Are you looking to travel to Cuba independently? WIthout a tour guide, without somebody holding your hand? If so these ten tips Are you going to be invaluable.
What's up world it's Jon and this is going to be my final video on Cuba. I've created a pretty big Cuba playlist, a lot of vlogs on there, some other tips videos. So definitley check that playlist out, i'm going to link to it down below. Let's jump right into My top 10 tips to have a good time in Cuba. Tip #1, download the app maps.me. I did not have this app on my phone. I met so many people in Cuba that already had it. While I was trying to figure out where I was going in Havana. The old fashioned way by trying to remember landmarks. They had turn by turn directions. Already set up, I even remember one experience https://oncasinogames.com/the-top-zimpler-casinos/. Where I had somebody in a colectivo with me giving directions to a cab driver. Using maps.me. Definitley don't forget to download this. You can not download it when you're in Cuba. I tried. Tip #2, this involves Havana airport. And your arrival. When you get to the arrivals area after customs Don't stay on the ground floor. Instead look for the staircase. It should be an escalator. But it's probably not going to be working. So take the stairs up to the second floor to departures. Find the cadeca window. That's the money exchange. Their will be no line there. On the first floor I gurantee you're going to be waiting some time to exchange your money. Then instead of going back downstairs. To arrivals, where there is going to be a line for taxis. Instead, look for a taxi dropping somebody off on the second floor at departures. I tested both of these moves. And I got in and out of Havana airport really really fast. Tip #3 get yourself some local currency. The Moneda Nacional. Now this is different than the standard currency that most tourists get. The CUC. Which you're going to get at the airport. Or any exchange house if you ask for it. However, at any Cadeca you can also get one of these. The Moneda Nacional. And this is one of the coolest bills I have ever seen. A Che Guevara three peso note. Now this gives you access to local markets , local places where they'll only accept , money in this form. It is so much cheaper. The actual exchange rate is 24 CUP to 1 CUC. Or about 24 of these , to 1 U.S Dollar. You can pay for colectivos, local groceries, local items. And I gurantee you most other tourists , are not going to be thinking of doing this. And I actually got this idea from a book called the Real Havana. And I've e-mailed the author back and forth. An amazing guy. I'm going to leave a link down below if you want to check that book out. It's something like $4.00 on kindle. And worth every single penny. Let's move on to #4. This one is for the American's out there. And I know there's quite a few of you watching this video. Do not bring U.S Dollars to Cuba. I repeat, do not bring U.S Dollars to Cuba. You will get a 10% penalty , exchanging that money anywhere in the country. Instead, change your money to Canadian dollars or Euros in advance. Before you go. I'm going to recommend Euros personally because the exchange rate in Cuba 1 CUC to 1 Euro. Is 1 to 1. And it is a lot easier to keep track of your money that way. I did Canadian dollars. And at times it did get a little bit confusing for me. Numero cinco check your receipts closely at restaurants. This one happened to me a couple of times. I saw a beer, I saw a drink, I saw an appetizer. That was not on my bill, the first time , I thought it was a coincidence. The second or third time it started to be a bit of a pattern. So make sure that if you have an item on your reciept, you actually paid for it. Tip number six. Food selection. I never got sick in Cuba, but I did meet some people that got food poisoning. And one rule of thumb I use, not just Cuba, but anywhere around the world is , if you're walking around looking for a restaurant And you don't have any recommendations.
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When packing for your trip, make sure you pack the bare essentials. The absolute minimum, because space is essential. Just like Kenny has here. Well done, Ken. And you cant start a road trip without the perfect soundtrack. Kenny, pass me up your phone mate.
