So, this is kinda trippy. I'm in the midst of what feels like the enormously overwhelming task of sorting through my apartment and deciding what I want to keep, what to sell at a yard sale, what to give away. It is mind-blowing and incredible how much crap I've accumulated. Before I moved to this apartment, I was always on the move, so this never happened. Now I feel like I'm drowning in stuff.
Anyway, just now I was sorting through a stack of back issues of The Sun magazine. I tend to hang on to things so I have them going back for years. There are a lot I haven't read in awhile. What was kind of a trippy experience is looking back through the table of contents of previous issues and realizing I've met a lot of the featured people in the interviews and articles. Some of it's not surprising - I went to a writer's retreat put on by The Sun in 2005, so those connections aren't surprising, but some of the other ones are.
The one I just looked through had a feature article by Reza Aslan, who was here on Orcas last fall for a lecture and reception. Another feature article was by Diane Lefer, who taught at the Orcas Island Writers Festival last fall. She was fabulous, her writing practice comes from a deeply passionate social and political conviction adn she was a real inspiration in that way. And then there was another issue with an interview with Andrew Harvey, who was also recently on Orcas doing a workshop.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Moving Right Along
Tomorrow will mark two weeks after my return from India, and it feels like life is moving pretty quickly and changes are happening fast.
I made a decision about which college to go to pretty quickly after returning home, and I think in many ways, I had already made the decision, deep down, beforehand. I'm going to Portland State, which is the same school that my India program went through, and I'm pretty excited about it. I'm still a little sad that some of my top choice schools didn't work out, though I'm also seeing it in some ways as what Julia Cameron would call "Gain disguised as loss," because the more I move forward in this process, the more right PSU feels, so there's also a part of me that's glad some of the other schools didn't work out.
PSU is going to be a great place for me to explore all kinds of different academic interests, they offer so many classes and subjects it kind of boggles the mind. And that's good because I have an ongoing issue about being interested in too many things at once and wanting a really diverse schedule that feeds my left and right brain at the same time. Pouring over the class schedule for the last ten days or so made me feel like a kid at Christmas, like, oooh I could take this class, and that class, and oh boy! And PSU is known for having a lot of older students, so that's cool for me, being in classes and organizations and campus housing with people in my same age range. And they have a great disabilities department, and it seems like a lot of other students with disabilities, and a separate disabilities advocacy organization on campus, so it feels like there'll be lots of support. Oh yeah, and when I was visiting, I saw lots of hot boys on campus, that's always a plus.
I'm super excited about all of it. I've wanted to live in Portland for years. I remember the first time I went there, during spring break of my second year of college, and the first morning I was there, sitting in a cafe with my friend Kelly and a few other women, just soaking it up and feeling so strongly that I wanted to live there. That was over 8 years ago! And my good friend Elynn who used to live around the corner from me here on Orcas, who I miss terribly, is there. I've moved a fair number of times in my life, and I have to say it is comforting to know I'll have Kelly and Elynn as two really close friends in a new locale. I also have a few contacts to hopefully set up some tarot reading stuff down there, and also a few contacts to get involved in the literary world of Portland.
I applied for campus housing, which I was NOT going to do - I'm way too old to live in a dorm, and I wasn't crazy about it when I was the right age - but it turns out that PSU's on-campus housing includes a lot of buildings with studio apartments and the like. See, that's what I'm talking about, the benefits of having lots of older students around. So, the price was decent and location is great, and so I applied and put in my deposit, should be finding out which building I'm in fairly soon I hope. I'll be moving in mid-September, so trying to soak up the joys of having a one bedroom apartment with a back patio that overlooks woods for the rest of my time here. I will have to downsize for the move, and I'm sort of looking forward to that too. Already going through my apartment thinking what I want to keep or not. India was good preparation for that in a way, I mean, I lived out of a pack for three months, I stayed with a family of seven who lived in a house that was the size of my living room/kitchen (aka not very big), and these things make you think about what is or isn't necessary. It just helps in terms of shedding what's not needed.
So, for those on Orcas, I am sure there will be some sort of yard sale outside my place at some point this summer. Get ready.
This morning I registered for classes, and so now that that went through it feels really, truly official that I'm going there. I was so sure something would go wrong in terms of signing up, I just thought Murphy's Law would be in effect, but no, I got every class I wanted at every time I wanted, so I got my ideal schedule. It's still subject to change up until the beginning of the quarter, but for now it's set exactly as I wanted it. I planned it out over a week ago, taking a lot of time to examine different class choices, how they'd fit together, and how the profs rated at those sites to review professors. And that last one was a good thing, I was going to take a writing class with someone b/c she's an author I like (the particular subject was not so thrilling, kinda something I have already taken), but the reviews were pretty much across the board not that flattering, putting it tactfully, so I decided to go with something else.
I am just so psyched for my schedule though it is not going to be an easy courseload (which honestly is a big part of the reason I'm psyched, I've been craving intellectual stimulation). I'm taking two science classes - bio and chem - as I still haven't fully given up the idea of doing a double major in something sciency, and I have my basic Physics credits and then some done already (and none in the others), so that alone is going to be intense, and awesome b/c it's that part of my brain that has been more deprived these last few years. I'm of course taking some writing credits, in scriptwriting actually. I was going to do non-fiction and probably will at some point, but I was just a lot more excited about the scriptwriting class, and it's totally undiscovered territory so it'll be challenging and engaging. And the last class I'm taking may be surprising, I'm taking Arabic. I've always been interested in learning it (still want to go to egypt someday), and I've never taken any college level foreign language courses, and taking Hindi classes in India gave me a boost of confidence as far as studying a language that is more different from English than something like French, which I took in high school. Sooooo, those are my four main classes. It's not going to be an easy semester, but the truth is I wanted a difficult courseload, b/c I know myself and without that I will get bored and feel like I'm not being challenged and whenever school is too easy I start slacking off. So I feel like my schedule has the diversity in subject that I crave, and a difficulty level that will be just right.
Oh I'm also taking piano (for beginners) as a two-credit class in the mornings, which should add some extra fun and creativity to my days. I've been wanting to teach myself for so long, but I don't do all that well with it being completely unstructured, I just end up never doing it, so the class should be good to cure that.
So, all around, I'm excited to make the transition to go back to school. September can't come fast enough, though I am actually glad to have the time to make the transition over time.
In my last post I said I would not go back to my old job. That did not last. The reality is that even with financial aid, and with the fact that I'm feeling good financially right now (I only spent $250 the entire time I was in India, so it feels like I saved money), going to school and moving are expensive things and it just can't hurt to have the income. And I'll be here for four months, so I decided to go back, but only four days a week, and on morning shift, which means that I will have to leave my place at 5:15! That is going to be rough, but I'll be done at 2 and have the whole day ahead of me. Though I am not crazy about the job and though I hear things are not good over there, everyone is really happy to have me back, and I'm actually surprising even myself by feeling pretty positive about it. Camp is just so beautiful (on almost 300 acres of gorgeous woodsy forests, fields, waterfront) and I feel such a strong spiritual connection to the land there, that I'm looking forward to the long walk in the early morning. Okay I might regret saying that tomorrow when it's really fucking early, but I bet I'll get used to it fairly quickly. I'm also thinking some days instead of coming home right away, I'll wander around some of the less traveled paths in the backwoods of the camp and really love up my last summer here. So, we'll see how it goes when I'm actually there, but for now I'm thinking positive.
So, all in all, things feel like they're moving right along.
