Comments on: Gross Eats, Fearless Leaps and Lemonade Stands: Kids Being Kids [Audio Slideshow]

By: David Thomas

David Thomas — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 00:35:12 +0000

Jumped it over 100 times during the summers in the 80’s! Miss the thrill.

By: Migration Mark

Migration Mark — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 03:51:59 +0000

Gross food is almost always a sure bet to get people laughing, weirded out (in a good way), and giggling amongst each other. I’ve done a couple social classes for students in Thailand about weird and gross foods that I’ve eaten, to the shrieking and love of my students. It always gets them excited!

That cliff jump looks like a lot of fun. I don’t think I would be able to resist it if I was there!

By: Audrey Scott

Audrey Scott — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 12:46:09 +0000

@Mariza: We’re always looking for other sources of income 🙂 Dan hates hearing himself and doesn’t believe me when I tell him he has a good voice for audio, so I’m glad to have a second opinion on this!

@Jonny: Very true. You always have to start somewhere.

@Shannon: Love the imagery in your comment. I think the more one travels, the more one sees the similarities in people than the differences.

By: Shannon OD

Shannon OD — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 15:47:54 +0000

I absolutely love this piece. So many times on my travels I would see kids jumping into fountains as their parents chased after them, or a pig-tailed little girl skipping and it just hit me that no matter where you go, kids are kids 🙂

By: Go Jonny Go

Go Jonny Go — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 16:23:54 +0000

Lemonade stands are the beginning of any multimillion pound empire.

By: Mariza

Mariza — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 08:26:06 +0000

Dan,
I like your narration in this video. If you get bored with traveling, I think you’d make a great audio books narrator!

By: Audrey Scott

Audrey Scott — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 09:18:20 +0000

@Jetpacker: Mimi was the first capybara I ever met, so I didn’t realize she was a super rodent. Although she looks a bit scary, she was really quite sweet…especially since I had her favorite snack – peanuts – in my hand.

@Margaret: Glad we were able to take you down memory lane! Sliding down falls while sitting on a potato sack sounds pretty frightening! I think we were more scared watching these kids jump than they were. Eventually, a cop showed up and shooed everyone away, but the kids were back fifteen minutes later.

@Pete: I laughed out loud at the image of all these kids with red and bruised marks on their forehead from jumping off the rock all day. How did the foreheads look the next day? I’m imagining a group of friends walking around all with red foreheads, as if they were a badge of honor.

Eating bugs while riding a bike – if you got a big bug, that could be quite a shock. I lucked out on the bug-eating – they people in Cambodia took to Dan first and decided to “educate” him on how to eat bugs while I took photos.

@Earl: There are times when we wish we could turn off our “traveler’s eyes” since we’re constantly observing…and that can get tiring! It’s a mixed blessing – there is lots of stuff that really bothers us about our home country (lack of public transport options outside big cities, huge servings at restaurants, what passes as news, etc.), but each time we return home we also notice so many things that are unique and special about the United States and its people.

@Guy: Sounds like an incredible adventure ahead of you! We hope to be following in your footsteps across Africa later this year. We just tried out CouchSurfing this year, but have had such wonderful experiences staying with hosts in Uruguay and Argentina. I’m glad you’re having fun hosting travelers before you go – wish we were stopping by South Africa!

@Nomadic Chick: Being home these last few weeks has evoked so many emotions for us! It’s nice to be in a familiar place with familiar people, but there are so many things that still feel foreign to us (we still aren’t used to swiping the credit card ourselves at shops and look like idiots each time!). So, it’s nice to find these similarities and universalities with kids and experiences that we can connect with. Sorry for the trauma from the photo of the giant rodent!

By: Nomadic Chick

Nomadic Chick — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 06:42:16 +0000

This post invoked so many emotions! Delight at kids being kids, recoiling in fear at the largest rodent in the world – I have a healthy fear of rats [shudder]. But the impact of your travels in how you view home was icing on the cake.

By: Earl

Earl — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 01:39:05 +0000

What an excellent job at capturing your traveler’s perspective while at home. I think that often times travelers, including myself, tend to get wrapped up in the frustrations and challenges of returning home, and this is a reminder that that there is an entire world of positive observations to make as well.

As for the ridiculously large animal in the photo, it drew a gasp from me so I have no doubt that it was a crowd-pleaser with the kids!

By: Pete De Ritter

Pete De Ritter — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 00:56:18 +0000

I used to eat bugs too but that was mostly a function of how fast I was going on my motorcycle.