You told me to pack light, I didnt bring it! We need, we need that. We will go back and get it. Australia is a summer wonderland, and its very important to stay hydrated while on the road. Hey mate can we pull over, I need to piss. We literally just left. You can save money on the road by cooking your own meals. Canned foods are great because they have got a long shelf life, and are delicious! My favourite are the baked beans. Oh, stop. Stop, stop, stop, stop the car. Another great tip for road trips, always carry air freshener. Just in case. Oh my God, Kenny. What? I like beans. When you have got a long journey ahead of you, make sure you have got some fun car games to play. Like Eye Spy. Ready boys? Yep. Yeah. I spy with my little eye, something beginning with R. Ah, radio? No. Rabbi!? How could I possibly see that? Risk, the board game! Are you serious? Its road. Weve been on the road this whole time. I would have called that highway! Its definitely highway. Always bring a surfboard along when you are going on coastal trips. Not to surf though, thats way too hard. You can use it to actually pick up chicks and look cool in front of strangers. Like this. Hey man, how ya goin? You gonna go for a few tube gnarly dogs? Yeah and the shack attack, hit up the dew, you know how it is man! Yeah cool. Nailed it. The best part about an Aussie road trip is meeting all the colourful characters along the way. Especially those ones with their own unique stories, like this guy. Hey, how ya goin mate? You look like you are not from around here mate. Ah, no. Bad things happen to people who arent from around here mate. OK, what do you, what do you mean? Theres crocodiles! So just take it easy mate. Theres a petrol station down the road, theyll fix you up. Tell them Glen sent you and youll get a bit of a discount, wont ya! Cheers Glen! Nah all good mate. Thanks mate. See, what a legend! What was that!? I said what a legend. Oh yeah. Nah you are right, I am. I bloody am! If you are driving across Australia chances are you are going to run into some spots that have no radio reception. Then its time to improvise. Why not have a fun singalong with your mates! Galileo! Galileo! Magnifico! I am just a poor boy, nobody loves me. He is just a poor boy from a poor Can you guys shut up! Jesus. Mother Nature can be unpredictable, so make sure you have got some games ready for a rainy day. Um, can we play something else? Nope. Come here, Kenny. Always travel with mates to keep you company. And more importantly, keep you sane during these long driving stints. Isnt that right Mr. Baggy? You would never fall asleep on me. Anyway, hows the family? Thats good, thats good. So there you have it, some survival tips on an Aussie road trip from a few experts. The road trip might be over but the friendships and bonding weve experienced on this trip has been unforgettable. Absolutely, I will remember everything from this trip. Lets go home. Can you hear something? We forgot Ken! I didnt forget anyone, keep going. Bro, hes not there? Yeah, he shouldnt eat beans so much. Thats true, he did stink out the car. Now, if you don't have one of these to hand, then a local bike shop will be able to supply you with one. Now, you simply pop that in there.
And fish around, and you can pull the cable out. When packing up your bike, we'd always recommend that you remove the rear mech hanger. Some bike box brands claim that you can actually pack up your bike without removing the rear mech, but we'd say it's always better to be safe than sorry. And it's really easy to do. Also, if you're going on a long trip, we'd recommend packing a spare mech hanger. These can be purchased from the bike brand of your respective bike, but they're often very hard to source and unique to your bike. The rear mech hanger is a deliberate point of weakness that's designed to bend or break, and in doing so, take the strain of impact. But they can be very hard to source, and they're often unique to each and every bike. So, if you're going on a long trip, it's advisable to take a spare one so that you don't end up having to rent another bike. (relaxed music) Water bottles are really useful for storing and transporting heavy little items that may move around inside the box and damage your frame. Say, things like your multi-tool, or your spare mech hanger, or any other little precious bits that you wanna put in there. Put them inside your water bottles, and then, put the water bottles inside the bottle cages, as this stops the bottle cage, if it's empty, it can get crushed in transit. When packing your bike into a box or bag, we'd also recommend padding it out with some clothing. But don't just chuck your clothes inside because if your chainset's dirty, then it'll make your clothes dirty, too. So simply put your clothes in some plastic bags. And then use these to pad out the bike. If you lose a bolt from your bike while traveling or perhaps you snap one when you're rebuilding your bike, then a hack you can do is to take one of the four that make up the stem plate on the front of the bike, and use them somewhere else. Now, we wouldn't suggest you go and do some max sprint efforts on a bike that only has three stem plate bolts in, but this is a hack that can get you home or get you to a shop where you can get another bolt. (relaxed music) If you're on a budget or don't want to spend money on a dedicated bike box or bag, then go to your local bike shop and get a cardboard box for free. All new bikes come in these cardboard boxes, and bike shops routinely throw them away, so they should give you one for free. I've even seen pro riders transporting their bikes with cardboard boxes. But remember to pack plenty of tape so that you can tape the box back up at the other end for your return journey. And use plenty of padding, too. (relaxed music) If you're traveling with a bike that has hydraulic disc brakes, then be aware that once the wheel is removed, if you pull the lever, and that's something that can happen accidentally, if will close the pads, and that will mean that you can't get the rotor back inside. The solution is to simply prize them apart, and we have a video that shows you how to do this. The link's in the description below. But you can avoid this altogether by simply using some special spacers like this. These slot inside the caliper in between the pads once the wheel is removed. If you don't have these, well, fear not. You can simply use a hack that's a business card folded up and held in place with an elastic band. (relaxed music) And finally, should the worst happen, and your bike gets lost in transit perhaps by the airline, then a great thing to do is to have a note inside the box with your name and address on as this will help it get back to you. Now, this has never happened to me. It's very rare, but it can happen, so why not? Right, I hope you found these hacks and tips useful. And be sure to let us know your own in the comment section down below. We might include them in a future video. Subscribe to the channel and give the video a thumbs up if you'd like to see more hacks and tips in the future. And for another video on how to pack a bike box, simply click down here. Your place is with our people. Lok'tar Most players may or may not recognize major franchise characters, you know Thrall and Arthas and King Varian. Depending on the faction you’re on you may not have ever interacted with those very popular characters.
