Patchwork Feet

The clouds of monsoon start to curl over heads, slinking into the atmosphere, cyclical rainstorms which remind to us that we end as we began. Its very nearly a year since my first drenching. Its a strange set of circumstances which lead to a bemused relocation of heart.

When you leave home for the first time you punch a hole within yourself and it irrevocably becomes a subconscious mission to fill that hole, be it with food, art, an amazing book, an attractive biker, a bedazzling view; for me it was my itchy feet...sometimes we try so hard to fill that hole that we convince ourselves that we're happy. Then we wonder why our hearts are aching.

Through a haze of planes, planes and more planes, buses, boats and bikes; a tangled kaleidoscope of books, encounters, reunions and goodbyes, reunion, goodbye, reunion, goodbye, fantastical encounters with circus performers, a vague mugging, street fights, noddle soup, fluorescent seas and landscapes to melt the coldest, I turned on the lights and finally I arrived home.

Home is the ever running road; the fire dancers who carry their lives on their backs to enrapture themselves in glittering world immersion. The scientists, the singers, the biters and saxophonists all wheeling and trudging their way to the mountains, taking only the most absurd, fantastical route they can. Home is within us, wherever we find our hearts, home is the River ever winding and silently unstoppable. Eventually I stopped trying to fill the hole with what I was told I should fill it with and began patching it with every kind of fabric, every pattern I found in a tucked away market, every scarf tied to the back of a rucksack and now I am becoming filled with colour, reveling in rainbow souls.

Inspiration is out there, its waiting loudly and resplendent in sunset glitter. Find what it is that makes you happy, whatever makes you want to do cartwheels and throw your arms over your head and use it to patch yourself into a masterpiece.

In amongst the constant noise of deadlines, outside voices, expectations you have no desire to fulfill and pleasure pushed aside for pressure, we need to pause to remind ourselves that everything will be okay if we let what really matters in, if we just jump and let the universe catch us, if we let our hair grow long in the wind. Everything will be okay as long as we always, always remember to dance in the rain.


It helps if you're listening to: If It Makes You Happy - Sheryl Crow

(because no big decision was ever made without the help of Sheryl)

Building Nests

"What is the meaning

Of old tongues

Reaping havoc

In new places?...

Swoop down, find a stick, preferably small, maneuverable and strong. Take to your branch. Repeat until you have a solid, comfortable nest.

The following is a transcript of a diary entry a couple of weeks or so ago, so tenses and any notion of time has gone out the window on this piece:

"I am standing at my window, in my room, straining my eyes to focus through the fine mesh that does its best to keep our skin from bubbling from insects. I'm enjoying a swift, shuddering breeze; it doesn't happen very often. Cool air glides softly over the weather-beaten puckering of my face, fills my lungs with dry warmth, a freshness gladly welcomed, however momentary. Strands tickle my temples and nudge thought into action; "how very odd it is that a place once so alien and incongruous can now feel so familiar. It's almost as if I'm not afraid anymore, like I belong." Well isn't that a kicker?! Go back talk to Me three months ago, you would get only terrified babble and the belief that I will always, without changing, be an anomaly. See, the square never quite fit in the circular. The environment and I are learning to welcome each other. 

I say that, the heat still swathes me in callous reams of sweat and irritable exhaustion - I'm a joy to be with on hot days - but the air tries in earnest to apologise, to soothe with sporadic, blissful rolls of shimmering breeze. These cool moments are a craving, and while they don't happen often, they arrive precisely when they mean to, when they're needed and I can sense Thailand is accepting me, finally.

One, two, three, four months have steam-rolled by; each month the highest of waves, enveloping continents and I teeter on the crest, watching in baffled fascination. Four full months of changing perspectives, growing and forceful maturing, reverting back to selfish youth, picking up the pieces, dragging yourself on through your own mistakes and running to catch up with yourself, slowing to suck in the air as your chest pounds. Reinventing, re-evaluating, reciprocating, ripening. All of that in four months, seemingly repeating and repeating, is why the breeze is so coveted.

So with buffeting, twirling, elated times I've realised what we all do eventually, but which seems to be realised too late by many; nobody, no one in the ether has a single clue what they are doing.

Not in any negative, incompetency way - though for some, that stands as very much the case - but in the way that it seems people simply fall into life. We fall into careers, fall into luck, fall into misfortune, we fall into each other. I spent my first few months here thinking "I'm far too young and inexperienced for this, I don't know what I'm doing! Look at all of these people! They've all got it sorted, they know what to do, how to do things, where to be, how to get there...what am I doing?!" These "sorted people"? Well one of them is thinking exactly the same as me whilst picking up after the kids which have suddenly seemed to materialise in their life, and the other is secretly playing Snake underneath their accounting desk.

