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challenges from west to east
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| During our SEA adventure family, friends and website readers gave us challenges to accomplish. You can read about them on this page. With the completion of our Southeast Asia Adventure we also round off our challenges. |
| 1) Edwin Mensink
Get the car through the Ministry of Transport roadtests in one go
[Jan '03]
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1) Accomplished. The first challenge is a fact. It took blood, sweat, toil and tears, but we feel very proud and happy about the car being roadworthy. "Fortunately they rust", the inspector said, "otherwise everybody would drive Toyota".
[Jan '03]
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| 2) Nol, Ike en Judith
Find two bears preparing a sandwich
[Feb '03]
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2) Cancelled. It was too good to be true, 1,000 euros for finding two bears making a sandwich [this refers to a Dutch nursery rhyme]. But we hear they are working on a real challenge.
[Feb '03] |
| 3) Monique Wubbels and sister Marijke Ruts
Buy two jade massage rollers in China
[April '03]
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3) Accomplished. China, and especially the northwest province of Xinjiang, is known for its jade so this was an excellent place to work on this challenge, And yes, among all the rubbish and kitsch we found two massage rollers. Made of real jade.
[May '04]
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| 4) Housing co-op "Woonpunt"
Visit a housing co-op in one of the Asian or Arabic countries that you pass through
[April '03]
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4)Accomplished. In Ho Chi Minh City [Vietnam] we could finaly accomplish this challenge. Chesterton is a leading real estate consultant in Vietnam. We spend an interesting afternoon with Mrs Minh and Mrs Lien, who could tell us a great deal about their business.
[augustus '06]
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| 5) Bas Engelen
Take pictures of classic Volvos in non-European countries
[April '03]
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5)Accomplished. Bas describes his challenge as follows: "take pictures of classic Volvos in non-European countries; license plate or the surroundings in which the picture is taken will constitute proof. Classic Volvos are: Humpbacks [PV444, PV544], Amazones [122], 140-160 series and the types 240-260 and 340-360 series".
For Bas we found and photographed Volvos in Greece, Turkey, Iran and Pakistan, but not in India or Bangladesh. In Singapore we saw an Amazon but without the camera on hand. In Malaysia, Thailand and Laos we saw many classic Volvos and made a selection of the nice ones. Click here to see the Volvos...
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 6) Marja Wegman
Search for combs made of natural materials
[April '03]
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6) Accomplished.
Status Feb '06: We found three combs. It's been quite a challenge because we discovered that in Asian countries they apparently prefer plastic combs. The first comb, a wooden one, we found in Xinjiang, China [May ‘04, picture above]. Both the second and third we found on the floating market on Inle Lake in Myanmar [Nov '05]. We found a beautiful bone comb and a silver one.
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006] |
| 7) Colleagues Karin-Marijke [Operations Noord-Oost van Albron Catering]
Take a picture of Kumari
[May '03]
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7) Failed. Nepal has living deities, of whom Kumari is the most prominent. The Kumari is a young girl who is the manifestation of Durga. In Kathmandu astrologists search for a girl between two and four years old who is from the right caste. She must have 32 good qualities. When found she is put behind the walls of a palace. Her feet are never allowed to touch the ground and she may not get involved in any earthly activities. During festivities she gives people a tika [red dot on the forehead] and once a year she is carried through the city. Her divineness ends when she starts to menstruate or wounds herself badly enough to leave a mark. Then she is sent back to her parents whom she hardly knows. Kumari lives on the first floor of the Kumari Bahal. On request she will show herself occasionally in a window of the courtyard.
Explanation: Unfortunately we could not go to Nepal. Just before we planned to enter the country, the king of Nepal sent his government home and established a state of emergency. Although flying into Nepal might have been a possibility, driving our own vehicle into the country at that time would have been utterly irresponsible and asking for trouble. Too many cars that crossed the border never arrived in Kathmandu. But we're not ready to give up the challenge yet, who knows how our journey develops...
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we round also off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 8) Eduard Smeets
Send a postcard from anywhere on your journey
[May '03]
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8) Accomplished. Already in Valkenburg [the Netherlands] we found the right postcard for Eduard.
[June '03] |
| 9) Stefan Wegner
Visit the holy places of Palitana and Girnar and compare Jainism as religion with Hinduism
[May '03]
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9) Accomplished. We climbed many steps [3,000 and 10,000] in order to visit the many temples of Palitana and Girnar. This was a real challenge! Besides the sore legs we got from ascending and descending these steps, the challenge taught us many things about Jainism and Hinduism. We wrote a separate story about this challenge in our logbook, but only in Dutch.
[Nov '04]
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| 10) Breukersweg 38/40
Send a postcard from Greece
[May '03]
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10) Accomplished.We sent two beautiful postcards from the village of Klytoria.
[June '03] |
| 11) Ike and Nol
Take a picture which we can hang on the wall in the living room
[May '03]
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10) Accomplished. On the beach of Goa we took a picture of the sun setting in the sea, with an "old" wooden table in the foreground on which we put a bottle of wine and a plate with Indian cheese [pakoda's]. These were specific conditions of the challenge. Ike and Nol could choose from five pictures.
[Dec '04]
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| 12) Judith and Geert
Make a triptych with a theme, but not too crowded
[May '03]
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12) Accomplished. The theme is "religion". We made six triptychs, one of which they could choose. Each triptych consists of either three pictures depicting three different religions or three pictures depicting one specific religion.
[Dec '04]
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| 13) Marlies and Steven
Take a close-up picture of colorful Asian children
[May '03]
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13) Accomplished. During the trip we've had quite a lot of contact with children so we had pictures enough. But which one to choose? We reduced the number of pictures to five from which they could choose.
