Yesterday I got a body scrub. It’s the first time I’ve felt clean in over a week. I just am hot and sweaty all the time in Sam Ngao and I don’t feel like I’m really getting clean when I shower only to be sweating 3 minutes later. Then Wednesday I didn’t have any water at the house so there was no shower to be had. I had some coffee shop time, some pool and read Game of Thrones time and I did some coloring in my new Under the Sea coloring book.
I tried Tinder again. Made some matches and chatted with a few guys. I was hoping to meet someone to have dinner with, but didn’t. I posted about it on facebook and got a bunch of replies cheering me on or telling me how to Tinder better. At some point it just seems like a lot of work and by the time I was hungry I was glad to go eat alone. I need to move somewhere cooler. I think the heat takes all my energy and motivation. Of course, I’m also questioning all my thoughts and beliefs about ‘alone’ too since that has historically been my biggest issue. In the past I would swing between craving a relationship and not wanting to be around any people. Now it no longer feels like a swing with big highs or lows on either side. It feels more like an electrical short. One minute I want company and conversation, the next I want to sit alone, then another minute I’m completely indifferent. It switches so quickly that it feels silly to make any plans because it’s going to change. It switches quickly, but none of it has much emotional charge to it. There’s no craving, no sadness, no longing, just a quickly changing preference. Now if only that would happen with my opinion of the heat…..
Today has been uneventful – breakfast and more coloring. I ventured out to explore more of Chaing Mai and then went and hid from the heat in a coffee shop. Think I’ll try to explore more after I write this blog. Or give up and go back to the pool.
So, those of you following how I find AH Almaas relevant to my journey, the rest of this is for you. I know that I’m not seeing life correctly. With this knowledge, it shouldn’t matter where I live or what I do. There is no real basis for waking up with the dreads, not liking teaching, hating the heat or thinking I should be planning what is next. The chapter I’m reading is talking about how the world we live in is all concepts in our mind. “Even if our mental world is lonely, and we gain little pleasure from our experiences, our thoughts are familiar and give us an illusion of security and control that binds us to them. We may see no alternative to this way of understanding ourselves and our world. Because we believe it’s reality. How can we think of an alternative? Even if we think of and long for freedom, we think of freedom within that world”. He suggested a meditation where you observe your thoughts. Not the content of the thoughts, don’t try to figure out what they mean, but just notice the thinking process. When does the thought arise, when does it stop, how long is the gap before the next thought arises? It doesn’t matter what the thought is about or how it makes you feel, just look at the strings of thoughts and gaps. No need to do something or react to the thought, see it as thinking itself. I’ve tried this a few times. It’s interesting. That’s all I’m going to say about it right now. Try it and see for yourself.
I didn’t do much exciting today. I spent a good part of it at the coffee shop. I don’t think Thais hang out in coffee shops for hours the way we do so they probably think I’m nuts or wonder when I’m ever going to leave. So, rather than spend the whole day there I tried to go shopping.
I don’t know why, but going into the stores around town makes me very uncomfortable. I’m being stared at. I don’t know what half the stuff I’m looking at is. And if I have questions, forget it. I feel uncomfortable at the market, but I like it. I don’t like stores. Weird. So, shopping didn’t take up much time. Now what do I do?
I chased the mouse around the bathroom quite a bit today. Then tonight, found him dead. The bathroom is mine again, well, not really. There are probably 8 small geckos living in there and some bugs. Why do jumping spiders live near the toilet?
I tried to find the orange house of the lady who made me promise to come visit her. I didn’t find it. There were a few peach colored houses and some cedar colored houses. Too bad it wasn’t pepto bismol pink because there was only one of those and it was unmistakable or that equally obnoxious green house.
