0:13

You've never experienced anything like a clear

0:15

night looking up at

0:18

the sky, when there's no light

0:20

pollution and you see every

0:22

star and you suddenly it

0:25

all makes sense. Welcome

0:28

to A Way to Go, a production of I Heart Radio

0:31

and Fathom. I'm Jarlyn Gerba and

0:33

I'm Pavio Rosatti. Garlyn and I

0:35

are thrilled to welcome our guest today, Rob Long

0:37

and entertainment industry multi hyphen it.

0:40

Since two thousand four, he's been the host of Martini

0:42

Shot, a weekly radio show about Hollywood

0:45

and its many tentacles. He's the author

0:47

of several hilarious books, Conversations

0:49

with My Agent, set Up, Jokes, set

0:52

Up, and most recently Bigley Donald

0:54

Trump in Verse. He sits

0:56

on the board of My Friend's Place, an agency for

0:59

homeless kids in Las ang Angels, and just

1:01

finished a four year term as president of the board

1:03

of Southern Foodways Alliance. He

1:06

also has a Grand diploma from the

1:08

Escopier School of French Cuisine

1:10

in Parents, I know

1:12

No No, Gerlyn, I'm not done. He

1:15

also has day jobs, by the way as

1:17

the founder of the podcast network Ricochet,

1:20

and he's an Emmy nominated

1:22

twice Emmy nominated writer and television

1:24

producer who began his career at a little

1:26

show called Cheers. I'm

1:29

done. Okay, Well, all that is very

1:31

great and impressive, Rob, thank you so much. Obviously

1:34

not at all what we're here to talk? Um.

1:39

Can you tell Pavia and I this is one

1:41

of my favorite stories. Can you tell us about the time you

1:43

decided that what you really needed to

1:45

do was leave your beautiful home in Venice

1:48

Beach, California to hop on

1:50

a very bleak container ship and

1:53

sail all the way across the Pacific

1:55

from Seattle to Shanghai. What

1:57

were you thinking? Well, in my defense, I didn't

1:59

think it was going to be that bleak. I thought it'd be kind of cool.

2:02

Um, and it kind of was cool. And I didn't anticipate

2:05

that the this is a while ago, that

2:07

the world economy would be so

2:09

slow, that all the

2:11

shipping would be slow. And

2:13

you know, you're a passenger on these ships, like you just you're

2:16

just you're like a container, like you're not you know, I was

2:18

not in a container. I was in a room

2:21

that it's sort of like a pre fabby kind of room.

2:23

Like you go you go to a bad roadside hotel

2:26

and it's like it's it's nice, it's not dirty,

2:28

but it's not you know, fancy. It's much smaller

2:30

than a container. Also it's much more well.

2:32

Yeah, and

2:34

I just didn't expect that the world economy's

2:37

health would affect the schedule.

2:40

And what it's really fascinating

2:42

how these things work, I mean, container shipping. Everybody's

2:45

listening to this and they're probably a little smartphone and

2:47

we think, oh, this is so modern, you know, and

2:49

the computers and all that great stuff. But actually

2:51

the twenty centuries brought to us by container shipping.

2:54

And container shipping started the fifties where some guy

2:57

was a shipping guy, a trucking guy. Uh,

3:00

I own a trucking company in North Carolina. His

3:02

name is McClean something

3:04

something, Sam McLean or mc McLean.

3:07

And he just didn't know why hit truckers had

3:09

to drive and wait three days

3:12

to unload at the dock and then

3:14

load it back because that was like cargo, nuts and

3:16

stuff. And he said, why can't I just

3:18

take the back of my truck and put it on the ship.

3:20

And that was like a light bulb moment for container shipping

3:22

in that brought us to twenty century because If you can do that, then

3:26

Walmart can send an email or send

3:28

a message to a factory in

3:30

China and say we're gonna sell twenty

3:33

flat screen TVs next week in

3:35

Little Rock. And then those flat screen TVs

3:37

will be made in China and then be

3:39

put on a container and the container will end in Oakland

3:42

on the back of a truck. The truck will go and

3:44

get too Little Rock will lift it from

3:47

the giant and then we'll put

3:49

it on top of the wheels. It's so genius,

3:51

it's brilliant. It's really it's a wonderful world to watch

3:53

these things. But so I didn't and I thought that just happens

3:55

naturally normally on a regular schedule. But

3:57

it doesn't. If the economy goes dead

4:00

own, then the shipping owners who

4:02

are like in Hamburg for some reason there,

4:04

you know, think it's old. It's like

4:06

all shipping happens like in the North seas, right,

4:08

that's where the boats are made, that's where this

4:10

is. This is being the case. Right. So

4:12

if you if you can go and see Hans Holbins,

4:14

one of his famous portraits is called a Hanseatic

4:17

merchant, and that was the shipping guy from Hamburg

4:20

was so the people in Hamburg said, well, we're

4:22

not going to pay a lot of money. We're

4:24

sending empties back to China anyway, so let's

4:26

just slow down. And they usually don't

4:29

tell you they're gonna slow down. So I was kind of climbed up this giant

4:31

gangway was huge, like there's like eight stories,

4:33

this rickety thing. And I get down my little bag

4:36

and I'm in the thing. And the first thing you

4:38

do this or your room and go to the room. And I said, and you talked

4:40

to you hang out with the officers and

4:41

the captain and the skipper. They called

4:44

him the the Boss. Let's he

4:46

had some other name for it, um the Master.

