M8

I transported directly into lake Lake Texcoco where the city of Tenochtitlan is a island on the western side of the lake, boy, it's wet. On the shore I see the city, and the 5 major temples arranged in the center. I swim up to the shore of the island, and pass into the city. I attract a lot of strange looks from the people there, probably because I am soaking wet. I am going to the Great Market in the center of the city, to buy dry clothes and try to blend in with the other Aztecs. As I walk to the market, a Aztec warrior comes up to me and says that I have been chosen to be sacrificed to the Aztec' s sun god, so now I am stuck.

Right now I am tied up to a tree, from what I can tell I am going to be sacrificed to the sun god Tezcatlipoca. The next day a couple of warriors come and untie me, the drag me to the top of one of the main temples. Gathered around the temple are thousands of people waiting to watch me be sacrificed. This would probably be the end of me except that I am in no real danger of being mauled, I can always zap to a different location, but I am not going to. I want to listen to the prayers that the Aztecs say before they sacrifice someone.

I just disappeared right before the Aztecs were going to sacrifice me, using TTI technology I also left a fake heart so I wouldn't mess with there ritual. So now maybe I can sample some of the local cuisine. I have found a small stand that is selling rabbits, so I ordered a dish with rabbit mixed with hot sauce, it is good but it is really hot. I have decided to walk around the market and get a couple little trinkets to take home.

I notice a warrior following me around, I try to escape his notice but soon two of them cornered me, this time they were quite docile.
 "Great god, why do you hide from us? We know who you are because of the magic you performed during the sacrifice".
 "Well, I guess this is better than being sacrificed" I thought. Because of my godly status, I was treated to a large feast and a lot of apologizing by the priests.

 Now it is the middle of the night, and I am in a Aztec equivalent of a fancy bedroom, but I have to go home. I set my time device to the present and ZAP, I am gone.     

M7 Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) Safari

Today I am going on a safari, I plan on going into the Congo River Basin. We are going to see many different kinds of wildlife, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is known for it's diverse wildlife. We are entering the Basin now, buckle up, here we go!!

First we are going to the habitat of the bonobo, it is one of the three great apes living in the DRC. It looks just like the chimpanzee, but it is slightly smaller. All apes living in the DRC are threatened by bushunting, which is hunting but not for regular meat. The bonobos, like all great apes are very intelligent, and are known to use tools for gathering termites, to break open nuts, and other uses.

Next we are going to the wetlands to meet some hippos, don't be afraid, they might bite, hard.Oh, and they don't like it when you wince, just so you know.  We arrived just in time to see to male hippos fighting  over rights to dominate a mate, they fight by charging each other with there mouths open and try to bite each other with there teeth that can be up to a foot long.

Now we are going to say hi to some gorillas, did you know that a gorilla's genes are only different from humans by 1.6%. Silver back gorillas, are almost extinct, because of poachers and loss of habitat. The gorillas were originally thought to be a different species of human because an explorer described them as a large hairy man, but it is still uncertain whether he saw a gorilla or something else.

Our adventure is coming to a close, goodbyes are always the worst, but maybe if you commented it would make it easier. Well goodbye, I hoped you learned a lot, until next time.              

M6 Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)

I am traveling to the year 1884, when the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) was a Belgium territory, ruled by King Leopold II. He treated the country like his own personal property, Africans were considered savages and were all full time slaves to the king, I am going to a work site in the 1880s.

The air is filled with dust, everywhere there are hundreds of African men chained together pulling huge blocks of stone. White guards stand by holding rifles, in the distance I hear a cry of pain echo up the canyon, a man is getting one of his hand cut off for not working hard enough. To prove that they are doing there jobs, the leader of the sites will often show government officials baskets of smoked human hands.

In 1908 the Belgium government was embarrassed sufficiently that it persuaded the king to give the country back to the people, but while the work was less brutal, Belgium still made large profits off the then Belgian Congo. But finally France declared the Belgian Congo free and owner ship was given to Patrice Lumumba.

Because of the hurriedly arranged election, two provinces succeeded from the DRC, one of them controlled the copper industry and so, with support from the US and Belgium a civil war broke out. To put a stop to the war, Belgium paratroopers kidnapped and executed Patrice Lumumba. The new leader of the DRC began a period of Africanization, he changed all the names in the country including the names of the citizens to African names, the new name for the country became Zaire. The first and second Congo war happened between the period of Americanization up to the present, with the second war officially ending in 2003 but hostilities continuing up to this day. 

Although the people of the DRC have faced many problems in the course of history, they have succeeded and created a country with many problems, but on the rise. The DRC currently receives foreign aid from it's allies because of its strategic location. 

M5

I am going to Jenne-jeno, it is a important African city that thrives off trade.  My boat glides down the Niger river towards the city of Jenne-jeno. The city has a rather small wall by European standards, about 13 feet high.When my boat docks I walk up to the city, a guard questions me about my intentions inside the city, I tell him that I am a traveler touring the city which is incredibly close to the truth.

I walk past the wall towards the center of the city, on the way there I walk past the trading center.On the way through I happen to see a gold ring being traded for a small block of salt. It astounds me to see the value of salt, but it makes sense, salt is very rare in this area and it has many uses like keeping the body healthy.

As I continue into the city center I see a group of people huddling around a small stand shouting OOO and AHHH. I walk up interested in what is going on, when I get close enough to see whats going on I see a blacksmith with singed clothing hammering on a piece of red hot metal. In Jenne-jeno, the people here believe that blacksmiths are magical, they are often asked to perform healing and to tell the future, they are also used as political leaders and judges.