We're always too young for life, but that just means that we have no excuse not to play on the park swings, and it is through getting out there, seeing the world and gaining that experience of alien surroundings and dealing with yourself, that we become able to do the things our past selves' eyes would boggle at.

I'm standing at my window, breathing in Thailand, the fragrancy of realisation sweet in my grateful lungs." 

Right now I can hear Pe Ae chanting Japanese, the sing-song echo rolling back at her from the students, drifting down the corridor, letting the building rejoice in life. There’s a breeze in my hair, the birds’ wavering songs are telling me I’m right where I need to be. This world is my nest, and I have created my own to be proud of, to rejoice in, to feel the comfort of a country which once felt so hostile and is now my grateful sister.

...Ah, sweet mystery;

Come to break the frozen lake in me,

Shaking the foundations of the very trees within me,

            That the earth is the earth is the earth."
          

           - Grace Nichols; Hurricane Hits England

Stepping Into Pictures

"Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die."

There are points of negativity, always, there always will be. Whatever we do, wherever we go, there'll always be a tangle or two. Messy emotions.
But they do not measure at all to the awe I see around me. Moments of negativity, elongated moments of absolute awe. In Thailand, I have truly stepped into the pictures. The pictures you see which speak to you, inspire you to get out there, to see everything the world has to offer; I have packed my bag, laced up my shoes and tumbled, feet first, into the rolling wonder of the world's beauty.

There's something about South East Asia which makes me proud to be part of something as incredible as this world. I've realised, finally, how lucky I am to be able to not only see these things, but touch them, breathe them, jump into them. I'm lucky to get to feel this way, it is a humbling, magnificent thing to feel. Liberating.

We've been back at the project for nearly a month now, finally being of some benefit to the school which feels so good. Our little house is feeling like home...especially when it's clean. The cat has learned not to pounce on our feet. We live in Thailand, in a pretty part as well, and that is a great, great privilege. Though I miss everything and everyone I left behind, the pangs are constant and painful, I would never ever trade this experience...not for all the Yorkshire Tea in the world. Though I've had my fair share of bad luck...and other people's shares, come to think of it...I have never once regretted coming here, I have learned so much already and what I've learned about myself, about this culture and about global society is invaluable. We need to interlink more, we need to learn more, we need more intertwining relationships. We need more explorers.

This life moves fast, I'm here for a year and that's only a spec in time. I know its a cliche (to be honest what in this blog is NOT a cliche?) but we really don't get much time to get about; we're constantly running to catch the next train, held back by paper obstacles, files, time limits, restrictions, and the old evil...financial instability. Limits, limits, limits.

I'm making it my personal mission to always go over my limits and I am very much resigned to the fact that that means I will probably always be poor but I am going to be very happy building my scrapbook life. Stepping into the pictures and indulging in learning.

"One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

Words: the beautiful, immortal genius of Tennyson.
Music: Yes, I am listening the the Brave soundtrack. 

   

The Reasons Why

This is what good luck is, finally we have some. This is why we do it. This is why we drag ourselves on through culture shock and feelings of "I can't do this, I wasn't cut out for this...why did I leave everything dear behind?" This is why we squat in dank holes, endure horrendous bowel movements and share showers with cockroaches, spiders, mosquitoes and blood suckers. This is why we came here. This is Thailand and this is our year.

We hefted a year's worth of our lives onto our backs and shuffled through Chiang Mai: Song Thaw, walking, bus station, floor, bus, Chiang Rai, Song Thaw, guest house, floor, beds. Heft, drag, collapse, that's the key. Chiang Rai held little promise, save for the White Temple, a gleaming reminder of the morbidity of Religion, it blinds in sunlight. Once again we hefted, dragged, sagged, squashed ourselves into a minivan which seemed too clean for our grubby feet. Everything is too clean for our grubby feet. There we stayed, huddled and contorted, laughing at ourselves as we wound up dizzily through the mountainside, up, up, up towards the heaven of Pai. It is a heaven, if one believes in such a thing, this is it. Pai is beautiful, it's views are the pictures you see in your mind when you think of Thailand, and there those pictures were, right outside our window and we were weaving in and out of them, incorporating into it, tiny ants in a vast sphere of awe.

9:00am and we hired scooters (stop laughing) to zip through and around Pai. If there's one way to really appreciate where you are, in this haze of rolling green and blue power, hurtling through it, feeling its stinging breath pelt you in the face and freeze your grinning teeth is certainly the way to go about it. Euphoria. There's a freedom comes from it, from being in control and being on your own two feet, it was so good to feel that.