But the one thing that unites all players is the land. The world itself is probably the key character. My favorite WoW zone has got to be Nagrand. My favorite zone ever. So many things to kill, twelve of this, eight of that. It’s just like a Warcraft twelve days of Christmas. It’s got to be Karazhan. -Karazhan. Winterspring. Molten Core. -Icecrown Citadel. Australia, where I was filming Superman Returns the time WoW first came out... and we played a lot. I have fond memories of Westfall for sure. Stormwind City Casinoslots New Zealand. I remember walking through those gates. My jaw just fell to the floor. I couldn't believe how big the place was. That moment has stuck with me right through this day. Ironforge. I would always dance on top of the mailbox. Gilneas. -Frozen Throne. Hellfire Peninsula for sure. -Thousand Needles. This canyon of endless red rock reminds me of when I was growing up seeing these majestic rock formations. It’s got to be Azshara. It’s the feeling, the red leaves, they’re just really beautiful to look at. And I’m talking old school Azshara, before Deathwing did what he did. The craziest thing about this franchise is that the world itself is probably the most key character. That’s crazy, right? It’s very, very cool. So the powerful idea with Cataclysm was: What if we imperil the world you know? Chris was: “I wanna break everything”. I remember thinking: “Dude, like, what? Is this the end of Warcraft? Right?" He’s pitching the idea and everyone’s like, got this like: “Really? The game is doing really good. You wanna break it?” And they said: “We want to have this big moment, this big event where the players log out and log back in and the world’s all different.” That was probably the scariest thing I’ve ever heard. We didn’t quite know the extent of our madness. Then we realized: “Holy shit. What are we gonna do? How are we gonna do this?” My team and I sat down and we did forty-eight hours of analysis of our data and tried to figure out if we could make this effect happen. And we came back with a definite maybe. That was one of the more complicated things that we’ve done in the history of WoW. Incredibly complicated from an engineering perspective from a patch delivery perspective. We figured out a way to deliver two versions of the world. You’re standing somewhere in Kalimdor, you log out you log back in and the world was destroyed. Now it’s covered in water and a different place that it used to be but I’ll never forget my first time in there. Players seem to really become so invested in the time they’ve spent what it means to them, their friendships. It's interesting to watch the emotional ways people engage. It’s always that way. All of these expansion sets, all of these games. I think with any product like this both the creators and the players mature and grow together. And you see that in the stories that they like to tell to one another. When he was three years old, I put him on WoW and he played an undead, remember that? -Yeah, I got to level ten or eleven. His favorite part was making the campfire, remember? I don’t remember how to make the campfire We have to go back there. What’s your favorite part, Connor, about playing a warlock? So many demons. -That’s what I need to teach my son. The whole family plays, except for my daughter. We haven’t let her summon demons. We’re waiting on that one. Thanks so much, guys. We might do that tomorrow -Tomorrow! I think with Mists of Pandaria they took a slightly different approach where it wasn’t just about defeating one big bad guy. It was about really exploring a whole new culture. The Asian themes, very different. The story-telling was more philosophical. Why do we fight? For my kind, the true question is: What is worth fighting for? And maybe that reflected the fact that the people who make these games were getting older and more mature. Maybe there’s a more sophisticated storytelling that you engage as a person and player. I was heavy into the martial arts movies China, Japan. My daughter was born so I made an Asian inspired panda. So there’s a little kid there’s me, big fat guy on the hill. People really started enjoying these guys and they ended up becoming a race. And it’s just a Christmas picture to start with. I might have printed it out and gave it to someone they said:” Oh, this would a cool race to do” we’re like: “It seems weird for Warcraft” and they go: “We’ve got April Fool. Let’s make this an April Fool thing”. We put a bit of history added pictures and: “April Fools, the new race in Warcraft 3, the Pandaren.” And everyone’s like: “Oh, that’s so cool! This is gonna be so awesome!” and we’re like: “They actually like it. What do we do now?” Mists of Pandaria, I think shows how much we can continue to drive the visual look of our expansions. What’s really been awesome is seeing what Chris Robinson, the Art Director and what that art team is able to accomplish. And they’re just given the time to craft, you know, art. Everything has to be about the idea, so what we’re trying to support here is: “Don’t focus on finished, don’t focus on rendering perfectly make sure every pixel is in the right place. Focus on this first part and make sure that if the idea