Currently Listening:
"Fidelity" - Regina Spektor - this may possibly be the song I listened to most in India, b/c it was on two people's iPod type things. I haven't listened to much of her other stuff, but this song is constantly stuck in my head. And yes, it's in an episode of Grey's (do I even need to say that anymore? I'm such an addict).
Fidelity
(Shake it up)
I never loved nobody fully
Always one foot on the ground
And by protecting my heart truly
I got lost in the sounds
I hear in my mind
All these voices
I hear in my mind all these words
I hear in my mind all this music
And it breaks my heart
And it breaks my heart
And it breaks my heart
It breaks my heart
And suppose I never ever met you
Suppose we never fell in love
Suppose I never ever let you kiss me so sweet and so soft
Suppose I never ever saw you
Suppose we never ever called
Suppose I kept on singing love songs just to break my own fall
Just to break my fall
Just to break my fall
Break my fall
Break my fall
All my friends say that of course its gonna get better
Gonna get better
Better better better better
Better better better
I never love nobody fully
Always one foot on the ground
And by protecting by heart truly
I got lost
In the sounds
I hear in my mind
All these voices
I hear in my mind all these words
I hear in my mind
All this music
And it breaks my heart
It breaks my heart
I hear in my mind all of these voices
I hear in my mind all of these words
I hear in my mind all of this music
Breaks my
Heart
Breaks my heart
I made a decision about which college to go to pretty quickly after returning home, and I think in many ways, I had already made the decision, deep down, beforehand. I'm going to Portland State, which is the same school that my India program went through, and I'm pretty excited about it. I'm still a little sad that some of my top choice schools didn't work out, though I'm also seeing it in some ways as what Julia Cameron would call "Gain disguised as loss," because the more I move forward in this process, the more right PSU feels, so there's also a part of me that's glad some of the other schools didn't work out.
PSU is going to be a great place for me to explore all kinds of different academic interests, they offer so many classes and subjects it kind of boggles the mind. And that's good because I have an ongoing issue about being interested in too many things at once and wanting a really diverse schedule that feeds my left and right brain at the same time. Pouring over the class schedule for the last ten days or so made me feel like a kid at Christmas, like, oooh I could take this class, and that class, and oh boy! And PSU is known for having a lot of older students, so that's cool for me, being in classes and organizations and campus housing with people in my same age range. And they have a great disabilities department, and it seems like a lot of other students with disabilities, and a separate disabilities advocacy organization on campus, so it feels like there'll be lots of support. Oh yeah, and when I was visiting, I saw lots of hot boys on campus, that's always a plus.
I'm super excited about all of it. I've wanted to live in Portland for years. I remember the first time I went there, during spring break of my second year of college, and the first morning I was there, sitting in a cafe with my friend Kelly and a few other women, just soaking it up and feeling so strongly that I wanted to live there. That was over 8 years ago! And my good friend Elynn who used to live around the corner from me here on Orcas, who I miss terribly, is there. I've moved a fair number of times in my life, and I have to say it is comforting to know I'll have Kelly and Elynn as two really close friends in a new locale. I also have a few contacts to hopefully set up some tarot reading stuff down there, and also a few contacts to get involved in the literary world of Portland.
I applied for campus housing, which I was NOT going to do - I'm way too old to live in a dorm, and I wasn't crazy about it when I was the right age - but it turns out that PSU's on-campus housing includes a lot of buildings with studio apartments and the like. See, that's what I'm talking about, the benefits of having lots of older students around. So, the price was decent and location is great, and so I applied and put in my deposit, should be finding out which building I'm in fairly soon I hope. I'll be moving in mid-September, so trying to soak up the joys of having a one bedroom apartment with a back patio that overlooks woods for the rest of my time here. I will have to downsize for the move, and I'm sort of looking forward to that too. Already going through my apartment thinking what I want to keep or not. India was good preparation for that in a way, I mean, I lived out of a pack for three months, I stayed with a family of seven who lived in a house that was the size of my living room/kitchen (aka not very big), and these things make you think about what is or isn't necessary. It just helps in terms of shedding what's not needed.
So, for those on Orcas, I am sure there will be some sort of yard sale outside my place at some point this summer. Get ready.
This morning I registered for classes, and so now that that went through it feels really, truly official that I'm going there. I was so sure something would go wrong in terms of signing up, I just thought Murphy's Law would be in effect, but no, I got every class I wanted at every time I wanted, so I got my ideal schedule. It's still subject to change up until the beginning of the quarter, but for now it's set exactly as I wanted it. I planned it out over a week ago, taking a lot of time to examine different class choices, how they'd fit together, and how the profs rated at those sites to review professors. And that last one was a good thing, I was going to take a writing class with someone b/c she's an author I like (the particular subject was not so thrilling, kinda something I have already taken), but the reviews were pretty much across the board not that flattering, putting it tactfully, so I decided to go with something else.
I am just so psyched for my schedule though it is not going to be an easy courseload (which honestly is a big part of the reason I'm psyched, I've been craving intellectual stimulation). I'm taking two science classes - bio and chem - as I still haven't fully given up the idea of doing a double major in something sciency, and I have my basic Physics credits and then some done already (and none in the others), so that alone is going to be intense, and awesome b/c it's that part of my brain that has been more deprived these last few years. I'm of course taking some writing credits, in scriptwriting actually. I was going to do non-fiction and probably will at some point, but I was just a lot more excited about the scriptwriting class, and it's totally undiscovered territory so it'll be challenging and engaging. And the last class I'm taking may be surprising, I'm taking Arabic. I've always been interested in learning it (still want to go to egypt someday), and I've never taken any college level foreign language courses, and taking Hindi classes in India gave me a boost of confidence as far as studying a language that is more different from English than something like French, which I took in high school. Sooooo, those are my four main classes. It's not going to be an easy semester, but the truth is I wanted a difficult courseload, b/c I know myself and without that I will get bored and feel like I'm not being challenged and whenever school is too easy I start slacking off. So I feel like my schedule has the diversity in subject that I crave, and a difficulty level that will be just right.
Oh I'm also taking piano (for beginners) as a two-credit class in the mornings, which should add some extra fun and creativity to my days. I've been wanting to teach myself for so long, but I don't do all that well with it being completely unstructured, I just end up never doing it, so the class should be good to cure that.
So, all around, I'm excited to make the transition to go back to school. September can't come fast enough, though I am actually glad to have the time to make the transition over time.
In my last post I said I would not go back to my old job. That did not last. The reality is that even with financial aid, and with the fact that I'm feeling good financially right now (I only spent $250 the entire time I was in India, so it feels like I saved money), going to school and moving are expensive things and it just can't hurt to have the income. And I'll be here for four months, so I decided to go back, but only four days a week, and on morning shift, which means that I will have to leave my place at 5:15! That is going to be rough, but I'll be done at 2 and have the whole day ahead of me. Though I am not crazy about the job and though I hear things are not good over there, everyone is really happy to have me back, and I'm actually surprising even myself by feeling pretty positive about it. Camp is just so beautiful (on almost 300 acres of gorgeous woodsy forests, fields, waterfront) and I feel such a strong spiritual connection to the land there, that I'm looking forward to the long walk in the early morning. Okay I might regret saying that tomorrow when it's really fucking early, but I bet I'll get used to it fairly quickly. I'm also thinking some days instead of coming home right away, I'll wander around some of the less traveled paths in the backwoods of the camp and really love up my last summer here. So, we'll see how it goes when I'm actually there, but for now I'm thinking positive.
So, all in all, things feel like they're moving right along.
Currently Listening:
"Fidelity" - Regina Spektor - this may possibly be the song I listened to most in India, b/c it was on two people's iPod type things. I haven't listened to much of her other stuff, but this song is constantly stuck in my head. And yes, it's in an episode of Grey's (do I even need to say that anymore? I'm such an addict).