4:48

He's the Master. And then the

4:50

Master says, would you like to come and see us? See the

4:52

pilot pull us out of the port, and Shank in

4:54

Seattle is like sure. So as we're moving

4:57

away from the port, like

4:59

it's ten feet twelve feet,

5:02

he turns and says, they told

5:04

you about the schedule change, right, and now it's

5:06

fifteen feet would be like no, he says, Oh, it's

5:08

gonna take an extra two and a half weeks anymore

5:11

because of the storms, and we have to

5:13

go all the way up and around storms and

5:15

now it's like thirty feet and then you realize that

5:18

I can't even jump out in an hour,

5:21

Like you're just you're you're you're out of touch. You

5:23

can't there's nothing you can't So

5:25

you couldn't even tell anybody. Sorry, I'm not going to be

5:27

home for that meeting. I'm I have another two and a half. You

5:30

can sign up for get a little satellite

5:33

phone email address and

5:35

then you don't have until you sign up on boat

5:38

so that then you can see email at various people,

5:40

but you can't Like I couldn't go to the Flying

5:42

Blue whatever air miles used

5:44

I used to for my flight back from Shanghai. I couldn't

5:46

go there and change it, right. I

5:49

just was like others

5:52

do it and they're like, yeah, that's how, and we

5:54

think that's when, but we don't know, right,

5:57

Sorry, why did it something? Why was it going to take two and

5:59

a half more? Because because you don't

6:01

burn any more fuel than you need to. So they're

6:03

just gonna hang out and wait until they

6:05

get some some orders so that they know we

6:07

have It's like they have the rule from Hamburg

6:09

is don't go over you

6:12

know twelve knote way

6:14

as you walk across the Pacific, tell us why

6:17

you decided to travel this way and then back to

6:19

the and then after we also, of course I want to know how

6:21

you set it up. Oh so why,

6:24

I think because it sounded really cool. How

6:26

did you even hear about this? I mean, you are a brilliant

6:28

man who knows about everything at all times. I didn't

6:31

know about this. I guess it's right. It's always something

6:33

you don't know. And I think I read about

6:35

it somewhere and it sounded

6:38

I don't know how I was. Also, it sounded too like elder

6:40

hostily for me, like you know, people in birkenstocks

6:42

and like you know, beards going and say we're gonna you know,

6:44

we don't. I don't want that. But a friend

6:46

of mine and I we've had writing projects to do, and

6:48

this is like you when you're on a boat, like that's it, like

6:51

you you can't. Oh, I procrastinated.

6:53

But on Instagram. No, there's no Instagram. There's

6:55

nothing. There's just you and then

6:57

the ocean and the Pacific, the mighty Pacific. Yes,

6:59

well, well mobic right, treat

7:02

that's what he goes over the Pacific they try. They

7:04

circumnavigate the world, the whalers,

7:08

and what you discover is they tell you, oh, there aren't

7:10

any whales. There are tons of whales.

7:12

Trust me, I saw them all. There's so many whales, there's

7:15

no shortage, there's whale setting.

7:17

You're like, I don't even Jimmy,

7:19

I saw him yesterday. And

7:22

it's huge specific oceans huge also

7:24

what you forget and like you get on the boat and you you

7:27

walk up the gang cland this is a huge continuership.

7:29

It's giant. Do you even feel like you're moving

7:31

on the ocean or that you do when you when

7:33

you get on it. It's the largest thing you've ever been on in

7:35

your life? Is it? I'm imagining like an airplane

7:38

carrier. It's like a like a naval carrier.

7:40

Huge. And then you wake

7:42

up the next morning and you're in the middle of the Pacific and you're

7:44

the smallest thing you've ever seen, right, You're tiny.

7:47

It's a tiny little boat bobbing up and down.

7:49

Are you in a twin bed? Do you have nice big heavenly

7:51

bed mattress and big fluffy down and

7:55

no meant no no turndown

7:57

service, no house keep

8:00

being none of that, and there's none of that. As

8:02

the master. You have to respects the master from

8:05

you have to respect, and you have to be careful what you say,

8:08

because he was very nice guy. They're all nice, but like

8:10

at a certain point and he says, well, Hamburg tells us

8:12

where where Hamburg came and gave

8:14

us a new route Hamburg, you know, the computer

8:16

in Hamburg and this like TMT guys in the computer

8:18

and they just sent him by satellite. His his

8:20

his, you know, and

8:23

you realize these container ships used to have much bigger crew.

