"Dead Men Don't Leave Tips"

Adventures X Africa
by Brandon Wilson

Book Description

Dead Men Don't Leave Tips is an edge of your seat tale about a couple’s seven-month, 10,000-mile "dream" odyssey–overland across Africa from top-to-tip. Against their better judgment, two confirmed independent travelers join a bewildering band of companions and clueless guides. As their dream of crossing Africa becomes a nightmare, they set off across the continent alone. And that makes all the difference.

Join them as they meet mountain gorillas face to face. Melt down during a blistering Saharan breakdown. Hunt dik-dik with Pygmies. Climb Africa’s highest mountain. Feel the raw power of the Serengeti. Hop the "gun-run" through a civil war. Rush down thundering Class V Zambezi rapids and dive into South Africa’s cauldron of turmoil.

This engaging story is filled with a zest for life, travel and unbridled adventure. It offers a humorous, sometimes anguished, yet always candid look at taking the road less traveled–across a land little fathomed.

My Review

Brandon is author of 'Yak Butter Blues' that I review last year. Now, his new book is about a 7-month trek covering almost all of Africa. You're going to laugh and cry. With his wife Cheryl, they start out on a continent-bound bus with the most eclectic collection of travelers I've ever read about. I couldn't stop laughing. But, despite the humor, Brandon also describes the sometimes heart-breaking images of people and places in the Africa you don't hear about from the Travel Guides. He really captures these moments, both good and bad. Highly recommended. [smile]

Dead Men Don't Leave Tips available at Powells.com

Other Books by Brandon Wilson:
Yak Butter Blues

Links: PilgrimTales.com

“It’s Not About the Bike”

My Journey Back to Life
by Lance Armstrong

Inside Cover:

This is the story of a journey from inauspicious beginnings through triumph, tragedy, transformation, and transcendence. It is the personal story of Lance Armstrong's life so far, from childhood through early success, nearly fatal cancer, recovery, survivorship, more triumph (victory in the 1999 Tour de France), marriage, and first-time fatherhood.

Meaningful Quotes:
I wanted to live, but whether I would or not was a mystery, and in the midst of confronting that fact, even at that moment, I was beginning to sense that to stare into the heart of such a fearful mystery wasn’t a bad thing. To be afraid is a priceless education. Once you have been that scared, you know more about your frailty than most people, and I think that changes a man.

To believe in the face of utter hopelessness, every article of evidence to the contrary, to ignore apparent catastrophe – what other choice was there? We do it every day, I realized. We are so much stronger than we imagine, and belief is one of the most valiant and long-lived characteristics. To believe, when all along we humans know that nothing can cure the briefness of this life, that there is no remedy for our basic mortality, that is a form of bravery.

It's Not About the Bike available at Powells and Amazon

“Buddha or Bust”

In Search of Truth, Meaning,
Happiness, and the Man
Who Found Them All
by Perry Garfinkel

Publisher Comments:

Why does an idea that's 2,500 years old seem more relevant today than ever before? How can the Buddha's teachings help us solve many of the world's problems? Journalist Perry Garfinkel circumnavigated the globe to discover the heart of Buddhism and the reasons for its growing popularity — and ended up discovering himself in the process.

The assignment from National Geographic couldn't have come at a better time for Garfinkel. Burned out, laid up with back problems, disillusioned by relationships and religion itself, he was still hoping for that big journalistic break — and the answers to life's biggest riddles as well. So he set out on a geographic, historical and personal expedition that would lead him around the world in search of those answers, and then some.

First, to better understand the man who was born Prince Siddhartha Gautama, he followed the time-honored pilgrimage "in the footsteps of the Buddha" in India. From there, he tracked the historical course of Buddhism: to Sri Lanka, Thailand, China, Tibet, Japan and on to San Francisco and Europe. He found that the Buddha's teachings have spawned a worldwide movement of "engaged Buddhism," the application of Buddhist principles to resolve social, environmental, health, political and other contemporary problems. From East to West and back to the East again, this movement has caused a Buddhism Boom.

Along the way he met a diverse array of Buddhist practitioners — Thai artists, Indian nuns, Sri Lankan school children, Zen archers in Japan, kung fu monks in China and the world's first Buddhist comic (only in America). Among dozens of Buddhist scholars and leaders, Garfinkel interviewed His Holiness the Dalai Lama, an experience that left him speechless — almost. As just reward for his efforts, toward the end of his journey Garfinkel fell in love in the south of France at the retreat center of a leader of the engaged movement, the Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh — a romance that taught him as much about Buddhism as all the masters combined.

In this original, entertaining book, Garfinkel separates Buddhist fact from fiction, sharing his humorous insights and keen perceptions about everything from spiritual tourism to Asian traffic jams to the endless road to enlightenment.

Memorable Quotes:
“Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart to give yourself to it.” the Buddha

“You know quite well, deep within you, that there is only a single magic, a single power, a single salvation... and that is called loving. Well, then love your suffering. Do not resist it, do not flee it. It is your aversion that hurts, nothing else.” Hermann Hess

“You cannot travel on the path until you become the path itself.”

Buddha

In the void of knowledge, we create our worst nightmares.

“The hope of all men, in the last analysis, is simply for peace of mind.” H.H. Dalai Lama

“Do you want to move from existing to living?” Jon Kabat-Zinn

“You should not loose your self-sufficient state of mind. This does not mean a closed mind, but actually an empty mind and a ready mind. If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything. It is open to everything. In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, in the experts mind there are few.” Suzuki

“My life is one continuous mistake.” Dogen Zenji

Buddha or Bust available at Powells and Amazon

“The Four Noble Truths”

The Foundation of
Buddhist Thought
by Geshe Tashi Tsering

Publisher Comments:

The Four Noble Truths provides a strong step toward a solid foundation in Buddhist thought. This volume is the first of six, and offers a complete presentation of the Buddha's seminal Four Noble Truths which summarize the fundamentals of the Buddhist worldview. Indeed, they are an essential framework for understanding all of the other teachings of the Buddha. The Four Noble Truths explores central tenants of Buddhist philosophy in direct, non-sectarian approach, interweaving the insights of the Theravadan and Mahayana views (Buddhism's two major streams). This unique book was developed by Geshe Tashi Tsering, a Tibetan scholar renowned for his ability to render Buddhist teachings accessible and relevant to everyday life.

Memorable Quotes:
The best way to take refuge in the dharma is to put the path into practice. And so we go from taking refuge in the sangha to 'becoming' the sangha.

Nirvana is simply the cessation of suffering, not the annihilation of the person.

...peace arises from chaos, cessation of suffering arises from suffering, and nirvana arises from samsara.

“Ethical conduct is not something we engage in because it is somehow right in itself but because, like ourselves, all others desire happiness and to avoid suffering.” H.H. Dalai Lama

Understanding our minds, we can slowly learn to lessen the effect that unwanted emotions have on them. And through constant effort, we can avoid falling prey to strong emotions that lead to great suffering.

Our basic composition is imperfect, so how can we expect perfect happiness?

Although other people may contribute to our problems, the main cause is internal.

Realizing that 'this' problem is only temporary, like all things, and it will too will pass, gives us more space to find ways to resolve it.

The Four Noble Truths available at Powells and Amazon