Fidelity
(Shake it up)
I never loved nobody fully
Always one foot on the ground
And by protecting my heart truly
I got lost in the sounds
I hear in my mind
All these voices
I hear in my mind all these words
I hear in my mind all this music
And it breaks my heart
And it breaks my heart
And it breaks my heart
It breaks my heart
And suppose I never ever met you
Suppose we never fell in love
Suppose I never ever let you kiss me so sweet and so soft
Suppose I never ever saw you
Suppose we never ever called
Suppose I kept on singing love songs just to break my own fall
Just to break my fall
Just to break my fall
Break my fall
Break my fall
All my friends say that of course its gonna get better
Gonna get better
Better better better better
Better better better
I never love nobody fully
Always one foot on the ground
And by protecting by heart truly
I got lost
In the sounds
I hear in my mind
All these voices
I hear in my mind all these words
I hear in my mind
All this music
And it breaks my heart
It breaks my heart
I hear in my mind all of these voices
I hear in my mind all of these words
I hear in my mind all of this music
Breaks my
Heart
Breaks my heart
Friday, May 8, 2009
Can You Ever Go Home Again?
I don't know.
I woke up twice in the middle of the night completely disoriented, not knowing where I was and both times it took a few minutes to figure out where I was. It was weird, b/c I had something a little similar about halfway through the trip, when we had been moving around so much and slept in so many different places that as I drifted off to sleep, in that semi-lucid in between state I'd find myself momentarily thinking I was still in Calcutta or something. It happened for a few days in a row, but what happened last night was a lot stronger and felt so much more disorienting, like it really took awhile for it to register where I was and get my mind around it. Guess that could be expected for the first night sleeping at home in over three months.
I can't get over how weird it feels to be back. I honestly feel a bit uncomfortable with it. As I was saying at the end of the last post, a lot of things are the same as when I left. Some minor things have changed, like the local supermarket has totally changed their setup, and apparently my old job is just a clusterfuck of absurdities and people quitting and all kinds of trouble. And maybe that's good b/c it solidifies my resolution not to go back. Overall though, a lot seems the same, and it's sort of hard to reconcile that, b/c I am not the same.
I was wondering how that would feel. Everyone told me before I left that I would come back changed. My friend Becky told me she thinks of her life in terms of before a big trip she took to Jamaica and after. It's kind of a huge cliche, go to a foreign country, especially one like India, and come home forever changed, but it's also so true. What's hard to anticipate is how to integrate it all and how hard that can be.
I don't think I ever elaborated on the tattoo I got in Calcutta. For awhile three of the girls in the group, who I bonded with early on in Varanasi in week two of the trip, were talking about getting tattoos in India. At first, though I wanted to join in, I was skeptical - when I got my first tattoo I knew for over a year what I wanted to get before I had it done, and this time I had no idea. By the time we got to Calcutta, I had a strong feeling that the theme of the trip (and by this point I knew I wasn't coming home the same person I had been) was courage. I actually thought about getting something Durga related but decided against it. One morning while volunteering at the Mother Theresa home, doing laundry on the rooftop with the Willa and Graham, I kept thinking about it, thinking maybe I'd get "courage" in Hindi or something. I later looked it up online, and just didn't really like any of the translations I found for different Hindi words that meant courage or something similar, the definitions were all too warlike for me, more about power and dominance and I was looking for something more inner. So another morning I was again doing laundry on the roof and thinking about it, and was thinking that I wanted a song lyric that symbolized courage, and was going over Tool lyrics in my head, mainly the song "Lateralus" for whatever reason. And then I picked up this tiny t-shirt (there were some interesting ones with all kinds of logos and sayings) to hang up to dry and looked at it and it said, "Learn to Swim" on the shirt.
It was perfect. It's a Tool lyric that to me has everything to do with courage and finding one's own way, the courage to swim against the current. In fact, for awhile I was going to call my book Learning to Swim, and there's just been a lot of swimming and drowning symbolism in my life and I've had a lot of spiritual experiences involving swimming and water. So that's what I got, on my left upper arm (I knew for years that's where I'd get my second tattoo so that was a no-brainer). I got it in purple, in a style called Goddess Script, and felt good about it being on my left side, which is the side of the body that's traditionally related to moon energy, to the subconscious, the intuitive, the heart, the inner, deeper, the feminine, and these things all symbolized the more inner courage I was trying to get at.
What was really cool was that Graham got "water" in Hindi, Willa got an anchor and "deep" in Hindi (and a spiral), Hilary got "beauty" in Hindi, and we figured out that if you put our tattoos together, it's "Learn to swim in deep, beautiful water." And that was completely unintentionally awesome. It was such a bonding experience.
Anyway, the point, if there is one, is that the tattoo to me sort of symbolizes some of the whole bit about feeling like I'm not the same person I was when I left the country. What was cool was that both of the trip leaders referenced my "learn to swim" as we were leaving. Karen mentioned it in my "exit interview" thingy that I was writing about yesterday, and both of the leaders wrote us each cards and Andrew referenced it in my card. It just feels like the symbolic phrase signifying the inner changes.
But I also look really different. I've never really had short hair, and when it's been semi-short I've never liked it, but it looks different this time, and I do like it, and it's way shorter than ever before, and still pink. It really changes the way I look big time. And I think I carry myself differently too. Actually my sense of my body has probably changed more than my appearance. I was sick a lot as a kid, and always had the feeling I had a pretty weak constitution, below par immune system, susceptible to being blown about by the wind. Well, I was in the land of foreign diseases (one person in our group got e. coli and another got giardia) and was remarkably not sick. I think I was actually the least sick of anyone in the group, which I never in a million years would've suspected. And I never really felt jetlag. Even though my sleep schedule's been off and I felt tired from traveling, I really never felt anything yesterday and got up at a normal hour today. I never got carsick or even close to it, and trust me when I say we were on some carsick inducing bus/train/especially jeep rides (we also pretty much never wore seatbelts as most vehicles in India don't have them) and was just totally fine, even thoroughly enjoying the bumps and sharp turns and rockin' and rollin'. And I had zero trouble with the high altitude of Ladakh, and never felt lightheaded when we were on the really high passes or any of that. I knew the moment I stepped off the plane in Leh that I'd have no problem with the altitude (I'd been worried). Overall, I felt like I was a lot stronger than I give myself credit for, which expanded things for me in a way.
It's definitely more inner change, which is almost harder to integrate. I just don't feel the same inside, and coming back here, I'm afraid of losing that, of getting small, shrinking back, because things here do feel smaller. I do feel more courageous, more outspoken, less willing to take shit. I felt at times in the group that I drifted away in some ways from the ones I felt closest to, which felt sad at times, but I also think rather than a separation it was more me finding my own way and following my own path and following it. I think that's important, and something I was really looking for. Authenticity was another big goal for me, and I feel like I clearly made progress on that. I did a lot of journaling and inner work on the trip, and I feel like I covered some major ground and was in a really good place and able to see some things and have a lot of insights and realizations that were tremendously meaningful.