Speeding on, we stumbled on these sights. Stumbled upon them! Only in Thailand could you unexpectedly crest a hill and be confronted with all this...breathtaking. That's the realisation we all need, being able to think "okay, THIS is why I'm here" is a great, great thing. Left, right, loop, return, up, down, this way, that way? We picked a direction and gunned it down, only two minutes in and we stopped to pet the elephants who loitered right next to the road. Another beautiful surprise, just there. Right there, in front of us. Just elephants. HA!

On we went for the day, on and on, never letting up on the accelerator, never letting up on our grins. Pure, sweet, tangy life. Best day.

And then I just CHUNDERED EVERYWHAR...

Baptized By Fire

                                                            "So I'll be sailing on
                                                           Out into bermuda blue
                                                         Compass needle breaks
                                                        Like the heart I gave to you
                                                 I've been laying down in the devils lair
                                               Sailing into the sun I'll be baptized there"


Over a month has passed since I moved here, within that month I have been jerked and jived into a brutal tango, my flesh and bones clawed at by six inch talons, ripping away, exposing every sensitive, raw part of my being and watching with pleasure as I collapse in exhaustion from the constant pirouette. Sounds harrowing, don't it? Let me indulge you in woe.

I don't know if I expected to be gathered up and thrown into the pool of fire, or if I expected to be eased gently into it, either way it would've still felt like the baptism of fire it has been. And what a fire has burned, I've felt thrown about by change, music I don't want to dance to keeps forcing me up and around the room. I seem to be having to make peace with the fact that nothing here is ever going to be completely fine and I'm not sure if that is something that I should be making peace with...I'll try my best to change it, make things okay, but god damn everything makes that so hard. We came to Chiang Mai looking to forget the intensity, instead we got the opposite; frequenting hospitals, negativity and arguments heightened by lack of sleep, complications and being away from home. It's all on us here, some of us can't handle that fact. Me included, sometimes.

Don't get ill in a foreign country, just look after yourself and watch what you eat when travelling, its not worth the needles and pills and drips and long, long waiting hours filled with not knowing what the hell is going on or what the hell is wrong with you. I spent several hours on Friday with my head in a toilet - everything I've ever consumed in my life making an unwelcome reappearance for that entire time - my head and every pore of my body screaming for home. Take me home, where things are easy, why can't things just be easy? Why does everything have to be difficult? Being ill makes you seriously reconsider everything, particularly when you're so far from everything you know, so the whole "nothing worth having comes easy" attitude...not so easy to adopt when you're genuinely not sure if this is worth having. Like I say...you reconsider everything. 

Sometimes life enjoys buffeting and battering you around until you feel rung out, bruised and broken. I am utterly crumpled, this morning I could barely support what little weight I've managed to keep on me from being so sick, physically I probably could but to hell if I want to. To hell with telling myself tomorrow will be a better day; "yeah that's what you said yesterday..."

This country and the situations I've been thrown into are hellbent on stretching me, contorting my body and making me scream for escape, and damn if I haven't fallen into a heap and cried for home. But I will not let it beat me, I will not let it crush me into submission; it has hit me hard...and I will hit it back harder, its about time I started getting tough. I will find armour and I'll use it to carry on, through the storm, through the spinning. I will beat it. Because this is my dream, this is me and I will stay true to myself.

"So we beat on. Boats against the current..."

Artists seeing me through just now: Daughter, Spinnerette and Rae Morris

Great Expectations

"You'll be fine after two weeks. Everything will seem normal. Give it two weeks." Not quite, guys. Try again.

We asked a lot of ourselves after only a couple of weeks, we're still watching the bikes whoosh past carrying families, whole stalls and furniture and thinking..."hmm. Health and Safety would have a field day." I'm still reaching for my HTC phone whenever something interesting happens, thinking "damn that was interesting, I'd better let Lewis know about this interesting thing which happened to me IN THAILAND!" And then reality comes back and I'm standing in the heat, surrounded by people giggling at my excitement over their normality whilst oogling my alien paleness with the same wonderment.

It'll take much longer than a couple of flimsy weeks, to get used to this.

Uthai is strange, or rather, what it makes me think is strange. One day I'll be sitting under a much needed air con, feeling sorry for myself and thinking "this town is my hometown...in Thailand. Might as well have stayed home." "Urgh! There's nothing to do here!" (never mind that at this moment I am sat inside, not actually making any effort to explore...) and of course, the unwavering "I want my teddy bear!" All these I'll think and then I'll start a new day, such as today, and I'll see the little side streets, the scurried away stalls of glittering wonderment, the wooden trails of colour leading to glittering white shrines of religion. Inviting exploration. Senses increase and I can see that every place will always have secrets to be discovered, you just have to step outside of your insular security long enough to find the love in them. 

