Really? You took one of each dish?
Today I moved a whole bunch of boxes into my new apartment. This was a very satisfying activity (though of course it underscores a whole bunch more work that I need to do…) and I was reminded of all my favorite parts of a move. Things like knowing exactly what is in your house and where for that one shining moment; or being clean down to the baseboards. And that supremely satisfying feeling of plopping down on the couch, or in my studio-dwelling reality the bed and surveying all that is yours to behold.
That all sounds great.
Getting Out of India: As always, it’s what you take with you that matters.
Varkala Beach is a really beautiful place and I was glad to be there reading and sitting in the sun and eating tandoori paratha and fresh fruit and listening to music. But then two things happened. For some reason unknown to me, a load of backpackers arrived. Where had they descended from and why were they there polluting the air with patchouli and cigarette smoke and painfully inane conversation? This was supposed to be the low season; didn’t they get the memo? Please, stay on the backpacker trail so the rest of us can avoid you.
And I found out that one of my cats had gone missing back in Hong Kong.
Doubly inauspicious.
I contemplated my options as I sat in Little Tibet eating vegetable pakora. I had been thinking of going home early anyhow because I was realizing I might have grossly underestimated the logistical and emotional hurdles that were going to need to be surmounted over the remaining weeks of June. Also, it turns out that I had given myself a strangely useless amount of time post-ashram in India. The thing is, while twelve days may be a good amount of time for a little foray into many a foreign land, This Is India. And that was not enough time to do anything. Why? Here is why: India is amazing and overwhelming and cheap and fantastic and wild and vibrant. And in order to make it all those things it is incredibly inefficient. Finessing plans is totally impossible. If you have lots of time and flexibility you can go for weeks – months even – ambling around the Subcontinent. However, if you have any sort of schedule: Good.Luck. Trying to adhere to even a simple schedule ends up being fairly costly, and truth be told, the schedule is not gonna stick anyhow. This Is India. Just that morning I had been reading an article in the local paper about how India is Number One for Asia’s “most inefficient bureaucrac[y], with red tape a constant blight to citizens and deterrent for foreign investment.” (Indonesia and the Philippines came second and third. The most efficient? Hong Kong and Singapore. SNG won the top spot, but that makes sense, as police states do tend to be very efficient.)
Considering these realities and wishing that my plate of vegetable pakora was bottomless I started picking up on the conversations around me.
“Dude! You went there? Why? I heard that is like the rip-off capital of India because all the tourists go there!”
“I know mate. It was mental. And all these tourists who couldn’t even work out how to get on a train, I couldn’t believe it.”
“Hey, gotta fag? I’m out?”
“So, did you ever see those birds again, the ones you met up with in Agra?”
[Mental note: Agra = THE tourist destination of India.]
“Ha. Yeah man. Ran into them in — (couldn’t hear where). It was crazy.”
[Mental note: Crazy? You all go to the same places, how can that be crazy? And on that note, why am I here?] Amidst stubbornly lingering cigarette smoke, a personal aggravation I always look forward to leaving behind, I decided to move my meditation on “What To Do” elsewhere. I was wondering where Norman could have ended up on Lamma. I mean it is an island, not too far to wander. And he had run away before (he took a three-day punishment holiday following the toga party and had twice been gone for a couple of days for reasons unknown.) By the time I was alerted to this absence he had been gone four or five days already. Not a good sign. I mean, he could survive, cats are wily. But this was very unusual behavior for a cat who is well-known for adherence to routine. I felt sad, but in a strange emotional turn for me, I seemed to understand there was nothing I could do about it and so it was what it was. I briefly wondered if I had somehow matured or become less of a crazy cat-lady while in the ashram. Unlikely, but you never know, I guess.
Two Western girls sauntered by in their hippie dresses and a cloud of smoke laughing riotously over something. One of them was wearing Crocs. I was definitely going to have to GTFO of here. I sent an email to my most amazing travel agent from my iPhone and within the hour had secured a new ticket home and began to adjust to my new itinerary. It felt right. Then I thought about that damn cat and I started to cry.
