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About Brian Jarvis

Digital Storyteller | Air Force Veteran

Belize By Bus

 

If you’re planning a Belize adventure, you may find the most expensive part of getting around this northeastern tip of Central America is, well, getting around. Renting a foreign car or cramming into a puddle jumper plane can run hundreds of dollars and require extensive planning. Looking to un-plan your trip? Try the bus. 

The bus terminal in Belize City.

Belizean buses will look very familiar to the American eye, as they tend to be former American school buses repainted in tropical colors. A mere $10 can take you from one end of the country to another—revealing a rustic panorama that you won’t find via any other mode of transport.

I entered the bus terminal at Belize City with no schedule and no route; only a vague idea of traveling southeast to Placencia (known for its offshore coral reefs that make for spectacular snorkeling & scuba diving), and then west to the Guatemala border in quest of Mayan sites on the other side.

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“Trust me, I’m a Consultant…”

George Clooney plays a corporate downsizer for hire in the 2009 film Up the Air, but most consultants do positive work.

Choosing a job title is serious business nowadays. If you’ve ever attended a Meetup group or built a LinkedIn profile, you know what I mean. Almost every day we inevitably encounter some variation of “So, what do you do?” The answer had better be truthful, easy to grasp, and (most importantly) make you proud to say it.

“Consultant”—the title on my business card—is wonderfully malleable. Depending on who’s talking, it can mean just about anything. Let’s examine just what consulting entails across the career spectrum, and why it’s a fast growing profession.

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Living the 4-Hour Workweek

Fitness guru Tadeo hopes to bring his brand of fitness to Latin America.

Timothy Ferriss presents bold ideas in his bestselling The 4-Hour Workweek: Quit your job, start an Internet business, outsource daily tasks to overseas virtual assistants for $5/hr and go travel the world. Can it really be that easy?

This week I found someone who lives it — Tadeo, an old college chum turned personal trainer who recently filmed a fitness-themed infomercial. Here’s what he had to say during our interview in Los Angeles:

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#AskObama: History-making or ho-hum?

President Obama types his first tweet on Wednesday, July 6 as Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey looks on.                        Photo: Dana Ritter/CBS News

President Obama, whom admirers tout as our first social media president — much like Bill Clinton was once touted as our first rock n’ roll president — decided this week that a Town Hall meeting could be micro-blogged.

Put another way, Obama read pithy questions off a screen in front of a press gaggle rather than take lengthy questions from a press gaggle. At least that’s how it looked via livestream.

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Live From Brussels!

Brussels makes for a fascinating mix of old and new world. Photo: Brian Jarvis

Entering Europe for the first time not as a tourist but as a resident, I was hit by the thought that must strike many an American abroad: Why didn’t I come here years ago?

I landed in Brussels, Belgium to finish grad school via the Missouri School of Journalism (and a sizable student loan). I also have the honor of traveling/living with nearly two dozen 21- or 20-turning-21-year-olds, but I’ll save that savory subject for another day.

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