swollensun

it seems there is ever
a battle of good
& evil being
waged inside my heart;

the desire for good,
to be creative,
to feel God,
to be close to nature & breathing
things, living things,

is ever assaulted by dark
fiery dreams of destruction,
of enslavement of the soul;

this part of us:
this devil-soul,
would delight in seeing the rest
of what makes us us,
the beauty,
the freedom,
the unchained moan of expression,

caged, hungry,
devoid of God,
alone.

With what wielded words do we beat this back?




*thx to daeng for the typo spot!

As some of you may know, I was offered a job a month or two ago as a private English teacher for a Spanish family in Delhi.  Lured by the (now that I think about it) outrageous salary, I went for it, only to find quite at the last minute that the whole thing was a scam, the Spaniards didn't actually exist, and my $650 "visa processing fee" that I was literally walking out the door to go get a money order for was in fact for the scam-artists.  And I use the term artist because it was cleverly executed, up until the very last step.  So that sucked, bummed me out for about a day, but I was in a sense relieved, because I could go back to Thailand, pick up where I left off, return to the creative path I was working toward in an environment of incredible love and support.

During the period we thought I was going to Delhi, my dad emailed a few of his friends and acquaintances.  One of those people is a writer in Delhi named William Dalrymple.  When the scam was uncovered, he expressed his condolences and offered to keep his ears open for anything else that may come along.  A few weeks later, I got an email directly from him, telling me that Jatin Das, the famous contemporary Indian artist (pictured right), is looking for an assistant/archivist, and was wondering if that would be something I'd be interested in.  So I thought about it, having flashes of what my life could be like with a very successful artist, who has his own Jatin Das Centre of Art in his home state of Orissa, as well as many projects in Delhi, including a recent show called Earth Bodies in Delhi. 

I emailed him, expressing interest.  He wrote back asking for a resume, which I sent to him, with a cover letter.  A few days later, I was asked to come work with him in Delhi.  He said I was just the type of person he was looking for.

So today, with a 10-year multiple-entry visa for India in my passport, we bought a ticket to Delhi.  I leave June 17th.
And I know what you're probably thinking (holy shit!) and I am too in a way.  I know little about what I'll be doing, what my accomodations will be like, though if I'm staying near where he lives, Dad says it's a pretty nice part of town.  The high for tomorrow in Delhi is 111° F.  Dear Jesus let there be air conditioning.  But right when I got that email, my heart told me to follow it, and my heart was right last time.  I jumped into the unknown going to Thailand and came out more fully myself than I ever have been, more confidant in my skills as an artist, and most importantly, not so cripplingly judgemental of the creative work I do.  I only hope India will be the same sort of environment for me.  I just figured if I want to be an artist, (writer, singer, whatever) surrounding myself with art, both literally (I'll be archiving paintings from his 51-year career) and figuratively (entering a community revolving around art), some insight must be there waiting for me (grist for the mill I've heard more times than I can count).  To be part of something interesting and creative just really appealed to me more than teaching kids English who may or may not want to learn it.

I am saddened to be not returning directly to Thailand, but there's a trip in the works for July or August, to see the ones I love and clear some of my shit out of Rose's house (sorry Rosie!).  I see this as an important step for me.  And if it sucks, Thailand is just two countries away.

So that's where I am today.  I've spent the past months enjoying the southern spring, spent some time writing up at my parents place on the river in Ellijay, in northern Georgia.  I've been playing music with an old friend of mine.  We're talking about doing a show together before I head off in a few weeks.

And next week i'll be 24.  I'm going to see Al Green and Etta James on my birthday.  Then, the weekend following, on the 13th, I'm going to see my new favorite band, Grizzly Bear, who I very highly recommend you check out.  Also saw PJ Harvey two nights ago, which blew me away, to put it modestly. 

So thanks for reading; sorry for the lag, but life doesn't seem blog-worthy when you're just hanging out with your parents and your dogs.  Look for a new website soon, and some more poems.  Thanks for reading!

d

I watched from far
above as the o/
cean uncur~
led its fingers
out across the s
                          an
                            d;
it pur- (secretly sandily)
red
the
red
mor-
ning
in

while your feral eyes
yelp & sing f
/or me to stay,
my limbs cry for home;

the sun in your mouth (fullbrightroundwhole)
my fingers pierce the ground,
quickly spread roots\\
to tear th\rough civilizations

my sour veins a ten\drilled vine
tinged pink with  flow ers
& the smell of old wine

my hands f/old\ed in like rusted
iron gates
crumpling into fists
decaying into snowwhite
bones(fingersfalling
like fairy  wings )

until you reach through
the dusk,
             the dust
of the city,
             the bones
in my chest,
             the folds of my
flesh,
             (the flesh
of my beating,;. . . )
to
       the center, the ever-
bloodied rose,

to pluck my
bitter seeds
for planting.

I remember us --
how we would sway
   side by side
hands on hips
the night dizzy with stars &
the sea far below ---

how you whispered
printemps
as bougainvillea bloomed
in the darkness
& jasmine floated
across the sand up
the hillside
with its aching smell
of a life without longing

Your eyes held
the sparklers'
scattering
flashbulbs of
light
like an acolyte(in
the quiet hours be
fore dawn Easter
m  o  r  n  i  n  g)

When I return to this space, especially after weeks (or almost a month) of absence, I feel strange pangs of guilt.  Why haven't you written in so long Dave?  Some of your most insightful stuff has happened right here, without plan or preconception, published immediately to all three of you who read this (you know who you are).  But I usually brush it off, bargaining that I've been keeping up on my journal, or have written a poem or a song in the past few days.  But now, more than ever, frequency is less important, and the simple act of writing, of taking the pen to the page, fingers to the keys, has become a quiet joy, not a chore, not a requirement, not something I should feel guilty for neglecting.  It is play, as it should be.