is amazing the structure and foundation is amazing we’ll get to the rendering part.” As a Technical Director, it’s a lot of collaboration with the arts team. When we were thinking for actually doing the Pandaren for Mists of Pandaria, they wanted to make a character that is much more alive and need to emote better, which required facial animation technology. We actually had to build kind of custom technology to make sure that the actual face shape can change. With the technology you provide you give artists and designers the tools they can use to bring the world to life. Engine tries to enable creative people to do very creative things. Our bond is iron, our will unbreakable who will stand against us? Every new expansion, we try to push our storyline forward. We try to offer new types of experiences that you never had before. In Warlords of Draenor we’re saying: “You wanted to build a base in the world? You’re interested in Blizzard franchises back twenty years ago.” Now you can have a bit of that in your World of Warcraft also. Wouldn’t it be cool if we went back to Draenor before it was Outland? What if we were able to encounter the warlords that we heard about in Warcraft 1 and 2 and these stories in Warcraft 3 but I’ve never played with in WoW? A thing I love about Warlords of Draenor is that it gives us the chance to kind of go back to a place and an era in the history that no one’s seen. And what comes with that is, all the super nerdy layerings of like: “You’re gonna break the timeline. We can’t go back. It’s like Marty and Doc and the time machine. We’re gonna break it all. What about the space-time continuity?” We had to think through all the fiction and all the consequences of what happens if we screw it all up. So today we open up our first raid bosses for testing on the beta servers. One thing that I think is a hallmark of World of Warcraft betas is that players are getting a chance to be invited into the creative process and to see things not finished. Well, Midwinter has ten people here so, that’s enough to test. For something like we’re doing right now, where we have the new Warlords of Draenor it’s a closed beta test, where we send out waves of invites. The two designers here today are Jason, who made the Butcher fight in Highmaul and Candace, who worked on Gruul in Blackrock Foundry. Are we expecting this, in terms of their positioning? The first step is putting RaidBot soft for testing. We also open a thread, for feedback. It’s just too much for three, I think. We often err on the side of making things a bit harder because when something is tuned to be more difficult than we want it to we can then see how far people make it. If something is too easy, they just go on and win and we don’t know how much harder we need to make it to actually get it to the right place. Remind me what that mechanic is... I though you want your ranged to soak it because your melees are usually soaking this other thing that has the stack... Yesterday, I reviewed Judith Schwartz’s book The Therapist’s New Clothes, which is printed and published using the first Espresso Book Machine in the country located at the Northshire Bookstore in Vermont. Today, Judith sits down with us to talk about the EBM, her book, and self-publishing:
L: Hi Judy. Thanks for talking with us today. First, tell us a little about yourself and how you came to write the book, The Therapist’s New Clothes. JS: I didn’t so much choose to write the book as the book demanded to be written. Years back, as an author at an impasse, I decided to become a therapist. The rational reason was that this way I’d have steady income when I was between projects. However, the truth was that therapy had become my life and framed how I saw the world. After I went through the rabbit hole and came out the other side, I could see the huge ironies in what had happened to me, truths that I knew I would best understand through the process of writing out the story. The book is only 144 pages long. How long did it take you to write and edit it? The first draft came very quickly: I wrote it in about six weeks. That 90 or so pages had the basic story, structure, etc. But then I kept going back to it, adding scenes and filling in gaps, kind of a process of layering. Editing-wise, a writer friend and my agent offered suggestions. But mostly it grew over time, as I looked back at the manuscript and saw ways to make it better. Did you explore other avenues of publishing before ultimately deciding on the use of the Espresso Book Machine? Goodness, yes! I had a top New York literary agent who strongly believed in the book, and she sent it around. It came excruciatingly close. At one house it went all the way up to the founding editor who finally turned it down, saying he feared it would fall into the “small book syndrome”. I could second-guess this till I made myself crazy, but for whatever reason or no reason it didn’t get placed. Then I started reading analyses of problems in the publishing industry, and it started to dawn on me: hey, if this system is such a mess, why am I letting it determine my fate as a writer? I was mulling this over when I started hearing about the Espresso Book Machine and learned