Tag: Travel

7,744 Miles Later

by pennypostcard • August 26, 2026 • 0 Comments

Two weeks ago today, I returned to the United States. V and I flew together with our cat from Rangoon to Seoul, where we parted ways. V continued on to Washington Dulles to return to work, while I headed to Portland, Oregon, via Seattle for Congressionally-mandated home leave.

Upon arriving, my dad picked me up at PDX, and we grabbed an early dinner. After nearly a full work day, followed by day-and-a-half travel and the 90-minute drive to his house, completely exhausted and drowning in jet lag, I proceeded to sleep for about 24 hours straight.

Burma, Foreign Service

Farewell, Burma

by pennypostcard • August 11, 2026 • 0 Comments

Later tonight we will head to the airport and fly to Seoul, effectively ending my fifth diplomatic tour in Burma (Myanmar). As excited as I am for what is before us, and as much as I am ready to move forward, I inextricably feel that this departure may be the most bittersweet since we left our beloved Australia in 2019.

Burma, Foreign Service

The Beginning of the End

by pennypostcard • July 25, 2026 • 2 Comments

In May, we entered the last quarter of our tour. All of the storylines — my work, our lives here, and what’s next — started to converge, signaling that the beginning of the end was underway.

Foreign Service, Travel, U.S.

Milestones

by pennypostcard • July 13, 2026 • 1 Comment

We spent the second part of our April R&R to the United States from Burma (Myanmar) in the state of Georgia attending the wedding festivities of my eldest stepdaughter, A.

The wedding had been planned for a relatively long time. At only 27, A and her partner B had already been together since 2018 and engaged since 2024. It probably would have been easier for us had they decided to wed in the late summertime, after our tour in Burma ended. However, a spring wedding in Georgia was better aligned with their wishes (and who wants to be outside in the south during late summer!?), so we were happy to make the trip.

Bosnia & Herzegovina, Burma, Foreign Service

Sixth Tour Bidding: Postscript

by pennypostcard • May 29, 2026 • 2 Comments

In January, while V and I were on R&R in Vietnam, I received the excellent news that my assignment following the end of my tour in Rangoon would be as consular chief in Sarajevo. I could not have been happier, as Sarajevo had been my top choice during bidding the previous fall.

After receiving the handshake, I wrote here on the blog that I would tell the story of how it went down; four months on, I am finally getting around to that.

Burma, Foreign Service, Leadership & Work Culture, Travel, U.S.

Year in Review: 2025 Blog Stats and Recap

by pennypostcard • May 28, 2026 • 1 Comment

I have both been writing this post for months and procrastinating finishing it. I normally publish my annual recap and blog stats in January, or at least earlier in the year.

But I hesitated to relive the personal and professional difficulties I experienced in 2025. A stressful international move, a life-threatening accident, family illness, job insecurity, work-related chaos, and policy whiplash were all lowlights in 2025. It’s a lot of work to dig through it all and think about how to organize and convey the details in a way that’s interesting to people aside from me.

Upon reflection, though, in characteristic form, I decided that feels like all the more reason to write this post — even if it took me a while to find the words, and even if no one else particularly notices whether I keep up what has quietly become an annual tradition. I would notice. And as the memories slowly fade around the edges, I think in the future I would regret letting a year like this pass without summary.

Burma, Foreign Service

A Rolling Portrait: Yangon Circular Railway

by pennypostcard • May 16, 2026 • 0 Comments

In March, the embassy’s Community Liaison Office (CLO) organized a weekend day trip to ride the Yangon Circular Railway.

Often called the “Circle Line,” the train travels on an approximately 28-mile (45 km) loop track around the city. It is supposed to be one of the most atmospheric and socially revealing railways in Southeast Asia. It’s not only a commuter railway and a relic of British colonial infrastructure, but also an informal street market, a lifeline for people who need to travel inexpensively, and a beautiful way to understand how the city is laid out.

Foreign Service, Travel

Finally, Bangkok for Tourism

by pennypostcard • May 14, 2026 • 0 Comments

One of the amazing delights of serving a tour in Rangoon is its proximity — via a one-hour flight — to Bangkok. Similarly to how we viewed the southern Kazakh city of Shymkent (located within driving distance of my first posting in Tashkent, Uzbekistan), Bangkok offers shopping, international cuisine, real banking and medical care. It’s also a genuine reprieve from the stresses of Rangoon, such as burning garbage and electrical outages.