And the journey continues, Chapter 4: Life Essence = Prana or Bodily Fluids? You make the call.
General Jack D. Ripper: Nineteen hundred and forty-six. Nineteen forty-six, Mandrake. How does that coincide with your post-war Commie conspiracy, huh? It’s incredibly obvious, isn’t it? A foreign substance is introduced into our precious bodily fluids without the knowledge of the individual. Certainly without any choice. That’s the way your hard-core Commie works.
Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake: Uh, Jack, Jack, listen, tell me, tell me, Jack. When did you first… become… well, develop this theory?
General Jack D. Ripper: Well, I, uh… I… I… first became aware of it, Mandrake, during the physical act of love.
Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake: Hmm.
General Jack D. Ripper: Yes, a uh, a profound sense of fatigue… a feeling of emptiness followed. Luckily I… I was able to interpret these feelings correctly. Loss of essence.
Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake: Hmm.
General Jack D. Ripper: I can assure you it has not recurred, Mandrake. Women uh… women sense my power and they seek the life essence. I, uh… I do not avoid women, Mandrake.
Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake: No.
General Jack D. Ripper: But I… I do deny them my essence.
I am not sure if I made this clear originally when I spoke to people about coming to this ashram, but I am actually completing a course here. Ostensibly this is to facilitate the teaching of yoga, though I remain completely unconvinced that I want to do that. It is nice to have something in my life that I don’t have the responsibility of teaching, though with the horror stories I hear of the job situation at home, I suppose there is no way I can be too prepared.
To that, or those ends, I am spending quite a bit of time learning about the theory and background of yoga. I must admit, I wish I was doing a little more yoga, but then again, in looking at it, I am managing about 4-5 hours a day, of which about two hours are pretty intense. The other more subtle elements are probably good for me and my wound-up self anyhow. We are learning about asanas but also pranayama, meditation, kriyas and a whole lot about the particular spiritual bent of this ashram (Vedanta-sutras and Swami Vivekenanda.) I am interested in this stuff because one of the things I noticed about yoga when I started doing it was that it made me feel different… better really, than any other sport or exercise I had participated in over the years. And I wanted to know why.
Well, one of the big theories is the movement and management of “prana.” Prana is defined as our Life Force. And right here I lose it. I can only visualize General Jack D. Ripper discussing his precious bodily fluids and his essence. Every time. [This does mean that I am not managing to control my mind to the degree that a more advanced yogi does, because I should be able to block that extraneous information out... but I swear to Krishna, every time one of our teachers starts talking about the flow of our prana, and the importance of it, I feel like Lt. Mandrake. At least I do not laugh out loud.]
Still, the lessons are valuable and the fact is that when we manage our minds which is most tangibly done by managing our breath, things seems calmer, better, more manageable. So that is a total win, right?
The Complainer is still rocking her issues daily, and these complaints are manifesting in very interesting ways. Like she is having all sorts of problems. I wonder if maybe she might want to look at some of the lessons we are learning about managing our minds. But I am not here to teach, so I will let her work that out on her own. I feel like I am getting something pretty worthwhile out of this and even if it is not what I expected, or at times what I want – 4:30 a.m. wake up everyday??? – I think it is worth it, and a nice intro into India in an easy and user-friendly way.
We had a crazy storm here the other night; thunder like I have never heard anywhere… not just on us but enveloping us. And a torrential downpour. We lost power for about a day and things got pretty messy. But in the end, it was just another day at the ashram. Hardly anything to get worked up about. The food is good, but I am tired of carbohydrates. [A sentence I never thought I would say - ever.] And everyone seems completely fascinated by my age. Like, everyone asks me how old I am all the time. I cannot tell if this is a compliment or an insult, or in the more yogic perspective, just a question. Either way, they all seem shocked by the truth. New high? New low? I dunno.