8:25

They don't need it. They don't need a be crew anymore, and they

8:27

really don't even need a master. And so then I made the mistake

8:29

of say, so, wait a minute, so if Hamburg does all this,

8:32

and remember a pilot, a local pilot

8:34

brings you in and out of port. So

8:36

it's never the master of the of

8:38

the container ship doesn't actually dock

8:40

in Seattle or in Shanghai or pull out

8:42

of Shanghai or Oakland or Long Beach

8:45

in his places. A local pilot always

8:47

does that. So and

8:49

they say they chopped at the pilot on sometimes

8:51

when they come outside. Yeah, it's like always a local pilot,

8:53

so you don't really need a master, which I then

8:56

suggested, like when are they going to figure out? And

8:58

I stopped saying, and he said that they don't

9:00

need me. I hope not to tell ill.

9:02

He's German. I would not tell mad for the next day.

9:04

Beat But twenty days

9:07

left. Business brain

9:09

is working. He's inventing driverlessless

9:13

sales across the sea. Is

9:16

going to get on that in a nice room, I could like anyway.

9:19

So the reason I did it was to be undistracted,

9:22

because I thought that what, what's this? What could

9:24

possibly be distracting? About the Pacific Ocean

9:27

and snowing on the Pacific and whales.

9:37

So all that you saw was blue, gray

9:41

gray. It was cold because of December December,

9:44

and you started in Seattle and you

9:46

had to change the roots. So where did you go?

9:48

North? So you kind of go close

9:50

to this Arctic circle, so you're kind of going in the

9:52

bigger arc or nearly are you hugging the coast

9:54

of Alaska? As it really you can see it. You

9:57

can see it. You can see these giants, ice

10:00

mountains, and some of them are ice volcanoes,

10:02

old ice volcanoes. I think it's kind of cool. It's

10:04

really cool. And I think that's when

10:07

these are ice volcanoes, And I thought, wait a

10:09

minute, isn't that

10:11

that's our scientology, right, they believe that lives

10:13

in an ice volcano. We

10:15

should just go up there and see, you know, anyway

10:19

you can tell you from l A but you know

10:22

that's

10:25

right. Well, I'm in a pantheist um.

10:28

So you go across and then yeah, so we're

10:30

we're north and you could kind of see the storm. You can see

10:32

it because it's there's nothing in between you and that, and

10:34

you could see the storm. And then every now and then there'll be a

10:36

clearer day and a clear night. And you've

10:39

never experienced anything like a clear night

10:41

looking up at

10:43

the sky when there's no

10:45

light pollution and you see every

10:48

star and you suddenly it

10:51

all makes sense because you

10:53

know, people would look at the stars for ever,

10:56

and we tend to think that's strange because

10:58

we look at the sky we see four stars, and

11:01

they would look at the sky in the ancient world and see them

11:03

all and it must have been just

11:07

impossible to ignore. I mean, how could you

11:09

not believe the gods were powerful or

11:11

God was powerful or looking at you or there were

11:13

these these things had forces. When you look up

11:15

at the sky and all you see is this

11:18

incredible canopy is insane. It was just really

11:20

amazing and a blanket of just thick

11:22

stars. Yeah, that's what we have up there,

11:24

I know, but I just don't see it, right, well, I know we

11:26

don't see it. Every time I think about that, I'm like, how did they know?

11:30

How do they navigate by them? It's just such a different

11:32

way that a brain works,

11:34

But there's more navigation. I

11:36

mean, how do you walk around the city? Right? You know the building?

11:39

I know, I get not not that well. I

11:41

mean, I know that I've crossed fifteenth Street,

11:43

but it's not as though I recognize the building on the corner

11:46

and eighth from the one on the corner of eight. You

11:48

might be deep in your subconscious

11:51

And on the point is like if they're there, they're

11:53

so loud, they're

11:56

so you have to start paying attention to shooting

11:58

stars all the time, saddle student stars.

12:00

You know, you look up, you wait fifteen minutes. The

12:03

earth is being bombarded all the time by

12:06

these things. Apparently. I mean I'm acting like, I like,

12:08

I'm really kind of interested in this stuff, but

12:11

really you had no intention. Is the star as a sun?

12:13

Did you know that star is a sun? Yes? And

12:17

the sun is a star. I

12:19

don't believe that. But were

12:21

you going to bed early? Because well

12:23

that's there's no television. That's

12:26

the weird too. You had to be really bring your own. You had

12:28

to bring your own liquor. Okay, number

12:31

one, if you're honest, If you're going on a shipping

12:33

container, bring your liquor, pack

12:35

your and liquor. Also pack extra because if

12:37

you're going on a ship, like if I brought enough

12:39

wine to get me through the two weeks to cross

12:42

the ocean and suddenly I had to space it out over a

12:44

month. Oh that's funny, pa, I thought

12:46

you meant to share with the master, but you just meant

12:48

to drink it all yourself. Listen,

12:50

I'm just saying that I would have needed another

12:53

case to get me through that. Yeah,

12:56

I would recommend if you told me that, I wouldn't. I know

12:58

you well enough to say you double up on the open. Yeah,

13:00

I'm putting double up on the line, so you

13:02

ring. So. So there are two kinds of people right there. Kind of

13:04

people go on a container ship because they like the isolation

13:06

and they really need some work done. And they're

13:08

kind of people like me who would go into a Canadian ship

13:10

because they want to be the isolated, they want to get some work

13:12

done. And they get on the container ship, they're like, I'm not I'm

13:14

not I'm not even gonna do it here, Like

13:17

I'm not even here, Like

13:19

I couldn't be more. I don't

13:21

know what else I can do. So like for two

13:24

days, I was just like I just was depressed.