I went to the gardens up by the dam. At some point the road has manicured lawns along it and beautiful landscape. This makes me sad because I live in the woods and I want to live in a place with lawns and landscape. So this brings up the question: Why do certain things make us relax and others don’t when in reality, one isn’t better than the other? I think it’s a combination of familiarity and programmed preferences. The manicured lawns remind me of the US and of wealthier/nicer neighborhoods. The woods I live in make me think of snakes, bugs and other crawly things. There’s trash everywhere and it’s wild and uncared for. Granted, I’d rather look at pretty flowers than trash in a pile of dead leaves, but it’s the way looking at one vs the other actually changes the way I feel, my emotions, my nervous system, my energy level. The reality is one is not actually different than the other (except the trash), both are nature. My friend Corina and I were discussing this the other day as we were comparing me trying to rid my house of mice and tokays and she had squirrels in her garage. Somehow, the squirrels were not as bad as mice and tokays. But in reality, what is the difference? I also noticed this when I was in Vietnam and they drove on the “right” side of the road. I felt my system relax a little. I noticed this in Singapore too. Everything is clean, people drive politely, there are gardens and art everywhere. Why is planned landscape better than natural? I think part of may be because of the intention that was put into creating a garden or art, but it’s still interesting how physical the reaction is, not just a simple “aw, I like that”. And how automatic the reaction is that we may not even notice it enough to ask the question. So, apparently I want to live a wealthier lifestyle and I’m drawn to the things that represent that to me.
I read some more of Diamond Heart Book 4. I’ve mentioned this before, but it’s just amazing that whenever I read AH Almaas, he’s speaking directly to me as if he just wrote that chapter for me 5 minutes before I decided to read it. This only happens EVERY time I read his books. This time it was about how the problem is that we aren’t seeing correctly. We aren’t seeing reality. We are seeing concepts we learned a long time ago. We are seeing concepts in our brains. I was just talking about how I feel like I’m not seeing correctly. And I think the previous paragraph fits into this as well. Maybe I should read more Almaas and less Game of Thrones…….
Daylight helps so much. Nothing looks quite as dire during the day. I woke up not happy, but not completely covered in bugs so that’s a plus. I hardly slept at all last night. It was so hot that I just laid in bed sweating trying to lay as close to the edge as I could so I got full effect of the fan. I’m still amazed how much my face can sweat. I noticed that I’m just holding all the stress of it all kind of like holding my breath, waiting until September. I can’t hold my breath until September. I can’t live like this that long. I still don’t know how to let the holding go. I tried to cry or get angry, but it’s not an emotional thing. I’ve done that work for years. Cognitively I understand that it’s an issue of seeing. None of this looks the way I wanted it to. The fairy tale I was fed as a child isn’t true. No knight in shining armor is coming to save me. I wanted a more comfortable life than this. I wanted to live in a different culture, but in a city with expats I could be friends with and the ability to get around easier. And then I wanted the next step in my process to present itself easily. And some how money would appear and I’d live happily ever after. It doesn’t look like that. I need to see differently. Last night as I typed that I was feeling broken, I thought maybe I need to be broken. Maybe it’s like losing all that muscle I lost a few months ago, where I felt that I had to lose it all to start over. Maybe I have to be broken, have everything I want not possible so I can let go of how it “should be” and really see. Maybe it’s already happening.
The janitor came over and finished covering holes in my house. There are so many he didn’t do because it would take a month full time to cover every hole, but I think we got the ones that mice and tokays could get through. Speaking of mice, I found the one living in my bathroom. We both chased him around for 5 minutes and then he disappeared. Like magic. I have no idea where he went. So mind boggling. There must be a secret trap door that only mice and frogs know about.
Now I’m sitting in the coffee shop in air conditioning and wondering how they can actually get that much sugar to dissolve in a latte. On my way here, I ran into one of the teachers, Pit. I don’t know Pit’s actual title, but he’s kind of like an assistant principle. He and one of the other teachers looked so happy to see me. They both mentioned the air conditioning. So, I will have air con in the future. As usual, I’m not clear on the full content of the conversation, but I think the air con unit will be here on the 15th.
So, over the next few weeks, I’m going to try putting tags in my blog so that they are searchable by others. Or at least, that’s what I think it will do. I’m not sure because the whole thing about hashtags has me mystified. I understand it makes things searchable, but I have no idea who is searching for some of the things I’ve seen hashtagged. I have no idea how someone goes about searching. And above all I have no idea why. So, if you get a bunch of emails in the near future saying I updated a blog, sorry. I don’t know if WordPress sends an email every time I make and update or only when I post a new blog. Also, if you have any good ideas of hashtags I should use, let me know.
I like this part of Chaing Mai that I’ve been staying in. Of course, I probably like this area because it’s a more expensive place to live so with nicer condos comes nicer restaurants, shops, etc. I’d rather be staying in a hotel than an condo, but it’s a real nice condo.
