal hasn’t seen my fingers since a little after I got back. What with the semester at school, work – I’ve gotten a part-time hourly job at ASU as an ICA Facilities and Operations Stadium Control Officer… Not a bad job. Basically I’m a security guard and crowd control officer for ASU athletic events. I like it. It’s simple, doesn’t take much cognitive thought but does require a bit more of the physical side. I get to show hospitality to our visitors and interact with folks who have a real passion… one way or another… for the games. Other than that, I completed another semester riding at 17 credits. I’m signed up for my final semester and preparing to graduate in 2010. I spent the holidays camping outside Tucson with my Parents as my brother leads the berger family into another hemisphere. He’s off exploring Belize and Latin america – feel free to check it out at www.virtualwayfarer.com

May is coming I’m nervous but trying to figure out where to put in my Graduate school applications. I’m also looking for a career job in urban planning/urban systems. My thesis is both a grad school application and a job portfolio… all rolled into one. It’s a good thing I’ve got an entire semester dedicated to perfecting it.

I’ve been spending time getting used to becoming independent. Every day, I eek a little bit closer to being able to fully support myself. In regard to that each day I become more thankful for the support and love of my family and friends, and how much trust and confidence they’ve placed in my success. I’m a significant investment, and I value myself as a person who’s worth every penny and more. Confidence it seems, won’t be an issue. 9 months traveling alone with a backpack and a strong will proved that without question. There is no situation that could prevent me from taking advantage. I can’t wait to branch out and find work with an NGO or company overseas and really start working on making a difference. I’m coming world.

School is going well, my GPA is still rising at 3.63 cumulative and I’m preparing to take the GRE and finalize my grad school applications come January 9th. I’d prefer a job and 2-3 years of on the ground experience before returning for a doctorate but I know that it lies in my future. The experience and on the ground understanding offered by the U.S. Consulate general were vital in furthering my education and giving me an opportunity to see the skills and material offered in class in action. That experience increased the value of my following classes by 100 fold. I expect further experience could increase a masters or doctorate experience similarly.

Now its about finding the opportunity to make it happen. The right fellowship and I’d stay in school, but other wise its time to start advertising myself and my specific generalist skillset to companies around the world. I’m adaptable, I’m learning more every day, and I’m not afraid to be mobile or to be thrown into a new challenging situation every time I open my eyes.

Its time to get going.

Now is later. I keep telling myself, I’ll write another post tonight, well tomorrow morning, tomorrow night…. Wait it’s been 3 months. Life rushes by us. It’s been repeated for ages, when you’re young, time crawls by. For a youngster their frame of reference is shorter, we measure our experience in terms of our own realization. That is to say that for us we understand life in relation to the amount of time we’ve spent. When you’re eight, time crawls by because hell, there’s 78 more years to live and each day seems to crawl by because you’ve only experienced 2920 of them. As you grow older, you see a quarter century, then half, then ¾ then if you’re lucky, you’ll get to see a whole century… that’s a whole lot of days, and they start to blur together. We start to put time in relation, a day isn’t that much, and it’s not so special…. When those words leave your mouth, you know you’re in trouble.

A close friend of mine told me that the last six months of his life just flew by, and he couldn’t understand how it went by so fast. He was worried, because to him that meant that he wasn’t making the best of the days he had. Each day of his life, was marked by the same routine, he was on autopilot…. How many of us feel that each day? How many times do we remember the drive to work, or the endless routine of breakfast, lunch, and then home (if we’re lucky) for dinner. Our routines become us, we become human’s doing, not humans being. It’s not just about relaxing. Each day should be special. Reserved. If we lose touch with that… well. That’s a tough thought. If we lose touch with ourselves, our being, there’s not much left to live for.

Part of it may be our culture, after all throughout life we’re taught to put off our dreams, our goals until we make enough money. Put ourselves into a routine, don’t be the nail head sticking up, work hard and defer your goals, then one day you’ll make it and can live your goals… well what happens when you’re too old to take advantage of the system. When you’ve lost yourself in your routine, and forgotten your goals… a lot of minds find themselves lost and unable to recover. The highest suicide rate among 25 to 50 yr olds are highly successful men. Men who made their fortunes, but have no idea what to do with it.

