 Profile
Places both inside and outside of the U.S have helped to define who I am. I grew up in Ocala, Florida. My parents split when I was 11. For years I devoted all of my time to engaging and writing poetry. I have volumes and volumes of books filled with writing. I grew up listening and watching thunderstorms. Ocala is sometimes known as the so-called "thunderstorm capital of the world" for it's sheer amount of thunderstorms per year. I've also been on the beach during several major hurricanes, with my face in the strong gails. My favorite sport is basketball. I've been playing and following the sport ever since I was a wee lad. Though I also played soccer, American football, and baseball a lot. Also when I was a kid, I was really into creating businesses, for example, I made my own sports magazines, a mini putt-putt golf course in my friend's backyard, sold goods out of my backpack at school, and potted cactii from my neighborhood with a friend and sold them to a local plant nursery, LOL.
I lived in Daytona Beach for a year with some friends after high school. My last year in high school I was brought up in foster care, because the situation at home with my mom was not so healthy. There's also a year where I went to study in Deltona, Florida. At this point, I was into all things gothic. Dressing in all black and experimenting with clothes and body decorations.
On a whim I moved to Los Angeles in 2000. I started working in the I.T field for one of the leading edge VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) companies opperating in California. I started to go to parties in Florida and I continued the tradition in California, including throwing some amazing house parties. I got involved with "harm reduction / harm minimization" concerning recreational drugs. I became a moderator and then an administrator for several years on Bluelight - http://www.bluelight.nu.
After a year in L.A, I left the U.S to go overseas for the first time. In 2001, I obtained a work visa for Australia. On the way I stopped in the Fiji Islands for a week. I worked and traveled around Australia for 6 months, including taking a VW van with some friends from Melbourne to Perth. I went to New Zealand for a short while. I then returned to the The Fiji Islands, because I was in love with Fiji. The most amazing rainbows, sunsets, sun risings, and deserted white sandy beaches I have ever seen were during those months in Fiji. Returned to the U.S in 2002, I worked as a care giver for a short while in Seattle, Washington. In Seattle is when I started to take a keen interest in eating and growing organic foods. After Seattle I moved to Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada for a duration of 5 months. There was an awesome trip that I did from B.C to the Canadian Rockies. I stayed in the Canadian Rockies for a month and a half mainly in Jasper and Banff.
I stayed in Oregon for a short while after Canada. I then did a "driveaway" and did a trip from Portland, OR. through Idaho, Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona stopping everywhere nice along the way, including a week at Arches national park. Did training and took a job as a "trek adventure leader" in Santa Rosa, California, where I was leading groups of mostly European tourists across the great national parks and cities of the U.S. One trip involved driving from San Francisco, California, USA to Anchorage, Alaska, USA (3,307.59 miles!!!) - in only a few days, LOL! Discovered San Francisco in 2003 - a place that I still like to refer to as "home". I lived there and had my own business doing I.T consultancy and private lessons English lessons. I protested against the War In Iraq. I also joined several organizations that deal with human rights, gay equality, plus environmental and animal rights.
I flew to southeast Asia in September, 2003. I lived up in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand for a while. For a month I taught English for an EU Micro-Project Development Through Local Communities (MPDLC) project at a rural village in Laos. Did volunteer work with Hmong refugees in central Thailand. I stayed with some friends in Malaysia and spent Christmas in Singapore. In early 2004, there was 5 months there I backpacked around India. I visited some of the most important birthplaces of the Buddhist, Sikh, and Hindu religions. While in South Asia I had the chance to hop over to Pakistan for a few weeks. Returned to Thailand in September, 2004. I worked as a teacher and I designed web sites working with content management systems (CMS), php, MySQL, and developing Web2.0 technologies.
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