Alex in Wanderland

No Rest for the Fearful

2013-05-21T16:58:00.001-04:00

I had many irrational fears as a child. I watched the movie Twister and my 8 yr old mind replayed reels of footage of a massive, catastrophic tornado tearing through my neighborhood and attempting to suck me out of my house while I sit in a bathtub holding onto the faucet for dear life.

I was terrified of Rumpelstiltskin. This withered elfin creature with matted shoulder-length hair, hanging beside a long crooked nose and beady eyes shows up to inform you he will spin your straw into gold in exchange for your child; then he smiles wickedly, displaying rows of yellowed pointy goblin teeth. So what do you do? You a. KILL IT or b. RUN. You don’t agree to give your baby to a goblin. You just don’t. Anyway, that’s a pretty relevant fear for a small child staring at the cover illustration of this terrifying imp begging you to fall asleep so he can leap from the book and drag your child soul to his evil elf den. I’m still not over this one.

I also watched a movie about a little boy who had AIDS. I’m still unsure as to how my parents made their blockbuster choices, but it’s safe to say this one seemed heartwarming and turned out to be a time bomb in my shed of unreasonable fears. After this movie I became petrified of blood transfusions and needles, neither of which most small children have access to on a daily basis.

Then there’s the fact that I couldn’t (can’t) sleep with my feet hanging off of a bed for fear that a stranger beneath my mattress will suddenly slash my Achilles tendons in one fell swoop of a copper machete. Or the phase I went through when I first started driving and felt compelled to roll down the windows and unbuckle my seatbelt on bridges so in case I drove off the side I could easily swim out. That was actually after hearing a TRUE STORY from someone who knew someone who knew someone whose dad and baby sister were driven off the side of a bridge by a semi truck. This world is terrifying.

I’m not just heading down this uncomfortable dirt road of memory lane for nothing, I have a point, I promise. I read an article today courtesy of future Denver roomie, Allie Kranick, about Recent College Grads and their realities The author had a dream to become a writer—much like myself—and she spent the first couple of years walking in circles—exactly like myself—trying to decide how to make this intangible dream a concrete reality in the face of naysayers and those that maintain that as a twenty-something in this economy we’re in no position to be chasing down unicorns and Skittles trees. Scared to make the wrong career decision, the girl took a few jobs that didn’t necessarily cater to her writing dream but that paid the bills and gave her something semi-respectable to do with her time.

Then one day she decided to take back control. Sometimes the thing that we need most in our lives is also the scariest book on the shelf. The one glaring down, challenging you to make the wrong move. The kind of bullying fear that stares you down on the playground, daring you to run, all the while knowing you could end up with cuts and bruises or worse if you choose to stand. We’re all afraid, whether it’s spiders, or heights or love or failures; but there’s a difference between a fear that should grow and a fear that should go. And this is something I grapple with every second of every day. And in this constant struggle, when I find myself most frightened and vulnerable, it is also when I find myself basked in the glory of my surprising strength.

Is conquering this fear going to make you a better person, a stronger one, will it set you up for rejection but leave the windows open for triumphs beyond all comprehensible imagination? Then do it! Are you afraid you’re going to be stuck in this job you despise or in a relationship that doesn’t feel right or wearing some itchy outfit that squeaks when you shift slightly? These are the rational fears that tell you when something doesn’t feel right and you should change your environment or your mood and alter the catalyst. These fears help you to grow because they sense that something in your life needs to change. This fear keeps us from doing stupid things, like running with scissors or watching anything hosted by a ~~Kardashian~~.

Afraid of dolphins or public speaking? Do heights make you queasy or the prospect of small talk with a stranger incites hand tremors? Are you worried you're going to look like a fool in that YouTube video you've always wanted to make? These are fears that need to go. Irrational fears that hinder personal growth because they label the unknown as something frightening, rather than as something or someone incredible that you just haven’t met yet.

When you take a leap into the unknown people always ask, “Aren’t you scared?” And I always tell them the truth: Shit yeah, I am. I’m petrified of my own shadow. From people following me too closely in parking lots to the startling sound of the icemaker--something always makes me jump. But, to me, never knowing is much scarier than the unknown. And I now know that the things that make me jump don’t have keep me from taking a dive. I’m slowly learning that creepy clowns and murder mysteries shouldn’t play the same part in my life as eating a meal alone, letting my guard down or chasing after some silly dream to see my photo on a bestseller list.

I used to have a lot of irrational fears as a child. Tornadoes, bridges, tiny elfin men. But death scared me more than any horror movie—the decisiveness of it all. I’d close my eyes and see space. Stars, nebulas, nothingness. I’d imagine bodies floating somewhere, tucked in a corner of an unknown galaxy, lifeless and forgotten. Today, I realize death didn't scare me, I was just afraid of never living up to the life I’d dreamed. And that’s a fear I’ll keep around.

Vantage Points

2013-04-17T12:05:00.000-04:00

My side still aches from the masses of best friend jokes, the types of one-liners that only you and your best friends understand that keep you howling on the ground clutching your side. My muscles burn from nights of strange dance moves that only make appearances certain nights on the town. My tongue is still rendered numb from the quart of hot sauce we felt was necessary on each and every late-night snack.

I spent the weekend strolling around beautiful Boston, arm and arm with the people I’d like to stroll with most. The aches, pains and burns were the good kind, the happy kind. But now more than anything my heart hurts, our insides ache with the heaviness of an unexpected heartbreak. Our eyes burn with sights of a city struck with the silence of an entire population with no diction to describe their emotions, no words to answer their questions.

Monday was Patriot’s Day, after all. A day Bostonians anticipate with the eagerness of children on Christmas Eve. Marathon Monday welcomed the culmination of hard work, dedication and passion rolled out into a grueling 26.2-mile map to freedom. The finish line welcomed triumph and was paved with the sweat and tears of those fortunate enough to experience the expected jubilation. We had walked through that area only days before, watching marathoners and their families—unable to contain smiles of anticipation—taking photos in their neon blue and yellow jackets, picturing their stream through those last steps into the safety of foil blankets.

Those steps are now marred by the unfathomable. My friend Allie texted me, panic-stricken, asking if we were alright because she’d read on Twitter that there were explosions at the finish line. I expected something commemorative, something jubilatory and planned, not something violent and evil. I reply that we’re across town at Fenway, the lines were too long at restaurants near the finish, and we’d heard nothing of such explosions.

Then the accounts began to flood our social media networks; panicked text messages from family and friends who continually received our voicemails when they tried to call our phones. We look at the TVs of the marathon coverage, where complete pandemonium ensues. We set our drinks down, the bitter taste of alcohol unsettling. We decide to leave busy Fenway. There are sirens, shouts, and helicopters overhead. We walk through quiet back roads as a succession of ambulances makes their way to hospitals—a disturbing train.

We receive an influx of concerned texts. But we are able to reply, “we’re fine, we weren’t there.” We have chills thinking that we easily could have been nearby, as if connecting ourselves to the tragedy somehow makes it less vague, less distant. But so many weren’t fortunate to give their families and friends the affirmation of their safety. It’s disgusting. It’s tragic. It’s senseless and it’s one or more humans at their worst and so many humans at their best.

The replay of the explosions is followed by hundreds of regular Joes and Janes running towards the carnage, near the danger. Not superheroes--clothed in the inhuman garments of invincibility--people, spectators, sprinting to scoop up the injured and running them to safety, passing through the finish line with shrieks and blood, not sweat and smiles. The runners, exhausted from traveling a monumental distance on foot, continue sprinting to hospitals to donate blood.

I’m no more tied to this tragedy than the next person. It’s all about vantage points, the hundreds of way we can look at the incident and the thousands more we can use to interpret it. That sickening feeling in the pit of our stomachs connects us all. These feelings unite a people, knowing we must bury the innocent, wondering if evil does sometimes conquer good.

But good outshines evil. Good rebuilds upon foundations obliterated by evil. Good lets evil have its five minutes of notoriety and then swallows it whole--a harsh pill--waiting to be digested slowly. Good connects, it unifies and it’s the little voice that makes you want to run towards. It is silence of a population digesting. It’s the last fight in a beaten featherweight.

This Boston trip is not one I’ll ever forget. It’s engrained into our memories with the forceful heat of a cattle brand. And it’s etched into the tears, bruises, cuts and mutilations of those not lucky enough to say, “we’re fine, we weren’t there.”

Who knows what types of violence the future holds. In a jar of jellybeans there’s always the sour one, the terrible one you would never think to eat. But someone out there would eat that bean; and someone would want to hurt innocent people. It’s safe to say the spotlight is on the heroes, the fighters and the fearless run towards-ers; while there’s a sinister storm cloud looming above the head(s) of those responsible just waiting to erupt.

The hug from my little brother, 10 years old, when I walked through the door lingered. At the age where he’s not a big hugger, (too cool for affection) he held onto me as if I was a ghost and could disappear at any moment. Some people won’t have the opportunity for those hugs and I am so grateful I do. It’s the little things. And we will keep running, with the legs we’re so fortunate to have.

Sidenote: I was NOT running the marathon but am flattered that people thought I could run more than a mile without whipping out my inhaler.

Craigslist Creepin'

2013-03-06T12:35:00.000-05:00

After a year living in a place where strange and entertaining things occurred on an hourly basis, I've found myself quite bored in this predictable, rule-orientated place. I keep waiting for the egg cart to pass my house at 7 am honking that damned bicycle horn or to pass the broom lady, exhausted from pedaling her merchandise, napping on the slide on a children's playground set. Where is the chaos? Where is the noise?

So I've found other ways to "amuse" myself in addition to trash television and mindless cyber stalking.

I found a random number scrawled in the front cover of the novel I'm reading, so I decided to text him/her. Much to my chagrin there was no answer to my angry text regarding the discarding of a fictional feline in my apartment. I relayed my dismay to a friend who shared a shockingly misogynistic Craigslist ad with me.

http://denver.craigslist.org/evg/3650793197.html

The said misogynist was advertising for women to partake in a bachelor party as, one can only assume, the party favors. The ad calls for "fun, down to earth, party girls who look good 'nekid' (later changed to its correct spelling) to engage in party activities in exchange for free ski tikets and a ride to aspen. Unspecified (albeit inferred) characteristics of eligible women: latent daddy issues, low self esteem, attraction to desperate and/or off the market men, high threshold for idiocy.

Disgusted by such candor and feral need for flesh, I begin psychoanalyzing the types of men who would feel the need to advertise for drunken sex. Surely Aspen has bars with equally as desperate girls who would do much more for much less and save that awkward car ride home post debauchery. But these horned lepers felt the need to market their free roofied cocktails and party planning skills via Craigslist.

Leaving your phone number on the bottom of such an advertisement paves the way for inquirers from (a) toothless middle aged former exotic dancers with a meth addiction (b) cheeky, immature yet hopelessly loveable pranksters.

Rounding out team B, I sent "Nameless"-- later changed to "John"-- a harmless, however slightly terrifying text message. I chased afternoon caffeine with the creepy conversation seen below.

I pride myself on the innate ability to make others uncomfortable. And there is nothing more frustrating than someone refusing to cooperate with the task at hand. I set out to frighten this man and instill a sense of respect for the establishment of Craigslist. Sell your couch, your sister's handbag collection, your worthless sperm, but don't sell your sexist ideals in exchange for ski tickets.

I had hoped this hairy Arabian (assuming) man would rue the day he posted his cell phone number on this ad. My dreams were crushed when he 1. played along and 2. STILL tried to sell the dream of sweaty stranger petting to this lunatic. Desperation with a capital D. I never called to follow through with my dream of becoming someone dude's weekend snow bunny, but that won't stop me from sending weekly photos of cats and ambiguously sexual and unidentifiable body parts. Of men.

A Song for Matthew

2012-12-14T09:41:00.002-05:00

Most twenty-something adults don’t have the opportunity to live with a much younger sibling or to even have one, for that matter. We lucky enough to have parents that continue to procreate beyond the 90s have a different story. Many are products of second marriages, others are surprises and still some are planned Life Spices.

My youngest brother, Matthew, and I are thirteen years apart. He was born during my tumultuous tween years and the last thing I imagined was aiding my mother with changing diapers and keeping an eye on this small, drooling, defecation machine.

I stood in the midst of a circus of emotions and hormones and this small wonder inconvenienced my life with every whimper. During the most awkward years when (I believed) everything should’ve been about me, it was all about the much cuter, less cranky child. But those large blue-green eyes melted my ice heart faster than Al Gore’s global warming model. While babysitting still inconvenienced my social calendar, I loved that little imp.

I had an excuse to go to a park without lurking like a recess predator. I could teach him inappropriate words, which sounded much more adorable coming from the mouth of a toddler. I watched transitions through sporting phases from soccer to baseball to hockey. And I had a small butler to deliver foot rubs and beverages on command.

Fast-forward a decade and the helmet-haired 4^th grader has the same high-pitched dog whistle voice, gap-toothed grin and his own unique personality. And quite the character this little boy has grown into. He’s an odd one, for sure, with quirks and outlier interests far from the normal boy things. But, most importantly, he’s a good kid. Actually, a great one.

Anyone with children or that close contact with children, understands that these years can be tough, especially for those considered “uncool” by the invisible standards society sets for us. As we age and grow more confident, those standards dissolve into our own personal standards, yet for a 10-year-old boy or girl, those standards dictate his or her self-confidence, happiness and stability.

Recently, a group of malicious smelly recessers has been bullying my little angel. I think back to how I myself treated people during those days and am disgusted by the level of malice I exuded over others. Watching tears stream down a little boy’s face while he describes the way a group of kids took his bike and kicked it over then peed on another little boy’s bike, it takes every fiber in my being not to march down the street and knock a set of braces into some kid’s skull.

My pacifist brother could never harm another human—he and his awkward 6-foot ten year old friend would rather use Instagram as their own personal dating website or drag each other screeching down the road on skateboards.

So instead of practicing our roundhouse kicks on four-foot dummies in the driveway, I decided to teach my brother a special version of cool, by showing him a whole lot of awesome people that were a particularly epic breed of outcast. We sat down on the carpet in my bedroom and rifled through dusty vinyl records while I described the strange artwork and the funny photos on the front. We listened to the Who, Led Zeppelin, Queen, the Beatles and other great rock artists using music as a weapon against aggression.

