Finally...

Ok, so after 20 minutes of waiting for this page to load, I guess I'll get started. Crazy how used to fast and convenient I am. Today I rode from Dien Bien Phu to Lai Chau, through Muong Lay. It was another gorgeous day with a nice cooler temp, around 80. The ride started easy and pretty much stayed that way until Muong Lay. I stopped there for lunch of stir fried veggies and rice with the saltiest fried egg I ahve ever had. Greasiest too. Maybe it was MSG? Anyway, after leaving ML, the climb started. Choking on my greasy egg I knocked out some serious threshold work for an hour and a half. After the top, I decended to Lai Chau on the most incredible road since the Izoard. I am staying at the Lan Ahn Hotel, rm 608 if anyone feels like calling Vietnam.
The countryside has become populated by primarily hill-tribe folks. H'mong mostly, and I believe some Dao. The clothes are just incredible. Beautiful dresses, tassled headscarves, hand woven handbags carried by all the schoolkids. I have been chased by so many kids on bikes. It's amazing how long they keep up. I usually try to give the last one with me a treat of some kind. A little gold star in the form of a can of pop or a bit of change.
Today I have been thinking about the value of money. I don't know exactly where I am going to go with this, but here goes. When one brings up the subject of sweatshops, or Nike paying their overseas workers $3-4 per day, the argument usually goes "but everything over there is so much cheaper. They don't need more than that and they can live on that wage." This argument is very true on the surface. People can absolutely survive on very low wages here.
I have been considering what brings me joy in life. Travel, leisure, art, music, hobbies, etc... To most people living here, and in many other countries in the world, these things are unattainable. Let's just take travel for instance. A person in Moc Chau can live, buy a house and maybe even a scooter on $90 a month. Can they buy a plane ticket somewhere? Well, tickets are generally priced for the first world, so the answer is no. They can work and survive, but in the context of my world, they have very few options. Should everyone be able to travel all over? I don't know. Maybe not. Maybe it's too resource intensive considering the number of people who would like to travel.
Imagine if a ticket to NYC cost $50,000. When would you go? Probably never. I don't know where I'm going with this anymore! Oh well.
I was thinking about what the world would look like if it was a big house (which it is.) I can imagine one big room with A/C and a plasma screen. That's where I live with a few of my friends and family. There are many other smaller, more crowded, but still nice rooms. That's where the other white people and the Japanese live. Then there are a bunch of closets packed with people. India, China, Mexico, SE Asia, Africa, the American poor. I could share some of my space, but I don't. I keep the door locked and stay cool and comfortable.
This is one unjust world. Help me understand how it can change. Could it be a movement that makes excessive consumption unpopular? Can it all be put into a human context that would shift the desire to have more and more? Do we really need Paris Hilton, Bennifer, TomKat and the entire industry that has us believing that not only are they desireabl, but that we can be just like them? Madness!

Geoff