13:26

First of all, it gets dark early, and

13:28

I'm like, I'm not even doing it, Like what's wrong

13:30

with me? And then day three or day four, I

13:33

was like, well, you know today we're

13:36

gonna be o this thing for other two weeks, so I'm

13:38

gonna just sit and just look

13:40

out at the ocean. And then

13:43

the next day you do that, and then

13:45

you're like I could just do this for two

13:47

weeks. And then I wrote something,

13:49

but I first had to get over the panic and oh

13:51

my god, I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it, and

13:53

then say, well, wait a minute, this is kind of cool. You're looking

13:55

at this, looking at that, You're on the Pacific,

13:57

You'll go to the stars. All that's all that

13:59

stuff off. That was it, and there was rough

14:02

seas for three or four days where really it's

14:04

like a comedy where you're at the table and

14:06

the ship and your back from

14:09

the table, and then it comes back and you come to a club, back

14:11

to the table and you're like wait, like

14:13

you do that you're able the fork of food and then

14:15

you go, you know, and that's funny, right,

14:18

But you also I woke up on the floor humps

14:20

because they you know, this is amazing

14:22

though that these ships are this big.

14:25

So sometimes it happens that container

14:27

ships get lost at sea because they just because

14:29

the waves are so rough, they just topple over, yeah,

14:32

or they smash open or stuff. Like, I'm

14:37

not exactly a great endorsement for taking

14:39

continuous. I think it's ultimately

14:41

very sick. But but the the other thing is

14:43

like you just realize, oh, they just put

14:46

your stuff in a box. They

14:48

just put your stuff in a box. And then they put the box

14:51

in a big metal box and

14:53

the side

14:55

it's not they're not inside kind

14:57

of rains and snows and stuff and like

15:00

held fastened down with bungee courts

15:02

the corners of each one.

15:04

So that we have now we call forty ft equivalent

15:07

containers and they originally sort of the twenty

15:09

foot You can still see the twenty foot driving around like

15:11

they're a little one. They're like, oh, let's that little truck. That's

15:13

the twenty ft equivalent. And on the corners

15:16

you can see their little bolts, little bolt holes,

15:18

like little gromuts almost, and

15:20

those are what they and they have like this giant

15:22

stacks of them, and they had little little bolts

15:25

that hold them together and kind of like lego pieces, they fit

15:27

into each other, they right and uh. And so the

15:29

crew goes and undoes them,

15:31

and then the crane operator lifts them and

15:34

moves them. And basically so when we were in

15:36

Buzan in no, actually

15:38

when we're in Tianshan, which is in Hong Kong, I

15:40

just didn't do anything, he said. I got a folding chair

15:42

and sat on the top of the deck

15:45

and watched the whole thing.

15:47

And they just they take all the containers out

15:50

and they sort of arranged them by the crane and they put

15:53

them all back in with new ones, and they pack

15:55

and repack the thing according to you know

15:57

where this container is going, and it's all organized.

16:00

You get your flat screen like you get whatever you're

16:02

looking for from where. It's kind of remarkable when

16:04

you see it happening like that. Okay, So

16:06

so you decide to take this container

16:08

ship for a few weeks because you have to get

16:10

this deadline going, and

16:12

and there's a room prepared for you,

16:15

kind of miraculously because who would think to

16:17

put people on this ship with these

16:20

other things? So so you got this idea

16:22

you heard about it? Is this something that writers do?

16:24

Is this something that there's a history or a legacy?

16:27

Here's what here's now. Alex Haley,

16:30

who was the author author of Roots,

16:33

wrote his second book. Okay,

16:36

so there's some romanticism to it, sales.

16:41

No, I think it's like Roots to actually or

16:43

something like maybe. I don't

16:45

know, but he went he went the Atlantic route, which is

16:47

the next thing I want to do from Savannah to Barcelona

16:49

or something. It sounds really cool, but I

16:51

really would just go Barcelona down through the Suez Canal,

16:54

Barcelona down through the Suez Canal, and then end

16:56

up where I think they'd up like any

16:58

singer. But you don't have to go to Singapore. You can just get

17:00

off and I'm imagining this is a very

17:02

affordable way to travel it's

17:05

cheap, but it's not that cheap. I mean it's cheaper

17:07

to fly, yeah, it's and it's it's

17:10

cheaper to but but it's over the

17:12

course of the couple of weeks and you get room

17:14

and board. Yeah, you get you get room and board. The

17:16

board part, I don't know. I

17:18

don't think it's really going to hit the on a scale

17:21

of you know, zero to tavia

17:23

it's a two, right, So it's good for people

17:25

who maybe like drinking soilent or something

17:27

like that. Yeah, I mean it's not

17:29

bad. Did you go into the kitchen and say, we'll let

17:31

me show you what an chew

17:34

here? The interesting thing is you discovered this is

17:37

a class distinction on these

17:39

ships, actually on cruise ships too,

17:41

but it's harder to notice. Officers

17:44

are always sort of Germanic issues more

17:46

than European, and the crew is from the Philippines.