I made him his very own playlist on 8tracks.com where he could listen to these great songs when he needed a friend, or even just some great drum and guitar solos to jam to.

I told him that so many of the heroes he looks up to as role models were also bullied for being “different,” and that some of the best people in life are the ones who might be a little outside the box. Then we discussed the evil neighbor children’s future employment at Arby’s and called it a win. I’m the first to admit I wasn’t the poster child for kindness when I was young, but Matthew is my second chance and a much sweeter version of the little me I could’ve been. We’ve got a shot to get this right because at the end of the day, we’d really just like to teach the world to sing.

http://8tracks.com/afaubz/the-greatest-classic-vinyl-rewind

Over the Hills and Far Away

There's a Teenage Wasteland where American Girls pray

Money don't matter and Woodstock’s the trend

And Sympathy for the Devil lurks Up Around the Bend

(Un)Fortunate Sons lose lives for a cause

A Rock and Roll band leaves a stage with applause

The outcast kid hides in Castles made of Sand

One day he’ll know happiness of a different brand

So Come Together, let's Give Peace a Chance

On this Magic Carpet Ride where Tiny Dancers prance

Forget all your troubles and just Let it Be,

Cus baby, its still Rock n Roll to me.

Transitions to the Front Nine

2012-11-07T22:45:00.003-05:00

In terms of transitions, my senses have gone from working overtime to completely dormant. I'm struggling to find stimulation in my surroundings so my brain is forced to actively create my own stimulants. As much as I try to listen, I tend to zone out while others are speaking and my mind wanders to different worlds where the lack of sense once again makes sense.

The first morning I woke up in California, I decided to take a morning jog. I was startled by how unnervingly silent the world seemed. Everyone was in cubicle land, leaving Orange County suburbia completely desolate save the stay at home moms, a few maintenance guys and an old Asian man in a grey tracksuit. I ran and a pack of street dogs didn't appear to chase me until I reached the safety of 7/11. I wasn't dripping sweat the second I left the house. There were no nasaly shouts or the sound of felines clawing the hide from the backs of their brethren. No motorbikes or food carts or traffics outside of the marketplace. No morning fried chicken overflowing trucks full with pineapples and everyone abided by traffic laws. It all seemed a little too post-apocalyptic and my zombie radar stood on high alert.

After coming from a place where every outing, no matter how insignificant was an adventure and often a struggle, the fact that I could drive in a vehicle to a convenience store, purchase a soda, pay for it, chat with the cashier and leave without hand gestures and in a matter of minutes was alarming. Surely my gas tank would be syphoned upon returning to my vehicle. The cashier definitely gave me the wrong change back. These Lays aren’t really baked. But to my surprise, the world turned, my Lays appeared saturated-fats-less and my gas tank remained unscathed.

And after a few days of adjustment, I rolled back into the rhythm of life here. I’ve always been, for lack of a less cliché term, a “roll with the punches” kind of gal, but I truly expected to have more issues with this place. Instead I either take each day in stride or completely block out the things that make my head hurt. Hence the space cadet routine.

*My boyfriend didn’t even notice I cut an inch off my hair.

*These are THE cutest shoes I’ll die without them.

*I saw on TV that they sell a machine that sucks the fat from your neck.

*I’m not shaving during November because I want to prove to the other males in the pack that I passed the puberty test and am able to grow facial hair.

And all I hear is: blah blah blah cat with neon high tops yadda yadda platypuses are the only mammals that lay eggs blah blah taco bell.

A friend who returned to America in June to begin a teaching job warned me that the transition into the workplace from the lax job settings of Thailand was brutal. She advised me to ease into working, rather than cannonballing into a demanding position requiring infinite responsibility. I heeded her advice and my workplace transition couldn't be smoother.

In addition to playing nurse for mother who just underwent a full ankle replacement, I am a beverage cart server at a golf course. This basically means I drive a golf cart around all day handing out snacks and refreshments to golfers. And by golfers I mean elderly people knocking balls in my direction.

Other than the obvious likeness in the simplicity category to my old job, there are a few other connections I made.

· Instead of driving a motorbike through the jungle, I'm now driving a cart through a forest. Less humid and instead of fixation upon the monkeys surrounding me, I’m back to believing squirrels are planning a hostile takeover of the human race.

· Rather than Asian people telling me I'm pretty every day because I'm pale and blonde, old men tell me I'm pretty because I'm young and holding cold beer. Then they hand me cash. So I keep my self-esteem boosters and add a pocket full of cash.

· I get to be by myself most of the time and listen to my iPod, read and just enjoy being outdoors. Primetime practice for my whistling and harmonica skills.

· Similar to my thoughts on Asian people, old people all tend to look the same. I like this—it makes me feel like everyone is my friend.

· Asian people loved the fact that I had a boys name and was a girl. Old people just love the name Alex. "Alex, well that's just my favorite name in the entire world." clearly my name was born into the wrong generation and onto the wrong continent.

· Old people banter is similar to foreign kindergarteners banter. Both will forget the inappropriate things I say because one for lack of attention span, the other for abundance of senility.

· Children and elderly people have the fortune of getting away with saying whatever the they feel, which keeps me on my toes and makes for an interesting day. Like a 65-year old man proposing, after which I had to help him up from his knees.

· Children and old people always carry an abundance of treats. With my students, it was usually a snack of some sort that they would share with me if I allowed them to eat it during class. With old people it’s two-dollar bills. No other species carries around a pocket full of two-dollar bills save the elderly. I was convinced they stopped printing them, but clearly there’s an ancient money printer out there doling out these special treats.

· And finally this gem:

“Alex, do you go to school?”

“I graduated a year ago from FSU, then I spent a year in Thailand teaching abroad.”

“A broad? What was her name?”

And although I don't like toeing the line of diaper changing, it seems I've been fortunate in both arenas and I am thankful for that much. And my pocket full of "collector's" 2-dollar bills.

Please Store Belongings in the Overhead Compartments

2012-10-27T00:34:00.001-04:00

I'm startled awake harshly by the prodding index and middle finger of the 6-foot Ladyboy whose role is acting attendant on this overnight bus. The former he aggravatedly shoves a cup of scalding coffee into my slumber-tingled hand. Where are we? Closing in on Bangkok, I'd imagine. My watch reads 5 am. What kind of sociopath wakes up humans before farm fowl? The kind intending to discard you and your belongings at an unidentified bus station twenty minutes later.

She makes an announcement in Thai to the rest of the passengers; some grab belongings while others remain seated. I'm not exactly thrilled about the idea of being stranded at five thirty in the morning in a Bangkok bus terminal, so I ask where we are. Without glancing in my direction she repeats what she's already announced, still in Thai. I managed to make out the name of the terminal I'd intended to reach, so I gather my crap and exit into a throng of taxi drivers each attempting snatches at my bags. I throw some bony elbows and manage to barricade myself between trashcans and an entrepreneurial hero hustling to peddle a cart full of fried meats on sticks before the sun has a chance to catch up.

Not a white face in the whole terminal to share my plight or offer advice. My flight isn’t for 10 hours so I hobble on my semi-infected toe (compliments of a questionable pedicure) until I reach a mild-tempered older man fixed proudly beside his Toyota mini-van. "Ow bai Khao San. Tao Rai?" ..."you want to go to Khao San Road... five hundred baht." I laugh. Touché old man with the impeccable English skills, touché.

I reach Khao San. My backpack weighs more than a young calf and I’m rolling a carry-on suitcase down the grimiest road in Thailand. An Indian man saunters up to me in a startlingly clean white shirt, his head wrapped in an equally unblemished wrap, and presses an index finger into my third eye.

What is it with people in Southeast Asia and poking? Poking is not polite. Let’s try tapping.

“Miss, Miss! I will tell it to you, your fortune. Give me it one moment I will tell it to you.”

“I already know ‘it’ my fortune, your country wouldn’t let me in.”

A few hours later I'm sitting in the airport terminal bucketing hydrogen peroxide onto my toe as a preventative measure against possible amputation by bush infection. A small man sits down next to me. He strikes up a casual conversation in a language foreign to both my own and my slight knowledge of Thai. I guess he's from Taiwan considering my connection is in Taipei. I attempt to force a congenial conversation with this man who speaks maybe 25 words of English. We exchange three words simultaneously look to the ceiling for a hint of some sort then give each other the raised eyebrow, closed lip smile and nod.

He tries infallibly to retrieve the right words, balling his hands into fists and shaking his head. I regret not having the ability to instantaneously create the words he so fervently searches for within his limited repertoire. A white gentleman overhears our conversation and begins asking me questions about teaching. He's American and the exchange is effortless and a real novelty at that point. Moments later, my Taiwanese friend, Maa, stands to board the plane and pats me on the shoulder to hand me a parting gift: a keychain with a stuffed Winnie the Pooh knockoff, felt grin glued crookedly below beaded eyes, heart on his chest.

"For me gift," he says smiling and walks away.

“That was weird,” mumbles the heavyset man from North Carolina.

Right then I contemplated staying in Taiwan with my new friend Maa. Who would struggle day in and day out to find the words to make me comfortable, ultimately creating an awkward jumble of misunderstanding and frustration. Someone who would exhaust time and energy to listen, understand and to find a shred of honesty in a nest of embarrassment. Who would put himself at most vulnerable to hand a stranger a creepy stuffed toy in the middle of an international airport. For that brief moment I wondered why I'd ever go back to the self-proclaimed Greatest Country in the World! Where people would undoubtedly find such interaction uncomfortable and irritating. Then I pictured any of my friends enjoying the attempted communication with this man and realized that those good apples, those kind souls, those special people were the ones for whom I chose leaving.

Fast forward 30 hours and I'm traipsing through LAX in my genie pants about embrace a best friend I haven't seen in two years in the smelliest hug of her life. After 40 hours, the fumes emanating from my person could have declawed a jungle cat by sheer potency. Two days later I’m zooming around an indoor go-kart track getting re-acclimated to driving A week later I'm jamming to one of the best concerts I've seen courtesy of the amazingly talented Black Keys. I'm drinking real beer; I'm dancing to the radio while driving… mutually exclusive events. I calmly sit in traffic and wait in lines. I’m in zero rush. I'm talking to everyone: gas station attendants, airport personnel, people in line, post office workers, a random on the sidewalk, an outdoor canine that won’t turn into a zombie past sundown. I've engaged in more small talk in the last three weeks than the previous 20 years of my life and I dig that change. I’m remarkably comfortable with being uncomfortable.

I keep waiting for the "reverse culture shock" to ensue, yet it never does. I imagined a plague of locusts depositing a sheet of depression onto my body like a cold, wet blanket. I pictured awkwardly stumbling through conversations and driving on the wrong side of the street. Surely I couldn't relate to anyone after using hand gestures to buy soap in a place where nose picking is like hand shaking and by comparison my schizophrenic behavior is ordinary.

Rather than living in the past and depressingly recounting good times had, I inadvertently began to compartmentalize my life. I put people, experiences, opinions, beliefs and memories into labeled little shoeboxes and placed them neatly on shelves in my mind. It sounds strange to put your life in little Lego fortresses, separate from the other entities that make up a person's being. But sometimes, maybe just temporarily, it's necessary for a person to keep things unattached. No man is an island and all that jazz, but maybe his thoughts can have their own islands. I've missed out on a lot of things in peoples' lives and they've missed out on a lot of things in mine. But it's unfair to expect someone to unload a year's worth of happenings onto you in one sitting. A lot happens in a year. Sometimes instead it's better to reestablish common ground—to find things relatable to both parties and roll from there.

Sure, eventually I'll open the boxes and mix and match contents. But I want my life to unfold organically. I can't expect people to immediately understand the way I behave and think now, but I'm all for offering glimpses into that other existence. That dream world that I wouldn't believe actually existed if it wasn't for the photographic evidence. I'll leave that place, those experiences and that girl in a box for myself and slowly I'll share them. I just can't fully open that box right now, not because I'm afraid of who or what will get in, but because I'm terrified of what will get out. That’s all I have left of that place, those experiences and the people that shaped this person. I'm in survival mode now, keeping them safe from the corruptions that prey on the audaciously naive hopes of the endless dreamer.

India from my Couch

2012-09-28T23:02:00.001-04:00

I've been hunkered down at a computer for the last three days trying to figure out how to climb out of this quicksand pit I dug for myself. For the past few months I've had this pretend persona of a responsible adult overseas thing going, booking flights to travel, booking flights home, obtaining visas etc. And one week is all it took to obliterate any shred of adultish notions regarding myself I had fluttering about. Where did I go wrong? I've lived in a third world country abroad for a year now and I thought I could handle anything. I'm seasoned enough to know how these things work. Which is surely why we booked flights to a country with a stringent visa policy without an actual visa. And in our haste to procure said visa, corners were cut and impetuous decisions made. We handed over our passports--our lifelines-- and $200 to a strange woman from an unaccredited courier company and held on with nothing more than pitiful hopes for success. But in Thailand, things rarely go the way you planned. If I know anything by now it should be that.

Already under the impression we wouldn't get our visa in time even under the 'urgently expedite this shit' extra fee we paid, we paid to move our flights back almost a week. A few days after handing over my passport, I left my debit card in an ATM machine. Sadly new cards aren't issued without a passport. I had no passport. So we're passport less, I'm running on fumes in the funds department and theres a good chance we just paid someone two hundred dollars to mass distribute copies of our American passports on khao San road.

Then came Judgement day. The visas had made it ON TIME! Lindsay goes to pick up our improved passports, an elated spring in her step. An hour later I receive a text message. "so they put your photo in my passport and mine in yours. We're fucked." Which sounds dramatic, but i would even go as far as saying we were raped, sodomized. basically the geniuses at courier service decided to switch our photos rendering the visas illegal and invalid. And with a visa that takes two weeks to process and a flight in five days, we were so, so fucked.

So what do you do when life botches your visa? You said screw the visa and bail. After ditching the completely Effed up India trip, it was as if a herd of camels stepped off of our chests. We could now breathe. All signs pointed to 'if you still go at this point you're asking to be sold into Indian slavery.' we'd thrown away heaps of money, time and worry on this trip only to discover that something in the universe wanted us outside of India. When we managed to get full refunds for our visas from the company (pretty much unheard of for a Farang to get money from a Thai person) we began mapping out a new escape route from Thailand.