I found a language school near the condo. The shortest class they offered was 20 hours. I don’t have that much time. My brain would explode if I tried to do that many hours over a few days anyway. I went in and talked to them anyway and asked if I could do private lessons. I signed up for 3 hours Friday and 3 hours yesterday. My teacher was a wonderful, cute, young, energetic lady. She taught me basic sentence structure and gave me good worksheets I can refer to later. That is good because I have forgotten just about everything she taught me. She basically gave me everything I would have learned in the 20 hour class. My brain did not explode, but it was touch and go for a while there. Not much stuck. I think it will come back as I study the worksheets later. We went to lunch together the first day and then the second day I offered to buy her a coffee on break. She took me to her favorite coffee shop and made me order in Thai. Now, I just have to put in the time to practice.
I worked on some stuff for my engineering company. It wasn’t much, but every little bit of income helps. I spent way more on vacation than I made. I hung out in the pool. I hung out in the condo and watched bad American and Thai tv. Thai soap operas are horrible. Their game shows are hysterical. For American tv they had bad cop shows, Grim, a firefighter show, A Minute to Win It, the ScyFi channel and a movie channel.
I got massage almost every day. My fingers hurt. I wonder what’s going on with them. I wonder if I’m getting arthritis, but assume it’s something else. My shoulders are very tight. It feels like my muscles are burning, like a chemical burn, when they work on them. My hamstrings and IT bands are pretty flexible though which has never been something I could say. I got a body scrub one day instead of a massage. Unlike the one in Vietnam, it didn’t hurt. At no time did I think I might be bleeding or might need a trip to the hospital. After, she put on oil. It didn’t feel like massage oil or lotion. It felt like she was turning my skin into silk. Oh, I wish I had asked what she used because it was a marvellous feeling. Now my knee caps are peeling. With all the sun I got over the past two months, no part of my body has peeled except my knee caps. So weird and fascinating.
I went on a few google maps adventures. Some of the restaurants I asked it to lead me to didn’t exist. Some of the routes were impossible. Still, how did we ever do anything before google?
I had a session with my teacher. He thought the hurting fingers might be a diet thing – too much starch. That might explain the burning muscles too. That or I have a rare horrible burning muscle disease. It’s probably diet. Nothing monumental happened in the session, but that’s not unusual for me. It did come out that I’m just not in a place where I have a bunch of emotional processing to do. I’ve worked through so much of that. It seems that now I’m down to Muscle Zero, that what I need to do is rebuild muscle while rebuilding my center. So, how do I rebuild? DSE exercises! In the past I did these exercises regularly and they usually put me into process, helping me work through the stuff that came up. I’m excited to see what the exercises will do now as I try to rebuild my body and energy system. So, I’m ready to go home with a new resolve of doing this conscious movement, finding a way to work out/lift weights, and seeing if I can eat better. The eating better will be hard as I can hear ice cream taunting me from somewhere off in the distance as I write this.
Strange food experiences of the week! I think this will be a regular feature of my blog. I went out for ice cream one afternoon. I found a place that advertised snow ice. It could be ice cream. I couldn’t tell from the pictures. I’m more adventurous with dessert than other foods so let’s see. I ordered the watermelon snow ice. It was gigantic. I couldn’t eat it all, but I tried real hard. The best I could tell is that it was like a snow cone except they used sweetened condensed milk instead of ice. Then they put water melon balls and ice cream on top. And they gave you a red syrup on the side to put on the snow ice. It was a bit much, but I’ll probably forget that in the future and do it again. The other food adventure was one morning I went to get breakfast. I found a couple coffee shops that had coffee and cake. I didn’t want cake for breakfast. I found a place that had bread. By now, I was starving and decided garlic bread for breakfast would have to do. They put syrup on the garlic bread. How on earth is that a good idea? Why can’t there just be food that is savory without having to be sweet too? Not every food has to have every flavour in it. It was edible, but I wouldn’t rush out and try to re-create this food concept. This I won’t forget, but I suspect it will happen again not by choice.