On our prior trips to Bangkok, we have been most interested in what it offers that isn’t otherwise available to us. With that said, Bangkok is a world city with plenty of things that make it special and worth visiting, not just in comparison to Rangoon but independently. In February we finally took that kind of trip to Bangkok.

Burma, Foreign Service

A New Normal

by pennypostcard • April 18, 2026 • 1 Comment

As I mentioned in a previous post, February was the month where life started to slowly feel like it was getting back to normal again for us in Burma. We returned from our R&R in Vietnam and Indonesia with some fresh perspective and gratitude, ready to hit the reset button.

As we reached the halfway point of our tour and I was finally able to leave my walker and cane behind for good, we focused on making memories and ensuring my accident neither became the legacy of our time in Rangoon nor overshadowed the time we had left.

Foreign Service, Travel

Pool Villa Life, Part II

by pennypostcard • March 25, 2026 • 5 Comments

Before too much more time elapses, I want to finish sharing my thoughts about the third part of our January R&R — in Bali, Indonesia.

Foreign Service, Travel

Pool Villa Life, Part I

by pennypostcard • February 23, 2026 • 2 Comments

I planned our January R&R from my hospital bed in Bangkok last December. My intention was to pack the beginning of the trip with sightseeing and activities, then gradually slow the pace into a more leisurely vacation as the days went on. After our busy four-day visit to Hanoi, we headed to our second destination in Vietnam—the coastal city of Da Nang—where a private pool villa awaited us.

Foreign Service, Travel

Holiday in Hanoi, Part II

by pennypostcard • February 19, 2026 • 1 Comment

January found V and me on R&R in Vietnam, a country we had never visited before. Our first stop was Hanoi—the country’s vibrant capital. Its streets buzzed with the cacophony of commerce and the chaotic crush of cars and motorbikes. It felt so different from Rangoon—more optimistic, more productive, life moving in fast-forward motion. I had only been out of the hospital for a month after being hit by a truck eight weeks prior, and I was still using a walker. But I didn’t let that stop me from enjoying Hanoi as much as I could.

[This post is the second in a series. To read the post about the first half of the trip, please click on the link.]

Foreign Service, Travel

Holiday in Hanoi, Part I

by pennypostcard • February 6, 2026 • 7 Comments

After a short work trip to Singapore in mid-January, I returned to Burma for one night to repack and reorient before V and I left on our first R&R trip. Rangoon is a hardship posting; one year of service earns two airfare-paid R&Rs. Unlike a decade ago when I served in Tashkent, we can now use 10 days of administrative leave in lieu of annual leave to take R&R. (This is especially good for entry-level officers new to government service who haven’t yet accumulated much annual leave.)

Since we were approaching the halfway point of our Rangoon tour already and hadn’t used either R&R yet, while hospitalized in Bangkok in December I’d been busily sketching out a short vacation in Vietnam and Indonesia — two countries where neither of us had ever been before. Our first stop: Hanoi.

Foreign Service, Health, Leadership & Work Culture, Travel

Postcard from Singapore

by pennypostcard • January 26, 2026 • 4 Comments

A couple of weeks ago, I began 2026 with a work-related trip to Singapore to attend a consular leadership development course called the CLDC—it was my first CLDC and my first time ever in the country. It was also the first time since returning home to Burma from the hospital in Bangkok in December that I had traveled anywhere on my own; it felt not only like an exciting professional opportunity, but also a chance to road-test my healing body.

Burma, Foreign Service, Health, Travel

Ableism and Access: Return to Burma

by pennypostcard • December 29, 2025 • 3 Comments

About 10 days ago I returned home to Burma. I’d spent a month hospitalized in Thailand after being hit by a truck while crossing the street in mid-November.

While I was in the hospital, I wanted nothing more than to come home and “get back to normal.” But the two days I spent in a hotel between my discharge and my return home illustrated how difficult navigating the real world would be as long as I could only bear about 15 kg of weight on my left leg. Most able-bodied people simply never notice the ways in which the world is inaccessible to those who move through it a bit differently.

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