But the issue with escape routes is no matter how much you plan, you still have to hit the ground running, ready to encounter obstacles unaccounted and circumstances unforeseen. And we're not prepared for an all out escape when frankly we don't want to leave all that badly. Not to mention the idea of more travel plans going awry makes my stomach writhe in foreshadowed pain. We've lost energy, we've lost money and we've lost faith in our own decision making, which might be the biggest failure of them all.

Then I remember the minor detail of my flight home bring OUT of India and I am not allowed IN India. So contacted Travelocity and realized that I cannot change the airline for my flight and Budget Booker Alex decided to choose some obscure German airline that flies maybe three places in southeast Asia. I looked into changing my flight from Bangkok back to the states with this airline.... for the price of SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS. Pardon me Deepak, I didn't ask for a breast augmentation, I just want a flight home. At this point I'm prepared to scrap any sort of trip and just get the fuck home yet I can't even do that right.

I'm dealing with people who don't speak English. I'm dealing with conglomerate companies that don't give a shit how nice of a person I am; an unwavering rule is an unwavering rule. No amount of begging gets someone to "bend the rules" for me. The worst part of this entire situation is surely that my negligence caused it. I'm like that dog that takes a massive shit and steps backward after finishing, blindly trotting about in their own personal brand of doodoo and then looks around bewildered like someone else set that pile of steamy feces there as a trap. The worst and best type of anger is anger set at yourself. the type of seething anger where you're trapped in a prison cell of your own devices with no one to blame but yourself, no matter how many different scapegoat portraits you attempt to paint. But it's also the type of anger that gets shit done. A proactive urgency pointed to fix everything I broke.

Im contacting consulates and embassies, posting messages on travel discussion boards, stalking Deepak at Travelocity and refusing to accept defeat. I haven't been this stressed since we first arrived in Phuket with no money, no job and no home. Afraid of this strange place and terrified of a misstep. Now it seems all I've got are left feet and even those are bound together by a rope made from fibers of stupidity. At this point it's all a waiting game.

Then I received my first response email from the Indian Embassy in BKK:

"Dear Mister Faubel,
We cannot process your request at this time. Please contact the embassy by phone if you have questions."

Jerks. Why is it so hard to answer a simple question? Then I scrolled down and re-read what I had sent.

"Would it be admissible for me to have a 4-6 hour lover in the Mumbai Airport without the proper visa documentation?"

And then I laughed for the first time in three days. Thank you autocorrect for making my exchange with the Indian Embassy significantly more awkward than it needed to be. LAYOVER PEOPLE, LAYOVER. I don't expect you to grant me free reign to fornicate with a strange man in your terminal I just want to wait there quietly, maybe eat some airport food and read a book.

So here I am, fixing, when I imagined I'd be enjoying. I'm learning when I should've been celebrating. And I'm forever adapting when I was completely certain I'd molded to enough uncomfortable situations to learn my lessons. Check before you bet, right? Instead, I bet before I checked and now I have to stretch. Stretch resources, stretch possibilities and stretch time. All because Peter Pan couldn't be bothered to read the fine print on the Neverland flying regulations.

So dear friends, I decided that the universe is obviously calling me straight home. After countless battles against formidable obstacles and giving up trying to get a small Thai man to smuggle me to India in his cart of bananas, I decided to cut my losses and go straight to the land of breakfast burritos and solid poops. (not in that order). Everyone has been asking my "plan." Well there it is. After a year living in Thailand I am headed back to America MONDAY. I'll fly into California to see some of my best friends I haven't seen in over two years. Then I'll head home to take care of my incapacitated mother, where selfish me should've been from the start. I didn't need some grand Bon voyage trip, this entire year has been a vacation inside a vacation inside a resort, I was always meant to go home. Although I'm now filled with so many different places to call home and I'm more fortunate than any gangly blonde girl on earth for this experience and I'll never forget it. A special thank you to all of my best friends who were forced to shuffle around their own schedules for my impulsiveness. And to my mom, who has needed someone to take care of her while I'm across the world with my thumb in my butt. Don't worry, I'll be picking my nose on your couch before you know it.

The Importance of Impermanence

2012-09-19T23:01:00.001-04:00

Impermanence is an impasse, a stalemate, a quagmire. No one ever wants anything good to end but on the other hand, it compels us to seize every opportunity, to leap from comfort, to try new things because we’re not sure when we’ll have another chance. People don’t make bucket lists at the beginning of their journeys; they make them when they realize their time is the baton carried by a relay sprinter heading around that last curve before the finish line.

I booked my plane ticket back to America and immediately began mentally mapping my treasure route through Thailand for the next month, trying to squeeze every ounce of experience out of my second home. I can’t believe a year has flown by so quickly. I can vouch for the second hand ticking faster when you’re older. Now I have to start thinking about adult things like jobs, 401k, insurance, paying back debt, etc. Things I’ve fortunately been able to lock away in a storage unit across the world for the past 12 months.

How seriously am i taking the fact that im going home to no job, no vehicle, no phone, no apartment and a sack of student debt? Welllllllll define serious. Sometimes I wonder why there wasn’t an Adulting 101 class in college. I don’t know how to do half of the things my parents do each day and most of the time I’m not even aware they’re doing it. How does my mom always make our house smell so nice? Do people still balance checkbooks? A credit card isn’t magic money? How do I set the iron so I don’t burn holes in things? How often to I ACTUALLY have to see a dentist? Does every house already have a junk drawer? Are throw pillows REALLY necessary? Why does my budget hinge heavily on wine sales in CVS?

I’ve learned so much this past year and my wisdom has aged far faster than my outward appearance. I've grown in inexplicable ways- ways far removed from the infamous ‘real world’ and the responsibilities that accompany being a working adult. Have i acquired applicable skills? Well I can drive a motorbike through a monsoon, order meals in Thai, climb the face of a rock, pack a freakishly efficient traveling backpack, barter at the night market for a pair of socks, teach impressionable minds the lyrics to the Fresh Prince theme song and patiently navigate while completely lost in a snarl of unpredictability. I've learned patience, assertiveness, I've learned resilience and adaptability, I've found calm. This place has given me souvenirs I can never re-gift and I’m forever grateful for the time spent here, the people I’ve met and experiences I’ve shared. Lessons and experiences not exactly applicable to a 9-5 desk gig. But ones I'll not soon forget.

But all things eventually kick the proverbial bucket. It would be easier to continue squatting in Asia,island hopping and teaching phonics to tiny grab assers; but honestly, I'm ready for a new challenge. I’m ready to set the knowledge I’ve acquired to use and make something of my time. If good things didn’t end everyone would continue on the same paths forever, when we’re ultimately meant to bob, weave, wind, sometimes backtrack, but always end up trucking onward. Road trips don’t involve driving circles around a cul-de-sac. So I guess I’m coming to terms with leaving this paradise—this third world utopia where the only things I have to do are the things I want to do.

A few days ago I said farewell to my kindergarten militia, my troop of 60 miniature Asian muppets. I've relinquished a major role in my life- a persona of sorts. Every day for the past year I was TEACHA Alex. Not miss Alex, not white lady shouting things at us in garbled English, but teacher. Like an actor completing their role in a film, I must remove myself from that character-- that alternate life-- possibly forever. I shed that role with more dejection than buffalo bill stepping out of his female novelty skin suit.

Realistically, Ill never see these children again.What will they grow up to be? What kind of people will they become? Did I give them enough love and positive reinforcement to combat the spirit crushing adversities they may come up against? Will they continue to hum Call Me Maybe while they color?

Sure, I taught them to write their names which they continue to scrawl in backward capital letters like the font in Winnie the Pooh and instructed them that the word dingleberry should always be separated into firm syllables to best convey meaning. But above all, I'd like to think I taught them a little something more about what it feels like to be cared about, what its like to love unconditionally and what its like to gasp through fits of laughter like oxygen is going out of style. I genuinely enjoyed going to work each day and Buddha knows there was never a dull moment. Things in lodged nostrils, inadvertent rectal exams from tiny probing fingers, nosebleeds, butt sprayer ambushes, arm hair twisting, eye ball poking... It was a semester of anatomy, biology, drama, a little English and a lot of tomfoolery.

They don't necessarily understand that I'm not returning but thankfully kids' emotions are pretty elastic at that age so I suspect my lack of presence will be forgotten once a new teacher is in there doling out sugary treats. they've changed my life in ways far beyond anything I've done for them. On my worst days, one antic or giggle from them and I've forgotten the reason for my anger. Children have that effect. The De-Serious-ify effect: a special way to make you put things into perspective. Life doesn't have to be serious and they have a way of making adults realize that sometimes a 4 year old recognizes the absurdity of the frivolous things we throw big kid tantrums over.

Saying goodbye is difficult but prolonging the inevitable in favor of the comfortable is futile. Adjusting to life back in the states will be a new test and luckily I have the greatest friends and family who will try to understand and support me even if they can’t understand. That will sit listening to me drone on about how things were in the good ole days of Thailand, attempting to direct my attention elsewhere, like to shiny things or buffets.

I emailed my mom telling her I'm nervous for “reverse culture shock” and fear I wont fit into society back at home. Her attempt at sympathy went something like: “sorry to burst your bubble, but you were never a functioning member of society.” And that statement was strangely comforting. Just because I’m heading back to more normalcy than I’ve experienced for the past year doesn’t mean I’ll magically morph into an ordinary member of John Q. Public. no one said commonness was contagious—thank god.

If anyone ever asks me for advice about living and working abroad, I'll tell them: go. Pack your shit in a dirty sack and move, man, just move. *hippie voice* Ive tried my best to capture My version of Thailand through this blog and I hope people have enjoyed it, but like I said its MY version and yours might be completely different. I've found my version of life and the way I want to best live it and now I'm off to start a new adventure.

For now, my sights are set on new challenges. Braving crowds of groping men in India. Heading west, Kerouac style. Writing my first piece of substance. Helping others. Making my rounds and coming into contact with awesome people. And never ever stopping. Basically trying my hand at this big kid thing without ditching the kool-aid stache and light up high tops. There are always bills to be paid and responsibilities to be taken; yet there’s SANOOK to be had Over the Hills and Far Away. Leaving is scary but I dig scary.

Thai this, I think you like!

2012-09-08T07:35:00.001-04:00

With two weeks left in Thailand, I'm continuing my post on my favorite things thereby allowing myself to slowly make peace with leaving them all behind. A twisted release of my favorite Thai creatures back from whence they cometh. (that didn't even sound right in my head, but we'll go with it)

6. Cat lady
Every self-respecting neighborhood possesses its own creature that emits a bizarrely mystical aura both terrifying and curiously compelling in its own right. That kooky old person that either A. Remains within the confines of their dilapidated home knitting outfits for their guinea pig militia or B. Shuffles throughout the neighborhood imposing their own regulations within the confines delusional view of neighborhood vigilante. Unfortunately, our cat lady is the latter. Not only does she insist upon feeding the masses of stray cats that now flood our street, she's slowly transformed to resemble a larger, more ferocious member of her feline family. Sharp spikes protrude from her head in a variety of splotchy fall colors giving her the appearance of an autumnal porcupine. In addition to feeding the beggars, she strategically places obstacles throughout our road forcing motorists to slow to her allowed speed. She moseys about the street looking through her others' mail, furtively sweeping the dirt from her yard into another. She and her Swedish husband add to the myriad of reasons this woman enthralls, perplexes and terrifies me. He stands 6'4 as his snowy white hair cascades in boyish tendrils about his large cranium, giving him the appearance of a large man child. His signature transparent white tank top reveals a basketball sized gut and excitable nipples. When on outings, cheetah queen drives the motorbike while Klaus (speculations of his actual name remain fruitless) towers above her helmet donning his own large head protector and the type of riding goggles people dress dogs in as cheeky motorists for Halloween. My first week here, I was walking the neighborhood and Klaus invited me into their woodshed of a home and not missing the opportunity to get an inside look at the place decorated with yogurt cups and a scream mask- even with the risk of winding up as a taxidermic decoration of my own- I headed inside. Every inch of the ceiling is covered in tiny hanging flags and paintings depicting sheer frustration and insanity line the walls. Before meeting Cat Lady I assumed the artist was a peg short from the top of the loony ladder but frankly even my imagination couldn't have painted the masterpiece that is the Tramp's lady. Suffice to say I made it out to see another day of catnip.

8. Bank
In Thailand "losing face" is a daily war waged by pretty much everyone. No one wants to shame their family or be made to look foolish in the face of others. It's a crap concept, but prevalent nonetheless. So when special needs kids are placed into school, they usually don't receive the specified attention they require. This brings me to Bank. Bank is about 6 feet tall and in second grade. Bank wanders the school holding his toothbrush and cup and no one bats an eyelash. Maybe they just don't want to deal with him or maybe leaving him to his own devices is their way of caring. I, on the other hand, have taken a special interest in Bank's life and often spend my free time pondering a labyrinth of paths of his past and future. My coworker and I have created Bank Theories in which we hypothesize his home life. We're convinced he's the equivalent to an Autistic savant and that our job now includes unearthing this well hidden prodigious talent, whatever it may be. Perhaps hes a world class accordian player or can hack into the governments mainframe and purge documents with the click of a mouse. I selfishly picture Bank realizing hes a gifted microbiologist and makes a breakthrough engineering a virus that gives superhuman capabilities that he shares only with me, his acting guardian and benefactor. But back in reality, Bank makes his rounds, many of which include circularly pacing the English teacher office. He stands over shoulders peering at whatever the particular subject is doing like a curious redwood. For being as large and dimwitted as he is, he's rather noiseless on foot, which increases his element of surprise tenfold. When bank isn't startling teachers, he's touching our things with his fried chicken fingers. We all humor him and smile as we wipe the grease from our electronics. In addition to pacing and touching, Bank has his own language. Similar to ebonics, but with tones placed on a list of grunts rather than words. To the untrained ear, it sounds like he has a chest cold, but to those with Bank experience, every grunt has its own special meaning. The Scooby doo grunt usually answers questions and means "I have no clue what you're talking about" ..."aaaaoooooghhh. His curt static grunt signals his entrance and exit of the office and also his presence over your shoulder. And his clipped cough signifies he reached an epiphany of his own Bankly proportion.