On a similar note I had a weird restaurant experience. I saw a restaurant near my condo and went in. They didn’t have a menu out front so I asked to see a menu. They asked if I wanted whiskey or beer. The place was called a café. I wanted a menu. They gave me a menu and then seven of them stood by my table and watched me look through the menu. This has happened often before where the waiter or waitress stands by the table waiting to take your order while you look through the menu. But it was seven women. I felt like an animal at the zoo. “What will it do next”? I’m not sure what was going on, but I decided I didn’t want to eat there.
I tried Tinder. It’s a dating app, but less intensive than most websites. It’s a weird concept to me. It shows you a picture of someone nearby and you either “like” them or not. If you hit the X or swipe to the left they go away forever. If you hit the heart or swipe right they go into your likes category. You don’t get to see the next picture until you’ve decided on the first. If you like them and they like you then you can send messages. There can be few photos and a short description you can look at. It tells you their age too. It only shows people that are physically nearby you. You decide what radius to look at. I messaged two guys, but didn’t meet up with anyone. I don’t think I like this app, but I am extremely curious to what comes up in the app when I get to Sam Ngao. And it might be a good way to meet people to have dinner with in the future when I go to other places for the weekend. We’ll see.
I’m feeling drawn to write a book based on my blog. I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know if I need to get my blog out to more people first or if I just write the book. I don’t know how to go about getting a book published. Maybe it’s just a matter of advertising on my blog and getting it out to more people to make money, but it feels more like a book to me than a money making blog. If any of you out there have ideas of how to make this happen, please let me know. You can email me at rrainefiore@gmail.com. I might try putting hashtags in my old blogs so they can be found easier by people I don’t know that may be interested in reading. If you haven’t subscribed to my blog, but are following it regularly, please do so as I assume the number of followers I have will be useful in marketing to a publisher. If you are not interested in subscribing to my blog, that’s fine too. I don’t want to pressure anyone. I know how annoying it can be to receive emails you don’t want. I may try advertising on my blog too. If I do and you find it takes away from the blog, let me know as I’m still figuring all this blog stuff out. I don’t mind advertising that’s off to the side, but if it highjacks my blog or gets in the way of readers enjoying my blogs, then it’s not worth it.
(c) All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore
3 headed elephant statueSnow IceThis penguin made my snow ice, I thinkI think he likes me
Yesterday I left Singapore and flew to Bangkok and then to Chaing Mai.
The Singapore airport is amazing. There is art everywhere. There are at least 2 gardens in each terminal. It’s easy to get around. They have reclining chairs in case you want to relax. They have lounges, tv rooms, a pool, and a movie theater. . I heard they had free massage chairs, but I didn’t find them. One of the gardens was a butterfly garden. I went early just to see the butterfly garden.
Bangkok airport has no gardens.
The strange food story of the day…..Mochi. I like the gummy mochi candy you can get in the US at yogurt places. I love mochi balls (ice cream wrapped in mochi). I saw this mochi dessert on the airplane menu each time I flew. Then a video of it appeared on facebook on someone’s page as clear cake (it resembles cake in no way at all). So, it was time to try it. It is a clear tasteless jelly. Then you pour a brown uneventful syrup on it and top it with crushed nuts. It was good enough that I ate it all, but there is no reason you should ever pay money to eat this.
I got to my hotel in Chaing Mai, only it wasn’t a hotel, but an apartment complex. The guards had no idea what to do with me. I had no idea where to go. I called the number on my reservation, but it said “this number is not available right now”. I sat in the guard’s office for a while trying to figure out what to do when someone called me. He said his wife emailed me (I didn’t receive an email). The key was at the guard’s shack. So, it appears I rented a 2 bedroom apartment. I’d actually rather have a hotel, but it is a real nice apartment. There’s air conditioning which I won’t see for 5 months, a gym and a pool. The location seems good – near a mall, plenty of restaurants, and massage places. I ate at a restaurant that only serves made to order salads. That made me feel a little better. Then a massage. I was going to do a massage and a body scrub, but if I ordered two services, they would tack on another 50 baht in addition to the regular cost of the two services. This marketing approach is backwards and didn’t work. I gave up on the body scrub.
Today I signed up for private Thai language lessons for tomorrow and Saturday, 3 hours each. I’m not sure if my brain can handle 3 hours each day, but any new Thai I can learn will be helpful. All of the classes I looked up on the internet last night were longer – weeks or more so that is why I did the private lessons.