What can that tell us about our future? About our place in the world? What can that help us understand?

I’ve now moved into my dorm and am working hard to get my degree done this semester! What a trip!

I wanted to hop in here and share this video with you guys.

I promise more updates coming soon.

Phrases from David Berger on Vimeo.

Italian culture is an amazing mix of history, passion, and poetry. It’s been said that French is the language of love, Spanish the language of God, and Italian the language of Poetry. The mixed artistic and cultural heritage created and passed down since the early Roman Empire is nearly unsurpassed in the European theater. Italians as a people in this modern age are a little different than most traveling Americans expect. I’d like to spend this blog doing a brief introduction to my revelations regarding those differences.

Italians are a strong, passionate cultural group with amazing food, great family connection and strong national pride. However, they’ve got a different concept on a few key interactions.

In my travels I’ve found that Italians are much more physically active in conversation and interaction. Hand gestures which are a fully integral part to the Italian language and communication structure are essential to Italian conversation. I often joke with my Italian friends that they couldn’t hold a conversation if they held their hands behind their backs. They’re also more willing to make physical contact and build friendships quickly. This said it is important to note that there is a major difference between northern and southern Italians. Southern Italians are often much easier to build a quick report with, if you’ve got the patience to deal with their passionate attitude of life. Now, by that comment I mean that in conversation and daily interaction even the smallest point of conversation or daily frustration is like the end of the world. It’s a huge disaster regardless of the scale and must to be dealt with immediately. Southern Italians in my experience are also much more touchy-feely. They will quickly accept you and I found that they were generally the group which invited me home for dinner or to meet their families within only a few hours/days of knowing me.

Northern Italians are much more reserved. Again I’ve only had experience with Italians from the larger cities of Northern Italy, and it’s only a generalized perception but, having taken a lesson from their industry they’ve got a more global perspective and have pushed themselves toward a more business class/materialistic/withdrawn attitude. This was especially expressed during my time in Milan. Northern Italians are often colder at first and it takes much more effort to get to know them and be on a friendly basis with them. They were also often more reserved than their southern counterparts. In my opinion, this is in part due to their heritage, influenced by being the major cross roads for Austrian, German, and Asian/Eastern European and French/Spanish markets over the last 3 thousand years and the fact that they are now the financial and business heart of Italy. They are now more exposed to the international market than their southern brethren.

On a note more for travelers, I have often had non-Italian female friends express their shock at Italian men. It is worth mentioning that Italian men are much more forward and thoroughly blunter when it comes to courting a woman. They will often make physical contact -especially if you’ve made eye contact – and can even create threatening situations if they get out of control. In addition given a camera you may find that you’re having your picture taken without your permission. I think that this is in part due to a Media and cultural influence. All their lives they’ve been fed a glorified media image of foreign women being easy, open and accessible, where as Italian women are more reserved and much harder to court. It is my opinion that they have not discovered how to balance the reality and the image. Often it can be overwhelming and can be quite frightening for female travelers to encounter this type of behavior. The key is to be strong and to maintain calm.

Male travelers will encounter a slightly different difficulty. Often times they encounter a much colder welcome from Italian women. Italian women deal with the stronger pursuit from Italian men all their lives. So it takes a lot more effort and a different approach to generate a friendship and or a relationship with a native Italian in Italy. I met my girlfriend through my Internship in Milan (she’s from the south) and luckily had four months of work and social events to get to know her and her friends and date her. This different environment gave me an advantage. However as a traveler in hostels and cities through northern Italy and across eastern and central Europe I discovered that as a male traveling, you need to be careful. Although clubbing culture is becoming more globalized it is still culturally different in each country and province/region, the way you dance and interact on a social level in Italian clubs is much different than here in the U.S. there is a greater emphasis on personal boundaries and space. In addition Italian men, especially family are extremely protective of their sisters/female friends. You can find yourself ostracized very quickly by interacting rudely or without finesse regarding your courtship.