9. Asian tourists in Asia.
I've touched on this subject a number of times, simply because the sheer warmth that Asian tourists in Asia bring into my life. You're sitting on a desolate island in southeast Asia when suddenly a ferry boat lumbers into view carrying what appears to be 900 Nikon cameras attached to flailing appendages. When the boat reaches your line of vision, you realize its a tour boat that nearly three generations of Korean, Japanese or Chinese visitors and these distant relatives and friends have booked for the day. They're herded off the ferry boat and onto the sand like newborn gazelle, stumbling and bumbling about as if the loose sand is actually the floor of mars. Vibrant colors and ludicrous patterns cover huddles of matching families aimed to stay together by any and all means necessary. A group of elderly women shove to the front of the line, eyes ablaze and umbrellas dually employed as cattle prodders and sun stoppers. A family in matching cowboy hats tethered together by what appears to be a bungy cord enters the roped off swimming area carefully stepping around the sandollars as to not nick any possible souvenirs with their watershoes. A group of mischievous younger lads practice their cheerleading stunts in the water while the adventurous few shoved into a cocoon of life jackets and water wings attempt snorkeling (even after my explicit shark warnings) and the land dwellers inspect the alien species of coconut. There's splashing, shrieking and shenanigans galore, all the while the Canon is stacked with a lens that could zoom enough to make ones epidermis appear transparent and shutter speed is set to light speed per second. Three hours later they're herded back onto the boat where they will compare electronics and matching souvenir hats.

Thailand's Prizes: Part One

2012-08-30T07:44:00.001-04:00

With less than a month left here in the Land of Thighs, I've begun compiling a list of my favorite things here: from foods to places and tiny Asian people, I will miss these things most when I return to where the Wild Things aren't.

1. Jumong

Educators aren't typically supposed to pick a favorite student and should be objective and blah blah... but well, I think that's horse shit. I have a favorite color, a favorite food, why can't I have a favorite small Asian child? So I do. His name is Jumong (Jew-mong) and he's the weirdest student other than Brazil who speaks in robot linguistics, incessantly repeating "Cut the Rope" and TeTe who disrobes completely front and center in the classroom before using the toilet. I've tried to communicate that he only need unbutton his shorts, but the little exhibitionist feigns ignorance in favor of displaying his unmentionables to his peers. Anyway, Jumong has a head the size of a cantaloupe on top of which rests a thick helmet of black hair, contrasting uncharacteristically non-Thai milk white skin. I'm certain he's got some Korean orJapanese in him and is surely the prototype for the perfect robot child. And not just because he zombie walks everywhere and spastically moves like a broken transformer action figure and I like teaching him novelty dance moves to watch him jerk about like a beached sea lion with Parkinson's. In my eyes, Jumong can do no wrong and although I try to keep my love for him subtle, the other students must wonder why Jumong's homework comes in the form of "Hug for teacher Arex!" From the laugher that sputters from his stomach and out of his mouth sounding like a squirrel caught in the spokes of a bicycle tire to his child's excuse for a monobrow and the way he swallows each word before he speaks it making him sound like a talking Big Gulp, Jumong lights up my days with his lantern of lunacy and I've hinted to his mother that I'd gladly take him should she relocate to Antarctica or undergo a lobotomy.

2.Scout Day

EveryWednesday is scout day. Students from all schools dress in their gender respective scout attire: khaki colored shorts and shirts with burnt orange shoes, brown socks, a blue bandana, a ranger hat for the boys and a blue skirt and top and nurse's bonnet for the girls. The scout activities commence promptly at 3pm and I'm still not 100% sure as to their function. Sometimes a pregnant lady wearing a matching scoutmasters uniform beats a gong while boys march and flamboyant teacher Bandit practices his karaoke poses. Other times they camp inside classrooms in the school on weekends and make food on grills. (Serious survival tactics being executed) Other days teams of prepubescents fly head first into inanimate objects during blindfolded piggy pack races, boys battle eachother with wooden poles Jedi style, while a group of younger boys sit silently in rows holding up the "Scout's Honor" hand gesture for twenty straight minutes while two female teachers trade gossip and curry recipes.

3. Som Tam

Known to we Farang as "papaya salad," Som Tam is one of Thailand's signature dishes. Usually a burly woman or poorly disguised Ladyboy deposits the ingredients into a mortar and beats it to submission like a baby seal. Shaved green papaya, lime, 2-3 chilis, palm sugar, garlic, fish sauce, tamarind paste, tiny dried shrimps and peanuts are all smashed together until they form a delicious salad spicy enough to sprout chest hair on an infant. I first made the mistake of ordering mine "Thai Style" and was more than a little terrified when a woman deposited what appeared to be claws into my salad. Did that broad just throw a tarantula into my lunch? Well, not quite. But she did throw in some dried crab claws that add an extra fish aftertaste (not my favorite thing in the world.) Thankfully, Som Tam and I have moved beyond that treacherously scarring incident and our relationship has blossomed. Even if one of us leaves the other with heartburn, sweat stains and scorched lips. I can't do much about my addiction at this point. The hotter the better. And it literally takes my tongue swelling and physically not being able to deposit the rest of my meal into my mouth before I'll give up. Eating Som Tam is more like a marathon than a casual dinner and nobody likes a wuss.

4. Kai Dow

I was reluctant to immediately delve into another one of my Thai food addictions as not to appear overanxious about my next meal, but let's be honest, that's all I'm thinking about at 6pm. Kai Dow is basically a fried egg except for a special difference: you can slap it literally on top of ANYTHING and make your meal instantaneously better. Kai Dow Dat has become a common saying between our friends as we accept that eggs are no longer pigeonholed into the breakfast category. Pad Thai? Kai Dow it. Fried Rice? Kai Dow dat. Som Tam? Well, you get the picture. Two months from now when I walk into a Taco Bell and order a Quesadilla, bean burrito and Nachos and ask the cashier to toss a fried egg onto each item for the unarguable price of 30 cents and they look at me like I just asked them to prepare my meal using only their big toe and a spoon, I may just tear up a bit.

5. My Motorbike

The first time I braved the morning commute to work I probably shaved 5 years off of my lifespan from the stress alone. Other motorbikes propelling around at unnecessary velocities, massive trucks weaving in and out of poorly drawn yellow lines, bus drivers holding up lines of traffic to pick their wedgies and endless pot holes filled with gravel. I quickly realized I was in the largest, most important game of Frogger in my life and I can't afford to make one wrong hop. The mindset on the roads here is that the other person always sees you and will yield to your demand. I wonder how people in America will respond to me flicking my wrist to the left indicating that as we speak I intend to cross all four lanes unencumbered. Coupled with the trepidation noted above, the roads of Thailand are littered with WTF situations, people and objects. A family of 6 glide through the lanes like a well practiced bobsled team while a truck full of pineapples plows into a billboard advertising fish flavored Pop-tarts. A van with a the words PEE WATER written in bold and decoratively adhered to the back of this man's windshield races another car with the Che Guevarra's face artistically splayed across the bumper. Not only am I fighting for my life, but I'm greeted with a billion things I'd like to snap photos of for concrete evidence when my future psychiatrist wonders why I associate raw meat with wind. Well, Doc, on my morning commute I'd occasionally witness slabs of hanging meat dancing in the breeze from their respective hooks while their merchant hastily makes his way to the market where he'll peddle the debris-covered animal flesh to my fried chicken lady.

Rock Candy

2012-08-15T23:28:00.000-04:00

I'm strapped into a purple diaper apparatus like the ones used to twirl carnival goers three swings past dizzy but the chain line safety line is replaced by a small girl holding a rope. Clipped onto my harness dangle metal 'beaners' each with a small tag bearing the comforting message, "warning: climbing is dangerous." no advice of making the situation less hazardous, just the simple statement of its peril.

Florida is flat. The loftiest rocks are the ones decoratively adhered onto the walls of stone dwellings. Clearly I knew rock climbing was a thing people do. Unshaven hippies in far off lands who bead jewelry made from tree bark and protest outside butcheries. Until I moved Thailand I'd never met a "climber” and never entertained the idea that I could ascend anything other than staircases. Then I met an assemblage of folks whose idea of a great weekend involves scaling the side of large cliffs. I'm terrified of heights; even balconies find me bolted upright against the back wall rather than peering below at the stark image of my imprint in the asphalt. But after 9 months of discomfort, conquering fears begins to come naturally with this “well, I’m here, why not?” adopted mentality for people abroad.

The more my friends discussed dangling above the incredibly humbling images of nature’s infinite belongings, the more I desired to grasp the feeling that left my climber friends with this drunken euphoria. My friend and coworker Jill has been climbing for nearly a decade and offered to take Lindsay and I whenever we decided to go. With the number of weekends dwindling, I asked Jill if she could squeeze in a beginner’s climb. When she agreed, we were ecstatic. She rattled off terms like belay, draws, crag, routes; but my mind refused to preserve any information other than the prospect of an untimely death.

So we boarded the ferry to Koh PhiPhi, a smaller island near our own, where the movie The Beach was filmed, for all you Leo fanatics (Allie). As Lindsay and I later discussed, we knew nothing of climbing other than listening in on conversations between our friends; therefore zero knowledge transferred to zero expectations. I didn't know what falling would feel like or if I could even manage to hoist my body a foot off the ground.

So I’m strapped into my purple diaper, sweating profusely and rubbing chalk on my clammy palms to create some grip for my carnie hands. I'm not sure why I didn't realize that there would have to be someone holding onto my body weight from below, clearly I wasn't bitten by a radioactive spider and given the ability to scale walls with sticky ease, but the image of Jill who barely weighs more than the kindergarteners she teaches sent a twinge to my fingers, which began to dance erratically upon the first grope of stone. I know she's capable of "belaying" me, but I couldn't help but wish I’d eaten a smaller lunch.

Seeing a coworker, whose contemplative attitude some people often take as a sign of disinterest, in her element was inspiring. She went from Jill the kindergarten teacher to climber Jill, scaling rock walls with the greatest of ease like some sort of modern day superhero monkey. I’m belaying as she sets our routes effortlessly, tiptoeing about ledges about as wide as a thumb and navigating up the cliff with the poise of the a ballet dancing mountain goat. She springs to the top of the route in what seemed like seconds and then she’s back on the ground tying the rope onto my diaper. She hooks herself up with the belaying equipment and shoots me the expectant “okay, get your ass on the rock” look.

Is there any special way I should go?

Try to grab the spots with the most chalk.

Oh, that makes sense.

I step up onto the ledge and so it begins. I grip the first “hand hold” which is more like a tiny outcry of rock wide enough for a lizard to sunbathe. I hoist my leg into a crevice that seems fit for a foot. It continues this way: just the rocks and me. I caress and grope them like an estranged lover searching for an ounce of forgiveness and when given a little leeway, I hold on for dear life. I manage to rise a good distance when, in response to the shouts of encouragement and advice, I look down. I realize that coupled with the distance we had to climb to reach the base of the climb: I’m up pretty effing high. My limbs begin to involuntarily tremble and I turn back to face the peace of the wall. There all I see are slits and crannies where I have to wedge my hands and feet if I hope to reach the top.

Reaching the top never seemed like a possibility, but I soon assumed the calm learned from months of yoga coupled with the thai “mai bpen rai” (thai version of hakuna matata) outlook on life. I breathed deeply and relaxed as much as one can suspended above solid ground, and let my fingers search for safety and my feet attain stability. Finally, I made it to the top! I sat back in the harness, now confident that little Jill could bear my body weight… well less confident and more physically exhausted and in need of a skyview seat to paradise. I turned to face an hourglass of beaches congratulating the motivation I’d discovered on this rock wall with a tranquility achieved through conquered experience. I sat back in my hanging lay-z-boy and took in all the thoughts rushing through my head.

To be honest it was two thoughts. 1. I have a terribly unpickable wedgie and 2: this is really gosh darn incredible. I finally understood why people would choose to hoist their body weight into exceedingly narrow spaces while irrigating the lands below with corpulent beads of perspiration, suspended solely by the weight of another human.

For our second climbing expedition we headed to the spectacular Tonsai: a climbing Mecca for evolved primates from around the world. A pristine strip of beach enclosed by towering stacks of rock unscathed by the hassles of modern day society—an entire place run on power from generators! A t-shirt in one of four corner shops reads “I’m leaving Tonsai tomorrow! …maybe.” And so is the mindset in this magical place. A community of climbers awakens before 9 am to beat the masses at Mama Chicken, where a prehistoric Thai woman whips up delectable entrees in a small shack with her family while climbers plot their routes and ready their equipment. Then the crowd parts like a bad comb over and everyone scatters to the various walls along the beach. Resting routes with names like “groove tube,” “lion king” and “mystic snow” now find rock dwellers scaling their façade with newfound energy from Mama Chicken’s muesli and fruit shakes. Shouts of encouragement and “beta” rise from the ground, sometimes finding the climber other times dissipating into the muggy atmosphere, as the climber’s own mental concentration trumps any sound from below.

I failed to realized how much physical and mental strength I possessed until faced with the option to fight my way up or fall. The first fall is the most terrifying and after you realize the person on the other end of that rope can support your body weight, you continue assured that you’re safe. My friend Tim described his progress in climbing with by saying, “A fall used to be my hands started slipping and I let go, now a fall is when all my strength gives way and my arms give out.” I never thought I’d enjoy rock climbing let alone develop a compulsion. Discoveries like this make me appreciate living in a place where I can cultivate new talents and hobbies. I’ve learned so much about my likes and dislikes and changed by outlooks on so much. Instead of being wealthy, I want to be happy; instead of being thin, I want to be strong; and instead of waiting for the future, I want to clutch the now.

And as we sat in the long tail boat watching incredible Tonsai disappear in the distance, Jill reminded us in her ever-poetic use of her second language to “make a wish to the rocks.” But we won’t part for long. We’ll prepare for another climbing weekend soon, because as my Filipino poet says “we’ve got to keep our relationship with the rock.” And good relationships with rocks are always better than rocky relationships.

Singapore: from island outhouse to modern penthouse.

2012-08-07T01:42:00.000-04:00

If Steve Jobs, the Jetsons and an iPhone procreated, resulting in an Asian love child, that child would be Singapore. For the rare long weekend amidst 45-hour workweeks with small crayon-eaters, we decided to forgo another island weekend and headed from the outhouse to the penthouse, so to speak. After living the third world island life for nearly a year, I figured a city would be different, especially if that city happens to have more rules than a mosque, one of which forbidding gum chewing.