I went to the hospital. I had to do the health certificate again since the one I did in February is now outdated. This is for my work permit. The first hospital I went to was a mass of people and no English anywhere. I couldn’t tell if I was in the emergency room, the general hospital or what. There were many windows and steps to go through, but I couldn’t figure out where to start. I knew there was a more foreigner friendly hospital somewhere so I found it on google maps and went there instead. Within 30 seconds of being there, I was pointed in the right direction. Then began the game of move Rraine from seat to seat to room to seat to room. Overall, it didn’t take very long. They actually took blood which was more than the last place I had this done did.
I had to wait 2 hours for my tests to come back to get my certification. So I went and got lunch. There was a mall with a pizza hut and another pizza place. I opted for the other pizza place. My pizza looked and tasted suspiciously like pizza hut though. I was able to find the phone store and get my internet issues resolved (in theory – haven’t tried it out yet). I got my certification. I didn’t look at it because it was in a sealed envelope. I assume I’m healthy enough to work in Thailand. The blood test was for syphilis. I think you have to have sex to get that so I should be good to go.
While I was waiting for the certification, I got a message from the owner of the condo. He wanted to know if I could move to the room I actually rented today. Huh? With all that confusion yesterday, this isn’t even the right room. Ok, not a big deal I guess. I told him what time I’d be back and he said he’d have the maid change keys with me. This didn’t go so smoothly either. The new room hadn’t been cleaned. It was a mess and had no clean towels or sheets. I went to the pool hoping the problem would solve itself. A lot of messaging back and forth and now someone is cleaning my new room.
Thoughts of the day though: This morning when everything went so smoothly with the language lessons, hospital and phone store (the three main things I needed to do today), I felt good and thought I might accomplish everything today . I wanted to finish blogs, do some engineering work and finish lesson plans too. Ha – too ambitious. Then the dirty room dashed all of that. Now I’m cranky and grumpy and have a bit of a poor me thing going on. Such a little thing. So, I know this is no big deal, but the old nervous system pattern is getting triggered that makes me feel bad when things are out of my control and not going the way I want. It’s not panic, but a dulled down version of panic. The new learning of the day is I’ve never been a person to panic. That’s rarely, if ever, a reaction I have. I realize that in the past I couldn’t actually panic because then there’d be no control over the situation I already have no control over. I can keep from panicking, but I can’t seem to let the dulled down reaction go either. Of course, the bigger issue is that I don’t actually have control over anything and I’m in the process of letting the ego’s control go and learning to go with the flow of life. Another tiny layer of the onion can now fall away as I see the dulled down panic as a control defense.
(c) All rights reserved Kimberly Fiore
One of the airport gardensMore airport gardensAt the airport – yay!
Mochi Series – Picture 1 – packaged for airplaneMochi Series – Picture 2 – Add the syrupMochi Series – Picture 3 – Add the nutsMochi Series – Picture 4 – EatI have no idea – just found it at a coffee shop
After breakfast and some pool time, my friend arrived at the hotel. We changed rooms in the hotel. We went to Seminyak beach which is a busier beach than the one the hotel is near. It still wasn’t the crowded mess I had heard of. The streets in Seminyak were crowded with traffic and lined with stores, but it had a nice feel to it, I thought. We went in search of a place that would do henna tattoos, but failed on that hunt. Better hunting tomorrow. They do the bean bag beach bars here too, but there’s a lot more of them. I got some pictures of them after they had set up for the sunset crowd. I didn’t get any pictures of them at sunset, but it was nice to just sit in bean bags and watch the waves come in. We also bought a couple of movies to take back to the hotel. I was surprised that Allegiant was already out. But when we went to buy it, they said it might not be good quality. Aha, it’s an illegal copy. We got it anyway. It was ok quality.
I’m feeling a combination of opposites. I’m tired of people. I’m tired of being alone. I don’t want to go back to work, but I’m missing the lack of routine. I’m tired of doing. I’m tired of sitting still. I feel out of place. I don’t like heat. I don’t like heat – oh wait, no opposite there. I feel like I should decide what I’m going to do with my life after teaching. But why do I have to decide that now? How is making a decision now living in the flow of life? I’m trying to live now and the future keeps hopping into my thoughts. When it does, it brings anxiety and “should” and exhaustion. Overall, I spend an enormous amount more of my time living now, but the future still has a bit of a hold on me. And, now that I am so much more aware, I can feel what living for the future does to a body so much stronger. So, I just watch it when it happens and note how it makes me feel and question who is watching. I think this is all part of a bigger shift trying to happen.
