To all the die-hard Captain Jack Sparrow stalkers, oops, fans out there – you know who you are.  How much do you really love him? Enough to swim up to his yacht in the middle of the night, sneak up the rigging and lie in the bed, the very bed, he sleeps in? Well, now you can.

As of this season, the world’s most famous pirate is renting out his superyacht. And, unlike most superyachts, it’s not a monstrous gin palace. For starters, there’s no pool and no helipad on the Vajoliroja. (If you’re a stalker with a helicopter, you’ll have to land it elsewhere.) Although it was built in 2001, it has the look of a classy 1930s steam yacht. You will have to contend with Depp’s interior design, which is somewhere between a fin de siècle Parisian bordello and an Agatha Christie novel, but there’s a Wii tucked away in one of the drawers if the role-playing gets out of hand.

Before you book, there is one tiny drawback: the cost. A week in Johnny’s bed with nine of your closest friends (in other beds) starts at £73,000 with Burgess Yacht Charters (020 7766 4300, burgessyachts.com). That includes snorkelling equipment, but not Johnny Depp, so it may be more practical to rent Pirates of the Caribbean and a dinghy.

via Rent Captain Sparrow’s ship -Times Online.

“A man is pulled alive from rubble in the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince, after being buried for 12 days, the US military says.”

As massochistic as it has been to watch each tragic, hopeless night of Haiti earthquake coverage  – of the gut-wrenching, primal howling  of a child in pain which affects me so deeply in the pit of my stomach, down to the depths of my womb.   Or the screams and sobs of a woman whose mind has just clicked over the edge, just like that, the pain and horror of loss simply too much for her psyche to bear, and so, willingly and resignedly, she simply slips away.

For me, like many, it is innate to focus on the good of a situation, even when you need a microscope to actually find some.  Which is not to suggest any sort of “Polyanna-esque” denial, but more to ensure that the energy that comes off me is warm and positive.  I have no doubt whatsoever that energy makes an impact, molecules move mountains – literally – and that my strength and hope will connect with people near and far. This is my fundamental truth.  I believe it beyond anything else.

And so, as we mark the two-week anniversary of the earthquake in Haiti, now more than ever, we cannot let this devastation be forgotten.  When the press compounds are struck, and when – God forbid – Anderson Cooper and Sanjay Gupta leave – we cannot – must not – turn away. We must stay connected, we must share our positive energy and hope, and above all, we must believe.

“What’s so funny about peace, love and understanding?” — Elvis Costello

I find myself struggling to hold back the tears while going about my evening routine, the TV on in the background, Anderson Cooper’s miffed, surprisingly flat, often emotional tone, for the third night in a row, describing the unfathomable sadness of lives lost and families fractured as a result of the devastating earthquake in Haiti.  I cannot remember even the Katrina coverage being this somber, this shocking, this hopeless.

No doubt there is devastation and suffering taking place in this world at any given moment.  The situation in Haiti is not any better, nor any worse.  What is resonating with me is the sense of compassion the world is clearly demonstrating, which has the feel of something very powerful.

This compassion is strongly evidenced by our volunteers and journalists, walking amidst corpses and flanked by tremendous loss and pain.  The journalists are not simply reporting this story, they have become part of it.  They work alongside anguished family members, desperately trying to dig out a daughter, an aunt, a brother, from under piles of rocks or a part of a building precipitously close to collapsing.   At the request of an inconsolable father, they lift a plastic make-shift shroud off a dead little girl for the world to bear witness to the catastrophe that has befallen their community, extinguished the bright light of a child and left a family to attempt to grieve amidst a perilous situation where their own survival will take every ounce of their ability to cope.

The whole world is watching Haiti right now it feels to me, with a profound sense of empathy and compassion which we haven’t exhibited in such a collective way before.  Certainly the level of catastrophe and hopelessness warrants these feelings, but maybe in the fall-out of this disaster, we can, as a people, recover a sense of grace and humanity that we’ve lost along the way.

If there is anything to be gained from this devastation, perhaps it is to recognize that the excruciating agony of a mother having to bury her daughter in someone else’s grave, with no service, no goodbye, no dignity, is our excruciating agony, too.  This is our daughter, too.  This is our family, too.  This is our loss, too.  If this devastation in Haiti can remind us of the precious humanity which connects us all to each other, whether in Afghanistan, Haiti, or here in Los Angeles – that we are all sisters and brothers, aunts and uncles, daughters and sons – members of one family – perhaps that will help to encourage a unified spirit, a more-peaceful and respectful co-existence and ultimately, a healthier planet.

When it comes to traveling, I like to think I become a senses-heightened, fully-engaged version of my normal self.  That is: high-functioning, buttoned-up, sharp as a tack, in control without being controlling, street smart, friendly yet cautious, culturally sensitive, forward-thinking, spontaneous and always – always – prepared.  Did I mention verbose?

Given my completely delusional sense of reality, it always feels particularly jolting when I tumble off my self-erected pedestal, as I frequently do when traveling, and onto the cold, hard floor of reality  in whichever destination – this time – I have made yet another error in judgment.  My Mom is the undisputed Queen of these embarrassing moments, which she calls, “walking in the room with an elephant on your head”, or something like that, which I’ve never actually understood, but applaud her enthusiasm nonetheless.

Thankfully, only one of my traveling missteps (thus far) has resulted in actual violence – a small matter of a guy pulling a gun on us while taking the MARTA back to our hotel one night.  My husband – to his enormous credit -  calmly diffused the situation and overpowered the guy, while I sat engrossed in conversation with a friend, completely oblivious to what was taking place right next to me.  No shock that I was the one who had assured my husband, against his better judgment, that of course the MARTA was perfectly safe to take at night.  Travelers to Atlanta, take heed.  Don’t do what I did!

In homage to the “Oops!” travel moment we’ve all experienced, some with more frequency than others, I have decided to suck-it-up and regularly feature some of my more embarrassing or “seemed like a good idea at the time” travel hiccups with the hope that other travelers wont make the same seriously-stupid gaffes that I continue to make on a regular basis.  If nothing else, I am optimistic it will be a cathartic process.

Stay tuned.