I thought a lot about myself in relationships, how though I've been single a lot, there's always somebody that I'm super into or someone I'm getting over, and I always have these intense crushes (at one point I went back to starting when I was like thirteen and went chronologically through my life and basically realized there was no time without this sort of intense feeling for an ever-changing someone else) and focus all my energy, practically live my life with someone else at the center, and usually that other person is like, the most unlikely person in whatever situation I'm in (including famous people and fictional characters, hahaha, I'm only sort of joking about the last one) so it's pretty much always unrequited, almost like on some unconscious level I'm seeking validation or love in places or people that won't or can't give it, so perpetuating a cycle of feeling rejected and unlovable and all kinds of bullshit. And in the meanwhile, always throwing my energy away. It's an incredibly unhealthy pattern and I realized that what I constantly seek for in others, I really have to find within. It's obvious, and it's something I've always known and thought about, but never really embraced, b/c it's easy to keep overlooking that when you're feeding yourself a constant stream of crushes on unavailable people and giving all your energy to trying to make them love you. That was the big picture, and I also had a lot of supporting realizations and observations about myself in love.
All that said, I have to say I do miss seeing lots of gorgeous exotic looking foreign men.
I also had a lot of insights and clarity about other areas of my life, and observations about how I operate and what I do and don't want to continue doing. I had a lot of ceremonial letting go of different things (my group knows I'm a big fan of ceremonial fire). A big unspoken goal of the trip was to re-awaken my spiritual side, which had felt a bit dead for some time. I felt beyond cynical, almost like I had an allergy to the idea of, and even the word spirituality for awhile there. I wasn't writing. I was avoiding everything, wouldn't even journal, didn't want to be alone with myself ever and my thoughts and had no belief in anything. This was all so unlike me, for my whole life no matter what I was going through, even when I was young, I always felt like I had an eye towards the spiritual (albeit in an earth-nature-sky-water loving way, and never a religious way), towards depth, towards self-awareness, personal growth, communing with the unseen, mystery, and all of that. So being without that made me feel a bit dead inside, but I couldn't seem to get out of the rut. That quickly changed in India, and part of that is because of Willa, who embodies spirituality and has so much wisdom. I found myself having profound experiences on rooftops under moonlight, or having spiritual revelations while rushing through the streets of Calcutta and felt that side of me re-awakened. I was writing like a madwoman during most of the trip, was seeking out and spending time in solitude, sometimes in nature, or just outside by myself on rooftops and felt a connection that had felt lost forever. It was amazing.
All in all, I feel bigger, stronger, and like I want different things out of life than when I left, and Orcas, though distance has made my heart feel fonder for the island and the nature here is nourishing to my soul in a way it was craving, just feels too small for me. And that really is factoring into what I'm thinking as far as school. It became really clear to me that what I'm looking for when I go back to school is not just academics or a degree, but to be somewhere where my spiritual and creative artistic sides feel nurtured and supported, somewhere that really fits me, and that it's a lot more important than the name of the school or anything like that.
Speaking of schools, I got rejected from my first choice school, which was a hard pill to swallow. As I told Nina at some point during the trip, I'm not used to academic rejection, at all. I only got turned down from one school when I applied as a senior in high school and by that point I didn't want to go there so it didn't really register. This did. I have to say a part of me felt relieved in a weird way, maybe just to know, or maybe it really wouldn't have been a good match - I think that's possible even though I had the most incredible experience there. But most of me felt sad. I only found out a few days ago, in Agra, soon after visiting the Taj. It's a loss for sure, but sometimes, as Julia Cameron would say, gain is disguised as lost. I do trust that, that it's probably a blessing in disguise. To add to that, my second choice school totally lost my financial aid papers (which I filed in January) and it's now way past the deadline and aid has been distributed and I'd need a considerable amount of aid to be able to go there, so, yeah, maybe another blessing in disguise as well. At least, it feels that way, like internally even though both of these things were big disappointments, I can't shake the feeling that they are also somehow right, and so I trust that feeling.
It leaves me with four major choices (and possibly trying to renegotiate my financial aid situation with the fifth), which all have strong pros and cons that are hard to weigh out. I know where I'm leaning, strongly, and I'm pretty sure that's where my ultimate decision will take me, but still questioning as well, b/c it has its cons and a few months ago I did not think I'd think this way, but again, times have changed. I'm also paying attention to signs and synchronicities, and the fact that an author I love and have blogged about is teaching a class there next semester. So we'll see, I have exactly a week to figure my shit out.
It's just sort of hard, being back here, sorting through the piles of mail from colleges, being in the same apartment I left, in a way going through the motions of my old life, to know where the newer self fits in. I don't want it to feel like I never went to India, which in a really surreal way I did sort of feel yesterday. It's just so strange being back to the place I was before with everything pretty much the same. I don't want to fall into the same patterns, go back to the spiritual deadness or other crappy habits. I'm not going back to my old job, I can't, it would be too much self-betrayal. I don't know who said it, but I'm thinking it's really true that you can never go home again. I feel really out of place. A part of me doesn't even want to stay on Orcas for the summer, but I also made a list of goals while here so maybe the integration is worth it and not something to flee from, and resting before rallying for the next big change. It just feels like this life doesn't really fit anymore, and I don't want it to, and that's okay.
Currently Listening:
"Chasing Cars" - Snow Patrol - another Grey's song that was stuck in my head a lot while in India. It randomly popped into my head during the first time I walked around Calcutta at night on my own, and was the one song that played twice while I was getting my tattoo. Graham and I were saying how this song comes up at such a crucial point in Grey's (she's my Grey's buddy) and how much we wanted to be able to watch the show together. What is interesting though is we were thinking of two different storylines that are going on when this song plays (she was thinking of Meredith and Derek, I was thinking of Alex and Izzie). Speaking of Grey's, I can't wait to catch up, though I've heard rumors that things are going pretty downhill. Anyway, the song.
Chasing Cars
We'll do it all
Everything
On our own
We don't need
Anything
Or anyone
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
I don't quite know
How to say
How I feel
Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden
That's bursting into life
Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads
I need your grace
To remind me
To find my own
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden
That's bursting into life
All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes
They're all I can see
I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things
Will never change for us at all
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
I woke up twice in the middle of the night completely disoriented, not knowing where I was and both times it took a few minutes to figure out where I was. It was weird, b/c I had something a little similar about halfway through the trip, when we had been moving around so much and slept in so many different places that as I drifted off to sleep, in that semi-lucid in between state I'd find myself momentarily thinking I was still in Calcutta or something. It happened for a few days in a row, but what happened last night was a lot stronger and felt so much more disorienting, like it really took awhile for it to register where I was and get my mind around it. Guess that could be expected for the first night sleeping at home in over three months.
I can't get over how weird it feels to be back. I honestly feel a bit uncomfortable with it. As I was saying at the end of the last post, a lot of things are the same as when I left. Some minor things have changed, like the local supermarket has totally changed their setup, and apparently my old job is just a clusterfuck of absurdities and people quitting and all kinds of trouble. And maybe that's good b/c it solidifies my resolution not to go back. Overall though, a lot seems the same, and it's sort of hard to reconcile that, b/c I am not the same.
I was wondering how that would feel. Everyone told me before I left that I would come back changed. My friend Becky told me she thinks of her life in terms of before a big trip she took to Jamaica and after. It's kind of a huge cliche, go to a foreign country, especially one like India, and come home forever changed, but it's also so true. What's hard to anticipate is how to integrate it all and how hard that can be.