Part of this comes from a program my dear friend Ali, who, in concert with various other forces of the universe, drew my attention to a piece of work called The Artist's Way.  It is a book, and I hate to call it a self-help book because that connotes to me the most awful loads of garbage and quick-fix bullshit ever conceived, not to mention gaudy neon-colored covers and Richard Simmon's afro (for some reason).  So let's call it something else.  Her term for what her book assists the artist with is "creative recovery."  There are exercises in the book geared to remove the blocks we all put on our own creativity.  We are all artists; simply being a creation of [insert diety of choice here], we are expressing creativity, and thereby doing [insert divine pronoun]'s will.  You sitting at your [insert sitting apparatus] reading with your beautiful eyes these words I wrote on a Wednesday night, sitting out on my balcony in the Thailand night, listening to cars amble and groan and sigh as they pass below me, dogs yipping, exhaust in the air, the coolness of early evening wrapping around my shoulders, you are expressing [insert deity]'s will.  Your every breath, word you utter, glance you offer to another, these are all your sole expressions.  The book gives you exercises to work through the blocks you have placed for yourself, barriers built to protect yourself from the scrutiny of others, built as barricades for childhood or adolescent (or often adult) pain, attacks on your creative self, attacks on any part of your self.  You learn to identify these negative aspects of your imagination, all the voices that have you so convinced the creativity you think you have is far from spectacular, those haunting voices that persuade you of your utter normalcy, your petty ordinariness.  These acts of self-sabotage, betrayal of what [deity of choice] gave you and continues to give you every day, these are all mechanisms to limit your exposure to the real creative essence that permeates the entire universe.  Some of the exercises bring up very painful things.  I found myself ferociously writing about events I had buried so deeply, never daring to tell a soul.  My candor and honesty frightened me.  I was no longer afraid someone would find it.  These things were blocks, they were barriers, inhibitions to the creative energy I possess and deserve to share, the energy that deserves to be shared.

But let's not get carried away.  I'm only on week two, and I only started week two yesterday.  It's a twelve week program.  The essentials of the program are few, but are important:
1) Write three pages every morning.  No way around it.  It can be three pages of "I hate you pen. I hate you morning. This isn't working. I am a shit writer. My breath smells like the fish market. and so on...
These morning pages skim off all that bullshit that sits on your creativity. They appease your critic, your censor, so your creative outlets can put stuff out.
2) Take yourself out on an Artist's Date once a week.  By yourself. Do whatever you want. Treat yourself as you would a potential lover. Buy yourself anything/everything you want. Think. Breathe. Take in what you see.

You also do tasks she gives to you, some creative writing exercises, some digging up people or events in your past that scarred or encouraged you.  It has been very beneficial to me, has organized some of my mind-chaos.  And more than anything, it has given me an intention.  Each day is a new way to fill the creative well, to notice things again, just when the monotony of work and settling in to a place has drained the novelty from this wild and vibrant country.  And I have identified people in my life, some whom I love quite dearly, who have been or are creative blocks, stealers of creative energy, enablers of self-sabotage, critics, demons, theives.  I can see their schemes; more importantly, I can love them more because I can see that they are just blocked creatives themselves, and expressions of creativity by those they are close to threaten them; their jealousy consumes them, when all they need to do is follow their hearts.


Perhaps the greatest gift I can see so far, even this early in the journey, is that I am learning to love more the time I have with myself.  I used to regard solitude with fear.  The silence was too great, the loneliness too suffocating.  I would place myself apart from others, but feel only that I was throwing myself into dark, bottomless water.  Now I find solace in solitude.  Comfort.  I take walks and sit alone in coffee shops to feel that unseen air, to watch the leaves flicker in the wind and the sun dig its fiery fingers into the afternoon.  I watch the moon climb the night sky like a flower crooking its slender neck over a vase that stands alone on a table.  I feel my breath fill my mouth.  I extend my cheek to the kiss of the night.  Songs fill my head.  Songs I've yet to write.  Songs unborn but longing to be sung.  Words unwritten but swarming, loitering, waiting in line, growing, seething, paying their fare, tipping their hats, catching my eye.

So my humble advice to you, dear reader:  Abandon your silly mantra of waiting till you aren't so busy with work to do what you've always wanted.  One part of the book that has really struck me thus far was a short little conversation between a blocked artist and the author:

"But do you know how old I will be by the time I learn to really play the piano/act/paint/write a decent play/story/book/poem?"
"Yes....the same age you will be if you don't."

thanks for reading.
d

second of january


when lips & love & beauty run
like watercolor seas into the sun
will vulgar tears send quiet ruin
down the slopes of suffering?

will tightlipped stares
bleed through the night
to drain the seas of sorrow --

or will love's blue eyes
send down the rain
to wash the scars
(a sweet refrain)
to bring new light
to ask the day
                  what it was
                                  it always wanted

if I held the keys to doors
that kept sweet secrets
                   (such as these)
I wouldn't have this awful heart
that seethes for love
                         but never believes

crawling into Christmas afternoon
presents all opened,
all the eggs eaten
littleboy sleeps with his new
trains lined up around the bed --

I knead my contentment
like a thick dough;
babies sleep and dream of animals

and the cold curls
around my toes
I reach for socks
and smile quietly,

for family is near and all rings true --
a bell in the cold clear air

This past weekend, I visited the Pucheefa Forest Park with some friends of mine.  I wanted to briefly note the experience, trying to remember the details before they're lost in the wash of time and forgotten like so many wild thoughts and secret moments crowded out of the memory by the dull hammering drone of the everyday and the ordinary.

My friend Ali, a friend from yoga, part of my Monday night yoga sangha (of which I will surely write more on), who works at Chiang Mai University, invited me to accompany some students of hers to camp on the top of a mountain near the border of Thailand and Laos.  I agreed, after being assured that we would not be riding in a songthaew but in a lush air-conditioned private bus.

I awoke before dawn on Saturday morning, gathered all the warm clothes (it's really cold up here now!) that I had brought to this "tropical" country, and set out against the pale darkness that still ruled the earth at that hour.  I picked up my friend April, a yoga teacher at Wild Rose at the Three Kings Monument, in the center of the old city.  In front of the monument, scores of Thai people were doing morning aerobics.  I commented to April about the sweet secrecy of the time just before dawn, how an anxious kind of hush descends upon the world about to wake up.  As if you accidentally stumbled upon the day as she was getting dressed, and divined some secret of her anatomy that would have otherwise been forever locked away in the realm of the secretive.   We drove up Huay Gaew Road, toward the mountain, feeling the chill that clings to the skirts of the mountain pierce our thin jackets.  Turning into the university around half-past six, we met Ali and her friend Jordan in the parking lot of the humanities building.

We waited, as is the fashion in this country, about twenty minutes past the arranged meeting time for the driver to arrive.  He did arrive.  In a dingy light-brown sonthaew, which would comfortably fit about ten people.  We were sixteen. 
One of the students, whose friend he had counted on to drive another songthaew, reluctantly relayed to the group that he was unreachable.  We discussed our options, deciding that if we rented a car and followed them, all would be comfortable.

A Thai liaison relayed this to the driver, who was also a professor at the university, whose incredibly Thai response I will try and recreate verbatim:
"Oh, do not worry, everything is fine and relaxed.  There is no need to rent a car, it will be expensive and since we are all each other's older and younger brothers and sisters, we will go together in a relaxed way and have good fortune.  Never mind do not worry."
So that was our answer.