Another funny thing that has happened is that I have been required to do assignments in a truly Asian fashion. By this I mean, the report cover matters more than the report. For real, yo. It is totally about style. And DO NOT THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX. This has been a real experience for me… But is a strange way, rather meditative as I meticulously copy the exact text they wish to see within the carefully drawn on page borders. Perhaps that is just another part of the lesson. I remain convinced that the more empirical, individual, trail and error method is superior… but that is probably just my inner-Western Imperialist shouting out. Time to go calm down that part of my monkey brain.
Namaste.
…something about my life…
I went to the doctor, I went to the mountains
I looked to the children, I drank from the fountain
There’s more than one answer to these questions
Pointing me in a crooked line
The less I seek my source for some definitive
The closer I am to fine
He thinks I am The Shit, I know because he told me so.
A soul mate’s purpose is to shake you up, tear apart your ego a little bit, show you your obstacles and addictions, break your heart open so new light can get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you have to transform your life… they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then leave.
~ Elizabeth Gilbert
I don’t really write about much personal stuff on here. I mean, I know I write a lot about stuff that I like, or I am interested in, or that is important to me… but I generally do not get too personal. That should not surprise people who know me well. While outwardly quite forward, I keep the real stuff, the stuff that is fragile, dirty, imperfect, fucked up, embarrassing, tender, most precious… locked up pretty tightly. I often giggle to myself when I hear people say they know me. Very few do. I understand that this is a fundamentally flawed way to live. I also understand that it can make being close to me – err…. tedious, to say the least. I cannot say that I know where it comes from. Perhaps from being an only child with a very tightly wound up perfectionist psyche. I think it has to do with the experiences I have considered EPIC FAILURES when I have shared myself with people only to be totally disappointed in the outcome. Perhaps it is something else altogether. Sometimes when I watch my LBFF I see parts of myself so clearly in him [throwing the picture away because he made a 'mistake,' wanting to be alone and sullen because something that he did had unintended consequences that he could not control and did not like] and I so want to free him from the burden that I know these behaviors can become. But those will be his struggles, they cannot be faced by anyone else. This is one thing I know.
It is easier to be angry. Or funny. Or sarcastic. Or witty. Or pretty much anything else besides being vulnerable or lost. This becomes obvious with just a cursory look at the way people act all around us. In the news, in politics, in Hollywood… everywhere. People go to a lot of trouble to project the person they want to be to the world and the ultimate cost of that is losing who they really are down to the core. We do not consider that cost because we are looking at the sort term expenditures of appearing foolish or naive or pathetic or needy if we are more true to ourselves. This is one thing I have learned.
Exit Strategy.
The bar had character. It is why he went there. Truly, it seemed like this kind of a town should be filled with places that had character, but somehow when he looked around all he saw was a giant amalgamation of the coupon section from the pitifully thin Sunday newspaper; bright signs with grotesquely large foodstuffs or cartoonish animals greeting any passerby who was looking for the “Early Bird Special” or “All You Can Eat Popcorn Shrimp!”
But this place was different. The bar itself was worn but solid, and not covered with some strange composite plastic, it was wood, real enough that you could feel the grain of it if you ran your finger along the edge as he was doing right then. The place drew a crowd, but it was a pleasantly anonymous crowd, none of this Cheers business where everyone knows your name and consequently has something to tell you or ask you want from you. You could sit here and drink domestic beer out of a can and unwind. At the same time the place was friendly enough that you never had to be on your own that long if you didn’t want to be.
Tonight, he was comfortable on his own. It had been a long day, not especially trying, but long none the less. The days seemed like that more and more lately, just there passing by. There were things that needed to be done, worked out, finished, but everything seemed static lately. A catalyst was needed. That such a vehicle would be found in the bar seemed unlikely, but unlikely was as good as it was going to get on this evening. Someone had turned up the music… “In my Tennessee mountain home, Life is as peaceful as a baby’s sigh, In my Tennessee mountain home, Crickets sing in the fields near by…” Somehow, the song did little to enamor the state to him.
As if on cue a man sitting to his left turned and said, “Shit, that song is pathetic.”