17:48

They're all Malaysian Philippine Malay. And

17:50

dinner is like a beef stew and stuff

17:53

like that. It's not good, but it's like it's like a

17:55

bad boarding school. The crew

17:57

eats really

17:59

cool pork stuff that's all crunchy and

18:01

delicious and like spicy. This adobo

18:04

and all that. You don't you run out of fresh everything

18:06

in two weeks a week and a half, so everything

18:08

else is sort of like there's nothing crunchy

18:11

or fresh there, but um,

18:13

their food is much better. And then at night they drink

18:16

you know, lousy you know, safe

18:18

Way vodka and do karaoke, the

18:20

worst karaoke ever, insanely

18:22

bad karaoke, and to get karaoke

18:24

into golic so it's like you can't

18:26

even join in. It's just and it's

18:29

like onto a video screen of like you

18:31

know, Filipino couples walking around them all

18:36

right, was

18:38

there with the passengers on board? I went with a friend of

18:40

mine, Mike Murphy, and he you know, how

18:43

did you convince him to do that? I

18:45

think it was more like mutually, one of those things

18:47

where I'll do it, well, i'll do

18:49

it, well, are you really going to do it? I'll

18:52

do it now, Yeah, I think

18:54

you wouldn't, like what are you talking? I'll you know, we just

18:56

basically, But

18:59

of course the with being with somebody like that is that he

19:01

actually wrote something, but he then

19:03

sold HBO. Meanwhile

19:05

I'm sort of smoking a cigar and staring at the whales. Yeah,

19:08

but then you settled down to

19:10

work once I got out of your head. I did,

19:13

yeah, but you know there

19:16

was no sale afterwards. That's mostly this. It's

19:18

just a really cool experience. Yeah, I mean cool

19:20

enough that you said you'd do it again

19:22

again more, I think more. Now

19:24

I need it. Would you do it because of

19:27

because you have work that you want to get done, or you want

19:29

to do it just to be alone and stare at

19:31

whales, or to say that you've done it. I don't see

19:34

the stars. I think that I will do it because

19:36

I think I'm not. I haven't grown

19:38

emotionally enough to be

19:40

able to say no, I'm just gonna do it because I like the experience.

19:43

Instead, I'll say I'm going to do it because I'm gonna This

19:45

is gonna be a work product at the end of this, and

19:48

um, and then I won't do that work product and I'll feel

19:50

really bad. So it's spent three days thinking, oh my god, I'm

19:52

just I'm such a Why am I not

19:54

doing? What's wrong with me? And

19:56

then I'm just like, oh, well that's pretty sunset

19:58

And then I'm then where you don't, I'll be in Barcelona.

20:01

So okay, So if I wanted to take this

20:04

trip. I want to know how I

20:06

would how could I book passage? And then your

20:08

checklist of things to bring with you. There used to

20:10

be a place called travel Tips. It's still

20:12

a website, still website, and they

20:14

it's travel of America dot com

20:17

slash t R A V L T I P s

20:19

Okay, So they think they helped

20:21

set either this help set us our thing up

20:23

or it was another company

20:26

like that. And you just

20:28

have to be super flexible because you don't you

20:31

are not important, and you don't know where you're leaving,

20:33

right, It depends when the ship is leaving,

20:35

right, it keeps to a certain schedule, but

20:38

you just don't know exactly

20:40

when, and you don't know when you're gonna get there. Um,

20:43

and you just that's it. You're just not important.

20:45

So this is great for the game for the unemployed or people

20:47

who are the masters of their own destiny. Right. This isn't

20:49

for somebody who's like my boss, I have to get I

20:51

have to, you know, fill out the form where I have one

20:54

week of vacation or I have a child at

20:56

home right at some

20:58

point, yeah, I mean it is if you have to keep a

21:00

schedule or you have to be day to day

21:02

connected. Right, it's

21:05

not for you. But if you can go seven

21:07

days eight days without being connected, so

21:09

cool? Is that part

21:11

of the drill that there's no internet access. I

21:13

mean I've when I've sailed people like we

21:15

have Wi Fi and it's like, no, there's one tiny

21:18

router and like you can get on it for maybe

21:20

thirty seconds, but it's almost impossible. Well,

21:22

you're not streaming any videos or anything that there's

21:24

no there was no wifan you went to

21:26

a terminal and the terminal is connected to the satellite

21:28

phone and you paid a dollar and a half or

21:31

two dollars for every bit

21:34

or bite. It was offensive, but you could

21:36

be a good disincentive if you don't want to have to

21:38

deal with it. Right, you were not connected to the web.

21:40

You got a special temporary

21:43

email address. Did you use it? Yeah?