We resigned to clamber into the back of the truck, thinking foolishly that the closer we sat to the cab of the truck, the lesser the amount of wind that would be able to whip in and chill our already cold bones.  April had the foresight to cite her residual trouble with motion-sickness, and was granted a coveted seat in the front.  Ali, Jordan, and I, along with eleven other Thai students, who clearly had never experienced cold before, crammed ourselves into the truck, sitting opposite each other on the eponymous songthaew's two rows.  Two students were given pre-school sized plastic chairs, which later caused a Thai girl to comment that it in fact was a "song thaew krung," and two-and-a-half row, which I realize as I type it lacks the certain punch it did then, but it was damn funny crammed in there like sardines.  I asked this same girl about now how many hours it would take.  Her response (deadpan): "long time." 

We rode for an hour, my foolish lack of knowledge of the aerodynamics of songthaews put on full display as the 50 degree wind whipped in around the cab, funneled in through the curved roof  through small gaps in the welding that held the covered portion of the songthaew to the truck it once was.  This created a forceful and concentrated sustained blast of cold air that my body was fortunate enough to block from the rest of the passengers.  Nothing could assuage this barrage of frigid air.  If I shoved my pillow into the gap between the carriage and the truck, the wind redirected upon my legs or face.  If I simply thrust my back against the corner of the cabin, the wind found ways to draw all warmth out of my face and nose.  I was inconsolable.  But like a good Thai, I bore my pain in a contemptuous silence, until I saw my chance for escape.

We stopped at mid-morning for breakfast, hot noodles and pork.  April and I conspired to oust her Thai partner in the front, claiming that I was her boyfriend and was also prone to carsickness, a malady that affects many, if not all farang.  I was granted the honor.  The rest of the ride up the dizzy hills of the northland was undertaken in the cramped warmth of the shared front seat, April in the middle dodging the gearshift with her knees, me pressed up against the window as the clear winter sun flooded in over the hills into the cab of the truck.  My water bottle sweated in the sun, the thick beads of perspiration catching the light and refracting with a golden hue the radiance the sun layed out across the land.  The fields had been cut, and stood solitary, mute, chopped haphazardly but with an innate sense of order.  The long stalks of wheat or corn were cropped to only a foot in length, and with a resigned but bold rusty color, bore the days of winter in the mountain sun.  Beyond the fields stretched the green mountains up into the clear azure sky.  The mountains straddled that fine line between jagged and rolling, as if unsure of their identity as mountains, or perhaps too new to have acquired the thick flesh required to be called rolling.  In the indecision lay a certain beauty, a tense kind of sparkling radiance, at once calm, at once fierce, but at all times more than pleasant to look at.  The day warmed as we moved north toward Laos and the mighty Mekong.

We stopped to admire a lakeside village called Phayao, taking in the pink water-lilies resting on the surface of the water, our Thai friends posing in all necessary poses (peace-sign fingers, hand to chin splaying thumb and index finger like a check mark, sundry poses of infinite creativity and utter cheesiness, the ubiquitous hear no evil...)

We stopped for lunch in a nondescript town whose name demands to be forgotten.  We were advised to buy food for dinner (despite the existence of food stalls where ever there are people). 

We climbed back into the truck, our legs stretched to endure a few more hours of cramped jostling driving.

The songthaew winded up and around mountain roads, climbing slowly and steadily a valley of rolling hills, patchworked by agriculture and glinting in the early afternoon sun.  The higher we climbed, the more spectacular and sweeping the vistas became, the thinner and clearer the air.  As the road became less civilized, marked with potholes and patches of sandy dirt, April and I talked at length about India and the nature of being out on one's own.  She is twenty-two, fresh out of college, pursuing, as I am, a clearer picture of herself and the world around her.  Talented at many forms of expression, not the least being song and dance, she told me her story of growing up in Colorado, of visiting Israel, and her tangible and intangible goals for coming to Asia.  The time passed beautifully as we climbed the hills, the sun softly falling in the sky.

After eight grueling hours in a rusty songthaew, whose windows were old and warped and would not shut, we arrived at our campsite, a mantel in a steep hillside that overlooked a valley sprawling with green and rolling into the foggy distance.  We quickly set up our tent and set off to hike up the knobby hillock, scarred by a single trail, that sat atop top of the ridge above us.

Climbing past a gold meditating buddha, and two children with weather-beaten faces selling incense and candles, we reached the summit and beheld the other side.  Over a large pile of pockmarked boulders stretched a valley cut horizontally by a straight and coursing river.  The Mekong, which flows from the hidden hills of the eastern Himalayas down through Cambodia and Vietnam to empty in the South China Sea.  Beyond the physical line cut by the river was Laos.  The cold mountain wind swept up the mountainside and blew straight into us.  It was achingly beautiful.  There was a strange fog on the horizon that visually divided the earth from the sky.  Above the foggy earth flew the clear and pure sky, blue as my mother's eyes, crisp as a glacier melt.  My eyes watered from the wind and enormity of it all. 

We climbed down and watched the sun sink behind the murky haze floating on the horizon line.  Two lights shone bright and metallic in the early night sky, one bigger and brighter than the other.  We wondered what stars would have the audacity to shine through the twilight.  I later found out they were Venus and Jupiter, out for a short time to align beneath the waxing moon to create a smiley face in the early night sky.

That night the temperature dropped below six degrees Celsuis.  The wind ravaged the feeble ledge as my tent clung to its stakes in the cold earth.  We attempted a fire of bamboo wood, but the wind, changing directions and force every few seconds, drove us into our tents and sleeping bags.  The Thai children that built our fire for us were long gone, off in the cold empty night to shriek their waning adolescence into the wind.

  The next morning, we awoke at around seven, collectively but without speaking deciding not to go to the top of the wind-swept hill to watch the sun rise over the Mekong.  Though the promise of beauty called strongly (almost as strongly as my bladder called me out of my warm cocoon to walk the five minutes to the bathroom), I could not muster the courage to leave my refuge of warmth.

We finally did awake, eating a quick hot noodle and hot chocolate breakfast, before disassembling the tent, bounding across the campsite to rescue a tent tumbling towards a precarious ledge followed by three screaming Thai girls, and packing everything back on to the roof of the songthaew, our noble chariot.

We lumbered back down the mountain, straddling potholes, crossing wooden bridges rusted with age spanning rocky streams, down through the saddle between the mountain we camped on, Doi Ba-dtang, and Pucheefa, which in Thai literally translates to, "point at sky."  We wound around turns up into the Pucheefa forest park, past some beautiful gardens and landscaping that looked cold and huddled.