I don't think I ever elaborated on the tattoo I got in Calcutta. For awhile three of the girls in the group, who I bonded with early on in Varanasi in week two of the trip, were talking about getting tattoos in India. At first, though I wanted to join in, I was skeptical - when I got my first tattoo I knew for over a year what I wanted to get before I had it done, and this time I had no idea. By the time we got to Calcutta, I had a strong feeling that the theme of the trip (and by this point I knew I wasn't coming home the same person I had been) was courage. I actually thought about getting something Durga related but decided against it. One morning while volunteering at the Mother Theresa home, doing laundry on the rooftop with the Willa and Graham, I kept thinking about it, thinking maybe I'd get "courage" in Hindi or something. I later looked it up online, and just didn't really like any of the translations I found for different Hindi words that meant courage or something similar, the definitions were all too warlike for me, more about power and dominance and I was looking for something more inner. So another morning I was again doing laundry on the roof and thinking about it, and was thinking that I wanted a song lyric that symbolized courage, and was going over Tool lyrics in my head, mainly the song "Lateralus" for whatever reason. And then I picked up this tiny t-shirt (there were some interesting ones with all kinds of logos and sayings) to hang up to dry and looked at it and it said, "Learn to Swim" on the shirt.
It was perfect. It's a Tool lyric that to me has everything to do with courage and finding one's own way, the courage to swim against the current. In fact, for awhile I was going to call my book Learning to Swim, and there's just been a lot of swimming and drowning symbolism in my life and I've had a lot of spiritual experiences involving swimming and water. So that's what I got, on my left upper arm (I knew for years that's where I'd get my second tattoo so that was a no-brainer). I got it in purple, in a style called Goddess Script, and felt good about it being on my left side, which is the side of the body that's traditionally related to moon energy, to the subconscious, the intuitive, the heart, the inner, deeper, the feminine, and these things all symbolized the more inner courage I was trying to get at.
What was really cool was that Graham got "water" in Hindi, Willa got an anchor and "deep" in Hindi (and a spiral), Hilary got "beauty" in Hindi, and we figured out that if you put our tattoos together, it's "Learn to swim in deep, beautiful water." And that was completely unintentionally awesome. It was such a bonding experience.
Anyway, the point, if there is one, is that the tattoo to me sort of symbolizes some of the whole bit about feeling like I'm not the same person I was when I left the country. What was cool was that both of the trip leaders referenced my "learn to swim" as we were leaving. Karen mentioned it in my "exit interview" thingy that I was writing about yesterday, and both of the leaders wrote us each cards and Andrew referenced it in my card. It just feels like the symbolic phrase signifying the inner changes.
But I also look really different. I've never really had short hair, and when it's been semi-short I've never liked it, but it looks different this time, and I do like it, and it's way shorter than ever before, and still pink. It really changes the way I look big time. And I think I carry myself differently too. Actually my sense of my body has probably changed more than my appearance. I was sick a lot as a kid, and always had the feeling I had a pretty weak constitution, below par immune system, susceptible to being blown about by the wind. Well, I was in the land of foreign diseases (one person in our group got e. coli and another got giardia) and was remarkably not sick. I think I was actually the least sick of anyone in the group, which I never in a million years would've suspected. And I never really felt jetlag. Even though my sleep schedule's been off and I felt tired from traveling, I really never felt anything yesterday and got up at a normal hour today. I never got carsick or even close to it, and trust me when I say we were on some carsick inducing bus/train/especially jeep rides (we also pretty much never wore seatbelts as most vehicles in India don't have them) and was just totally fine, even thoroughly enjoying the bumps and sharp turns and rockin' and rollin'. And I had zero trouble with the high altitude of Ladakh, and never felt lightheaded when we were on the really high passes or any of that. I knew the moment I stepped off the plane in Leh that I'd have no problem with the altitude (I'd been worried). Overall, I felt like I was a lot stronger than I give myself credit for, which expanded things for me in a way.
It's definitely more inner change, which is almost harder to integrate. I just don't feel the same inside, and coming back here, I'm afraid of losing that, of getting small, shrinking back, because things here do feel smaller. I do feel more courageous, more outspoken, less willing to take shit. I felt at times in the group that I drifted away in some ways from the ones I felt closest to, which felt sad at times, but I also think rather than a separation it was more me finding my own way and following my own path and following it. I think that's important, and something I was really looking for. Authenticity was another big goal for me, and I feel like I clearly made progress on that. I did a lot of journaling and inner work on the trip, and I feel like I covered some major ground and was in a really good place and able to see some things and have a lot of insights and realizations that were tremendously meaningful.
I thought a lot about myself in relationships, how though I've been single a lot, there's always somebody that I'm super into or someone I'm getting over, and I always have these intense crushes (at one point I went back to starting when I was like thirteen and went chronologically through my life and basically realized there was no time without this sort of intense feeling for an ever-changing someone else) and focus all my energy, practically live my life with someone else at the center, and usually that other person is like, the most unlikely person in whatever situation I'm in (including famous people and fictional characters, hahaha, I'm only sort of joking about the last one) so it's pretty much always unrequited, almost like on some unconscious level I'm seeking validation or love in places or people that won't or can't give it, so perpetuating a cycle of feeling rejected and unlovable and all kinds of bullshit. And in the meanwhile, always throwing my energy away. It's an incredibly unhealthy pattern and I realized that what I constantly seek for in others, I really have to find within. It's obvious, and it's something I've always known and thought about, but never really embraced, b/c it's easy to keep overlooking that when you're feeding yourself a constant stream of crushes on unavailable people and giving all your energy to trying to make them love you. That was the big picture, and I also had a lot of supporting realizations and observations about myself in love.
All that said, I have to say I do miss seeing lots of gorgeous exotic looking foreign men.
I also had a lot of insights and clarity about other areas of my life, and observations about how I operate and what I do and don't want to continue doing. I had a lot of ceremonial letting go of different things (my group knows I'm a big fan of ceremonial fire). A big unspoken goal of the trip was to re-awaken my spiritual side, which had felt a bit dead for some time. I felt beyond cynical, almost like I had an allergy to the idea of, and even the word spirituality for awhile there. I wasn't writing. I was avoiding everything, wouldn't even journal, didn't want to be alone with myself ever and my thoughts and had no belief in anything. This was all so unlike me, for my whole life no matter what I was going through, even when I was young, I always felt like I had an eye towards the spiritual (albeit in an earth-nature-sky-water loving way, and never a religious way), towards depth, towards self-awareness, personal growth, communing with the unseen, mystery, and all of that. So being without that made me feel a bit dead inside, but I couldn't seem to get out of the rut. That quickly changed in India, and part of that is because of Willa, who embodies spirituality and has so much wisdom. I found myself having profound experiences on rooftops under moonlight, or having spiritual revelations while rushing through the streets of Calcutta and felt that side of me re-awakened. I was writing like a madwoman during most of the trip, was seeking out and spending time in solitude, sometimes in nature, or just outside by myself on rooftops and felt a connection that had felt lost forever. It was amazing.
All in all, I feel bigger, stronger, and like I want different things out of life than when I left, and Orcas, though distance has made my heart feel fonder for the island and the nature here is nourishing to my soul in a way it was craving, just feels too small for me. And that really is factoring into what I'm thinking as far as school. It became really clear to me that what I'm looking for when I go back to school is not just academics or a degree, but to be somewhere where my spiritual and creative artistic sides feel nurtured and supported, somewhere that really fits me, and that it's a lot more important than the name of the school or anything like that.
Speaking of schools, I got rejected from my first choice school, which was a hard pill to swallow. As I told Nina at some point during the trip, I'm not used to academic rejection, at all. I only got turned down from one school when I applied as a senior in high school and by that point I didn't want to go there so it didn't really register. This did. I have to say a part of me felt relieved in a weird way, maybe just to know, or maybe it really wouldn't have been a good match - I think that's possible even though I had the most incredible experience there. But most of me felt sad. I only found out a few days ago, in Agra, soon after visiting the Taj. It's a loss for sure, but sometimes, as Julia Cameron would say, gain is disguised as lost. I do trust that, that it's probably a blessing in disguise. To add to that, my second choice school totally lost my financial aid papers (which I filed in January) and it's now way past the deadline and aid has been distributed and I'd need a considerable amount of aid to be able to go there, so, yeah, maybe another blessing in disguise as well. At least, it feels that way, like internally even though both of these things were big disappointments, I can't shake the feeling that they are also somehow right, and so I trust that feeling.