Another bit of shock when encountering the Italian culture is its proclivity to lively argument and prolonged yelling/screaming verbal encounters. I’ve heard countless stories and even encountered it myself. After a long prolonged, loud, and aggravated verbal encounter a non-Italian would escalate the confrontation to a physical encounter. He would be immediately surrounded and prevented from fighting as the Italians, shocked at this behavior reacted in horror, with questions shooting from every side asking if something was wrong – The general response… “of course something is wrong we’ve been arguing for 30 minutes”. This is the best illustration of Italian social interaction I can describe. To them an argument, yelling and screaming is only a part of normal interaction. It’s not a fight, it’s an expression. Only if something truly upsetting occurs can physical confrontation begin. Even then it is still frowned upon.

I’ve posted a great video:

And built up a nice follow-up blog of that video in Text:

Train travel and general travel tips in Italy:

Train travel in Italy is a friendly experience and one that can be faced without fear. Traveling by train in Western and Central European countries is the preferred route of travel by most visitors. Buses are an option, and although often cheaper may leave you at the outskirts of a city or have very limited departure and travel times.

I’d like to outline my experiences and draw on my time in Milan and traveling through central and eastern Europe to give you some insight into Train travel. I arrived in Milan, Italy January 20th 2009 and stayed until May 1st before participating in a Travel Study program across Eastern, Central and North Western Europe (Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia, Greece, Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Bosna I Herzegovena, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Latvia, Czech, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, British isles). During my Travels I used a mixture of Trains and Buses. I’d like to focus the first half of this post on Train travel in Western Europe.

Specifically I’d like to start with the Italian train system as an example. The system is open, straightforward and efficient. There are three major rules,

1. When you enter a train station, look for automated tellers (usually coded for 3-5 major languages). This has two benefits, the first is that the machines avoid speaking with a teller who may or may not speak more than one language. Second this will help you get written information and possibly provide information in English/German/Native language/ Chinese. Do be sure to check if there are student/youth/senior rates that are only available from a teller.

2. Find the departures board and the regular/regional train board. These provide information on the types of trains (as well as a description of what their symbols mean) and a regular daily time table so you can plan day trips on short notice.

3. VALIDATE YOUR TICKET! I can’t stress this enough. In every country I visited it was required that you validate your ticket. In Italy the fine for failing to do so can be 50-150 euro. It varies country by country but often the cost of forgetting or failing to Validate is 2-5 times that of the ticket. If you notice you’ve forgotten or the machines are out of order, Train conductors (in Italy at least) are required to validate your ticket if you come and find them. If they find you and it’s not validated some will validate it for a in pocket fee of 5 euro.

If you keep these three rules in mind, travel in any country via train is simple, stress free and can be significantly easier.

In Rule 2 I mentioned that there are different types of trains. In Italy there are fast trains, normal trains, and then there are the big commuters – called regional trains. Treno Regionale are the cheapest form of train transport in Italy. They are generally half the cost of normal trains and 1/3 that of the fast trains. They take a little while longer since they stop at almost every station but the difference in cost can make up for the delay. If your traveling across Italy, it may be worth the time to check different major cities along the path and check the Regionale connections. Instead of an express train you can catch a few Regionale commuters for a fraction of the cost. (Note this is not always the case, at times the number of changes can make the cost savings minimal).

The photo’s included here are representations of Italian (Trenitalia) equipment. However, the principles held true in Germany, Poland, Czech, Belgium, Holland, and the UK. Validation, and Train departure/automated systems are nearly universal in developed countries.

The second half of this Blog refers to Bus travel in Eastern Europe.

When I left the European Union and the fringe Shengen countries, I encountered an interesting phenomenon. Major train lines passed through capital cities and avoided smaller principalities. Leaving me with only one option – Buses. Eastern Europe, Greece, and Turkey especially were prone to major inconveniences when using the Train system. The trains were slower, less comfortable (minus sleeper cars) and had less flexibility and variety in travel destination, however to my surprise Bus travel in Eastern Europe is exceptional.