Climbing the steep hill from the parking lot, past children peddling fat infant buddhas, "authentic" hill-tribe wares, smiling beneath cheeks ruddy and worn from the mountain wind, we reached the top of Pucheefa, and beheld the great stretching mountain ranges, jagged and torn, sitting like open jaws waiting for the sun.

The sight filled me.  With what, I think I have not the capacity to say.  Or perhaps (shifting the blame here) that words have not the capacity to express.  Rilke says it better:

          "Things aren't all so tangible and sayable as people would usually have us believe; most experiences are unsayable, they happen in a space that no word has ever entered, and more unsayable than all other things are works of art, those mysterious existences, whose life endures beside our own small, transitory life."

This landscape was a work of staggering art.  By whose hand, no man could say.  I will say that it filled me with a sense that life is designed for these moments.  Designed to put you in a muddled place, to make you forget the real and clear things by weighing you down with the everyday.  Then, if you're lucky, and you have the sense to pursue it, you get moments where the world lays itself out before you, where the expansiveness of beauty and the fortuitousness we possess to be able to behold it, weave and fly together in a single silent song. 






I sat long and drank from the well of life.

















That of course made me have to pee.











The drive down was a prolonged, rocky exercise in quiet contemplation.  A bemused sort of quietude.  A gracious quiescence. 
We arrived home at the faded edges of twilight, tired, full, alive.  I returned home to read and go to sleep.

******************


I would love to offer a word on the current political situation in Thailand.  I imagine you have been following it.  The truth is, it has no real effect on me.  I am in no way invested in it.  Neither side is acting for the good of the nation.  Neither side has a solution to what ails the country.  I fear for the economy, for the tourist industry, and for the future of the monarchy.  Now it seems, the PAD will leave the airport.  This is not the end.  The solution reached is a disguised apparition of the same thing.  Know that I am safe and will not be affected by the turmoil that plagues this country.  Do tell your friends to come here, not to deter any plans should they have them.  I think once the economic effects of this disaster are fully felt, a lot more people will be a lot more indignant.

But for now, as the late afternoon coolness creeps in from the windows behind me, I must depart.  Thank you so much for reading.
d.

l(a

le
af
fa
ll

s)
one
l

iness

Thanksgiving Poem


Today I feel lonely,
and that is my song;
for to howl a song of loneliness
far above the trees
to the grey cold clouds
is the true heart's expression

to crackle the leaves
in cold red hands
to crush their death
as death does life;
they crumble and fall
in careening smithereens
circling and circling
to the dirty ground

my loneliness haunts
the looks of others
and lovers concede
to leave me be

I cannot breathe with you hovering over me like that.

Yes we can.

Words uttered time and again over the last twenty-one months.  Words that swelled our hearts, inflated our tired souls, gave that last glimmering flicker of hope in us a little more fuel to burn.  And now, after that climactic moment late Tuesday night (11am Wednesday for me), we can look to this man as not only our next president, but as the first black president in our long and troubled racial history.  What an amazing time to be alive.  To be front row in the writing of history, as the thick ink of time spills across the page, looping and careening to form the letters and words of fate, we watch and participate as the future arrives.

I can only imagine what it was like to be standing in Grant Park that night, as the big screens flashed the news into the 250,000 eager eyes spread out against the night.

Or to be in Ebeneezer Baptist Church in my hometown of Atlanta, Martin Luther King Jr.'s home church, as throngs of black (and some white) people danced and shouted, waving their arms, billowing their joy to the eaves of that historical building.  I cannot even fathom the significance of this event for the black community of America.  To see Jesse Jackson weeping was an incredibly poignant moment in the news coverage.  A watershed indeed. 

But that wonderful and hopeful day, which for me was Wednesday, was also tinged with a devastating sadness.  Last Monday, I began an eight-week yoga class called a yoga sangha, designed not only to deepen the practice of the students, but also to create a community based on trust and compassion with the other members of the group.  The first night was incredibly beautiful.  I'm under no pretenses to glorify the world of yoga.  For me it has been a wonderful and positive force in my life.  There is a dark side to it as well, filled with incredible elitism and snobbery.  But for all of that, it is a deeply magnificent and personal activity.  It challenges you to set and test your own limits, and gives you incredible insight into the age-old battle of mind vs. body.  The body is capable of so much more than the mind gives it credit for. 

So after an hour and a half of a beautifully flowing yoga, the group sat in a circle and discussed the meaning of community.  I voiced my appreciation for the people in the class, and how, as time continues to progress, my relationships with my friends here are deepening, and how those plaguing feelings of isolation and alienation that pervaded my first few months here have begun to fade.  I also talked a bit about my friend Yorke's cousin, Greer, who died suddenly about a week ago, and how life is so precious and ephemeral, and how easy it is to take for granted.  I challenged the group and myself to actively consider the gifts we take for granted every day, and the rest of the conversation echoed these sentiments.  The teacher of the class, Gaura, closed the session with a resounding "Om" and a few words about our ability to fall into complacency.  Gaura is a Russian-born yogi who spent the latter part of his adolescence in an ashram in India.  He is incredibly flexible, as if his bones were turned to rubber in his tenure in India.  He also came away from India with an incredibly beautiful and open heart, and above all, a deliciously childish and innocent view of the world and the nature of human relationships.  He is a master at breaking down barriers between people (even if it does at times make them uncomfortable).  Not to mention, he is a fantastic teacher, despite English not being his native tongue.

So Tuesday rolled around, me glued to the computer screen, despite the fact that the polls really hadn't even opened yet.  I woke Wednesday morning at 6 unable to sleep, left work in the middle of the day to go to a bar and watch the returns with other eager Americans and other foriegners.  Sipping a cold Guiness in a sweaty glass, the announcement was made, the victory confirmed, and we all went wild.  Shouts and cheers, hugs, tears.  It was such a profound and beautiful moment.  One I will remember and cherish forever.  But just that same morning, I got a message that shocked me to the core.

The owner of the yoga studio at which I practice, Rose, who is one of my best friends here, sent all of us in the sangha a message via Facebook.  Gaura's father had taken his own life in Russia on Monday morning.

From the viewing party, where joy erupted and flowed out of the open second-story shuttered windows into the streets of Chiang Mai, I drove with my friend Ali to meet Gaura (pictured right at the beach a few weeks ago) for lunch, to give him any warm clothes or money we could muster to assist in his expeditious and unexpected journey back to Moscow.  We ate vegetarian food with him as he attempted to smile and make small talk with us.  You could see in his eyes the utter disbelief that comes with such situations, and the long road ahead for him back in Russia.  He has not been home since he first left about five years ago.