At first glance, Singapore (although actually an entire country) resembles any other big city. And then you realize it’s clean. And there are trees—3 million trees, to be exact. And you begin to realize that when planning this futuristic utopia, people had more in mind than just creating a financial and business Mecca within the chaos of southeast Asia; these people actually cared enough about the environment to nix the chopping of trees in favor of more buildings and decided to harness the positive aspects that spring from nature. And after pruning these 3 million trees, Singaporeans use the 80 tons of clippings as energy from the biomass boiler.

Our first day in this strange, clean place with garbage cans and people following traffic rules, we headed to the Gardens by the Bay—an ultramodern take on greenhouses. Two massive domes border the the bay and a hotel, which appears to be three large skyscrapers holding up a cruise ship preparing for flash floods like a modern day ark of paranoia. The first dome houses flowers and plants from sub-arid areas of five different continents and in the time it takes you to walk around this massive greenhouse of perpetual spring, you can view and learn about plants, flowers and trees from Australia, Africa, the Americas, Asia and Europe. Other than its aesthetic value, learning about botany rivals geology in things I’d rather chew shrapnel than participate in; but something about being inside a large transparent egg overlooking a futuristic city enveloped in cool air and picturesque man-made flowerbeds gives a feeling of protection against a world of encroaching entrepreneurial, industrial and technological pandemonium.

The second pod recreates the feel and appearance of mountain scenery complete with a waterfall, misty mountain air and a large metal structure covered in various mosses, orchids, mountain shrubbery encircled by a small forest of conifers and evergreens. You clank up the metal steps and onto a walkway suspended in midair, winding around a bird’s eye view of the tops of trees and the side of a synthetic peak. It sounds completely mundane, but the truth is, the inspiration behind the structure had our minds reeling more than the structure itself.

It took nearly 6 years to develop and construct, opening only a month before our arrival. The idea blossomed from an entry in an international design competition in 2006. The best part of the entire place isn’t its physical grandeur or appearance, but the fact that it was created within this massive city as a means to educate people on the importance of environmental conservation. A projector on the way out timelines global warming into the future and illustrates its consequences affecting not only our habitat but also the habitats and lifelines for species all over the planet that will be wiped out if we continue heading in such a gloomy direction. I mean, I love the world of Nightmare Before Christmas, but that doesn’t mean I want to bunk with Jack Skellington. (That’s a lie, I totally do)

A forest of large “supertrees” creates a grove along the edge of the park. These metal structures look as if Tim Burton had been called in to design a set of eerie foliage for his next movie about corpse brides or skeleton cats. But the trees serve a purpose: they harvest solar energy powering their own light show each night.

I was blown away by the level of respect Singaporeans have for not only their uncontaminated country but also for the environment and the world in general. People follow the rules, they clean up after themselves and most importantly, they are mindful of the future and their roles in shaping it. For a city housing 5 million people, Singapore is creepily quiet, clean and unspoiled. And as lovely as that sounds, it made me more nervous than anything. Somewhere that quiet? That clean! Surely it’s a trap.

Luckily we were staying in little India and the hectic crowds of Indian people replaced the chaos of Thailand and gave us at least a little of the frenzied comfort of “home.” The endless shopping malls and multitudes of “glitchers” unable to set their smart phones down for three minutes reminded me of all the things I loathe about the consumerist society from which I cometh. Taunting me with harrowing images of home, I once again retreated into spiraling thoughts of returning home and the impending culture shock to ensue. Sure, it was nice feeling clean for the first time in nine months. And a little peace and quiet was welcomed, but the fact its, I’ve become so conditioned to the chaos that I don’t know anything else. And as we returned to our modest room to find our coffees from earlier crawling with 30 small cockroaches, rather than being angry and demanding to know why a relatively expensive room by Southeast Asian standards would be overrun with vermin, we all laughed because that’s the Asia we know and love. And I wouldn’t have it any other way. Until I’m forced to rejoin western society in October, that is. Terrifying.

Don't know how I'm supposed to leave this.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH, MISS LIPPY!

2012-07-16T07:29:00.000-04:00

A woman at yoga the other week inquired about the level Lindsay and I teach. When we replied kindergarten, laughter betrayed her attempt at taciturnity and she muttered that she made it a week in her own TEFL experience with the little mongrels. Her expression changed from amusement to sheer sympathy as she nudges me on the shoulder and says, “it takes a strong woman to teach kindergarten.”

The whole way home I thought about my kindergarten teacher, Ms. Humprey and I smiled. An expansive woman in her mid-thirties with chaotic curls and smile that could’ve singlehandedly caused global warming. In addition to providing my first course in the upcoming world of education, which would undoubtedly consume my life for the next 17 years, Ms. Humphrey moonlighted as my babysitter on occasion when my parents needed a hiatus from the incessant chatter about undeniably awesome 4-year-old things. I’d like to think Ms. H voluntarily took an extra interest in me because she recognized my specialness from a young age, but I think she may have run a (semi-illegitimate) daycare in her spare time.

I guess my point is that our kindergarten teachers make an impact on the course of our lives, however minute. They are the first adults bestowed the privilege to mold the tiny impressionable minds of the never before schooled future of the human race. Sure, it doesn’t take a heap of brain power to instruct someone to color the pig pink, but it takes some compassion, patience and love to do so while one monkey is hanging from the rafters, tiny thieves are pilfering my purse, curious Kip’s got two crayons shoved into his nasal cavities and the nudist has stripped down completely to use the restroom.

Patience has never been my forte and so I was forced to use a different weapon from the arsenal. I combined my affinity for humor and entertainment with semi-educational instruction to form a superpod of knowledge and amusement in T. Arex’s classroom. After a morning of teaching the thizz face, the dougie and various other novelty dance moves accompanied by the tune “Call Me Maybe,” I was feeling a bit under the weather (perhaps associated with the unidentifiable grey meat for lunch). My patience level hit an all-time low and I skirted the border between teacher and tyrant. After the kids began chanting “TEACHA ANGRY,” attempting to display their knowledge of the emotions I taught them last month, I cracked and my anger dissolved into embarrassment.

These foul-smelling booger pickers aren’t actively trying to send me into early retirement, they’re simply missing the social graces that evolve with age. My mind travels back to the time my little brother squeezed the breast of one of my mother’s clients at the supermarket. The woman, although shocked, laughed it off with complete poise. And those dwarves taking turns rubbing their cheeks on my unshaved legs and recoiling—a true game of game of pain endurance—aren’t adults; their tiny minds are still incubating and the whole reason for their irritating presence in my personal space is that they need instruction. So instead of harboring misplaced anger, I lined up my little minions and instructed them to come and give teacher some much needed hugs, one-by-one. Not only did this little game put me soul in a much better light, but the little freaks were coming back for seconds and thirds like plump crowds at Golden Corral.

After Hug-O-Rama, as I playfully nicknamed our ‘game’ and which they pronounced “hug-a-llama” (also fitting), I was showered in stickers and given a Power Rangers pin, which I am taking as a symbolic initiation into the inner circle of their five year old cult. After today, I realized that not only is teaching Kindergarten the hardest job in the world maybe besides being the guy that hangs off the back of the garbage truck, it’s equally as rewarding and entertaining, as long as the clown gauges her audience and never has a shortage of bribery tokens. I can also thank my little stooges for allowing me to foster my inner child, who stubbornly refuses to grow up.

I’ll never forget my kindergarten teacher and I truly hope that when I depart from this life that my little trolls will remember the funny antics of Teacher Alex and that weird afternoon she forced us each to embrace her. This post is dedicated to all of the kindergarten teachers out there. From Miss Lippy to Arnold, thank you for being the real-life superheroes for life’s first wave of sweaty recessers!

But remember children: recess time is not only a special time for you children, but for Miss Lippy too, so stay outside.

30 Days in a Microwave

2012-07-11T23:09:00.000-04:00

I confidently stride into the room, unaware that my short employment stint at a fitness center could never fully prepare me for playing twister in a tropical rain forest. Beads of sweat begin to accumulate in my unmentionable creases and the first trickle descends from the nape of my neck into my poor excuse for cleavage. I loathe sweating yet, sadly, as a particularly wooly breed of albino human, sweating comes as naturally as breathing. I inventory the nearby mats harboring overweight elderly people and overconfidence blankets my sweltering body in the cool air of assumption. Clearly I'll be able to bend my body faster, better and longer than the decaying funeral home field trip that knitted their own yoga towels during craft hour. I'm young, spry and in relatively good shape.

After a few minutes of sweating in the aptly named "dead body" pose, a wilted bean stock saunters gracefully into our humble microwave, his chestnuts securely fastened in a scanty bikini. He introduces himself as the instructor and seems amicable enough, diffusing the aura-sensing palm-reading vibe emitted by most yogis. Ten minutes in and I look like a Niagara Falls tourist without the protective poncho. Sammy Sunshine quickly morphed into Attila the Hun berating us serfs from his Olympic champion-esque platform and I hate him, I hate yoga and I hate gasping for rogue molecules of oxygen amidst clouds of moisture—especially considering this dampness is occupied by the scent of liver and onions.

Utterly perturbed that I've voluntarily engaged in an activity in which I wasn’t instantaneously adept, I humph and grrrph my way through a few half-assed postures, watching as granny's got her foot clear her head and the ninety year old fat man’s been teetering on one leg for what seems like thirty minutes while I've been chugging water and attempting to smear away the sweat congregating on my upper lip. Lindsay is all tunnel vision in the front mirror, executing every posture to perfection even as I attempt to distract her with amusing faces and drowning person thrashing movements. Not the place for humor.

I leave the class, conscious that the four other classes in my package were as unnecessary as bringing a towel into that steam room orgy. And I effectively evade Bikram yoga for another few months while Lindsay practices nearly every day and continually pushes me to join. Finally, I succumb and purchase a thirty-day package, vowing to finish the notorious tough 30-day challenge, with veteran Linds as my coach and accompanying yoga buddy.

And today I am proud to say after 30 consecutive days, I have completed my Bikram yoga challenge! I made it from work across the island in 30 minutes each day, through monsoons, on flat tires, hung-over, sick and after minor bodily injuries. And strangely, those 90 minutes inside the sun’s ashtray provided more peace and stability in my life than an unlimited Xanax script. Five hundred and forty seconds of thinking of nothing other than remembering to breath and occasionally hold my foot in some unnatural direction. 90 straight minutes of staring at myself in a mirror was like watching the tin man trying to do gymnastics, but I managed to destroy my self deprecating thoughts and the humorous imagery inlaid in this practice, like watching 15 other people twisting themselves into dripping pretzels in some sort of cultish rain dance.

I’m a flamingo! I’m a cobra! Then a rabbit and some sort of jet plane. I morph from one object to the next with the least amount of poise, channeling way more Transformers than Chicago. During floor poses I slink about my confined rectangular kiddy pool in a very newt-ish manner. My face glows a hideous shade of purple and the humidity twists wandering locks of my hair into sweat-soaked tendrils that float beside my face like mangroves along the riverbank.

WE DID IT!

And after this month, even if I’ve lost not a pound, I feel much happier and peaceful not to mention accomplished. This is the first time I’ve felt truly challenged physically since high school sports and even though at times I just wanted the instructors to leave me be so I can half ass my way through in peace, I thank them for pushing me to my limits and making me enjoy it. I will continue with Bikram yoga as a modification to my existence in general by constantly engaging in things that make me feel challenged and/or uncomfortable. Because if you’re not aching, sweating or straining, you’re not doing it right.

Different Shades of Grades

2012-07-06T00:19:00.001-04:00

Today I am truly humbled. As I briefly mentioned, I am taking a FREE online course with a sociology professor from Princeton via coursera.org. Currently residing abroad sparked a multitude of questions about people from different societies and the human race in general. I wanted to know why we behave the way we do in accordance to the societal conditions placed upon us since birth insofar as to say I want to know what makes people tick, what makes them different and how they respond to life's trials because of their circumstances.

Ive thoroughly enjoyed the class and it's been good to have all these esoteric ideas thrown at me to ponder in my free time. I was yearning for knowledge after being out of the classroom for so long, but wanted to apply the ideas I'd receive to the things I encounter on a daily basis here. A few days ago, I realized it was "exam day." Exam? That word tastes bitter rolling around on my tongue. I haven't had to take a test in about a year and it's been great, but now I'm confronted with a beast of a midterm and of course I didn't study. I mean, I don't HAVE to partake in the midterm as I'm taking this class on my own accord. But my inner nerd screamed SUCK IT UP. The same snarky wench that forced me to do extra credit and make 1000 flash cards for each and every test in college and nearly experienced an aneurism with our first C (ironically in WOMEN'S STUDIES). So I took the test dagummit, and today I'm more than elated with my decision.

Part of the course involves peer evaluation and I had the opportunity to evaluate a fellow student's work. I began reading nameless student's paper and my eye started twitching as I encountered not only the reading comprehension of a fifth grader, but endless spelling and grammatical errors and diction misuse. The inner grammar policewoman inside squirmed in discomfort as I forced myself to grade objectively.

I reach the essay portion of the exam and my heart stops. The student in question is no Princeton snob, not even a Western-educated idiot, rather the student in question is a lower class member of society in a country I've recently become familiar with-- Cambodia, my next-door neighbor here in Thailand. The student interweaves concepts from the class cohesively with his or her own life's circumstances and I'm suddenly impressed by the error ridden grammar and spelling because I realize how difficult it must have been for this person to not only find the time to take this class, but to even understand the language in which lectures and readings are given.

Spending some time in Cambodia among the Khmer people, I know that most of the country is fairly poor and uneducated, yet unaffected by circumstance and eager to learn. This person warmed my heart and awakened my soul in a way in which I'm truly grateful. How wonderful it is that Princeton and other colleges are giving people across the world the opportunity to further their knowledge not only with useless notions inapplicable to their lives, but with relevant ideas that can change the way they think forever.

This student didn't get an A on his or her midterm, he or she will be lucky for a passing grade; however the courage this person displayed in even partaking in a midterm exam composed for students of an IVY LEAGUE school is truly humbling.

