Introduction

Hi everyone,

      I decided to make this blog to stay in touch with my family and friends back home, but also for the purpose of giving travel recommendations to those who enjoy traveling as I do. You can subscribe to the blog through email and can stay in touch through gmail, facebook, or by simply putting your comments on this blog.

The layout of my blog is fairly simple, but let me backtrack first. "Countdown to 196" refers to the 196 countries in the world. Yes, I realize that according to certain foreign policies there is some controversy over countries like Taiwan and Kosovo, but for the purpose of this blog THERE ARE 196. The numbers (#) refer to the order in which I visited each country. Obviously, #1 is America [AKA Amurica] because I was born there. I only count actual visits as a trip, meaning that an airport layover does not mean I experienced the country. This is why Mexico is not #2 and China is behind the Philippines. Anyways, I currently have visited 14 countries and many cities within each country. Some posts will be city specific, while others will be a general country experience.

One of my goals is to visit as many countries as possible and detail my adventures to inspire others to travel abroad. International travel really is an exciting and rewarding experience! Luckily for you, I am pretty meticulous about planning trips and saving money, so hopefully you can find some good tips and itineraries~

My first real-time blog post will be about my trip to Japan during the Chinese New Year (Lunar New Year) break. Japan is my 15th country and will be my longest vacation thus far (24 days).

As some of you already know, I had another travel blog with pretty decent posts. Unfortunately, I lost them. So, I'll have to slowly do the blog posts again. A huge undertaking to say the least. However, as lame as it is, I feel as though it's my duty to keep a memoir of my experiences simply because I have been lucky enough to travel. From the first time I left the U.S., 2.5 years ago, I will have visited 15 different countries.

Anyways, I'll keep you posted about my whereabouts!

- Bobby