that the only bookstore in the world that had it (at the time) was…my bookstore, the Northshire in Manchester, Vermont. Now, tell us about the EBM. How did you hear about it? How long was the process from beginning to publication? How much of the formatting did you have to do yourself? It took a couple of months, but that was because I spent time working with a designer on the cover and, well, getting my bearings. After doing books with traditional publishing it would have felt weird, even disorienting, to have a book come out within days! I mean, I needed a bit of time to get geared up. start my blog, etc. The folks at the Northshire helped me with the formatting, but because the shifting between formats kicks up some odd tabs and spacing, it took a few rounds of proofing to get it right. How long does it take to print one copy of the book? Is the Vermont bookstore also handling distribution for you? It takes minutes—maybe three or four minutes. The Northshire is getting the newer version of the machine (2.0 rather than the 1.5 prototype) this month, which means it will pop out even faster. The bookstore essentially acts as my publisher, selling the book through their website and dealing with Amazon orders. (I had to pay a small fee for them to put it on Amazon.) They also worked with me to have it available via Lightning Source, Ingram’s print-on-demand program. This way someone can order it through any bookstore that uses Ingram as a distributor. I’m not sure if the Northshire does this regularly, or whether I was their guinea pig for this. I’ve also made the book available as an ebook through Just a year ago, when I brought the book out, it seemed you had to choose between doing a print book or an electronic version. No more. How is the book doing? Where have you gained the most amount of sales? To talk about this, I decided to write my essay for you. The book is doing well enough, considered its limited distribution, no marketing, etc. Most of the sales have come from word-of-mouth, and a few events I’ve done, including one at the Northshire and a signing at a library opening in a town where I knew no one – except the librarian! A few blogposts in the mental health area have also sparked interest (not that I compulsively check my sales stats or anything….) What kind of feedback are you getting?
The feedback from readers has been amazing – people coming up to me on the street or at concerts and thanking me for writing it, saying that they’ve told everyone they know to buy it. Several readers have blamed me for keeping them up late because they couldn’t stop reading it. Often it’s the people I least expect who respond the most powerfully. I casually mentioned to one woman I interviewed for an article that I had written a book. She liked it so much she bought a copy for everyone on her holiday list! What’s next for you? I lead something of a double life. On the one hand, I do my own writing, The Therapist’s New Clothes and a novel I’ve finished that’s a love triangle in Freud’s Vienna (based on my grandmother’s psychoanalyst who was a member of Freud’s inner circle). I’ve also started a second novel, also inspired by my grandmother, who was an artist in Greenwich Village in the 1910s. Then, improbably, I’ve been writing about “new economics”, basically the nexus of economics and the environment. I think my experience with publishing left me primed to question assumptions about we live and do business. When the financial downturn hit in late 2008, I started asking things like “what is money?” and found myself in some pretty fascinating, dynamic terrain. My pieces are published in Time, Miller-McCune, Christian Science Monitor, etc. Any hobbies outside of writing and publishing? What are you reading these days? We live a mile up a mountain on a nice stretch of forest/meadow and do a lot outdoors—swimming, walking, biking, gardening. I spend a lot of time with my son (within the bounds of what would be cool for a 15-year-old, of course) and love listening to his music; he writes his own rock songs and sings and plays guitar. As for reading, I just read, and loved, Billy Bathgate, and can recommend Jack London’s “John Barleycorn”, which I would call the ultimate addiction memoir with some surprising insights. And since you raised the subject…please indulge me a shameless plug for my husband, Tony Eprile’s, novel The Persistence of Memory, a beautiful and funny book about South Africa in the waning years of apartheid. Any advice for our authors and readers who may be considering the EBM or self-publishing in general? Go in with your eyes open. This is an extremely tough time in the book business and there’s a lot of confusion, frustration, and heartbreak out there. Some of us are killer promoters and some of us aren’t, so don’t go into it thinking you’re going to suddenly change. Better to work with your own style. When I decided to self-publish, the smartest thing I did was to make a deal with myself: I would go ahead and do this if I made it fun for myself. So when I start getting stressed or obsessing about numbers I stop myself and remember that it’s only worth it if it’s fun. |
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