I don't think it's any accident that this is the paper I received to evaluate and once again I thank the universe for a gift that lifts me from my own self-absorption and places me in the shoes of another inspiring human being. This world is a very big place and sometimes we don't realize this because were consumed by the need to make an imprint. It isn't until we see the tiny footprints made by another that we see how important it is sometimes to walk beside someone rather than ahead of them.

Smokin' with Granny

2012-07-01T22:42:00.002-04:00

Not actually granny, but a dead ringer. Granny may have been older.

Occasionally, life forces get a kick out of molding a routine activity into an unforeseen episode of shock and awe. An event leaving your personal judgment ransacking the cosmos in search of any shred of rationale to apply to this particular situation with which it’s being undermined. A jarring jolt from the universe saying, “I got bored being predictable.” Often these events exist in the form of misfortunes, reminding us that life is precious and we should live as such. Other times, comically misunderstood occurrences illustrate that although unpredictable, life hands you unannounced triumphs from the world of weird; a place hidden somewhere beyond depths of explanation, lacking any sort of reason and overflowing with absurdity.

Yesterday, we went for routine 9 doll-hair massages. After a (somewhat painful) hour-long oil massage—well technically a couple’s oil massage considering the place has three massage beds and no matter whom you go with, you’re getting real up-close and personal—we sat on the massage beds, scantily covered in a sheet drinking ginger tea while one of the women stands there intently inspecting us. We engaged in light conversation, inching towards our belongings, hoping she would pick up on our cues that we’d like to re-dress without a voyeur.

Soon after dressing, paying and assuring her that we’d be back, she continued to chatter, her broken English words compressing to form an off key Asian concerto. I strained to follow her discourse gathering bits and pieces of soliciting and discussion of corporal organs as she frantically points to an anatomy poster on the wall and then back to our bodies. She mentioned something about “FREE” and two minutes later we’re back on the massage tables while “Green,” our chatterbox friend’s in-house witch doctor is pressing her hulk fingers into our stomachs as if attempting to rearrange our internal organs externally.

We cry out in agony at the intense pain being inflicted onto our digestive organs but, not phased by ear-piercing yelps of anguish, the bulldozer continues her probing, intermittently shouting in Thai to Tua, who informs us in English of our digestive downfalls. Similar to a psychic, this Thai alternative medicine woman knew the ailments that had been affecting us for both short and long term periods of time. She went back and forth, bulldozing one stomach while the other sits beneath a sack of warm stones, relishing in the respite from being physically abused. She informs us that we need to “chi” more often, meaning we need to poop regularly, which clearly we would be keen on. Dr. Quinn also mentioned that my liver is experiencing some negative affects due to the alcohol I consume.

In the midst of this bittersweet torture, Green’s daughter saunters in from the back room wearing a nightgown and eating pork rinds while intently watching. Green’s husband sits diagonally from where we’re being “examined” watching Thai soap operas. It was truly a family affair. Moments later, an ancient Thai cadaver muddles through the room, countenance hidden by a thick layer of white powder, although unable to conceal the sunken cheekbones and pursed lips betraying a mouth of absent teeth. I glance at Lindsay and back at the very first Thai matriarch placing every ounce of energy into stifling laughter.

Granny musters the strength to make it to the door, then spins around as if she misplaced her entire reason for moseying on over along with her bicuspids. Again she hobbles back into the room, inching for the door. We shoot questioning glances at Tua, who glances at the white-faced raisin behind her and says “Mama, too much powder!” She begins giggling and wiping the old woman’s face. Granny surveys the room as if having achieved sight for the first time then hobbles outside the glass doors and parks herself and her plastic bags at a picnic table, proceeding to roll some sort of cigarette and puff dense clouds of white smoke into the air like the chimney of a crematorium.

I recall Tua mentioning her mother from a small village in southern Thailand, saying that the woman often came to Phuket to fish, gather mollusks and make a scene at the local Tesco when they refused to allow her to barter for goods.

“Mama live in the old Thailand. She trade for everything, no use money in Pantaloon. Mama come to Phuket and fish.” Not the same Mama.

I assess the physical condition of the 200-year-old woman toking it up outside and ask Tua, “That same Mama that goes fishing?”

Tua nods and emits a laugh akin to a disbelieving chuckle, shocked at the fact that this prehistoric broad is baiting hooks and yanking up sea creatures to trade for tamarinds and mangoes.

“What is mama smoking?” I ask, generally concerned that the thought of filling the dusty lungs of this fossil with smoke may shave a few years off of the decades she undoubtedly has remaining.

“Oh! She smoke Thai herb! You will try!” …We will? Oh hell… we will.

The entire crew ambles outside and Linds and I sit down at the table with Granny. Tua asks her in Thai to roll us a few of her special cigarettes. And we watch as the shriveled, yet nimble appendages of Mother Time set to work. She hands me the creation wrapped in dried banana leaves and a lighter and demonstrates how to effectively light a banana leaf joint.

“What do you think it is?” Lindsay whispers as I reach for the unknown.

“Probably Opium.”

“Oh, well okay.”

I light it and proceed to inhale and exhale the fluffy whiteness, feeling momentarily lightheaded and giddy after only a puff. Nope, not tobacco. But not marijuana either. After smoking with granny, we still possessed our faculties, but felt loopy, so we stay there for awhile watching granny pound and toss handfuls of a concoction back and slowly but eagerly masticating it with her three visible teeth.

“Now what is she eating?”

“Thai herb. Very good for skin and stomach… you will eat.”

At this point, we already know we will. Tua instructs granny to pound us some of her blend with her portable metal mortar and pestle and Wrinkle-toes begins pulling out the supplies for her witches brew: a few green leaves, a substance similar to Crisco and some sort of reddish root. She tosses it all in and begins thrusting her fists together while staring beyond us into the world in which she resides… someplace circa 1850. She ceases pounding and scoops us each a dime-sized amount and Tua instructs us to put it in our mouths and chew.

The chalky substance hit my tongue with the bitterness of an aggrieved ex lover. Linds manages to choke back a vomitous reflex and we smile as if the pile of shrubbery in our mouths is a delectable pastry. Without breaking eye contact or into even a shred of a smile, granny scoops a mountain-sized amount of the stuff into her fist and shovels it into her mouth with the swiftness of ravenous primate. Lindsay and I chuckle a bit and whisper bout the anomaly seated across from us and Tua says, “Mama have no teeth! Haha it take long time to chew.”

In Thai Tua asks Mama how many teeth she has. Granny looks up from her daze and spits a matter-of-face answer between mouthfuls of clay earth.

“Jed.”

Granny knew she has exactly seven teeth and made no apologies for it. No trace of embarrassment, not an ounce of shame. She went back to staring into the great beyond of Chaofa East road and rolled herself another fag. I aspire to the greatness that was this old ass woman--we all need a little more of what she’s smoking.

Think Round

2012-06-25T01:52:00.003-04:00

Some little gremlin must get his kicks off eating my minutes. That’s really the only way to explain the fact that I only have three months left in Thailand. We settled on one year when we embarked on this journey and our year is about expired. It’s crept up so quickly and I’ve realized I’ve spent entirely too many minutes living in indifference and boredom rather than basking in paradise.

So a few weeks ago after the monsoon depression, Lindsay and I made a pact to get our minds right because the only possible way someone can be dejected in paradise and in life in general is if they can’t find a smile in every situation. We’ve been spending less time indoors and more time trying things we’ve never done—like surfing, 30 consecutive days doing yoga in a sweatbox or taking a FREE sociology class online at Princeton. (coursera.org ... DO IT) My stress from teaching came from the seriousness I placed on a classroom full of four year olds—tiny little people that just want to make teacha proud. My only real job is to make them giggle and try and keep them from hurting themselves with over sharpened pencils—that I can do.

We stood up on our first waves and shared some life revelations while sitting on a cliff watching the setting sun engulfed by the enormity of the ocean like a misplaced firefly and pondering how the sun decides on which colors to paint the sky each night. After talking a lot about the absurd idea of one’s singular “soul mate,” we agreed on the fact that a person can have many soul mates… not necessarily many people who romantically fit the connotation, but friends, family, random people, moments, songs, inanimate objects, sunsets, smiles—these things can all be our soul mates if we recognize when they stir our spirit.

My coffee lady, in the moment when she places the perfect combination of coffee and milk into my cup that gives me the vigor to brave the day is momentarily the most appreciated person in my life. Princess Cuddles—my dingy grey (once stark white) teddy bear—is my snuggling soul mate. Every sunset that recharges my reason like a petrol pump of wisdom is my soul mate. My friends who constantly support me, challenge me, hug me, laugh with me and tell me when I’m completely full of shit are yings to my emotional yangs. My mom’s screwball cackle that shatters formality like a baseball bat in a glass shop is my laughter soul mate. That random old lady that resembles an incarnation of my deceased grandmother in Thai form who smiles deliberately (same menacing dentures and all) at me like she’s glimpsing deep into my being is my soul mate. And that little girl in 7/11 who pointed to Koala Yummies when I was having trouble deciding which cookie to go with on this eve was my snack time soul mate.

There is that perfect song for you at any given moment, that awakens something inside and drives you to the point of inexplicable tears and for those seconds, you’ve found the musical equivalent to a soul mate. Or some scene of beauty Mother Nature when mysteriously throws a flock of pigeons into your gut or raises the baby hairs on your hands fully upright and the universe reveals itself, giving you a connection to some enigma somewhere. It took me awhile to realize that life is 10 percent what it actually is and 90 percent what you think it is. We control much more than we’re given credit for even as much as to say your life is what you think it. No making involved.

And as we cruised through the jungle through the cool nighttime air, an assemblage of constellations materialize from beneath the dissipating grey clouds, our own personal planetarium as far as the eye can see. In this most honeymoon-esque of our adventures, I thought to myself, one would have to be a real shithead to be anything other than gloriously happy in this place. And as friends have left or are gearing up to leave, moving on to new chapters and new adventures, I cherish every second I have in this dreamland and I’m so very thankful for the sights I’ve seen, the things I’ve done, the knowledge I’ve gained and the multitudes of soul mates I’ve encountered that have enriched my life for sometimes only a moment, but left a tiny and lasting imprint on my soul. I guess what I’m saying is… thanks.

“There is no right or wrong, just masses and masses of ignorance and wisdom. Dearest Ann, think round.” –An anonymous inscription on a used book I found

How the OTHER Half Travels

2012-06-19T03:34:00.001-04:00

I haven't found the time in my ultra-busy schedule to compose a blog post, mostly because I've actually been finding time to be productive. But, I stumbled upon a post I composed after my travels through Laos, although I'd forgotten to blog it. As one of my favorite experiences in my adventures, I learned that most of the time things don't happen the way you intended and it's only when we step (or catapult) outside of our comfort zones that we discover things we'd never have had the chance to see or do.

Strapped two backpacks deep sitting front of our guest house waiting for a shuttle to take us to grab the bus to Vientienne from VangVieng, I can't shake the menacing feeling that we’d been forgotten. I’d watched a trolly shuttle up and down the main strip of road, carrying passengers bound to their seats with baggage, all heading in the direction of the bus station. Frustrated, I inquire whether our bus that was supposed to leave 20 minutes ago was actually leaving. Another Asian man in a sheer white tank top holding my future tells me not to worry, they are running late. I'm not sure what the recurring theme of direct contact with Asian men in wifebeaters has to do with impending misfortune, but after my tubing mishap a week before, I'd say I'm they coincide.

Fifteen minutes later, Browned Nipples pulls up in a tricked out Honda and starts loading our luggage into his trunk. Although baffled as to why this man is hauling my backpack into his personal vehicle, I stay silent and evade Jamie’s questioning glance for fear of bursting into the awkwardness cackle. Inside his Ricerator, Sheer Shirt states that the VIP Bus has broken down and the “local bus” will have to transport us to Vientienne.

As we barrel into the bus station with showboat swiftness, I scan the lot for our vehicle, but all I see are a few minivans and one massive pile of rusted parts gyrating and secreting sounds of fury in the middle of the lot. I turn to Jamie, whose mind is clearly traveling down the same dark path. I clamp down my agape jaw and transition between suppressing the alarm bells and calculating the logistics behind whatever scientific marvel propels this tin lunchbox. I realize it’s too late to back out now as Tank Top’s already hauled our things onto the leather upholstered metal benches.

Dazedly, I march up the steps and into Laos circa 1977. Five locals stare back, clearly as confused by my presence as I am. I briefly wonder how the rest of the VIP Busers found alternative transportation, when I realize that we had been forgotten. The scent of manure and metal rises from every orphus of this contraption as the driver shouts something in Laos and a woman takes her rightful seat by his side, indicating the beginning of our trip. Thankfully, there are only 6 of us, so Jamie and I both secure our own seat. Laughing to myself, I take out my notebook and begin chronicling our journey in RustBus77.

With windows and doors ajar, the bus barrels through back roads as the driver erratically honks, warning villagers interested in taking a death ride through the mountains that we’re here. Great, one of those buses. The kind without tickets or any sort of ceiling on the amount of humans they’ll shove into its motorized exoskeleton. New riders climb aboard clutching sacks of perishable food items, buckets wafting fishy odors and surgical masks to combat the waves of dust whisked through the open windows like swells of asthma rhythmically coating our faces with gusts of clay terrain.

Similar to a wooden rollercoaster attraction, no sane human actually wants to ride some rickety pile of decaying timber thrown together with oxidized bolts and Paul Bundy’s spit, people just want the theme park street cred of having braved this dangerous game of Chutes and Shit-Where’s-the-Ladder. This ride was very similar, minus the cart, tracks and semi-dependable park building codes. Instead, we’ve got 35 locals, 50 sacks of God knows what and a looming future image of riders banning together to Flintstone the last leg of this perilous backwoods trek.

Loving every second of the weirdness involved in this journey, I sit smiling like a creeper in a cult combine. I glance ahead watching as a truck spewing a colossal stream of water heads for us. I realize that with all the windows down, the entire left side of the bus is about to take a tidal wave to the eyesockets. I look over at Jamie, who is chin deep in some fried rice, completely unaware of the impending shower. Maybe a kinder person would’ve given her a heads up; instead I shifted my body for a front row seat/to avoid any ricocheting water drops. The truck trudges past dousing the faces of the entire left side of the bus. As Jamie gets a post-Songkran blast to the face, I explode in a maniacal guffaw pointing and holding my lunging chest while Jamie blankly stares with the same look my dog gives me when I hose him down out back.

