For the last month I’ve watched as everyone on Facebook and everywhere else on the internet talk about the various reasons they are thankful as if it’s an activity reserved solely for November.  Traveling on this side of the world for the last eight months has given me daily reasons to be thankful.  Since it’s Thanksgiving, I’ve gone through and made a list of some of the things I’ve been giving thanks for along the way…in picture form.

In short, this trip has once again reminded me that there are very few things in the world that I have any right to complain about.

I’m thankful that I didn’t grow up here.

I am thankful for toilets that flush, accept toilet paper, and toilets in general.

I’m thankful that my scooter managed to go all the way down the coast of Vietnam without breaking more than once on its own.  (One of those breakdowns was my fault…)   I’m also more than thankful that I only nearly died twice along the way and managed to make it all the way to Saigon without a single scratch …and only two run-ins with the police.

I’m thankful that the typhoons that came through Taiwan looked like this…

…and not this. (These are from the Typhoon that hit the Philippines recently.)

I’m thankful that as a child I was given the option to get a job at the grocery store, instead of having to get a job because I needed to support the family.

I’m thankful that I grew up in a place where doing laundry doesn’t look like this, and I’m glad that I know it does look like this in most parts of the world.

I can’t even begin to describe how thankful I am for seeing these…

I’m thankful for coffee shops across the world that seem to always have semi-reliable internet and occasionally a restroom worth visiting.

…and lastly.  I’m thankful that there are already people lining up to give me a very well paying job in March so that I can do this all again sometime soon.