Archive

AI Control - Lord of the Rings

Peter Thiel, as a libertarian-leaning venture capitalist and co-founder of PayPal, tends to interpret The Lord of the Rings through the lens of power, monopoly, decentralization, and civilization-building. His perspective often aligns with themes of technological control, centralization vs. decentralization, and the nature of progress. Based on this, here’s

Biking around Bali

I love cycling. I'd like to think I know a thing or two about road bikes/gravel bikes - and let me say that in general, Bali is a sucky place for cycling. It's unsafe, dangerous but can be quite fun if you can make it

A look into Bali Villas

I can talk and do the general spiel about Bali Villas, but this one will be a surface image/marketing one - as of today, August 1st, 2023 - the demand in the tourist sector for villas is through the roof. I'm not a great business person, but

I found a kitten

He was pretty dirty. I gave him bunch of showers, warm showers, he never resisted and even enjoyed the water, even if it was 2-3x a day. He was full of fleas and they were gone in the end. He was really nice and warm to me, most cats/kittens

My Favorite Traveling Hobby: Visiting Grocery Stores

I guess you could just call it "shopping". But Geo-arbitrage is an interesting concept. On the surface, different places have different prices for the same item. In Japan, Japanese food is inexpensive, while foreign foods are expensive. In USA, USA food is inexpensive (or expensive who you ask!

The Trap of Internet Communities.

I never realized how much time I spent, lurking or seldomly replying to posts in different online communities. My two favorite communities were Reddit and Hackernews. I also sometimes hopped onto 4chan /biz/ or /trv because there were nuggets of great info and opinions that would appear there. I was

State of CityPop/AOR in Japan

Recently I was at Tower Records in Shibuya. It's a cliche tourist stop, but it was nice when I went. It was early in the morning, before it opened and a day when an Idol was doing a live appearance. I was curious so I went in to

Bali and Photography - Modern Photography in General.

The biggest thing about bali and photos is that they are all a perfectly curated lie. Take the above photo, it's almost perfect. I was to lazy to getup to properly aim my camera, but I do enjoy the optical zoom making it out so clear. Yes this

Digital Nomad in Bali.

It isn't bad. The airport is workable, you can even arrange in advance pickup service. I prefer to use Grab and have them wait a few minutes. You can arrive via Jakarta or Bali Airport - Jakarta tickets from USA are the cheapest I've seen them

Opportunity Cost Vs Trade Off

Is there a way to find out that you make the right choice? Looking back, or creating a forecast can help - if you do x,y action and it comes to this reward - that means it was a good option right? What about mitigating grief or bad choices?

It's been almost a year since I've posted.

How time flies, I didn't even realize it. I wrote some diary entries and thought about posting stuff, but I can't believe I didn't follow through. Time, structure and patterns really are a big deal - alongside agency. All things, I feel I am

Why I picked Huxleian

This blog is an experiment where I'm documenting my travels and creating photo essays. I love writing, and after detoxing myself from social media websites, I looked back and wondered what did I really "have" or "leave." - Absolutely nothing. I feel the web

How I use Youtube - Blocking Landing Pages and Comments

YouTube is designed to be addictive and create addiction. This happens through the dopamine feedback loop which hardens reward through repeated behaviors. This is the core idea of the dopamine feedback loop - procrastination, distractiion, reward, repeat. Social Media / YouTube is no different - For YouTube, the Action is watch

Digital Nomad in Japan

My Fascination with the Toyota Wigo / Agya / Daihatsu Ayla

This is the Daihatsu Ayla, also known as the Toyota Agya (Indonesia) or Toyota Wigo (Philippines.) I thought it was a really crappy car, but it really isn't. Kinda. They're manufactured in Indonesia and come in super stripped, base packages starting at just 100juta, or $7,

Buying a car in Indonesia

This is so different from Philippines and most of the world. Is buying a car in Indonesia worth it? YES - highways are new, and are fantastic, roads are in good shape. There are some very steep grades, so something with high road clearance is needed, but not necessary. Cars

Covid NAIA Philippines Photos

Photo Gallery of Philippines/NAIA March-April 2020.

Digital Nomad in Philippines

I started my Digital Nomad journey in the Philippines back in 2015. I don't regret any second of it, but in the end I discovered I was missing a lot by staying in the PH. A big joy of being a Digital Nomad is the freedom to travel,

Buying a Car in the Philippines

So, you want to buy a car in the Philippines? It's an inverse market, what is cheap in USA or Japan, is expensive in the Philippines and usually viceaversa. There are great deals, and lots of issues - so this is a general guide for buying a USED

Learning Japanese Through J-Music

I landed in Japan in 2015, with just an experience of cliche anime tropes, video games and zero experience in the language. I would hate to call myself a "weeb" because I didn't really fall into that subculture much - but was aware of it because

30's and TRT - Testosterone Replacement Therapy

There's the biohacking community and there's other fringe groups of society that wish to better themselves. If you've ever seen the movie "Limitless" released in 2011, it's like that - but for your body, and asthetics vs mental cognitive ability.

Japanese Language School - 2 Years Visa, and an experience in Japan.

If you haven't heard of a bekka, well it's a pretty cool program. Used as a pre-entry course for Japanese Universities, it's a step or several stop above fly by night Japanese "Language Schools" that really operate as cheap labor for baito

The Taiwan Gold Card - A better option than "E-Residency."

The Taiwan Employment Gold Card is a combined open work permit, residence permit and visa for skilled professionals.

How I became a "Digital Nomad"

Back in 2015, the term wasn't that well known, but with a WFH "job" at Microsoft - I decided to travel parts of the USA. It helped me establish a footprint, embrace minimalism and then take it international.