[Dec '04]
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| 14) Danny Dikker
Find Mac hard- and/or software in an Asian country. An article will be published on www.macosx.nl
[Jan '04]
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14) Accomplished. In an earthquake-shattered Bam [Iran] we found a Japanese doctor from the UN who used an iBook with Japanese characters on the keyboard. In Urumqi [China] we found an Apple store with this sign.
[May '04]
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| 15) Aukje and Harry
Find at least twenty used telephone cards in Asia
[Jan '04]
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15) Accomplished. We found seven cards in Pakistan and swapped one for a beautiful Chinese telephone card. In 2005 we found another eight cards in different Asian countries. Southeast-Asia proved to be a good place for this challenge, we found many and thus accomplished the challenge easily.
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 16) Berry Habets
Visit a training school where they practise Asian martial arts and take pictures
[May '04]
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16) Accomplished. In the suburbs of Chennai we found an open-air school where karate is practised. The sensai [teacher] was working with ten pupils. It's too hot at this time of the year to practise inside, but outside, around sunset, the temperature is pleasant enough.
[April '05]
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| 17) Tiny
Find a unique Apple product
[June '04]
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17) Failed. In several countries we found some small gadgets with Apple logos in different languages, but have not really found the ultimate product.
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 18) Judith
Take a picture of an active Tibetan Mastiff
[Aug '04]
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18) Accomplished. Our unexpected journey to Tibet gave us an excellent opportunity to work on this challenge. It wasn't difficult. In Tibet we saw many Tibetan Mastiffs, although in general in very poor condition and scared of people. Unfortunately, Tibetans don't treat their dogs well. This picture was taken during our busride to Lhasa. No sleeping dog, but a very active and threatening watchdog. He barked and showed his teeth, he was definitely not one to walk over to and cuddle. Coen was happy with a large zoom on his camera!
[May '06]
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| 19) Pauline
Search in India for beautiful, preferably old, perfume bottles and buy them at a reasonable price.
[Aug '04]
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19) Accomplished. In India we bought three perfume bottles for Pauline, among which two old ones and one new one. During our Christmas holiday we gave them to her and she is very happy with them.
[Dec '04]
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| 20) Eric
Search in South-east Asia for a Moto Guzzi and take a picture of it
[Aug '04]
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20) Accomplished. In Singapore we found the only Moto Guzzi in Singapore for sale. At least that's what the salesman in the shop told us. This V11 costs 23,000 Singaporean Dollars [11,500 euros]. But 23,000 Singaporean Dollars is only a start since Singapore has a complex system of insurances and you must have insurance before you can even buy a vehicle. The shop is of course very willing to sell you an insurance too [even with a loan if you want to...].
[Sep '05]
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| 21) Sylle
Search for beautiful and funny monkeys for the collection and buy them
[Aug '04]
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21) Accomplished. Although India has more than enough monkeys in the wild, it was quite difficult to find one within the limits of the challenge. In the end we found a small "Hanuman", the famous god-monkey of the Indian legend, the "Ramayana". In South-east Asia we could really work on the challenge and during Christmas 2005 we had another five monkeys for Sylle's collection.Specifications are that the monkeys may be no more than 6 centimetres high and that they are solitaire monkeys or ‘‘see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” monkeys.
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 22) Lei Hendrix
Search for old fire trucks and/or fire stations
[Sep '04]
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22) Accomplished. For Beppy and Lei we hunted them down and took pictures of them.
The first fire engine was photographed in Pakistan and since then we established quite a collection of pictures. After a while we decided to concentrate on quality rather than quantity. The last picture was taken in Vietnam. Click here for Lei's fire-engines
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 23) Andreas
Give a business card, on which a personal message is written, to the manager of the Roerig museum in Naggar [India].
[Sep '04]
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23) Accomplished. That is, we handed the business card to the current manager since the former manager, for whom the card was meant, died in May of this year.
[Sep '04] |
| 24) Riëtte
Where and with what do children play in India. What do they do in their leisure time?
[Sep '04]
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24) Accomplished. This challenge raised quite some interesting discussions about "having leisure time". In the Western world "having leisure time" and "playing" in most cases go together. Also, "having leisure time" in the Western world means time outside school. But in India things work differently. First of all, not everybody goes to school. Instead of going to school children have to work. Even if they do go to school many of these children have to work when school finishes, so playing is not always so obvious in this country. We decided to split the challenge into two: we took 15 pictures of children playing and 15 pictures of children working. We hope in this way Riette can teach her primary- school children what children in India do "in their leisure time".
[Dec '04]
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| 25) John Hölsgens
Take pictures of postmen
[March '05]
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25)Accomplished.
We collected quite a few pictures of aspects that concern the delivery of mail.
- Click here for John’s "postmen-page".. Click here for John's "postmen-page"
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 26) Sylle
Find beautiful silver and malachite beads to make a necklace
[Dec '05]
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27) Failed: Too bad we only received this challenge after Myanmar, thè country for these kind of beads.
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 27) Jaap en Annette
Fotografeer honden op reis
[jan '06]
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27) Failed: We were going to take pictures of overlanders travelling with their dogs. Too bad we didn't accounter them after we got the challenge.
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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| 28) Leonne Muller
Take a picture in China of a mother breastfeeding her child
[May '06]
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28) Failed: We didn't think this challenge would be a problem. Unfortunately, our journey in China was cut short when we were evacuated to Bangkok because Karin-Marijke had malaria. As compensation we have a similar picture, but taken in Laos.
With the completion of our SEA Adventure, we also round off this challenge.
[December 2006]
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