It leaves me with four major choices (and possibly trying to renegotiate my financial aid situation with the fifth), which all have strong pros and cons that are hard to weigh out. I know where I'm leaning, strongly, and I'm pretty sure that's where my ultimate decision will take me, but still questioning as well, b/c it has its cons and a few months ago I did not think I'd think this way, but again, times have changed. I'm also paying attention to signs and synchronicities, and the fact that an author I love and have blogged about is teaching a class there next semester. So we'll see, I have exactly a week to figure my shit out.
It's just sort of hard, being back here, sorting through the piles of mail from colleges, being in the same apartment I left, in a way going through the motions of my old life, to know where the newer self fits in. I don't want it to feel like I never went to India, which in a really surreal way I did sort of feel yesterday. It's just so strange being back to the place I was before with everything pretty much the same. I don't want to fall into the same patterns, go back to the spiritual deadness or other crappy habits. I'm not going back to my old job, I can't, it would be too much self-betrayal. I don't know who said it, but I'm thinking it's really true that you can never go home again. I feel really out of place. A part of me doesn't even want to stay on Orcas for the summer, but I also made a list of goals while here so maybe the integration is worth it and not something to flee from, and resting before rallying for the next big change. It just feels like this life doesn't really fit anymore, and I don't want it to, and that's okay.
Currently Listening:
"Chasing Cars" - Snow Patrol - another Grey's song that was stuck in my head a lot while in India. It randomly popped into my head during the first time I walked around Calcutta at night on my own, and was the one song that played twice while I was getting my tattoo. Graham and I were saying how this song comes up at such a crucial point in Grey's (she's my Grey's buddy) and how much we wanted to be able to watch the show together. What is interesting though is we were thinking of two different storylines that are going on when this song plays (she was thinking of Meredith and Derek, I was thinking of Alex and Izzie). Speaking of Grey's, I can't wait to catch up, though I've heard rumors that things are going pretty downhill. Anyway, the song.
Chasing Cars
We'll do it all
Everything
On our own
We don't need
Anything
Or anyone
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
I don't quite know
How to say
How I feel
Those three words
Are said too much
They're not enough
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden
That's bursting into life
Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads
I need your grace
To remind me
To find my own
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden
That's bursting into life
All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes
They're all I can see
I don't know where
Confused about how as well
Just know that these things
Will never change for us at all
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world?
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Home Sweet Home?
I miss India.
I've been home for less than twelve hours, and let me tell you, it feels fuckin' weird. Let me back up first though, because there was a lot in the last few days of the trip that I'd love to recount.
So, Ladakh was the shit, totally one of the most gorgeous places I've ever been, in so many ways. And it was kind of cool being in a smaller group (though I definitely missed the others) b/c we got to meet up and travel with other people traveling from other countries, like Erez from Israel who was hilarious and loud and talked a bit like Borat and wore these lime green pants all the time and was always making dirty jokes. The pronunciation lesson I couldn't share on the group blog (see link in previous post) was the difference between "fact" and "fucked." It was awesome.
On another funny note, we traveled with a German woman named Astrid who told us about some sex ashram in Pune called the Osho ashram (and strangely enough, I used to have an Osho tarot deck, which wasn't at all a sex oriented deck, unfortunately), and Desmond was having her translate Rammstein (a german metal band) lyrics, which was hysterical, b/c she had headphones in, so was talking really loud in the back of the jeep, on our way through Nubra Valley, yelling out translations like, "I don't want to masturbate!" and a whole slew of other crazy lyrics.
We also traveled with Ambre from France, and it was really fun sharing a room with her. She really bonded with Karen, and might actually end up working on an art abroad project with her.
I was not overstating in that last post about the military presence in Ladakh - it was everywhere. The first night in Hundar (in the nubra valley) the only place to eat at all was some army "restaurant." And there were Indian army vehicles everywhere. Coming back from the Valley, we had to cross the pass by a certain time b/c after that it was all the green army trucks. One of the days that we were in the Valley we heard something that really sounded like gunfire, though we never heard anything about it on the news or from our host family back in Leh. Our host said she thought maybe what we'd heard was from within Pakistan but I don't think we were really close enough. Who knows? Anyway Ben tried to tell me when we were hearing the gunfire, that it was nuclear war, and then he and Desmond made fun of me for how much I would freak out if it really was (who wouldn't???). Even in the city of Leh, walking around, you'd see tons of military dudes. I guess th at is what happens when you are traveling within Kashmir.
I also definitely didn't overstate the amazingness of Ladakh - just wait until I figure out how to load pictures onto the computer. I took over 600 on the trip and I think over 100 of those were from the nine days in Ladakh. I'm definitely going back someday, and also want to explore other areas of India as well, like Kerala and other parts of the southern regions.
So we flew from Leh back to Delhi and then took a train to Agra to meet the other half of our group and see the Taj Mahal, which like a lot of things in India, has lots of pot plants growing right around it. Okay I have to say, I was not that impressed by the Taj - it doesn't BEGIN to compare to the awesomeness of the Golden Temple, in looks, vibe, people, anything. And I didn't like Agra. I don't think there is any other city in India I can say that about, but omg we got hassled there way more than anywhere else. It felt like we got swamped anytime we ventured outside, just hounded left and right! And at one point, I was walking with Karen and Andrew to go to some sunset boat ride by the Taj which we never actually did and some monkey kept coming at us, mostly at Karen (it seemed to be reacting to her camera or something), which was pretty scary for a moment there!
I got my hair cut a final time in Agra, the shortest cut yet, almost a bob. I am loving it. It feels so different.
Then we took an "express train" back to Delhi, and we got some other sort of tickets, last minute, like standby tickets, which basically meant we could ride the train but had no assigned seats. So all those other times we took trains where random people would be sitting in our seats and we had to ask them to move, well this time we were those people. So a lot of us ended up having to get out of the seats we found and standing or cramming into seats. And to make it that much more pleasant, the train barely moved for the first, oh I don't know, four hours maybe (the whole trip was supposed to be three), just inched along. We got in sooooo late back to our home base in Delhi, the Shelton. The next morning, Willa and I were so conked out it took us like half an hour to realize our leaders were knocking on our door to wake us up.
Then began all the ending stuff that goes along with a trip like this. We each had a closing meeting with each of the leaders, which made me a little nervous, but actually both went really well. Karen told me she felt like I was the glue that held the group together, and we talked a lot about different parts of the trip, especially the trek, which felt like a real turning point in the trip for me. I think it was after that that I stopped wanting to go home. Andrew told me he was sure I would have been fine traveling in India by myself if I had decided to stay longer. That was cool to hear, b/c there's still that part of me that has doubts.