 Jenne-jeno was built during the third century B.C. it existed for more than 1,600 years.The city had a population of about 20,000 during ancient times. At first it's houses were made from poles arranged in a circular fashion but later it evolved into mud brick houses.

I am done here for now,  but I am yearning for food, on the way towards the gate I buy some food with the coins that TTI supplied me with. I walk through the gate and to my docked boat, I untie it and float downstream, once I am out of sight from the city I time travel back to the present.

M4

I'm walking in the middle of the desert with a bunch of smelly camels. I have joined a Bedouin caravan crossing the Rub Al Khali Desert. We have animal supplies that we traded for with a clan of nomad herders. Our bags are full of goat and sheep hair, we have also brought some live animals trade for other supplies. After walking for two weeks our water is running out, we expected to find more oases than we did. A couple miles after we lost our first goat we see a patch of green on the horizon, when we get closer we see that it is a oasis, we drink our fill and fill our water skins and set out again.

On the next day it started to get very windy, every once and a while a dust devil would pop up and blow us all over. Around midday a giant dust cloud formed directly in our path, we increase our pace to try and make more progress before we hit the sandstorm. Even before we get to the storm the strong winds are buffeting us side to side, pulling at our close and burying us knee deep in sand. We wrap clothes around our head to protect us from inhaling any sand, just leaving our eyes visible. Continuing to struggle against the wind, we entered into the main body of the sandstorm.

It was horrible, one minute you would be walking into the wind, in the next minute the wind direction would change trowing you onto the ground then burying you in a foot of sand. Soon I was out of water still stumbling along in the general direction that I started, hopefully. After what seemed like hours the winds slowed and the storm moved on, and I was left there panting on the ground, not strong enough to pick myself up and keep walking, slowly closed my eyes to the harsh desert sun.

  I woke up to the friendly sight of the face's on the other members of the caravan. While I was unconscious they had been dripping water into mouth so when I moved I got the precious liquid all over my face. They told me that that had been a especially fierce storm and that we were all lucky to be alive. It took a couple of hours to gather all of our camels, many of which were laying in the shadow of a sand dune, but we got them upright once more, and we were off again.

Our destination, the city of Makkah loomed on the horizon. I made it, through a sandstorm, and almost died of dehydration but I made it. I felt stronger after the journey, mentally and physically because I had accomplished an almost impossible goal.

M3

The bell for morning prayer sounded, the deep sound echoing around the courtyard.I crawled out of my hard uncomfortable bed and set my feet down on the cold stone floor. I walked barefoot into the assembly area were Saint Benedict was preparing to give a prayer, I took my spot and knelt down. Later during lunch two monks came up to me and whispered.

" We are going to try to kill Benedict again," they whispered "do you want to help."
" I'm in.
" At ten o'clock we are going to sneak in to his chamber and poison his bread"
"All right, see you then."
The monks sneaked quietly away to make sure they weren't seen. Everybody hates Benedict, if we succeed we will be hailed as heroes.

 The day passed quickly, I hurried through my days prayers and chores, soon it was almost ten. At five till I sneaked up the stairs to Benedict's tower quarters, the other two monks were already there.
"What took you so long, we thought that you had chickened out on us. He isn't in there yet, he's probably down stairs leading the evening prayer, we've got a couple of minutes at most"
"Do you have the poison," I asked.
"Yes, it's right here"
"Lets go"
We pushed open the door, the gentle glow of candle light greeted our eyes.

M2: Rebellion!

I was sitting in my quarter eating meat covered in spices so I could barley taste that it was rotten when on of my guards burst in.
"Adviser! The king wants to see you immediately". I hurried out of the door on the heels of the guard, we ran down the hall to the king's quarters. We stopped at the door, collected our bearings and the guard knocked loudly on the oak door.

" The adviser is hear to see you my lord,"
 "enter," the king replied. I walked in,
"what is it my lord?"
"I have a problem, the commoners believe that my ruling is unjust. There are small riots breaking out all over the kingdom, they are small for know but they threaten to get bigger."
"What do you want to do?"
"That is why I summoned you, I was hoping that you might have an idea."
"Well we could execute any one involved in the riot, but that might make the riots bigger. I suggest that you give them what they demand."
"Well that is the problem, ever since the plague ended the serfs demand more pay and better working conditions, I couldn't find a word that meant this kind of riot so I am calling it a strike."
"Strike" I mused, "that is fitting, they are striking your patience and budget"
"Adviser, you are dismissed, thank you for you assistance."
I bowed and left the room quickly.

Two days later the riots escalated into a full scale rebellion, presenting a huge hazard, hundreds of people have already been killed. The army is having trouble containing it. The next day one of  the kings lords is attacked by his own serfs and was killed, the serfs destroyed and burned the entire mansion. The day after the king announced that it is now the law to treat the serfs better, the rebellions immediately subsided. 

Because the workers were no longer treated unfairly, food became am abundance, death by starvation dropped by 50%, I was summoned to the king once again.
"The riots are gone and my kingdom is thriving, I wish to give you a gift." He said reluctantly. "I command five great wise knights, I hereby place them under you command"
"Thank you O wise king" I replied.
"Go now, I have matters to attend to and the day is growing old."
I bowed and quickly left.

When I reached my quarters I immediately transported to the present, I wanted to spend at least one night on a nice mattress without any overly spiced rotten meat.