21:45

I mean I had an assistant in l A and I was like, to

21:48

help me do this. You need

21:50

to go and close there's

21:52

a moment you need to get me a passage back

21:54

to It's

21:59

one of those where I like, so you go, you're you're

22:01

in the middle of nowhere, and

22:03

then I fall asleep and am I using my phone

22:05

as an alarm clock, and

22:08

then suddenly at three four in the morning, it

22:10

just explodes and like all

22:13

the rings, ringing, everything, ringing, wistmail,

22:16

text, not all the all the all

22:19

the ring tones are going. And I look

22:21

out the window and we're between Hokkaido

22:24

and the mainland of Japan. And so my

22:26

phone has connected and it's updating

22:28

two and a half week's worth of messages, one

22:31

of them one from my neighbors. And you know, your back gates open.

22:33

Oh my god, when was that? And so I

22:35

had a furiously you know, text,

22:37

somebody please go and close to that gates another

22:40

place. And then well, here's what you bring. You bring a camera.

22:42

I recommend actually not line because

22:45

how how are you going to store it? This is where

22:47

I'm gonna have to start drinking whiskey. Something that you could

22:49

drink meat, yea, yeah, you drink meat or like a splash

22:51

of water. You're gonna have no problem.

22:54

Whiskey, drinker kind bars maybe

22:56

you know, something like that. They feed you, but every not. And

22:58

then you're in a little snack, little

23:00

snack. I would bring something you may

23:03

not be getting depending on the weather. How

23:05

about like a diptyque candle or something

23:07

like that. That's a really good idea. I

23:10

just upgraded the experience. Now

23:12

this is luxury container ship. What

23:15

about a down pillow that you can compression

23:18

pillow? Listen, Oh, calm on, listen.

23:21

It depends if I

23:23

can sleep in a lot of conditions. I don't

23:25

mind if it's a scratchy sheet, but I need

23:28

a pillow that I can sleep on and I need it not

23:30

Yeah, if I can't, I'm a great sleeper.

23:34

You know, I can absolutely

23:36

do this trip. You could totally do I could totally do

23:38

this trip as long as I'm not cold when I'm sleeping.

23:40

So that's just about you know, wearing socks and layers

23:43

whatever. Cot water bottle you're

23:46

you're a hot water bottle person. Because

23:50

luggage do you guys carry? No? Just carry

23:52

on very little. Also, I'm a big believer

23:54

in compression bags. So you could get

23:56

a pillow down to nothing and then

23:58

it makes a huge difference. Don't ever carry

24:01

a pillow through the airport because that is

24:03

disgusted, disgusting would why

24:06

would you do that? And I've seen people doing that all the time, Like

24:08

what are you doing with that pillow? Yeah? But they're like in

24:10

eighth grade. This discussion, I would say

24:12

the diptyque candle. A

24:14

friend of mine gave me a candle when

24:16

I was traveling through Central Asia and

24:19

she said, you don't need this. I was like, I'm not

24:21

carrying freaking candle from

24:23

you know, and did woolm She too

24:25

is samable. Now. I left

24:27

in Hong Kong thinking so dumb Day

24:30

four. I was in India for a month before

24:32

that, But like Day four, like I wish I had that camera

24:34

right I wish I had that camera right now. For

24:39

there are other guests in addition to you and Mike on this trip,

24:41

just us. So you guys in the crew, how many guests

24:44

could be on this trip? It depends on the cargo

24:46

because a lot of times you have like there's

24:48

a there's a passenger, there's

24:51

a The cabins are like owner's cabin.

24:53

They call it um and

24:55

that means the ship owner, not

24:58

necessarily ship um some

25:00

managing ship and the ship owner. It's like it's

25:02

complicated because like the Mr Shipping Company

25:04

is different from the people in Hamburg who

25:07

run it, and the shipping company were on hand

25:09

engine, which is a Korean um.

25:11

I think it's a Korean company h and

25:13

they either own the ship or they don't, or they own the

25:15

shipping line and they they lay licensed

25:18

the ship from RS in Green,

25:20

so they they always have a cabin. And there's what

25:22

they call supercargo, which which is a cargo

25:25

supervisor. So sometimes there this cargo that that

25:27

that the people shipping at want somebody

25:29

on that boat keeping on that cargo, and

25:31

then there's a passenger and there maybe one or two other passengers.

25:34

It's like an eight story small superstructure

25:36

on top of the So when you're looking at a container

25:38

ship, you're like you're on the beach as

25:41

I was this weekend, and you look at and the's a container

25:43

ship going by, and it's like a flat level of all

25:45

the ships, and then something sticks up that's

25:47

where the rooms. Caroline, I think that I could do this trip,

25:49

and I think it sounds really nice. What I like best about

25:52

this trip and what's most appealing to me is not being on my

25:54

phone though. I'm really interested in places

25:56

where you can where you're forced to unplug

25:59

because because

26:01

like you, I haven't. You didn't mention

26:03

bringing reading material, but that to

26:07

me and that feels like an

26:09

incredible luxury So if I had to,

26:12

if you had some kind of research to do, or maybe

26:14

you don't have research to do, and you could just read for fun

26:16

for wanting incredible both

26:18

fashioned trunk and fill it with books. Well, there's

26:20

always books that you want that you didn't read.