That night we had our last dinner, a fancy dinner in a rotating restaurant on the 24th floor of a building. It was cool. Since it was the last night, and no one could get in trouble for breaking the "group agreements" we (almost) all ordered drinks. I walked into a glass wall on our way out which everyone said is because I was tipsy but I've done that sober, and think it's more a vision thing. This was definitely not the first time I drank in India. There were a few "cultural exchange" instances when we were allowed to drink, like when we were on the trek and the villagers served us millet beer and rice wine, or when I kind of accidentally ended up going to dinner with Des and Andrew to the house of Mr. Sikkim, where we were also served millet beer, which I think actually tastes great and wish I could have some right now. Something about it was earthy and hearty. And then I got drunk twice in ways that weren't allowed - I went to a bar with a group member in Darjeeling (my idea) and got drunk with three others one night in McLeod Ganj, like obnoxiously obviously drunk, right before one of the leaders was coming over to have dinner with my homestay family! It was a close call, but somehow, to the amazement to everyone in the group who saw me wasted, rallied myself and played sober and pulled it off. It was incredibly fun, and I think part of it was b/c the experience was so rare. In the end of the trip, we all fessed up to whatever we had done during the trip, which was fun too.
Speaking of debauchery, during our last day, we were leaving at night, so in the afternoon were having a group meeting on the roof of our hotel, where there's a restaurant, and most of the group members, myself included ordered the infamous bhang lassi - how can you leave India not at least having that experience? So we ordered "magic lassi" and mine was especially loaded. It still sort of blows my mind that we could just order it like that, that it was on the menu, and that it cost about $1.20. Only in India. So yeah, we were riiiiiidiculous. I was still feeling it when we got on the plane, like eight hours later.
We said goodbye to Karen outside the Shelton Hotel, as she's staying to travel further, and is probably in Nepal with her boyfriend right now, doing some awesome trekking. I slept through the first flight (to Hong Kong) completely, and then when we got to the HK airport, we found a spot and all conked out. I passed out on the floor for hours. Then we drank champagne, ate lunch (time was just sooooo fucked at that point it was pretty much irrelevant), and boarded our cross-Pacific flight. THat's when I started to get really sad about saying goodbye and leaving India. I watched The Reader, Revolutionary Road and Slumdog Millionaire (finally) on the way home. Graham and I sync'd it so we were watching Slumdog exactly together on our personal screens. It made me miss India terribly, just seeing the trains and the people and the images of India.
At SFO, we started to trickle out one by one, Hilary and I being the last to leave. I had to get a hotel room b/c my flight was early morning and they wouldn't let me check in during the evening (I'd planned on sleeping at the airport) so Hill and I hung out and raved over the pleasures of using a REAL western toilet with toilet paper and other modern conveniences, and the whole room felt so luxurious it was almost disorienting. After Hilary left, I passed out, at like six in the evening, woke up four hours later, slept for a while later and then slept another few hours. I took a bath and felt the cleanest I had in three months (bucket showers and quick showers in freezing water, or hot water that could turn ice cold at any moment, just aren't the same). And oh yeah, drank some tap water, which felt really weird after being so vigilant about not getting tap water in me under any circumstances, it just felt weird to brush my teeth with tap water. It was nice to not be thinking about giardia (sp?) or dysentery.
I woke up at some point during that night, feeling really sad and out of place to be back in America, and really wishing I was still in India. The chaos starts to make sense after awhile, and I have definitely been having some reverse culture shock.
This morning I got up early, went to the airport, flew to Seattle and back to Orcas. THe lovely Jan picked me up at the airport. It feels so surreal to be back. My apartment is so tidy and wonderful and welcoming and the island was a really welcome sight - just the amount of trees and greenery was a comfort to my soul. Still it just feels so weird. I mean in one sense it feels like I never left, like the whole trip to India was just a dream. I'm coming back to the same place, which looks the same, with the same people, listening to the same music, and on and on. On the other hand, nothing is the same. I have more to say about all of this, but it's getting late and I want to get on a semi-normal sleep schedule.
Currently Listening:
"A Bitter Song" - Butterfly Boucher - I had this song stuck in my head a LOT during my trip, it was a random song that consistently I'd find myself absently singing, and once I had a dream about it.
All I need is a bitter song
To make me better
Much better
All I need to write is a bitter song
To make me better
Much better
It found me to hold me
But I don't like it at all
Won't feed it,
Won't grow it
It's folded in my stomach;
It's not fair,
I found love;
It made me say that.
Get back,
You'll never see daylight;
If I'm not strong it just might.
All I need is a bitter song
To make me better
Much better
All I need to write is a bitter song
To make me better
I feel better
I feel better
I've been home for less than twelve hours, and let me tell you, it feels fuckin' weird. Let me back up first though, because there was a lot in the last few days of the trip that I'd love to recount.
So, Ladakh was the shit, totally one of the most gorgeous places I've ever been, in so many ways. And it was kind of cool being in a smaller group (though I definitely missed the others) b/c we got to meet up and travel with other people traveling from other countries, like Erez from Israel who was hilarious and loud and talked a bit like Borat and wore these lime green pants all the time and was always making dirty jokes. The pronunciation lesson I couldn't share on the group blog (see link in previous post) was the difference between "fact" and "fucked." It was awesome.
On another funny note, we traveled with a German woman named Astrid who told us about some sex ashram in Pune called the Osho ashram (and strangely enough, I used to have an Osho tarot deck, which wasn't at all a sex oriented deck, unfortunately), and Desmond was having her translate Rammstein (a german metal band) lyrics, which was hysterical, b/c she had headphones in, so was talking really loud in the back of the jeep, on our way through Nubra Valley, yelling out translations like, "I don't want to masturbate!" and a whole slew of other crazy lyrics.
We also traveled with Ambre from France, and it was really fun sharing a room with her. She really bonded with Karen, and might actually end up working on an art abroad project with her.
I was not overstating in that last post about the military presence in Ladakh - it was everywhere. The first night in Hundar (in the nubra valley) the only place to eat at all was some army "restaurant." And there were Indian army vehicles everywhere. Coming back from the Valley, we had to cross the pass by a certain time b/c after that it was all the green army trucks. One of the days that we were in the Valley we heard something that really sounded like gunfire, though we never heard anything about it on the news or from our host family back in Leh. Our host said she thought maybe what we'd heard was from within Pakistan but I don't think we were really close enough. Who knows? Anyway Ben tried to tell me when we were hearing the gunfire, that it was nuclear war, and then he and Desmond made fun of me for how much I would freak out if it really was (who wouldn't???). Even in the city of Leh, walking around, you'd see tons of military dudes. I guess th at is what happens when you are traveling within Kashmir.
I also definitely didn't overstate the amazingness of Ladakh - just wait until I figure out how to load pictures onto the computer. I took over 600 on the trip and I think over 100 of those were from the nine days in Ladakh. I'm definitely going back someday, and also want to explore other areas of India as well, like Kerala and other parts of the southern regions.
So we flew from Leh back to Delhi and then took a train to Agra to meet the other half of our group and see the Taj Mahal, which like a lot of things in India, has lots of pot plants growing right around it. Okay I have to say, I was not that impressed by the Taj - it doesn't BEGIN to compare to the awesomeness of the Golden Temple, in looks, vibe, people, anything. And I didn't like Agra. I don't think there is any other city in India I can say that about, but omg we got hassled there way more than anywhere else. It felt like we got swamped anytime we ventured outside, just hounded left and right! And at one point, I was walking with Karen and Andrew to go to some sunset boat ride by the Taj which we never actually did and some monkey kept coming at us, mostly at Karen (it seemed to be reacting to her camera or something), which was pretty scary for a moment there!
I got my hair cut a final time in Agra, the shortest cut yet, almost a bob. I am loving it. It feels so different.
Then we took an "express train" back to Delhi, and we got some other sort of tickets, last minute, like standby tickets, which basically meant we could ride the train but had no assigned seats. So all those other times we took trains where random people would be sitting in our seats and we had to ask them to move, well this time we were those people. So a lot of us ended up having to get out of the seats we found and standing or cramming into seats. And to make it that much more pleasant, the train barely moved for the first, oh I don't know, four hours maybe (the whole trip was supposed to be three), just inched along. We got in sooooo late back to our home base in Delhi, the Shelton. The next morning, Willa and I were so conked out it took us like half an hour to realize our leaders were knocking on our door to wake us up.