After he had gotten on the plane to Bangkok, it was brought to our attention that Russia has a military conscription policy, and Gaura may be forced to complete a mandatory two years of service immediately upon arrival.  Furthermore, the stories of the hazing of first-year conscripts by the second-year soldiers and the brutality endured came pouring in from friends all throughout the community.  So now we sit anxiously, as anxious as we were Wednesday morning when the fate of a nation and the world rolled out in states of red and blue across the television screen.  We have no idea what will happen when he gets there, or if we'll even be able to contact him once he is in the country.  So please, dear reader, send your thoughts and love his way as he grapples with this monumental task, and pray he returns in two weeks as planned.

But now, the week winds down.  The excitement and anticipation is still palpable, but we now have our president.  I share the fear that so much expectation has been placed upon him, that we will inevitably be let down.  But adversely, I believe that he is a true leader, a uniter of disparate people and groups, and that by giving the power back to the people, we can truly accomplish a lot.  I also recognize, as many news outlets have commented, that we are entering a new era of history.  A turning point unprecedented in the history of this young human race.  To believe in the face of such adversity is such a breath of fresh air from the last few years, where fear riddled the minds of us all, and hope was a four-letter word.  So let us go forward together.  Proud and determined.

d  

p.s. this is my last hyperbolic political blah blah post, just had to get it out of my system.  thx for reading.

A few words after a somewhat lengthy absence:

After spending a week in the crisp infant autumn of Tokyo, then ten blissful days at the beach in southeastern Thailand, literary lethargy and a busy beginning of the second semester (not to mention I moved!) have all combined to make me negligent of my public writing space (and my private ones too!).  So now that I have a few minutes at work, with hoots of joy and the exuberance of youth issuing in through the open window behind me, the heat of the afternoon pawing at my skin, and the mug of cold water sweating anxiously on my desk, I wanted to say a few words about what today means to a young American living abroad.

I spoke with my mother this morning, we webcamed, which my auto-correct dictionary tells me is not in fact a word.  I opined that this historic election must be an incredible event in the eyes of the baby-boomer generation -- a generation that witnessed the murders of King and Kennedy, Kent State, and the Vietnam War.  For the country to come such a long way from those days must be, for those of that generation, truly remarkable.  I think of the impact Obama's canidacy has had on my generation, in his ability to reach out and connect with young people, to get them enthused about politics, and to give them ownership of a campaign that has, time after time, shattered records and assumptions.  I am so proud of Obama and the country by and large.  In our ability to circumvent the fear-mongering the media spews, in our courage.  Perhaps the political and economic tide would've ensured a Democratic victory, but for me, on the eve of this election (it is 3:00 on November 4th in Thailand, so for me it is the actual day!), I feel a cautious sense of pride and anticipation.  What an historic moment for us!  A country whose image has been dragged through the mud, whose reputation as the benevolent hand of good in the world has been burned by the fires of lies and deceit.  Now is our moment.  But enough: political hyperbole very quickly becomes flatulent.  Needless to say I'm very excited.  I can't imagine the feeling in America on this, the most important election in generations.

I met Obama.  And by "met," I mean, shook his hand briefly and he signed my book.

You can see my head in the bottom right corner of the picture.

I remember being somewhat apathetic about his canidacy, it being April of 2007, and the political hype machine already billowing black smoke.  But seeing him in the flesh, seeing him enter the room, was like a light going on.  An invisible brightness.  It is a moment that only grows in significance as this election plays out.



<------------  What a giant forehead I have!!




Must go teach.  More about my Japan and beach travels soon.  For now, let us be the people we've been waiting for.
Obama '08.

d

 

 I went to the shore
in the angry morning
to find a bit of self;
to separate myself
from     my                         self                  .........  
 
to dust off selves
on knockkneed shelves
while white sails and shells
grew wings and flew
bluely
through and through
the glittered glistening rippling
waves and crashing
s i g h s   on the shoreline

the sky was a taut rope 
of grief
a tightrope horizon
a skyline beating out of time

the dull sliver moon was a razor
hungry for wristlines
of lovers and leavers
to heave their {selves} upon

[first draft]

 for the best show of my life.

for the most amazing two nights of music i've ever seen.

for not letting me down.


you guys fuckin rule.

will write a long recap of the experience but there's sushi to eat and subway trains to cram into like sardines

no matter what happens next
you shouldn't be afraid
because i know
today has been
the most perfect day 
i've ever seen.....

i am falling in love.

the beginning of my time here, which i see now as past, as a section or chapter of my time here, and of my life as-a-whole story, has ended.  the feelings of alienation, of bitter loneliness, of emptiness, while not altogether gone, have lessened, have dissolved into the wind, and feelings of love and contentment have rushed in to fill that vacuous void.  i am falling in love with this city.  i have met people so full of life and love, who spend all the eager day finding new ways to love the earth and those who walk it.  people who exude the rich and myriad qualities of love and generosity.  to quote a friend, "chiang mai seems to have a surplus of people doing really awesome shit with their lives, an overflow of people 'living the life.'"

but life, as always, is not without its changes.  it is never always the same, though sometimes, especially in the low times, it tends to feels that way.  lately i've been confronting some very real ideas and truths about mortality, about the nature of life and death, and about the transience of those who choose to live such a life as i have.  having talked to many people who have lived here for some time (2+ years), the complaint is always that you make a really close friend, a friend you come to depend on, a friend you feel you can give your heart to, and then that friend leaves.  being so green here, so new, i've yet to experience this feeling.  but now, as time wears on down its dusty path to the river, i'm beginning to see what they meant.  

my friend keely, i would say my best friend here, is leaving.  she has been here now for over 3 years.  she has become fluent in thai, worked in HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention, and changed the lives of countless students and friends.  she is a truly remarkable person, a person who took my hand when i first arrived and gave me the security and trust i so desperately needed in such an uncertain and tumultuous time in my life.  she was my foundation here.  because of her, i have made amazing friends and have had the strength to spread roots and begin to be able to call this place home.  i will surely miss the hell out of her, but can say with radiant honesty that she was put here for me, a true friend in exactly the right place at exactly the same time.  

so thank you k.  for your friendship, for being there for me when i needed you most.

keely has had a bit of a rough patch lately.  after fighting off hemorrhagic dengue fever which tethered her to a hospital bed for eight days, she got better, decided to finally go home to america to help her mother take care of her sick grandfather, her father's father.  then on saturday morning, she got a call from her mother saying her grandfather had passed away in the night.  so now, with exactly a week before she leaves chiang mai, her home for the past three years, she must juggle the emotional tumult of leaving a life she's worked three years to build, while simultaneously trying to work through the grief of losing a loved one while her whole family is 10,000 miles away mourning the loss of their patriarch.

