“announces”

“Time flies—but I’m the pilot.”
The point is not to be admired but to be admirable.
Achieving is far more enjoyable than consuming.
Discipline rarely comes naturally but is always crucial.

I want to be the light I long to see in the world.
(Oddly, I’ve long been motivated by something very much like that thought, but only recently I discovered the cliched but beautiful phrase to give it form. I can’t think of a more inspiring phrase, demanding nothing on the world, putting the responsibility for imagination and effort squarely on oneself.)

One day in Tokyo and I already know the answer to one of the main questions that set me around the world. The answer is yes, THERE IS at least one city I like at least as much as San Francisco. I’m in love.

(Unfortunately, the prospects of being a free agent here even slimmer.)

Pictures of it all in my Flickr Japan set.

Ah, these are going to be some exciting 5 months!

In what is to date the biggest purchase of my life (my obscene former desktop was a gift), I just purchased the bulk of my travel for the next year or so. Check out my itinerary and start planning on visiting or bumping with me!

27 October 2008
    Mexico City MEX to Tokyo NRT (via London) for 4 months, 22 days of Japan!
20 March 2009
    Tokyo NRT to London LHR for 4 months, 29 days of Europe!
17 August 2009
    London LHR to Toronto YYZ for a month of Canada! (ticket back to Mexico to be purchased)

All the flights are with British Airways. All for $1,852, which still amazes me—BA is a great airline, flights are incredibly main-airport and nonstop (can’t stop in the US). It’s all beautifully simple, better than I dared hope. Past week has been a Kayak and travel agency blur but it was worth it.

So, so exciting!

The cover article of this week’s Economist brings the stem-cell cancer hypothesis to the mainstream. This is over 3 years after Eva Vertes talked about it at TED in one of my favorite video pieces ever. And is very, very exciting.

The plan is to travel, to go places for a year or so, to live for some 2-3 months each time, in Tokyo, Barcelona/Madrid, London, and Toronto (in that order). Both Spain and Canada beckon with legal, short paths to free agency. The goal shall be to find out which city I like better as my fulcrum for the decade, but mostly to learn, to start projects, and to swallow the world.

I didn’t expect to like working remotely so much, as I’ve been doing this last couple of weeks, but I’ve loved the freedom, the flexibility, and the discipline it imposes. Most important of all, it allows for freedom of place and having been kicked out of the U.S. I might as well look around. So I’m looking for some sort of remote job, failing that savings and odd jobs would have to do, but having an unhinged fixed job would accelerate and catalyze everything.

There is, still, the possibility that there will be no place for me like Silicon Valley. If that’s so, then I’ll try to get a tourist visa again within a year and give de facto (ilegal) free agency another shot. I doubt, though, that they’ll grant me a visa, but there are many other, safe, if somewhat expensive means, to get inside. And once inside de facto free agency is not far fetched at all. I’m heartened by the sanctuary San Francisco itself always was for me (as opposed to the dastard federal gov’t).

But that’s just one possibility. Just having done that scenario planning comforts me and sets me free. The world beckons and Japan has always been, after America, the country I’m hungriest for. I’ve always wanted to try the sink or swim approach to learning a language! It’ll take me a month or two to get there, but just you wait Tokyo!

But why wasn’t I legally in the States? Because there are no certain legal paths to what I want: free agency. That is, to be able to live and make wealth, however and how long I want (the legal equivalent would be a permanent residence, a citizenship is that plus voting).

Sure, there are work visas, but I’m not particularly interested in being an employee. I want to make wealth myself or with others, in projects we start. And yes, a work visa can (notice the lack of certainty!), given years, be upgraded to a residence permit—I know a couple of tech guys who have done this after some 7 or more years. It takes that long because professional green cards have a shameful 5 year backlog and because why would employers give you the freedom to work for others or for yourself when they can just have you on a renewable per-year indentured servitude?

The problem’s not getting into the States to vacation work where the powers that be want you to work, the problem is being a free agent. And yes, were America the only option, paying the many-year uncertain penance wouldn’t look so bad. But the world’s a big place.

Yesterday:

The window on the plane to Phoenix, the first stop of the trip to SF, showed the most stunning (and varied) cloud vistas I’ve ever seen: puffy, chunky, grape-y over the ocean, specks and daubs, strips and archs… We were very late yet just in time to the most spectacular, glaring sunset I can recall. The terrain was flatter than paved and the rare mountain or wrinkle were surreal, engulfed in a 3d-program plane of flatness or marred by veins that were rivers and lakes. I saw city-piercing highways from above for the first time and they were majestic and car choked. The street grid was perfect and every house had a pool. I didn’t know it would be the last time I’d look at the States in years.

Yesterday I got deported from the US on my way back from my mom’s 50th birthday in Mexico. Visa revoked for a year. I’m alright, friends. Saddened and stunned, yet exhilarated by the challenge. The world beckons.

I have so much to write about all this, I remember it so vividly… Expect a long post no longer than tonight.

As part of our WUXMs (Weekly User Experience Meetups, a tiny event of fine people), Chris crafted Tonight Radio, a very cool mashup to listen to the bands playing in town tonight, this week, this month; the idea is to make it easier to find and sample new cool bands to go watch live.

I was going to wait announcing it until I got my Caltrain timetable redesign finished but today Tonight Radio won mashup of the day and I couldn’t hold any longer.

41 days delta! That’s more than 10% of a year of silence and more than ever before. Frankly, I’ve been too busy living, trying everything I’ve been able to and coming to grips with my new life and how I want to live it. Now that I’m a bit more settled I want to again take the time to write here—I’ve wonderful stories, thoughts, and discoveries to share. So see you soon! (In the meanwhiles I’m frequently updating both my my twitter and my flickr)