Eurolines is one company that does cross European transit – I’ll use their coaches as an example of the type of buses made available to travelers:

These large, 40+ seat buses generally have media – TV/VCR/DVD and in eastern Europe (Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey, Serbia, Bosnia) they also have in drive refreshments (soda/water/snack food for free) and Orangeways and now some of the other major companies like Eurolines even have WIFI built into the buses. It’s a sense of luxury travel for a fraction of train ticket prices. As an illustrative example, I traveled from Istanbul, Turkey to Plovdiv, Bulgaria for 1/3 the price of the train ticket and arrived in just under ¾ of the time. As I continued my travels through Eastern Europe I ran into a lot of travelers who had purchased Inter/Euro Rail passes and found them to be a bad investment for eastern European countries for two reasons.

The first is that Train transportation in Western Europe is Much more expensive than eastern Europe making a Inter/Euro Rail pass a great investment because it sets a standard cost for each journey. However, Given the lack of functionality on most train lines and the lower cost in E. European countries the pass was more expensive than buying tickets individually and didn’t allow use of bus travel.

The plane landed an hour and some odd minutes later in Edinburgh International Airport. Without security or customs, we walked into Scotland and entered the UK. We crossed the threshold after getting some quick internet information about the address of our hostel, bought our bus tickets and then headed into the city.

We arrived at one of the most… interesting hostels I’ve see so far. Alex described it as Granola. I’d call it artistic to a measure. All the interiors were decorated with different murals…some quite competent, some a little lurid, and others stunningly beautiful. I’ve got a few foto’s from the hostel posted in my Edinburgh album on Facebook.

After settling in to our room (complete with a long term guest around the age of 75) we headed for the common room and the computers. We’d both seen Edinburgh before and we decided to wait until the evening to get some night photography of the city. After dark we got a few shots and walked the Royal Mile. We searched out some cheap food. Rounding Princes Street and heading back into *New* Edinburgh we found what we needed and managed some chips and pizza.

We headed back to the hostel and crashed exhausted. The next next day we spent walking around the city. We managed to see the new Harry Potter flick (not too bad) and to get some great foto’s of the Royal Mile. We also double checked our booking with Wild in Scotland. Everything settled we grabbed a bite to eat and then headed in to get some rest.

I managed to find two sets of beautiful new kilt socks. But, despite being thoroughly tempted I didn’t buy another kilt.

We woke the next morning and headed to the tour. We boarded our bus and started one heck of an adventure!

We wandered out the next day and made our way through the city with three lovely English girls we’d met before.

Alex:

And Hannah & Alex:

and last but not least Lizzie:

As you can see Lizzie became quite acquainted with Miss Molly Malone famed Lady of the Night and fish monger of Grafton street Dublin.

As we continued our adventure we discovered an amazing monument to those who fell during the Irish potato famine. With eerie bronze statues moving slowly on their treacherous route toward the port, life, and opportunity.

And last but not least: A police convention in the middle of the street

And finally the Irish predilection to keepin’ clean.

It was going to be a great day.

We started off leaving Dublin center with our guide. He cheerfully introduced us to the history and spirit of the region from the center and streets of Dublin to the ring developments and the beautiful quirks of the Wicklow mountains. In between every breath he tossed in a joke or two and when a break came along in the history, he threw in some wisdom. The Wicklow Mountains are the area where tannin has been absorbed by the natural spring waters and it colours the water a deep Guinness brown. It is the birthplace of Guinness, the set for Braveheart and holds the lake where Scrambled Eggs was first conceived and written.

As we wound our way through narrow valleys and along tiny roads we discovered the beauty of the area and its innate charm..Rolling hills covered with turf and heather just turning the first shades of purple, preparing to bloom in the coming weeks. We arrived at an old army barracks which had been converted to a child prison,then to an orphanage, and now the building is used as a site for peace talks between northern Ireland and Ireland. It was a touching site.

We then headed to an ancient monastic town straddling two lakes. We wandered about and explored the graves embedded deep into the turf before deciding to tough out the rain and walk to the upper lake. we met the bus then and after some chips and malt vinegar we headed on.

One of the crosses is known as a wishing cross:

We broke for lunch in a small village along the way with a beautiful cathedral and great fish and chips. We shared the fish and chips and a 1/4lb hamburger special.

As we climbed back aboard it was time to adventure back down out of the mountains. We stopped at Thomas More’s meeting of the waters:

Between napping and enjoying the driver’s humor we arrived in Dublin, took a breath and then prepared for the evening.