The two Lao men seated behind her catch the cackle like wildfire and pretty soon everyone is laughing. At the fact that they all just received a free car wash? Maybe. But I’d like to think my laughter tremors broke down some ethnic barrier and for that brief moment, we all spoke the same language—a comical language of circumstantial soakedness. The trip continues and I’m thoroughly enjoying seeing Laos from this perspective, this intrusive glance into how the other half lives. The family of woodland creatures propelling the engine coupled with the scent of fishcakes and the lady holding an anticipatory paper bag beneath her mouth for most of the trip give me a warm sensation of belonging inside this 19^th century shard of shrapnel.

The rattle wagon successfully managed to bob, weave, sling, turn and eek its way up mountains, down hills and around perilously sharp curves, all the while running singularly on the hopes and prayers of its passengers. The little engine that did.

So when your VIP bus breaks down and you’re forced to take the local MuskBus: wear your gas mask, pack flame retardant pants and bring your pet chickens because anything goes. In this metal death trap half a world away, I felt at home in the smell of dirty feet and metal. It’s strange how adaptable we humans are at finding comfort in the obscurities thrown at us by life.

Monsoonity Monsanity

2012-06-11T01:48:00.001-04:00

My patience squirms inside the tiny claws of 60 schoolchildren, slowly squeezing through their talons like a traumatic play-doh project dangerously closing in on painful ulcers and a one-way ferry ticket to Shutter Island. Basically, I really like teaching kindergarten. Okay, so the latter statement drips with sarcasm, but teaching four year olds is a whole different ball game—less runs, more injuries and coach Arex erratically scampering after her marbles in the outfield.

In my 8 years of various employment “positions,” I’ve never napped on the job; quite frankly, I’m not a napper. Two days into Kindergarten and Teacha passes out for two hours in a drool pool on her desk. Even harsh whistle blows produce an explosion of laughter and pointing at my terrible stern face. They do not fear me. I need them to fear me.

Sadly, teaching small ones has me wondering, do I actually enjoy teaching? Mehhh. Do I enjoy teaching kids that don’t understand a word I utter? Out on a limb, the split second answer is NO… back near the trunk after some careful consideration the answer is still Ehhh. I love these kids, I do. And it breaks my heart every time I fail to console a face full of tears because I can’t bushwhack to the root of the problem through the language barrier brush. I love Thailand, but what good is love when you don’t have the time to express it? Let alone a millisecond to exhale. I just want sit on a dock of the bay with Otis, a bottle (barrel) of wine and a shattering sunset.

Maybe monsoon season washed away my patience along with the roads, trees and abandoned motorbikes or maybe I just figure if a job is going to make me miserable, I might as well make some money doing it. Some long-awaited sunshine this weekend helped to heal my bruised soul—it’s mind blowing how a little vitamin D can repair you mentally, physically and emotionally.

Monsoon season in Thailand is no joke. I mentally prepared myself for afternoon showers and maybe a lightning storm here and there, failing to comprehend the severity of this period. In Florida, when streets overflow and flood to depths rivaling the shallow end of a swimming pool, we shut shit down. Schools close, jobs grant vacation days and families huddle together under mattresses in the kitchen encompassed in mounds of canned goods and flashlights. It’s called hurricane season and frankly it’s terrifying, or so I thought until I nearly experienced a rain-induced apocalypse last week. I remember being mocked because during torrential downpours, I pushed my seat forward, gripped the steering wheel at 10 and 2, flipped on the hazards and my inner granny materialized as I coasted down the street slower than a drive-by Prius.

Photo credit to Corey Husak!

Now I’m completely perplexed as to how to safely travel through troughs of muddy streams on the back of a scooter while thousands of tiny water knives prick my skin and gusts of gale force winds relentlessly toss me around. I momentarily stop under some metal overhang to place my poncho on then resume the perilous journey home. Rather than dispelling raindrops, my plastic garment gets picked up by the wind and transforms into wings/sails, treacherously sending me veering to and fro, like a kite in a cyclone. I again take refuge below some rusted shack and watch as brave Thais glide down the road helmetless, taking gallons of rainwater to the dome. Where’s Chiddy Bang Bang when you need him?

Even the beaches experience the wrath of monsoonity. The tide commandeers our stretches of beach and swimmers turn around defeated as red flags denoting NO SWIMMING flap violently in the draft. I attempted to brave some storm swells and was repeatedly wrecked and tossed into the sandy throws of a ruthless ocean. Moments later, I staggered to the shore with bikini bottoms filled to the brim with beach and received an uninviting welcome committee of a lifeguard and rentacop each motioning me to step away from the water before Farang gets hurt. I glance down the beach realizing that not only am I the only idiot swimming in a storm, but I’m also the only idiot on the beach. Not my finest moment.

Thankfully Mother Nature sensed the depression and imminent alcoholism resulting from days of being confined to the space of ones own home allowed the sun to grace us with her cheery presence. And after drunkenly contemplating packing our shit and hopping the next flight to South America, Linds and I again grasped our sanity with both hands. And even as prisoners in our turquoise living room, we interpretively danced for hours to Wilson Phillips and anxiously anticipated the arrival of September with Earth, Wind & Fire. Call it insanity, call it contrived happiness, either way, we’re making a conscious effort to find solace in the storm. To harness the wind and transfer it into some joyful energy and maybe some puddle jumping.

Took My Chances on a Big Jet Plane & Nothing's Been the Same,Same

2012-05-14T10:54:00.001-04:00

In the seven months I’ve been in Thailand, I’ve experienced more backwardness, frontwardness, upwardness and sidewayzness than one can only hope to stumble upon during their time on Earth. I try and commit it all to memory, but lezbehonest, the ole cranium aint what it used to be. But here’s a few life lessons I’ve unearthed during my stint in SEAsia.

Embrace the butt sprayer. There’s absolutely nothing third world about a little extra cleanliness downstairs, so fear not the ass-hose, my friends.
When in doubt, smile and wave like a lunatic.
Time in Thailand is not measured in military time; rather in ‘I’ll get to it after my nap’ time.

There’s really no point in showering, using perfume, or defunking your wardrobe when twenty minutes later you’ll moto through an open fire and smell like BBQ pork.
I should’ve minored in charades. I knew I was blessed with gangly appendages for a reason.
Deter your attention away from the woman scrubbing your chicken in a bucket, with her hands.

There are enough pathetic looking street pups for Sarah McLachlan to make a feature-length tear-jerker.
In America, you find a shard of bone in your soup you complain to the chef and receive a complimentary meal. In Thailand, you find a shard of bone in your soup you contemplate the safest way around ingesting this weapon, so as to not offend anyone.
The worst possible place in traffic when hung over is the one between the garbage truck and the fish cart. Mmm Good Morning Ladiez.

The first time I tinkled in a squatty potty without sprinkling my toes will rival the birth of my first child on the euphoria scale.
Asian Marketing has zero correlation to the product being sold, yet those brilliant bastards could sell me a ham sandwich from a hardware store with that dancing rooster playing the xylophone.

I’m continually surprised by the objects Thai people can carry on motorbike. From generations of monks to bathtubs and goats… Tim O’Brien should write a book about that. The Things they Moto’d.
Never pass up the opportunity to drink with a group of middle-aged Thai men. Whether sipping Thai whiskey with the neighbors or a group of hairdressers outside the pharmacy, there’s nothing uninteresting about breaking cultural barriers with a little chest burning sauce.
Cheese is the unifier of all food groups. Thailand refuses to recognize this fact. Currently I’d ditch appendages for some QUESOOOO.
Taco Bell’s sales are going to skyrocket upon my return. Fourth meal? Try Fifteenth meal with a side of burrito.
Only here can you don tie-dyed MC Hammer pants, a shirt that reads “I LOVE POOPING” and an epic mullet and not be featured on ‘People of Wal-Mart.’

Cartoon, Pancake, Soccer, Neon, Jetski, Doughnut and Arm. No, I don’t have tourettes, these are a few of my favorite names of students. Cartoon may or may not have narcolepsy.
If a grown man named ‘Bandit’ walks into the library and proceeds to sit down and shamelessly belt out notes alongside music videos on the projector, continue marking tests like it’s nothing you haven’t seen before. No sir, this is not a place of education, this is your personal shower concert and I respect your self-assurance.

Those days when you don’t want to work, then you’re greeted by a mob of tiny hands reaching for you from all angles, chanting your name and you can’t help but grin. It’s a beautiful thing.
Asian kids don’t need toys; they will successfully play with my blonde arm hair for hours on end. Teacha like white bear.
Don’t auto-tune your ecosystem. Sometimes it’s best to ditch the headphones and listen to sounds from the ground.

That being said, there’s a song out there for everything and if you can’t find the right words, surely someone else can. A Zeppelin a day keeps the crazy at bay.
If you plan on throwing down some aggressive dance moves at a stoplight, make sure you’re far enough away from school that the Principal won’t be stopped next to you.
Appreciate connections made across the world.

Do something that absolutely terrifies you. This may or may not involve eating a fried insect or getting on stage in front of a graduation show and dancing to Pitbull.
We’re either running from something or searching for something, when all we really need is to stand still with our eyes closed for a while.

The ocean can answer most questions.
And this fish gets life.

We all want a connection; to someone or something. But the greatest connection is the one you find with yourself.
But it's okay to let the drawbridge down every once in awhile. Concrete castles get lonely after awhile... let someone in.

People come and people go, but that’s life. The trick is to hold onto the few who lift you up and force you to be a better version of yourself; and I’m so thankful for those people in my life, near and far. Couldn’t have made this journey without your support!

Slow Boatin' Laos Style

2012-05-11T23:12:00.001-04:00

After Songkran little Jameson and I packed our things to set out on a three day journey to Luang Prabong, Laos. That night, Jamie woke up with the yaks continuing until the next morning when we awoke bright and early to catch a mini-bus for a winding ride through the mountains. My own flood of nausea accompanied the early morning rays and I fought back bile burps, believing I can think my way out of vomiting, considering it’s been years since I’ve puked—sober or intoxicated. I’ve got a steel stomach.

I manage to sleep all 8 hours of this hellish bus ride, a nominal feat for a terrible sleeper. Jamie and I forced sprites down our throats at the first rest stop and couldn’t even find the physical strength to walk a block to take pictures of the amazing White Wat in Chiang Rai; something I’ve wanted to see forever. Finally we’re dropped at a random guesthouse where the driver instructs the entire van that we’re to stay until tomorrow morning when we board the slow boat.

With the departure of the van drivers went the last shred of informed people with English language, leaving us alone at this Psycho-esque motel 6. After 20 exhausting minutes of sweaty charades, I manage to get Jamie and I into a private aircon room, where we immediately crash for another five hours. Jamie showers as I flip between our two available tv channels—Thai soap operas or Thai game shows. I settle on more sleep. An hour later, I decide it’s my turn to shower the travel grime from my body, when I realize our water ceased flowing. Weak to the point of forgoing cleansing my filthy body for another 20 hours until the boat docks, I lay back in bed. But the insight that my hair has enough grease in it to power a KFC factory, rises my zombie body from the bed.

I ask one of the Thai women where I can shower and she points to a bathroom down a creepy alleyway, but I grab my toiletries, now determined to find running water. I soon discover this bathroom hasn’t any water either, save the butt sprayer that trickles a decent stream when operated low to the dirt-encrusted tile. So here I am, more physically weak than an osteoporosis patient, Asian squatting in the middle of a disturbing commode, whose wallpaper was no paper at all, but imprints of the carcasses of jungle creatures as well as shadows of living ones. At this point, I’m close to my low point in traveling and Thailand in general fighting back tears and the urge to rip this ass hose out of the wall and choke someone with it.

The next morning, we saunter down to the boat dock and are shuffled into this wooden arc filled with people who’d managed to get their sleepy asses up to stake claim on some seats. Seats being the wobbly old mini-van benches some shyster stripped from a junkyard to set precariously on the running boards of an already questionably secure “watercraft.” Apparently, slow boat is code for Farang Slave Ship.

We’re herded with the other stray sheep to the back of the boat, behind the engine, where we realize we’re being forced to sit Indian style for the next 8 hours behind this massive, toxin-emitting engine. After avoiding a near-death conversation with creepy Chem Trails man, I occupied my time with journaling and staring out the square portal to the past. Through that window, I watched tiny villages pass where children dance and swim at the bank of the muddy river, wearing little beyond a smile, simply enjoying the company of other kids just all being real kiddy. And as much as I sound like a predator, I yearned for that innocence, to be swimming stark naked in a river in the middle of the woods.

These little mountain goat children hop from cliff to cliff on quartz moon rocks, their padded jungle feet adhering to the slippery surface like tiny Velcro shoes. I gave a wave to a small boy fishing and he countered by raising his trophy—a tiny fish barely visible—pride glowing on his tiny face. These scenes transported my mind to a much simpler time, where a lone fisherman fastens a blue tarp into his blue shelter on his deserted strip of heaven. And as sun dips below the mountains, a flaming raspberry hanging above the jagged space crystals and paints the mountains as pink as those strangely pigmented buffalo littered along the riverbank, I’m thankful for this rickety boat, gas fumes and Laos.

We're All a Little Songkrazy

2012-04-30T11:44:00.000-04:00

The Songkran puppeteer dangles buckets, super soakers, cups, bowls, bags ensuring not an iota of dryness exists on any human, animal or inanimate object within the Nation. There lives a majestic hero of all holidays in hills of Thailand, where it’s completely acceptably to walk up to a complete stranger and pump a stream of water into the back of their unsuspecting head and they cannot have you arrested for assault. A national holiday where buckets of ice water are dumped onto the heads of farang by truckloads of passing Thai people crowded around a garbage can housing a small glacier radiating more frigidity than a mail-ordered Russian bride.

After each pot of frost water dumped on your head, you pray for that follow-up bucket of unusually warm and disgustingly dirty river water fetched from the moat surrounding the city center. But when you’ve somehow found yourself on the other end of an icy bucket, some rubber band deep inside holding together puzzle pieces of sanity and morality snaps and triggers a feeling of superhuman all-encompassing power combined with a sadistic need to find the perfect douche bag deserving of a frosty pail to the dome.