26:23

You know, you're embarrassed

26:25

you didn't read. Yeah, I'm trying to read Little Women right

26:28

now. Yeah, that's perfect, and you're like the

26:30

brothers karamats Off. That's what I would bring perfect

26:32

because it's good. Perfect, right, that would be a really good

26:35

because you're you're going to get into it and you're gonna really

26:37

love it. And then at night, I

26:40

mean, there's this insane star

26:43

show that you've never seen before

26:45

that you that actually is the ancient world

26:47

right there. So you'd want to bring some Edith Hamilton's

26:50

you'd want to bring to bring

26:52

the Odyssey you're reading. My fantasy of the Odyssey

26:54

is I want to I might do this try this next year. Is

26:56

like you get a charter boat

26:59

in Greece, some but skipper

27:01

and a cook and you go with a

27:03

bunch of people and everyone and

27:05

at night you sail and swim and you eat and you have your grill

27:08

fish and your salad, and then and you're

27:11

sart wine and then everyone

27:13

reads a book out loud of the

27:15

Odyssey every night as you're

27:17

sailing through the islands. That's my dream.

27:20

That's a nice one. That's really nice. Have

27:22

you read it recently? I read it last year, have

27:25

read high school. It's

27:28

so great. It is so great.

27:30

The story is so great, it's so moving, it's

27:32

incredible. And I finished it last

27:34

year right around now, and I was in um.

27:37

I was an escellent in big sir, the only

27:39

other place where you really like, oh my God, with all

27:41

those stars, like because there's no light around, and

27:44

it was pretty amazing. Yeah. I

27:46

like this kind of trip too, because it's it's

27:48

incredibly low pressure. You don't

27:50

have to plan an itinerary. You

27:53

don't have to feel bad about missing

27:55

out on skipping out on the temples. After

27:57

seeing just a few of the temples reservations

28:00

about you, you and

28:03

but you're still in nature on this

28:05

in this weird on this weird moving

28:08

vehicle. But you can really focus on

28:10

kind of the the art of travel,

28:12

or just think about, you know, moving from one

28:14

place to the other very very slowly. Just

28:17

think about yourself and think, well,

28:20

but I mean to a certain extent, there's a meditative quality

28:22

to a trip like this. You went with your friend, Mike. But

28:24

if you don't go with your friend, if you just go on your own,

28:27

you could kind of turn it into a silent retreat because

28:29

at a certain point, how much more are you going to say to the captain?

28:31

You don't know? And there's something totally

28:34

romantic about it in a way if you are,

28:36

let's say you are kind of a moody, artistic

28:38

type. I mean, it sounds really great. Yeah,

28:41

it's insane. Yeah, I mean it's perfect for

28:43

that. I mean also I think it gets

28:45

you out of that. I mean, I don't know, but you I mean,

28:47

I always have the problem when I'm going to go somewhere um

28:50

or or someone's going somewhere I've been,

28:52

and they ask for tips, and then there's

28:54

a strange like like

28:56

a checklist now and now I feel like, well,

28:59

you know, she said this was a really good

29:01

We have to go to this restaurant because she said it was this

29:04

has also been recommended. I have to go here,

29:06

especially like some type a New Yorker type,

29:08

you like, well, I don't want to come back from this trip

29:10

and then tell my friend I didn't go to that place,

29:13

because then they were going to say, oh, then

29:15

why did you go in the first place, Because you didn't go there,

29:18

you missed a big thing, right, So you don't

29:20

miss anything on a container ship at

29:22

all. It's like there's only one restaurant

29:24

and it's not good, and

29:26

you're I'm like, that's it. So and

29:28

every trip is slightly subtly different, contending

29:30

on the weather and you know, the type of year

29:33

and all that stuff. So it is a really good

29:35

way to break the habit of either being

29:37

super bossy with people when they ask you,

29:40

Hey, where should I go eating, like then telling no, you

29:42

can't go there, you have to go here, which

29:44

is stupid, and then also the weird feeling that

29:46

I and this I have where I'm like, I have to live up

29:48

to this strange expectation that I've been set

29:50

for me about this trip. There's no expectation.

29:53

You just sit there on your butt, you look at the ocean, and you smoke

29:55

a cigar and you break what whiskey and you're done, Wow,

29:58

what a vaca? I'm salt, that's so

30:01

good, And I'm seriously

30:03

so your next ones, your next container

30:05

ships voyages will take you across

30:08

the Atlantic. Well, that's one across the Atlantic. I'd

30:10

like to do, just because it's weirdly symmetrical across

30:12

Pacific across the Atlantic. And how do you find out about

30:14

these this route these alternate

30:17

Here's the other things, Like if you're a modern person

30:21

in like in the world, you

30:23

have no idea how anything

30:25

gets there. Like, you have no idea. You think everything

30:28

is just zipped through the yeah, and it's like

30:31

vision and you're

30:33

really surprised that anyone figured it out,

30:36

Like you. I sat there on the deck in Tien Sean.

30:38

I thought this is amazing, like

30:41

like and kind of like the little

30:43

subtle things, like I thought I was smart.