I found it easier when I was watching the sunset yesterday to just melt into oneness and now than I did tonight. I think it’s harder for me when I’m with other people. I still have thoughts that tell me I have to be a certain way, have conversations, do things, be witty, be nice, behave like all the other people, etc.
We got up this morning and found a place for breakfast. It wasn’t very good. Then we hung out at the Best Western pool until it was time to take Carly to the airport. They had a really nice pool.
I drove the POS for the last time and was so excited to drop it off. That might have been the highlight of the day. I said goodbye to Carly and got a taxi to my new hotel near the beach. I’ve heard that Kuta and Seminyak are both dirty and over touristy and that I wouldn’t enjoy them. From my one night in Kuta, I didn’t find it to be that bad, but I didn’t find it worth going back to either. My hotel in Seminyak is great.
It was a 13 minute walk to the beach. The beach wasn’t crowded at all. I got there in time for sunset. There was a beach bar that I hung out at for dinner and sunset. I was hoping to meet some people and have a nice conversation, but that didn’t happen. But as I sat there, I just felt how alone I was and then for a while, I didn’t even exist. I could have stayed like that all night, but I had to go to the bathroom and that kinda broke the not existing experience. Now, note, I said “alone”. Did you read “lonely”? Did you put a negative story on the word “alone”? Did you assume that if I had met people and had a nice conversation that that would have been the “better” outcome? “Alone” is not the same as “lonely”, not even close. Now read it again without judgement, good or bad, or should be. Do you get a different picture?
So, this is the right way to do a beach bar. Put on some music, have a bunch of bean bags to sit on, put out some pretty lights, serve drinks and food. This is as simple, brilliant and perfect as it gets. Naysayers 0, Seminyak 1.
My experience with making a plan is that 90% of the time nothing goes according to the plan. Still, we make plans. Today was no different. The first beach I chose was supposed to have the blackest sand on this side of Bali according to the guide book. I got there and it was a construction zone. Machines were moving large boulders around. The tide was in so there was no beach. I could tell that if there had been a beach, it would have had very black sand. So, back into the POS to find the next beach. I got to see rice fields on the way to and from the beach so, check! – Picture of rice fields. Now, one of the side roads I was going to take later to see rice fields didn’t need to happen. The next beach was supposed to have a ton of mica in the sand so it’s extra glittery. I like glitter. There was a parking lot and some Bali restaurants and not much else. Since the tide was still in, the water came up to the wall. I could tell from the parking lot, that, yes, this would be a glittery beach, but not right now. I tried to order lunch, but all they had was fish. How do you have fish, but not shrimp? Then again, Google Translator could be lying. It does that often. I gave up and decided to eat lunch at the next beach. The next beach was not part of the plan, but I was determined to get a beach. No, not a beach. It was a harbor for a very large ferry and more dive operations than I’ve ever seen in one location. I did find a restaurant for lunch though. So, that’s the end of the beach portion of the plan and we are 0 for 3.
At many points of the day I am sweating so hard that I think water is pouring out of my face. I didn’t think a face could sweat that much. I grew up in Florida, but I don’t remember heat and humidity like this.
I decided to head to the place I’m staying tonight. The road goes more inland. There is a water temple on the way which is the next part of the plan. Google Maps decides to not work so we are going by signs and the map in the guide book. It shouldn’t be an issue to get to Amed without google maps, but the water temple is probably a loss and hopefully the resort is easy to find when I get to Amed.
I’ve finally figured out what the white stripes on the road mean. If you see a white stripe on the road, there is a driving lane to the left of the stripe, a driving lane to the right of the stripe and a driving lane straddling the stripe. At some point the road narrowed and buildings lined both sides of the road so there was no way to pull over, stop and check the map. The road wound up and down with huge curves. Often, the buildings would go away on one side of the road revealing stunning views. I couldn’t take pictures of any of it because there was no where to stop and I need both my hands to drive. The signs did not lead me astray though. I only missed one turn – the one to the water temple.