her strength is mind-boggling.  that's her in the middle -------------->


so it seems this encounter with the reality of mortality has rubbed off on me, in the form of a strange and vivid dream that came two nights ago.  everyone has dreams about the loss of a loved one.  it serves to remind us just how precious the ones we love truly are to us.  so two nights ago, i dreamt i was walking in a thick and verdant jungle, down a black-dirt path that wound through the cool humid wide-leafed forest.  life seethed and bloomed on all sides in a kind of mystical glowing landscape, vines and creepers leaning and curling in from every corner and space.  alongside the path, i noticed something out of the ordinary.  i couldn't tell you what it was, only that in that sure-footed reason of dreams, that assurance that even if something goes against reason or logic, in the dream the feeling is pure and so you have no choice but to follow it.  so i investigated.  the oddity led to a passageway downward into the earth.

i followed the dank darkness down, fumbling my way over smooth mossy rocks.  the tunnel was engulfed in darkness, and i could sense nothing save the sharp smell of dirt and the cool staleness of being underground.  as i continued down, clambering round corners and tumbling over small ledges and rocks, a dull green glow began to light the slick walls of the tunnel, reflecting off the pools of water that stood on the floor, glimmering in the deep.  

as i turned another dark corner, the tunnel began to widen, allowing me to fully stand up.  i walked forward, the dull green glow beginning to deepen and intensify; i felt the glow on my face beneath my eyelids.  the widening in the tunnel gave way to a massive arching entrance to a grand open space.  the space resembled the interior of a great cathedral, with ornately carved spires twisting up the walls to the ceilings, majestic curving staircases with balustrades of gold and silver.  everything was adorned with emeralds and diamonds -- every surface of every wall and floor and ceiling; the bright jewels gleamed from every sconce and chandelier.  at the far end of the cathedral an organ of solid silver shone with a brilliance my unadjusted eyes could not absorb.  the room hummed with the glow of itself.  vines and creepers exploding with blooming flowers of all colors dripped from the walls.  water gushed from the ceiling and down the walls in thick rivulets and streams.  it was as if i had stumbled upon some prehistoric amazonian fantasy world.  i stood still in the entrance, enthralled.

at once i felt a sensation, a presence both strange and familiar, a gentle feeling of familiarity coupled with the primal feeling of something being entirely out of place, a flight-or-fight sensation where my senses stood at attention, ready to react.  a physical reaction of fear to something i knew to be beyond the limits of the natural world.

the ghost of my mother appeared before me, a formless figure, an apparition of white fog, but somehow carrying with her a flood-tide of nostalgia and comfort.  she said this place, this holy place, was her gift to me, that it was built so i would always have a place to come and be with her, that all our memories of joy and love with each other would live in these glittering walls, and that pain would be only a distant memory washed away with the rains.  she wrapped herself around me, her ice-blue eyes appearing in the fog of the apparition, and at once she was gone, as a match blows out in a sudden wind.  my heart lurched and i awoke to my dark room, breathless.

these images stood fast in my head all through the day yesterday.  images of the grandeur of the hall, of my surprise in finding it, and then the incredible warmth and subsequent loss of my encounter with my mother.  i tried to grapple with the meaning all day, fearing that something would happen to my mother (who is very much alive by the way!!), that somehow the heartbreak of this dream would find its way across the barrier of the real and the unreal and manifest itself in the waking world.  i was busy yesterday, five classes, two of which required my maximum attention and energy.

i went to my usual yoga studio last night, wanting to try sandrine's class, after hearing thick words of praise for her ability to open your heart and deepen your practice.  she spoke with a delicate french accent, guiding the class of about eight of us through the postures, taking me through some positions i had never done or heard of before.  in some of the poses, she explained the mythological story behind it, how kali stamps the earth and turns everything on end every few thousand years, and how several different animistic religious practices -- the incas, the mayans, and some indian indigenous religions -- have predicted that this upheaval is soon to arrive.  

at the end of the practice, we went into shivasana, the "corpse pose," where you lie on your back for quiet meditation, feeling the effects of the last hour or so coarse through your body, you muscles humming with the stretch and relaxing into the mat.  sandrine began a guided meditation practice.  she said, "i want you to envision a place of pure relaxation.  now, go to a place in your heart or your memory where you felt truly loved.  a place of pure and unadulterated love, from a parent, from a lover, from a friend, even from an animal -- a pet.  a place where you felt the very essence of love flow through you."  my mind immediately went to the dream, and suddenly a great floodgate opened in my heart.  floods of memories from my past, memories of my family, times of love and joy we've shared over the course of my short life.  the images of the dream, and the incredible ache of the loss that i felt in believing in that cathedral of emeralds and vines and flowers that she was truly gone.  the flood poured up out of my heart down my cheeks, sending hot rivers of release down to the floor.  at the end of class i walked out the front door, and sat in the infant night, stars just beginning to appear in the hazy sky.  the night was cool, the breeze cool on my wet cheeks.  i sat still, allowing this release to take its course, allowing the emotion to exorcize itself, allowing myself to feel, to really feel, this catharsis.  not to judge it and not to suppress it, not to analyze it and not to dissect it.  just to let it be.  i felt my heart open and florid and full, calling to the keepers of love.  tears not for sorrow of loneliness.  just a friendly reminder, a memo if you will, from the subconscious, that yes, i am alive, and yes, i do feel.

i think the distance from home coupled with seeing a close friend go through the loss of a very close loved one brought about some very real thoughts about mortality for me.  about the reality of mortality.  perhaps watching my parents enter the grandparent phase of their lives, seeing for the first time that their roles change as well.  they will not always be my parents alone.  we all grow older as time rolls into the future.  and one day, not anytime soon, but one day,  i will have to face the world without them.  and it's hard to acknowledge those kinds of feelings.  to possess such a beautiful and terrifying amount of love for someone, and admit that it will not always be there.  

but i am far too young to be having these thoughts.  i guess the dream in concert with the incredibly heart-opening yoga class really brought out some incredible feelings and philosophical thoughts about the nature of life and the transience of being.  forgive me if this post is overly heavy, perhaps i should make a new blog, one for "very deep intense life musings," and one for "funny errors in english by non-native speakers."  i guess i've just found this venue as very useful for writing with out worrying about it being anything real that i have to send out into the world to be judged.  but last night, as i lay in bed, i thanked god, god being that force unnameable and inexplicable, for this gift of love.  for this gift of people who love so fiercely that their hearts buckle and break every day with the weight of it, but who would break their hearts every day to know the truth and pleasure of it.  so thanks up there.  whoever you are.  sending love and blessings across oceans.

d.