This power flows through the veins of human people transforming them into members of the Songkranian cult whose main principles are: nowhere is safe, I don’t care if you have a cell phone, I’ll aim for you not the baby and one in the eye is worth five in the chest. Speaking for myself of course, I sensed a demon being released during this inexplicably glorious holiday. A Songkranic Sprite prowling the streets of Chiang Mai, bucket in one hand, beer in the other and a chronically bursting water gun dangling around my neck—a twelve year old boy’s ideal notion of jewelry.

We combined Phuket teacher forces to form a Songkran squadron fit to man gunners and bushwhack camouflaged through dense jungle in hostile territory. To my fellow comrades and I, this festival was no holiday indeed—it was full scale, no holds barred conflict zone. We gained position outside a local clothing shop with a handy bar out front. The women working the shop brought us homemade necklaces, papaya salad and even permitted our soaking wet bodies to slog between aisles of expensive looking dresses and use their toilet.

Quickly, this spot became out territory and turf wars waged between our shop and the pub next door. I continued to scamper off throughout the day, back to where I discovered barrels of ice water that a kind Thai man permitted me to use in exchange for a small fee. The fee being that during the amount of time it takes me to fill up my gun and bucket, he continuously pours buckets of icy water on top of my head. Sadistic as that sounds, I understood his logic and took the painful torture in stride, because everyone knows pain is progress—especially in Songkran.

A parade pushes through the streets filled with euphoric Songkranians, high on the authority of water warfare and exquisitely dressed men and women undergo shots to the face, buckets to the dome, hoses to the skull and continue marching along like tiny nutcracker soldiers, poised beyond temper tantrums resulting from lost contacts or temporary water blindness.

The next day, we opted away from our usual spot and took a quiet back road by our friends’ hotel, where more than ample amounts of dry and irritable tourists attempted to scurry about undetected. We called ourselves the Soi Dogs and even pleading and bribery could not save you from our rapid fire. (Short bursts between friends). We all saw very dark places arise within ourselves, Heart of Darkness type places that arrive when obsession trumps realism and artillery of any kind is involved. Especially when the strolling strangers cease walks and one must succumb to turning on one’s companions.

My favorite (and most painful) Songkran moment occurred when this particularly dark cavernous fraction inside of my gangly blonde exterior fills with the excitement of battle and animal instincts took hold. A Thai family stood ready for contest beneath a tailgate tent. My backup were caught with empty tanks and refueling their arsenal… I was left to my own devices.

I give my gun a few intensely serious pumps, crouch to assault position and as an eerie wolf-like howl inadvertently escapes from my lips I sprint by this family squirting each one in the forehead counting in Thai with each casualty. “NUNG, SONG, SAAM, SEE…” and as I blast my last trophy and begin to utter my favorite number (and general Thai word) “HAAAA—“ I quickly turn to face forward, but I couldn’t reduce velocity in time. WHAAAAAAAAM. Immediately I run face-first into this pole, practically A Christmas Storying my tongue against the metal.

My fallen enemies explode in laughter as I cut my losses and realize I’m walking away without a shred of dignity and with a large lesson in instant Karma. I creep along smiling and cataloguing this moment into the section housing Karmatic headaches involving squirt guns.

But regardless of dark demons, cold buckets and big headaches, we blasted, poured, laughed, shouted, danced, chicken-winged, drank and stomped our way through flooded streets during the greatest holiday known to man. Sorry Santa, Buddha’s got you on this one.

The Current Has Us Now

2012-04-28T06:54:00.001-04:00

Blogging from the road proves difficult. My brain is constantly overloaded by an influx of stimuli and I'd rather not hole up in a dingy guest house typing away like GlitchCOM5, but playing catch-up is also a drag, so I time traveled to the land of pen and paper and chronicled my journey in a notebook, careful not to miss a beat. So for the next few posts, I will choose my favorite incidents and memories from the trip and update a blog daily. (Probably more like every two days, considering I managed to contract Bubonic Plague on my journey and one of my eyes is swelled to Asian status. fitting, really.) I guess I'll start two days after Wat-ing around Chiang Mai rolling down Pai River two deep in a tube made for one, deflated tube in one hand, beer and lone sandal in the other, legitimately concerned over the prospect of heading into Burmese territory.

After arriving in the beautiful hippie haven tucked between soaring hills, we decided to take a 'relaxing' tubing trip down the Pai river. A weasley whiskered Thai man with a brow ring and wife beater plops us and our tubes onto a random riverbank, takes our clothing and instructs us that if our tube is to pop, find a non-english-speaking local and ask to use their cell phone to call him. Mind you locals on the side of this particularly unpopulated river are fishing and farming and probably haven’t excelled in understanding the flailing hand gestures of the Farang.

The warning lodges a seed of paranoia into my psyche, knowing that with regard to unlikely happenings, I'm the exception. If it can be popped, broken, shredded, drowned or shattered, surely my fingers (or elbows, toes, bony knees, etc) will be the culprits. But I drink my way out of second guesses and elevate. Our tubes putz down the ankle deep excuse for a river, streaming over rock-shaped speed bumps, winding between farmland and mountains blanketed in foliage whose branches all seem to be ominously pointing in the direction we're headed. The lack of current leaves my tube plodding in the wake of the herd and Jamie and I find ourselves reliably banked on some portion of this inhospitable quarry.

The woodland creature in the white tank warned us that in some shallow areas incisive masses could potentially leave our bums scraped and tubes deflated, failing to reveal that these spots were actually the entire river and because it’s about a foot deep, they perform as obstacles in a jewel heist, beating the leisure out of our rears, spines and phalanges. Soon enough, the flow deficit meets swirls of torrents and I struggle to hold onto two bottles of Chang and my shoes while hip thrusting to avoid taking a cliff to an area deemed exit only. Jamie and I continue to pull up the rear and I'm in the middle of bruising my knuckle in a philanthropic attempt to open a fellow tuber’s beer for her by lighter, when suddenly I'm at a standstill a large branch and I merge forming one inanimate being, sending the riverflow curving around us on all sides.

I stand up avoiding razor sharp cliff rocks and realize that my once-inflated doughnut now hangs around my neck like a defeated boa constrictor. Suddenly the current wrenches me away from my branch and I struggle to hold onto the two beers, sacrificing my sandals and lifeless tube in the process, I'm propelled along in six inches of water, ricocheting off rubble like a giraffe-shaped gumball. A bewildered Thai fishermen retrieves my sandal from his net while his friend peels my comatose rubber tu-tu off a slab of stone.

Between diagramming how to best carry all of the necessities (beers) without surrendering the soles of my feet to the callousness of geology, I'm again torn from footing and into the current. I'm dragged along the rocks, hopping from stone to stone like their own human boomerang. Jamie attempts to paddle toward me holding out her altruistic, albeit undersized arm for my rescue. I turn in the direction of safety, battling against the current and shouting "I JUST WANT TO LIVE."

In retrospect, this exclamation seems a bit dramatic considering at any point I could've ditched the goods, stood up in the rocky 2 foot deep water and gracelessly marched my unhappy ass up the bank onto someone's farm and somehow communicated that I needed a ride back to town. Rather than risking the awkwardness of that wet, scantily clad conversation, I opted to doggie paddle through River Bedrock and hoisted my body, my beers and my encumbering flat floatation device into Jamie’s tube, leaving a two pink sandals and my dignity to the devices of the river.

We float the rest of the way two-deep in a historically non-durable tube made for one, hip-thrusting in unison to avoid creating two holes in our asses. Cutting our losses, we continue sipping our cheap beers and take each rocky blow in stride, even when we legitimately believed the group had shored hours ago and we were en route to Burmese territory—also a warning from our uber helpful guide. An hour later, we spot the faces of our friends, but not before a group of unnecessarily angry young Thai lads attempt to flip our tube and drown us with their vicious little talons. Luckily my long legs and Jamie’s shrill shrieks were enough to fend them off until we reached safety. Thailand needs to peruse the tourism section of leisure maybe once more, especially considering I was made to pay 100 baht for deflating my tube.

Vermin Villa

2012-04-04T10:22:00.001-04:00

Gingy Kitty about to eat a member of the roach graveyard.

I’ve complained countless times about cockroach infestations and continually claim to be stalked by roaches. I asserted my disgust of this particular insect breed the first time I found one crawling on my face in the middle of the night and since then life has never been the same. Apparently word has gotten out in the Thai roach community that I am particularly revolted and irritated by the existence and presence of their kind, so they’ve staged a coup on my place of residence. A day when I’ve had to chase down and kill three roaches is considered a damn good day in my present life abroad.

The first time you see a mongoloid jungle roach soaring through your living room, it’s like Mother Nature junk-punching you for all those times you couldn’t find a garbage can. You want to scream OKAY ENOUGH ALREADY, I’LL STOP USING STYROFOAM AND ONLY EAT KALE. And the first time a thumb-sized cockroach manages to contort the notches of its exoskeleton to squeeze through a dime-sized hole in our drain while you’re washing some dishes, entire organ systems begin to tremble. There is something about the sight of a cockroach that elicits both your gag reflex and internal hatred for all dirt dwellers. My home is not a sewer. I clean up after myself and use the appropriate amount of caution when opening doors and windows, and yet my home is apparently the safe haven for every roach on the island spreading dysentery all over this biatch.

As Lindsay recounts her run-in with three massive guys in her bedroom, I look around the kitchen to find a companion scurrying under the fridge, one crawling up the wall and two blocking the entrance to where my sheets hang drying. The type of infestation that makes you wonder what sorcerer in the roach community you so deeply offended to warrant this type of plague.

Back in the land of logic, you have 10 cockroaches in your home at one time one of two things happens a) you burn down your home and collect insurance on the vomitous insect clause or 2) a bearded man in a yellow VW bug with ears and a tail comes to your home and flea bombs the entire joint until you’re breathing toxic yellow gas for all eternity. But I do not currently reside in America, nor do I know the number of a pest company. What I do have is a hiking shoe and a knack for crushing these crunchy cats before they become airborne.

And while we’re on the cat subject, we’ve got another vermin visitor that frequents my abode. A satanic orange cat has taken keen to leaving daily piss puddles on our motorbikes. The first few incidents seemed harmless enough, until ginger kitty began pissing on the seat to my bike. Now I must hose it off before I leave anywhere. And after the hosing is done and the appropriate amount of swearing has occurred, I sit on my bike to leave only to have satan feline hop on the seat with me like we’re going on a joy ride to Petsmart. EFF YOU CAT. I’m 98% sure this cat is the reincarnation of all the ginger souls I’ve tortured over the years. And a look into my future of breeding my own angry ginger kids. The universe is quite the jokester.

Our house has a separate indoor-outdoor hallway and the door is just bars, wide enough for a cheeky cat to sneak between, which is just what this soulless feline did before he/she/ladyboycat decided to take a wittle kitty poo and then smear it all over the tile, walls, etc. So between scrubbing cat excrement, scraping roach guts off the walls and the harmonious sound of the rabid soi dog chorus that holds practice every morning upon sunrise, the animal kingdom of Choktip Villa has us now.

Mad Ups, My Buddha.

2012-03-27T08:33:00.002-04:00

I have a burning addiction and it goes by the name Big Buddha. I’ve begun weekly hikes up this little mountain, basking in the uphill climb that Florida has denied me for the past 23 years. I park my moto at the first elephant trek place at the bottom of the hill and begin my journey. Today, after I parked and chatted up the fellas for a bit, one asks:

You go alone? No friends?

Yes, all alone, I don’t have any friends.

Haha, no friends. Well I think alone is best. Time for think.

Ladies and gentleman, this Thai elephant wrangler gets it. I often feel guilty because I tell people of the relaxation wonders this hike does for my soul and yet I rarely invite people into my sanctuary for fear of tarnishing its luster. I'm even a little hesitant to put the amazingness down for all to experience but I also don't want to discountnthis large portion of my sanity while living in a foreign place.

So after a dollop of wisdom from my friend in the child-sized jorts, I head up the first and steepest hill. The hill winds me and prepares me for the rest of the mountain, which really isn’t so bad. And so is life, once you climb that first hill you can just traipse along and enjoy the scenery for the rest of the trip. And oh what scenery Buddha’s trek has to offer. The road, bustling with tourist vans and moto traffic headed up to the popular travel sight, cuts through thick jungle, brimming with life far beyond the comforts of cement.

On the way up, I receive encouragements from all angles. I pass the old man peddling bananas and he flashes me an all-gum smile; to my left a group of Burmese construction workers shoot me the thumbs-up signal; countless tourists on motorbikes shout borderline inappropriate words of support. And I continue my uphill climb, smiling like an idiot and waving to everyone that passes, no matter if they’re smiling back or attempting to eat my soul with a hateful gaze. I used to make fun of people that smiled for seemingly no reason. Then I moved to Thailand. Now I feel like that middle-aged accountant who saved up his entire life for a speedboat and now spends weekends wearing a captain’s hat and frantically waving at any and all passerby while his wife and kids groan at the embarrassing sight of drunk euphoria. Sure, I may look like a raving lunatic: smiling, thizz-facing and two stepping up a mountain to some jams but I suspect there’s no better place to unleash the cooped up crazy than the middle of the jungle.

I channel my inner Katniss, donning a single braid and a fearless sense of oneness with nature and, against my better western judgment, I climb over a fence onto the side of a cliff that overlooks a deep valley of lush, untouched greenery. I carefully step along the small dirt path that hangs perilously above a free fall that Tom Petty would want no part in. Eventually I come across a rock situated perfectly between a break in the trees that overlooks all of Phuket Town and Chalong Bay. The type of view that blurs the line between sea and sky and the type of multipurpose rock that can be utilized for thoughts, trots or Asian squats.

I refuse to divulge any sort of guidelines to reaching this spot, as my inner balance hinges upon its isolation. As I sat down upon my rock today, raindrops begin to fall and I thank someone somewhere for turning on that faucet that will smear the distinction between sweat stains and rain spots. After a few minutes of enjoying nature’s bath (okay, I promise I did actually shower after this hike, for those of you doubting my cleanliness over here), I began the trek down refusing goodwilled attempts to hitch rides in favor of a downward spiral in the storm. Maybe one day I’ll start my own Big Buddha Trek company: Faubel’s Super Sweaty Hikes, Antiperspirant Optional, Singalongs Enforced.