Then began all the ending stuff that goes along with a trip like this. We each had a closing meeting with each of the leaders, which made me a little nervous, but actually both went really well. Karen told me she felt like I was the glue that held the group together, and we talked a lot about different parts of the trip, especially the trek, which felt like a real turning point in the trip for me. I think it was after that that I stopped wanting to go home. Andrew told me he was sure I would have been fine traveling in India by myself if I had decided to stay longer. That was cool to hear, b/c there's still that part of me that has doubts.
That night we had our last dinner, a fancy dinner in a rotating restaurant on the 24th floor of a building. It was cool. Since it was the last night, and no one could get in trouble for breaking the "group agreements" we (almost) all ordered drinks. I walked into a glass wall on our way out which everyone said is because I was tipsy but I've done that sober, and think it's more a vision thing. This was definitely not the first time I drank in India. There were a few "cultural exchange" instances when we were allowed to drink, like when we were on the trek and the villagers served us millet beer and rice wine, or when I kind of accidentally ended up going to dinner with Des and Andrew to the house of Mr. Sikkim, where we were also served millet beer, which I think actually tastes great and wish I could have some right now. Something about it was earthy and hearty. And then I got drunk twice in ways that weren't allowed - I went to a bar with a group member in Darjeeling (my idea) and got drunk with three others one night in McLeod Ganj, like obnoxiously obviously drunk, right before one of the leaders was coming over to have dinner with my homestay family! It was a close call, but somehow, to the amazement to everyone in the group who saw me wasted, rallied myself and played sober and pulled it off. It was incredibly fun, and I think part of it was b/c the experience was so rare. In the end of the trip, we all fessed up to whatever we had done during the trip, which was fun too.
Speaking of debauchery, during our last day, we were leaving at night, so in the afternoon were having a group meeting on the roof of our hotel, where there's a restaurant, and most of the group members, myself included ordered the infamous bhang lassi - how can you leave India not at least having that experience? So we ordered "magic lassi" and mine was especially loaded. It still sort of blows my mind that we could just order it like that, that it was on the menu, and that it cost about $1.20. Only in India. So yeah, we were riiiiiidiculous. I was still feeling it when we got on the plane, like eight hours later.
We said goodbye to Karen outside the Shelton Hotel, as she's staying to travel further, and is probably in Nepal with her boyfriend right now, doing some awesome trekking. I slept through the first flight (to Hong Kong) completely, and then when we got to the HK airport, we found a spot and all conked out. I passed out on the floor for hours. Then we drank champagne, ate lunch (time was just sooooo fucked at that point it was pretty much irrelevant), and boarded our cross-Pacific flight. THat's when I started to get really sad about saying goodbye and leaving India. I watched The Reader, Revolutionary Road and Slumdog Millionaire (finally) on the way home. Graham and I sync'd it so we were watching Slumdog exactly together on our personal screens. It made me miss India terribly, just seeing the trains and the people and the images of India.
At SFO, we started to trickle out one by one, Hilary and I being the last to leave. I had to get a hotel room b/c my flight was early morning and they wouldn't let me check in during the evening (I'd planned on sleeping at the airport) so Hill and I hung out and raved over the pleasures of using a REAL western toilet with toilet paper and other modern conveniences, and the whole room felt so luxurious it was almost disorienting. After Hilary left, I passed out, at like six in the evening, woke up four hours later, slept for a while later and then slept another few hours. I took a bath and felt the cleanest I had in three months (bucket showers and quick showers in freezing water, or hot water that could turn ice cold at any moment, just aren't the same). And oh yeah, drank some tap water, which felt really weird after being so vigilant about not getting tap water in me under any circumstances, it just felt weird to brush my teeth with tap water. It was nice to not be thinking about giardia (sp?) or dysentery.
I woke up at some point during that night, feeling really sad and out of place to be back in America, and really wishing I was still in India. The chaos starts to make sense after awhile, and I have definitely been having some reverse culture shock.
This morning I got up early, went to the airport, flew to Seattle and back to Orcas. THe lovely Jan picked me up at the airport. It feels so surreal to be back. My apartment is so tidy and wonderful and welcoming and the island was a really welcome sight - just the amount of trees and greenery was a comfort to my soul. Still it just feels so weird. I mean in one sense it feels like I never left, like the whole trip to India was just a dream. I'm coming back to the same place, which looks the same, with the same people, listening to the same music, and on and on. On the other hand, nothing is the same. I have more to say about all of this, but it's getting late and I want to get on a semi-normal sleep schedule.
Currently Listening:
"A Bitter Song" - Butterfly Boucher - I had this song stuck in my head a LOT during my trip, it was a random song that consistently I'd find myself absently singing, and once I had a dream about it.
All I need is a bitter song
To make me better
Much better
All I need to write is a bitter song
To make me better
Much better
It found me to hold me
But I don't like it at all
Won't feed it,
Won't grow it
It's folded in my stomach;
It's not fair,
I found love;
It made me say that.
Get back,
You'll never see daylight;
If I'm not strong it just might.
All I need is a bitter song
To make me better
Much better
All I need to write is a bitter song
To make me better
I feel better
I feel better
Friday, May 1, 2009
Catching up
So, a handful of group blogs to catch you all up on, as much has happened in the last few weeks.
Right now I'm in Ladakh, which is part of Kashmir, and it is the coolest place I have been so far. It's unbelievably gorgeous, and the stars here MIGHT rival those you can see from Orcas. The mountains are amazing and the trees here are awesome. The air is fresh (and thin, it's pretty high elevation) and the sky is soooo blue. The only thing it comes close to reminding me of is the time I lived in Flagstaff, AZ, which is also high elevation, but not nearly as high (we're at 11,500 ft right now). I am definitely coming back here someday.
There is definitely a military presence here, which makes sense given the region. We went right up to the border of Tibet (which really was not even marked in any way at the Pangong Lake) and as far north as foreigners can go, about 100km from the border of Pakistan, in the Nubra Valley. On the pass there and back there were a lot of military vehicles and all of that.
Anyway here are recent group blog posts, in order
Rogue Travel Begins - Nina's post
Varanasi, One Billion Degrees - Hilary's post
Sitting On Top of the World - my post
And stay tuned, Ben is posting an update from our Ladakh crew to the group blog as I type, so it should be there shortly!
Right now I'm in Ladakh, which is part of Kashmir, and it is the coolest place I have been so far. It's unbelievably gorgeous, and the stars here MIGHT rival those you can see from Orcas. The mountains are amazing and the trees here are awesome. The air is fresh (and thin, it's pretty high elevation) and the sky is soooo blue. The only thing it comes close to reminding me of is the time I lived in Flagstaff, AZ, which is also high elevation, but not nearly as high (we're at 11,500 ft right now). I am definitely coming back here someday.
There is definitely a military presence here, which makes sense given the region. We went right up to the border of Tibet (which really was not even marked in any way at the Pangong Lake) and as far north as foreigners can go, about 100km from the border of Pakistan, in the Nubra Valley. On the pass there and back there were a lot of military vehicles and all of that.
Anyway here are recent group blog posts, in order
Rogue Travel Begins - Nina's post
Varanasi, One Billion Degrees - Hilary's post
Sitting On Top of the World - my post
And stay tuned, Ben is posting an update from our Ladakh crew to the group blog as I type, so it should be there shortly!
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