I saw an area with about 20 cars parked so I assumed that might be the temple. I had to drive quite a distance before I found a place I could turn around. I wasn’t going to miss everything on the plan though so I went back and it was the parking for the water temple! Actually, it wasn’t a temple, but a water palace. Taman Tirta Gangga was built in 1948 and has two swimming ponds, and a bunch of other ponds with fountains and koi in them. My favorite had stepping stones at water level so it felt like you were walking on water. They led different paths through the water like a labyrinth. As I headed back to my car there was a guy with snakes you could pay to pose with for pictures. He also had a bat and tiny owls. OWLS. My distaste of animal tourism out the window. Hell yea, I’ll pay you to hold a tiny owl and get my picture taken.
After that I headed to Amed by way of sign instead of electronic map. The road got smaller and smaller until it was slightly larger than one lane. Yet from the signs advertising guesthouses and scuba diving, I knew I was on the right path. I almost missed the sign that pointed to the place where I’m staying, but managed to hit the brakes and turn at the last second. I parked near the entrance and a guy asked if I was Kim.
This is no five star resort, but I’m in love with it. The dive shop is at the same place as the hotel so I was able to check in and I don’t have far to go tomorrow morning. There are a row of rooms on either side of a courtyard. Almost the entire courtyard is taken up by a pool. There’s a restaurant and a short distance from the restaurant and the pool is a black sand beach. You can see huge mountains when you are in the ocean. Each room has a covered deck looking out to the ocean and the decks all have bean bag chairs on them. My room is large, very yellow and has a bed built into the middle of the room. I can hear the ocean from my room. I stayed here for dinner because I’ve had enough venturing out for today and because I love this place. The food was great and I got to catch up on yesterday and today’s blogs.
I checked in with Mom. My brother is there again. They were getting ready to go to the funeral of my cousin’s son. The funeral for my Mom’s husband is Saturday. I wish I could be there. I’ve been struggling with feeling like I should go back and feeling very strongly that it isn’t the right decision. There’s a huge part of me that doesn’t want to go back to Sam Ngao and teach. That part is telling me to move back to the US. To stay in Sam Ngao would be the more difficult choice. I don’t feel that it’s the right time to go back to the US. I’m stuck again in the place of what “should” I do. I’m thinking of the future instead of being here. I’m feeling like I need to have a plan, make a decision, control the situation. But, I know that this is all part of the learning. The truth is that I don’t know the right answer, I don’t have to make a decision now and if I control the situation, it will not turn out happy for me. So, as uncomfortable as it is for me, I wait. I wait for life to unfold and happen the way it should.
I also had the thought on the dive boat yesterday that I would love to be on a boat and diving every day. Then I had the thought that I don’t have the money to get my dive master certification and it would be a hard life financially. I see that I took something wonderful that I was enjoying and in my head made it impossible to have that as my life. Instead, my life will be teaching in Sam Ngao, moving to Wisconsin which I have no desire to do, or some unknown other thing that is also ok, but I don’t love it. So, the belief that there’s not enough for me is still in operation at a very subtle level. I can never really have what I want. This has been one of my core issues. I want to love my life. I want to love my work and have it be enough financially. I want to put an end to drama and the need for there to always be some hurdle to get over. And it’s tied to doing and planning. And it’s tied to what’s going on with Mom. And it’s tied to the dissolving of the ego. So for now, I have no plan and I don’t know what I’m going to do in a couple weeks when vacation is over. I have no idea how I’m going to get that job I love or what that job is. I’m just watching what comes up and noticing it.
I had an interesting thought today. If, in my 20s, I had done what I’m doing now, people would say I was traveling and living abroad to find myself. I thought, what an interesting twisted concept. So many times I’ve heard people say they are taking time off to find themselves. It’s self identification that is the source of issues. And yet, finding oneself is often a lofty goal. On many occasions, when people ask why I moved abroad, I said to shake things up, to get lost. I’m trying to lose myself.
