Vagabonding : 2010 February |

New Contest - Win a free RIBZ Front Pack

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My backpacking website Startbackpacking.com and RIBZ USA are giving away one of their unique “Front Packs”!

All you have to do to win is subscribe to the RSS via email to receive new articles from Startbackpacking.com before March 15, 2010. No, you will never get SPAM, just a link when I make updates on the www.startbackpacking.com website.

Go read my RIBZ Pack Review and find the contest rules at the bottom.

The packs retail for $65 but the very cool owner has offered Startbackpacking.com readers a discount + free shipping.

The winner will be announced after March 15, 2010 - good luck!

Posted in Ramblings |

Interview: 77 Years Old and Still Vagabonding

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Sallie Latch in Egypt

One of the best parts of running this vagabonding blog is the opportunity to meet new and interesting people.

At least weekly I get email from female readers asking about how safe it is to travel alone, or asking my advice about where to travel as a woman.

I was wondering how to best answer these emails when Sallie popped up and I knew right away that I had to share her amazing story with everyone out there - she is an inspiration no matter who you are.

Sal is a 77 year old woman traveling the world alone.

Starting at the age of 18, Sal has been to 28 countries, many of which could be called “dangerous”, has been living in Mexico for the last 5 years, and has no plans to stop any time soon. In fact, even after being diagnosed with Leukemia two and a half years ago, she is in the process of planning her next year long adventure.

She spent 2 years serving in the Peace Corps in Malaysia, lived in China for 3.5 years as a teacher, and worked in a Burmese refugee camp. She was in Israel-Palestine just weeks after a bombing and Nigeria in 1981 when according to her there were “young soldiers with big guns and little food”.

I think I have a new hero.

Like many long term travelers have learned, Sal believes in the Law of Attraction - that your outlook and confidence attract good things to happen while you are on the road.

How I would love to sit down and listen to some of this woman’s wisdom. As is the case with most vagabonds, its hard to predict where she will be, so I had to settle with a remote interview instead.

If you are currently traveling, dreaming of vagabonding, or just want a dose of inspiration in your life to help exchange obstacles and excuses for dreams - read on!

(Read more…)

Posted in Ramblings |

Haiti and Corporate Greed

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Photo by AP/Gerald Herbert

It isn’t too often that I produce a rant but after recently coming across some startling data I was too appalled to sit here and do nothing.

Anyone familiar with my website knows that there is no love lost between me and cubicles, or giant corporations for that matter. After working in one for 8 years before I began vagabonding, I know first hand the cold, soulless drive they all possess to make more money at the expense of humanity.

Even being a former victim, I still threw up a little in my mouth after researching the following numbers. Have I become too jaded or has the world lost its mind?

You read and I welcome your opinion:

The Research

I recently came across an article detailing how my local University of Kentucky had raised US 1 million dollars for Haiti relief - not bad for a small university in a relatively broke state.

This prompted me to go out and see what other universities and companies had donated….but what I found was an article on the Huffington Post disclosing how much money big companies had donated to the relief effort.

Banks

Fifth Third Bancorp - $100,000
US Bank - $100,000 + match employee donations
Visa - $200,000
Wells Fargo - $100,000

Yes, you are reading those zeros correctly. All the other banks such as Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, and Goldman Sachs donated just $1 million dollars - the same as my university.

These are the same tyrants that despite Obama’s best sword rattling still continue to give bonuses much larger than any of the donations you see above.

But wait, it gets even better!

Other Giant Corporations

Coca-Cola - $1 million

Sprint - $50,000 ($1.5 Billion spent on advertising last year)

Wal-mart - $600,000

Google - $1 million (the same Google with a revenue of $23.65 Billion, stock price of $531 a share, and profit margin of 27%)

McDonalds - $1 million (the CEO earns $12.32 million / year)

Microsoft - $1.25 million (once the richest company in the world based on cash reserves)

Walt Disney - $100,000 (the CEO earns $21.34 million / year)

Cigna - $50,000 (health insurance provider)

The list goes on with very little improvement. I am not naive enough to believe that corporations in America have the ability or own the responsibility to fix every disaster that happens to every developing country.

But to think that a company with the sizes and resources of Walt Disney or Wal-mart could only muster enough interest to give a portion of what one university’s basketball team could raise is frightening.

For a comparison, here are the salaries of the CEOs for some of the companies above:

Coca Cola - Muhtar Kent - $6.35 million
Sprint - Daniel Hesse - $5.39 million
McDonalds - James Skinner - $12.32 million
Robert Iger - $21.34 million

Simply fascinating. Haiti is the poorest country in the Western hemisphere and a dollar there goes quite a long way for relief effort. Just a wild guess, but the kids in Haiti would probably notice that dollar a lot more than someone making $20 million a year plus stock compensation.

People wonder why I now preach not to give the best years of your life to corporations.

If these guys can throw the equivalent of spare change at one of the largest humanitarian disasters of our time, how long do you think it would take them to help you out the door with a boot when cheaper overseas labor comes along?

In Closing:

If you found these numbers to be as disgusting as I did, share this with friends - this is public domain knowledge and helping educate others might bring some awareness to just how deadly the cubicle can be.

Go check out www.thecorporation.com for a chilling documentary about just why and how these guys can think like that.

You can read about how to help Haiti yourself here.

Sources:

Advertising budgets

CEO Salaries on Forbes

Huffington Post article