Sarah and I have had a full on few weeks in Thailand, to say the least. I couldn't have coped without The Hives, Florence, Band Of Skulls and every other beauty. We arrived, we went to stay in a host house, with our host family, who we loved - we couldn't help but love them - but circumstances meant we had to move, and we had to move as soon as possible. Now we inhabit a small, deliciously clean, hotel room. Our toilet flushes. It's heaven. But I feel so temporary in a hotel, so out of place. I'm excited to move into our house. OUR house. Maybe then everything will fall into place and I'll feel a lot more like I belong. Despite the daily gawpings and "BEAUTIFUL [WHITE] GIRLS". 
 
The key to finding this town's inevitable treasures is to get lost, and I fully intend to spin myself into disorientation and discover its glitter.

Listening To: II by Unknown Mortal Orchestra (if you want to stay sane, some Beatles-like psychedelia is your medicine)  

And So It Begins

Hello, little blog of mine. It’s been a while. Let’s dive in, shall we?

First, leaving the UK; thank Thor and all good things all the volunteers were together for that! Saying goodbye to my family was...a gut-wrenching, physically tearing five minutes. If I'd had it my way at that point, I'd have clung onto my man for the whole year, rather than leave him. But leave I had to, and leave I did. It hurt, but thankfully there was everyone waiting with cuddles, tears in their eyes, the same pain in their hearts and adventure on their lips. We got each other through, again. Shortly after, we were chatting, taking our minds off things and things started to feel normal again. We could finally get excited. That first plane journey was a treat, so comfortable, a vast, empty airborne locker of cosiness, plus Kevin's hand to hold when it took off, which was a necessity. We flew over Dubai and saw the whole island, lit up like trails of fiery soldiers headed to battle, it blazed with the glory of decadence and life. That was a good moment, the young island which felt so full of promise and life, radiating up to us in our metal bird, very exciting. However, then we came to change at Mumbai...things went downhill, immediately we were hit by heat and stench, pure India, I suppose. The men in our party were inexplicably separated from the women, to be let through security without sign of fuss or suspicion. While we, the women, were huddled into a compact line, made to remove items from bags, despite being very obviously overloaded, then made to wait even longer while they let through Indian women with token wheelchairs. They didn't need them, one woman was wheeled straight to the front of the security queue, ahead of all the sweating, drooping, baggage-lacerated foreigners, just to be plonked in front of people actually standing in line for the beepers, where she stood up with no difficulty and strode right on through the machine to collect her bags at the end and waltz off like a swan sprung from the womb with full mobility. So after that trip to security took the full two hour layby we had in Mumbai, we legged it to the gate, to our tiny, tiny jet plane which we shared with a lot of disrespectful, demanding, impolite Indian men, all apparently intent on getting bladdered on complimentary booze and groping the stewardesses. Safe to say we've all been put off India now. (Sorry India vols!)

That took four and a half hours, I believe. One hour would’ve been too long, it wasn’t a pleasant ride. Eventually, however we arrived in Bangkok and were met, bedraggled and yawning, by Lucie. Wonderful, wonderful Lucie, who shepherded us through the airport and onto beautifully air con’ed mini buses to a lovely clean hotel, where she said the most glorious, longed for words we’ve ever heard from human lips…“Today you can sleep for the day, no need to do anything but sleep.” Glorious, and exactly what we did. Those couple of days in Bangkok were lovely, so relaxed and Western-friendly…we had a toilet that flushed. I miss that toilet. And we got toast for breakfast! Toast…two things, friends, to never take for granted; clean, flushing toilets and toasted carbs. You truly don’t know what you’ve got ‘til its gone. I love you, toilet. I love you, toast. Wherever you are.

Ahem…moving on.

Okay so, second day in Bangkok was brilliant, lots of touristy sightseeing and market-buying, etc. Relaxed. Then we had to say goodbye to a few people, as they headed off to their projects that night, the rest of us stayed the night and then headed to ours in the morning. Morning came; we hoisted our life-heavy bags onto our tiny, frail bodies and headed to the train, waved goodbye to Lucie, our guiding light, and spent the next five hours sweltering on a rickety old tram-train. Food vendors walking up and down the tiny, narrow aisle singing their products; buckets of ice carrying questionably coloured fluids, stacks of even more questionably coloured meats, wandering up and down and up and down, while we dosed in and out of consciousness, leaves stroking past the windowless sides, the smells and sounds of the city ever diminishing and becoming green country while our tired, foreign eyes tried to make sense of it all. After many awkward attempts at Thai “where are we?”’s with the security/conductor people, who really were very friendly considering how annoying we probably were, we finally did arrive at Nakhon Sawan, where we were met by gorgeous Pe Ae, Pear, countless others, all so excited to see us, like being welcomed home by our families. And there is the end of our feeling completely comfortable for quite some time.

The ongoing story of our struggle to adjust continues in the next instalment with “The Woeful Misadventures Of A Geordie Away From Greggs.”

Peace.