 i am stuck in the apple store.  with all this fascinating (expensive) technology....
i got an external hard drive the other day.  1,000 gigs.  should be enough room.  it's called a terabyte if you were wondering...
and i had my dj friend give me 120 gigs of music...so it will be nice to delve into that.
i'm at the apple store to get my external formatted and to retrieve some pictures off my ipod that were lost when my computer went to it's reward in mac heaven.  or at least its internal parts did.  so in my infinite boredom, i thought i'd take the time to post some stuff on here.  this entry will be far from interesting, but my adoring fans (my parents) always inquire about further entries.  you here ya go.

if you read this before monday the 8th, listen to npr at noon...they're broadcasting an entire radiohead show.

radiohead also did webcast of this entire show as it happened...
you were probably watching barack obama's speech at the dnc...
which reminds me of this guy that is american who works in this store.  we got to talking.  he let me know that obama is full of s-h-i-t, probably muslim,  that we really don't need alternative energy because oil works fine, and that global warming "isn't as big of a deal as everyone thinks it is."  i told him that science would probably disagree with that statement, but it's only science right?  how could climatologists possibly know more some 24 year old f-k from chicago who works at the apple store?

forgive me...
but this was my inner monologue... 


got this in an email from a friend.  thought it was clever.
again, forgive me if i seem politically charged today.  it's an exciting time though.  i like this race.  even my own family is divided, as i imagine many families are.  

more later.  going to dinner after being in this apple store for a million years.  seriously i've been here for like 4 hours.

d.

My Dear Reader,

many apologies for taking so long (i can't believe its been over a month!!) to update this feeble attempt to expound upon you the comings and goings of my heart, and the wanderings of my feet through this strange and scented land of siam........

i have loads of pictures from my family's whirlwind sojourn to northern thailand, as well as pics from my best friend will's visit with his special lady friend...  
all those will come in good time.

for this entry, i'd like to share with you some samples from my writing students.

but first, i'd like to preface this with a strange miscalculation in translation i've observed in the past week or so.  on the whiteboards in many of the classrooms, i kept seeing the same writing in thai, followed by the phrase in english, "Death Line."  this was wholly disconcerting so i investigated further.  i asked one of my thai colleagues what "death line" could possibly mean.  she informed me that it was the date upon which an assignment was due, or, the "deadline."  gotta love translations...

so, without further ado, some writing samples from my 10th and 11th graders.  some come from an essay they wrote about their school, others come from an assignment i gave where i cut pictures out from a newspaper, gave them out to the class, and asked the students to write a fictional story about the picture.  some were amazing, some were not, some were simply hilarious.  enjoy...

all quotes are "[sic]" so i don't have to repeat myself
note: "PRC" is the abbreviation for the school i work at, The Prince Royal's College.



"This school was built by missionary who come to Thailand for declare Jesus."

"P.R.C. have many beautiful building such as church, theatre, Harris building, Butter building, Blue building, Gray building, DG Colon building, Gym Nazism, and many building."
(note: this student was referring to the "Butler" building, the "DG Collins building" and presumably the gymnasium)

"Some teachers teacher teach student just for money not from the sincerity like PRC teachers."

"...but the superhero get the DarkRay then he evolution to super bad monster.  It like to annoy people."

"...sometimes, [the boss] should take care and look after his henchmen or be the adviser."

"Finally, I say that 'My School is to be like the second lovehouse.'"  
(where is the first lovehouse?)

"When I go to eat food and sweets I always go with my friends.  I think one week I meet my friends more than other people.  So make bind and love to me and my friends."

"My school started to love in God since 1887."

"...student in PRC have knowledge and mercy hard."

"Although sometime we play abnormal until be the fierce by teacher but we plead guilty together."

"She took her lottery and found that she won the lottery.  She was so exciting and surprising."

"Once upon a time, there was a big city on the oasis in the Percian's dessert.  There was many people.  The economic was very good.  This kingdom is very rich.  A few times ago the people in the kingdom begin to do very bad things such as rubbery and rapist.  The people is bisexual and impolite so the kingdom gone bad.  One day the God saw that kingdom.  The Lord is unpleasure and very angry so he punished that kingdom by fired ball."
(beware of rubbery)

"One day, In the big forest have many animals such as, monkey, elephant, snack, and bird."

"So they arsoned the hotel with many hostage and and escape in dark night.  They committed massage."


hope you enjoyed this little foray into some of the perks of my job.  life is not without it's sense of humor.  

this is from the front page of the Bangkok Post:

dear reader,

the internet is frustrating sometimes.  especially when you write a whole amazing blog (or at least half of one, being meticulous and sure to capitalize and spell everything right, including proper punctuation, subject-verb agreement, avoiding comma splices and other severely egregious errors, only to have your page refresh when you decide to be magnanimous enough to "allow pop-ups" and the entire text and pictures you took so long to prepare and present are lost in the breezeless wind of the internet, washed away in some invisible tide of information to the muddy depths of cyberspace.  

please forgive me if i seem irritated.  i'll try my best not to curtail any of the good details.  i'm not capitalizing though.  i made a point to do it and the internet took it out on me, so lowercase it is.  it's only you right?  who am i trying to impress?

after a week of midterms, where my sole purpose in existing was to watch thai students take exams, eyes shiftily moving from left to right through the thin slits god given, surely cheating as there is no word in thai for "cheating" (in the academic sense: the word for unfaithful translates directly to "outside heart") only "helping friend".  needless to say i was bored to tears and feeling cooped up and antsy for an adventure in nature.


keely, rob, and i set off in the beating sun saturday afternoon heading south along the highway that flanks the doi suthep mountain range.  the countryside, emerald green with rice fields whose flooded plains catch the summer sun and hold it like a diamond in the light stretched out before us, brimming with promise and blurring by as the doi inthanon range came in to view to the southeast.

we stopped for gas to be sure there would be no mishaps up the hill involving heavy pushing and bad tempers.

we turned right across the highway toward the park.  there life got quieter.  the highway was busy and fast, heart pounding, fearing death and being spilled across the asphalt.  the world behind us, of smog and frenzy, of populations and concentrations, fell away.  only the now was in front.  we zipped along winding roads bordering small farms, lined with leaning and swaying palm trees that held their leaves up to the sun like the hand of a child.

we turned left to go to the mae klang (or mae glang...the k's and g's in thai are pretty interchangeable) waterfall (pictured above).  a small hike downstream from this roaring mammoth were some smaller rapids, accessible and addressable by foot and innertube.  we swam and drank the slanting light of the afternoon, revelling in the rapids.  i stood long at a particularly big rapid contemplating my fate should i risk going down it.  standing with the water  circling serpentine around my knees feeling the twisting of my stomach at the thought of being swept down into the torrent.  the water clear and thick as it fell over the rocks into an explosion of whitewater.  i declined in lieu of keeping my bones and limbs in tact for what was to come.