30:45

I mean, I know I'm smarter than you guys, but like

30:48

you managed to do this amazing thing. And

30:50

they're all like, yeah, we figured this out a while ago when you

30:52

were reading Bodelaire or whatever it is. You're

30:54

wasting your time. Like people drive around the coast and then

30:56

they pass these ports and they're like, that's the port

30:58

and they don't even think about what it is, Like it's a

31:00

giant port

31:03

where giant chips come in with boxes

31:05

filled with stuff and these guys all your

31:07

stuff and you're you know, if you were driving

31:10

across the country or you're in the middle. So I saw

31:12

this when I was in last two two weeks ago

31:14

in Alabama and you're driving and there's

31:16

a big container on the side road

31:19

the word hand gin on it. That is a

31:21

container from the hand engine Chipping company

31:24

that got there on the back of a truck or

31:26

a train, because of course it's that's the other brilliant

31:28

part of this stuff is that it also fits onto

31:30

trains and it probably came

31:32

You got to come somewhere in these either in New Orleans,

31:35

which is bigport, or Savannah, which is

31:37

a big port, and we drive by these sports all the time, like also

31:41

Elizabeth also right outside New

31:44

York City. Over here you can sometimes see the cranes

31:46

going up and down. And also famously Baltimore, which

31:48

we all learned about from this season of The Wire

31:51

about the correction and the theft that happened.

31:53

That's how you know, like you know that you

31:55

can go from from Savannah

31:57

to Barcelona, because you're ever to Savanna

32:00

and there's like a lot of ship they come from somewhere and

32:02

the best, the best think about

32:04

the more you want to leave from Barcelona. Barcelona

32:07

would be a great port to end up in. Yeah, oh

32:10

yes, And then you can make up for all the bad meals

32:12

that you didn't eat for a few weeks we have by eating

32:14

eating things out a tiny tinny entertainers

32:17

like um, like sardines, little clamsy

32:19

because this canned food

32:21

and like, oh he ate was canned food for two weeks in

32:23

our crossing. And then you go to like Morafi in

32:26

in in Barcelona and you're eating little lancho

32:28

VI's out of a can. I love it. I really like it. I've

32:30

often when I've seen these container ships that do have

32:32

the clearly are coming from, like Scanda

32:35

is run of the other words, right, there's

32:37

a massive port in Cartagena also

32:39

that I was faculated by when I was sailing around

32:41

there. But I've often looked at decent thought it

32:44

would be so cool if one of these shipping

32:46

containers had a passport. And

32:49

it's like I went through Trent to New Jersey

32:51

and I've been to Portugal and I've been all over

32:53

like like there was a day of like a stamp

32:56

for every so kind of like luggage,

32:58

you know, if people used to put stickers in the place that they've

33:00

been to. I mean, this would be very messy, and

33:02

I like this, but I

33:04

just think that would be funny if you could track a

33:07

single shipping container. Can't You can't

33:09

by looking at it, but you can because

33:11

they are all barcoded. They all barcoded, so

33:13

at any given moment, you know exactly where

33:15

the container is. You just know

33:19

how to you know, if you have a zapper, which they all do

33:21

on everybody, on every everywhere. This will

33:23

call them Steven doors, I think. But if they end up in Brooklyn,

33:25

then they turn them into a boutique. Yeah

33:28

for recyclable goods and you kind of like sustainable

33:30

living, Yeah for upcycled lit And so

33:32

they turned them into really cool shops like

33:35

that are stacked up on top of each other. The

33:37

wonderful wonders of the container ship.

33:40

It is of the container,

33:43

unappreciated, underappreciated,

33:45

a massive change in the way we live.

33:47

And it's a real building block of commerce,

33:50

of goods, of movement, and apparently

33:52

a really cool way to travel to apparently a cool

33:54

way to travel. Yeah, okay, we're

33:56

coming with you on the next one. Okay,

34:00

wouldn't well know but then we'd have to talk to each other

34:02

and it wouldn't be so I promised to talk to you after

34:04

four days, no more talking you and

34:06

your starboard. Yeah,

34:08

and im not to make fun of your pillow. You

34:11

won't have to make fun of my pillow. Rob,

34:13

tell the nice people where they can find you.

34:15

In addition to adding Martini Shot

34:17

to their podcast list, which is

34:20

one of my favorite podcasts. I don't think I've missed a single

34:22

episode in a hundred years. That's

34:24

where you can find me. You can find me there, or you can find

34:26

me uh at our cbl

34:28

on all the various social media.

34:31

And we should let our listeners know that

34:33

there's a great story Rob wrote for us about this

34:35

shipping container experience

34:38

on Fathom. And we'll also put some

34:40

extra notes in the show notes so that people

34:43

can start planning their own trips. Yeah.

34:45

Yeah, I mean, it just should be a thing. It should

34:47

be a thing. Yeah, thank you so much for joining

34:49

us today. Thanks, it's always so great to be

34:52

Yeah, I'm surprised, not

34:55

surprised, but I'm not surprise. Very good. Time

34:58

should say downward and that's

35:01

our show. Thanks for listening. If

35:03

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35:07

Wait Ago is a production of I Heart Radio

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35:30

If you want to really go deep on the travel inspiration,

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35:37

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35:41

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