I went down to the lobby at 4:45. One of the night guys was asleep on a bed behind the desk and the other was on a lobby couch. I felt bad about waking them up, but the one on the couch hopped up and grabbed my bad and took it out to the taxi that was already waiting for me. I think the Vietnamese people are easy to anger and have short tempers, but when they smile or are helpful, it feels so much more sincere than the Thai people. My flight back to Bangkok was uneventful and it was the shortest wait I’ve ever had to get through immigration anywhere. I said goodbye to Annaliese. I felt a huge relief as I did. Not that I was relieved to say goodbye. She is a sweet fun person, but I realized I had taken on some of her energetic stuff (everyone has stuff). With all that I am learning and the big wall I am coming to with the disintegration of identity, I think I took on some of her fear, making mine feel larger, a trick of the ego to keep me in fear so I won’t move forward in this process. I know other people that feel the energies going on around them so strongly that it is overwhelming and they sometimes don’t know what is them and what is others. I never use to think I did this, but now I’m realizing I do sometimes. It just comes in more subtle and I don’t realize I’m taking on other energies right away. When I do, I’m able to drop it quickly. The relief I felt today was when I let her energies go and some of my fear went with it.
With a bit of difficulty, I found the bus to Jomtiem which is a couple hours south east of Bangkok.
Jomtiem is a beach area near Pattaya. Pattay is a big beach destination for old white men and people wanting to get away from Bangkok. When I first moved to Thailand one of my co-workers put me in touch with his brother-in-law, Chris. Chris lives in Jomtien. He was a huge force in keeping me sane when I first moved to Sam Ngao. I would often call him after school when it was the middle of the night in the US. I just told him I needed to speak and hear fluent English and it would set my brain right. He’s a sailor and told me he’d take me sailing if I ever made it to Jomtien so I decided this would be a good place to relax between Vietnam and Krabi.
The bus dropped me off and I walked a couple blocks to the restaurant Chris was meeting me at. It was nice to put a face to the voice. I managed to eat a half a sandwich. Yay! He recommended an apartment complex nearby that rents rooms and has a pool so we went there. There were several high rise buildings with plain looking apartments and a big pool. On the bottom floor of each building is a row of plain looking businesses, Thai restaurants, small bars, places renting rooms and other things. We went into one of the places renting rooms and booked a room for me. It’s not the nicest place, but it’s on the 10th floor. The rent was cheap enough and I have to pay for water and electricity when I leave. I think I’d rather have a hotel, but I think this will do for 4 days.
I had told Chris I was sick and asked if there was a doctor he recommended. He has and ear infection so he said he’d go with me. We walked into the clinic and I told them what was going on. I talked to the doctor for a while. Her English was difficult to understand, but she seemed to understand me better. She asked a lot of questions, took temperature, looked in my throat and nose. She told me it wasn’t Dengue fever as if I was nuts to ask. She said I’d be burning up and red if it was. Then I got called back in for an injection. The nurse put 4 or 5 things in the syringe. I have no idea what was in the shot and I don’t much care. Then she gave me a bag with 7 different drugs. She gave me instructions on how to take them, but not what they were. She said one was an antibiotic that would help with the sinus infection and stomach problems. Again, I don’t much care what the drugs are if they work. It all didn’t take long and cost me about $30. Much cheaper than the US, but way more expensive than Sam Ngao.
After the clinic, Chris dropped me off at the apartments. I went and got a foot massage at one of the places in the building. It might have been the best foot massage yet. Then I went to the pool and just sat in the water. Finally, I was immersed in water. The water was way too warm, but it was wonderful anyway.
I need to pay for wifi at the building and found out too late to pay. The office was closed. So, I ventured out for dinner and hung out in a sports bar until they closed, just posting blogs, putting more money on my Thai phone, making phone calls and catching up on email. I ate a whole personal pizza. I feel tired, but so much better. Thanks mystery injection.
I found out earlier today that my mom’s husband is in the hospital. He can’t keep food down and now isn’t very coherent. I talked to mom tonight and she is ok, all considered. I didn’t ask when he went to the hospital, but I can bet it was around the time I was in Hanoi processing about her. I wonder why our medical system thinks radiation is a good alternative to cancer. Most people I’ve known that had radiation died of radiation complications. Why don’t we just try to make people more comfortable and let them go of cancer? How did pumping someone full of poison become the solution to not die of cancer. I guess it works for some, but I still think something is terribly wrong with our medical system.
Rraine Drops 