as the afternoon drew on, and the light got later, catching golden splashes on the water and making the scene dreamy and lush, we decided to move on before being swept away by the opiate of relaxation and the cool fingers of the river.

we drove up to the visitor center and hiked back down to the mae klang waterfall, passing the rocky and jagged section of the river leading up to the falls, a screaming torrent of white water finding every path possible to throw it self at the sea.  


we walked down the steep and winding mossy stairs over what must've been some kind of canal for drinking or farming water but to my child's mind seemed like the fastest waterslide i'd ever seen, down to the base of the falls.  the water waved out over the towering cliff like a great white curtain, furling and curling about the rocks, spraying its mist onto the lenses of my sunglasses.

rob and i climbed out onto the rock that sat in front of the falls.  i gazed long at the falling water, trying to reckon the force and feel of the white torrent as it plummeted over the rocks, hurling itself at the ground.

we walked back up to find keely seated on the bridge over the "waterslide" eyes lost in the current.  she gave a quick wai to the water after her meditation and we were on our way.

the next waterfall was wachiritharn (above right in sepia and right), which is massive and equally, if not more impressive than mae klang.  wachiritharn is visible from the highway, as it makes its roaring descent to the plains.  i stood long in front of this one, as the sun behind the falls illuminated the crown of the cataract in a white blaze, and the rest of the foreground faded away.  you can kind of see what i mean in this picture to the right -->
but it doesn't do the real thing justice.  i stared at the base, where the water met the ground, my eyes focusing and unfocusing on the white space the water made.  there were points where my eyes could bring no real definition to the space, where all points of definition and lines of demarcation were lost and blurred by the perpetual movement.  it was here that i wondered if perhaps these points in waterfalls, where living things dare not go, could possibly be holes in the universe, small tears in the fabric of the natural and tangible world, where one could step through, like a hole in a chain link fence or a boxing ring, one leg at a time, into the timeless void beyond.

or maybe it's just water man.

feeling satiated and inundated with the beauty of nature and gravity and the intersection of the two, we
climbed back onto our two-wheeled chariots and soldiered on up the hill.  we had originally planned to stay in some larger cabins, but as the week wore on, the number going dwindled down to three, so we opted to stay in a small 
<---eco hut behind the park headquarters.  we settled for the 3-person eco-hut for 600 baht.  we were first quoted 900 baht, and were told, after asking about the price, that that particular eco-hut was the "nice one with the TV."  we came for nature, so we stayed in the TV-free one.

this picture is the view from our front porch, ot the mist covered mountains in the cool upper reaches of the park.  

we had a lovely dinner of tom ka gai (coconut soup with chicken), penang curry, and pumpkin shoots, which is called sai-yo-te in central thai, but in northern thai is called "yawt fawk," which to our english ears sounds like, "y'old fuck."  had a good laugh about that one (i.e. mmm that y'old fuck was delicious!)  we got drenched on the walk back to the cabin.  and in the rainy season, especially way up in a cloud like we were, nothing ever dries.

spent the evening reading poetry, ginsberg and plath, as the night closed in thick and heavy with the rain.  

awoke the next morning, walked over to the headquarters restaurant for breakfast.  we packed up our belongings, most of it wet from the rain and the night mist, and took off toward the summit in the cool mid-morning rain.  the hill became steep as the lush deciduous broad-leafed forests transitioned into more coniferous woodlands.  the transition was presaged by the sweet smell of pine sap cool in the mountain air as we wound up and around hairpin curves, our bike engines rattling off the hillsides and shaking our bones.

my hands began to grow cold in the biting air and the rain, a strange and all-together unusual feeling having been living in the heat of thailand for these past months.  we arrived at the top of the park, at the very roof of thailand, the summit of doi inthanon (doi means mountain).  across the road from the visitor's center at the summit of the mountain was a small trail, 350 meters or less, through a very unique environment dubbed by the thai signs translated into english as the "coat-wearing forest."  

we walked in wonder through this lush landscape, imagining outloud that we were in some prehistoric time, before the human race pulled itself out of the sludge of evolution to create language and ideas and later destruction and the impending death of nature (i'm no optimist).




but this place was amazing, covered in moss and brimming with symbiotic life of all varieties.  i haven't seen anything like it since i was in the verdure of new zealand.  made me homesick.





we spent a while in this forest, rob and keely making fun of my orange poncho, calling me "fisherman's friend" which is a brand of cough drops here with a bearded fisherman in an orange poncho on the front


the path was slippery and well-trodden, and we lingered long.











this picture is my favorite taken from the trail.  it really captures the growth of the mosses and the incredible hue of the green.  so green that it glows.  


the trail was called the angka trail.


it was cool.









this is keely at the trailhead.  we're still not sure who michael is or what he has to do with the trail.









from there we got hot chocolate (being freezing and soaked from the rain), collected ourselves, and walked up the road to the summit.  we couldn't find the famous sign proclaiming "the highest point in thailand" and keely swore that it didn't exist.  well it does exist you know-it-all and i want to find it!

only kidding.  but i do want to find it.







so we walked up the small stairway, up to the "other" sign that in fact proclaims the highest point in thailand, the "roof of siam."

there we are --------------------->


after hanging around at the top, sending postcards and looking around.  we departed for the bottom.

we stopped at a small roadside market in the park to buy sundries to take back home with us.  i got some lovely green tea with jasmine, keely got some really good coffee.

we drove back down the mountain, back through the raincloud that seemed to be following us the whole day, to feast yet again on a whole chicken next to the river by mae klang waterfall.  we also visited a few other falls on the way down, but their names escape me and they aren't on the map.

back on the highway to speed home.  the way back was much faster, as we flew through the cloudy afternoon back towards the smog and civilization of chiang mai.  

the trip alleviated those feelings of angst and restlessness that tend to crop up every now and then.  those feelings that if left unattended will eat you alive, gnawing at you with questions like, "what are you doing here? what are you going to do next? where is your life going?" etc. etc.  questions no one likes to address.  so i find that keeping myself busy, and going on adventures keeps those monsters in the closet.  i can effectively sweep them under the rug so long as i don't have to know they're there.

so now it's friday.  this weekend will be yoga and sauna tonight at Rose's playing music with my colleague brian, perhaps going out to hike at the reservoir on sunday.  it's all up in the air.

my best friend will comes next week.  really looking forward to that, as i haven't seen him since february when i left home.  i don't know if he's been out of the country, so it will be cool to see what effects thailand has on him. 

thx for reading.  dc.