“Nah, I get it, man, I know what she means,” was the rejoinder that came from an unnoticed occupant a few seats to the right.
“Maybe, but that ain’t the point.” Leftie began, clarifying his position. “The thing is, that song doesn’t resonate anymore, you know? When’s the last time you sat and listened to crickets?”
Mr. Rightside got up and slid his empty Budweiser can away from the edge of the bar, picked up his cue and headed towards the pool table. “Sometimes it’s just a song man, it doesn’t need to do nothin’.”
Realizing that he was in the middle of a conversation likely headed into that familiar vortex of inane details and picayune anecdotes laced with hyperbole, he considered his exit strategy. Not just in the immediate sense, but in the real sense. He glanced at the familiar four letters, back lit in green above the door and got up.
He gave a quick nod to the bartender and left a five dollar bill on the bar, careful that he didn’t leave it in the shallow pool of condensation that had collected in the uneven surface of the wood. He glanced at Leftie and Mr. Rightside casually and saw that, in fact, they had continued to wax on poetically about the qualities of an authentic country ballad and the best way to put a little English on the cue ball to nail the corner pocket. Exit strategy.
First he would stop by his office. It was not too late and it would be quiet at this hour – no students waiting around to solicit help, or any other sort of favor he would be reluctant to indulge. His work was supposed to be his ticket out, but lately it had stalled. Yes, A catalyst. That was the necessary component that was missing. Looking around the office space he sat down at the desk in front of his computer. As it booted up he considered what had brought him to this place, the veritable series of events that everyone can reconstruct from their current end point even though the directionality of each incident is never evident in real-time. Unsure if any of that really even mattered, he logged on to his computer and opted to check his personal web pages before looking into the more salient work related issues. He had taken to writing recently and had put together a few pieces that he could look at with a little bit of pride; they were good. And they said what he intended, which seems like such a challenge in so many of life’s other arenas. A subtle beep indicated he had a message. He opened it. A single word greeted him: “California.”
After a brief pause, he stood up and flicked the switch on the monitor to off. Leaving everything exactly as he had found it, he opened the door of the office and stepped outside, but not before looking up and acknowledging the bright green and white sign above the door:
One month in Hong Kong (well, actually 1 month and 2 days, but who’s counting?)
Okay, so finally… an update from Hong Kong, SAR (that means Speacial Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China for those of you who want to be in the know.)
I can’t believe I have lived here a month already, it is one of those time things that seems like time has been flying by, but at the same time it seems like I left Reno a lifetime ago.
Ummm….. so somethings I miss? I miss cheese (like real cheese, the Chinese are not such fans.) I miss my friends (duh, but you gotta put it in there in case they read this…) I miss teaching people who could argue with me (it is very surreal to work with people, adults and kids who all have ZERO idea what I am saying… I mean I felt like that a lot at SHS, but in the end, I knew people at least understood he words that were coming out of my mouth.) I miss my house… I had no idea how big my house was and now that I am living Hong Kong style I have a new appreciation. I miss dry air. It is so humid here is makes Hawaii, Florida, and Mexico all put together seem like one giant desert. I miss social studies (okay, you knew that was coming! I am still a total geek.) I miss American sports!
=ASIA=
Holy Shit! I just got my ticket to Hong Kong. It was the last available seat that I could use my frequent flyer miles on that would get me to Asia in time to start work on September 1, so I am (as usual) doing things out of order… I have a ticket but have not yet settled on a job. I am waiting to hear about the positions in Shanghai and have two other contracts waiting for me to sign… one in Hong Kong and one in Wuxi west of Shanghai.
I cannot believe I am actually doing this- my return ticket is for July 7, ’06.
I guess I have finally made some kind of commitment to something.
Best news of the night… the ticket cost $34.89. Nice.
So, I have 13 days to get all my shit together to leave the country for a year. That should be no problem, right? Right. People do this sort of thing all the time when they go through their first midlife crisis, don’t they?
Here’s to new adventures in far away places…….
Amanda
