from Then to Now

Dear readers,

i am pushing myself to finally write another blog entry.
it has been more than a month, the last time it has been so long between two entries was when i was in the middle of the pacific i think.
At least i have a good excuse 😉

Anyhow lets start at the beginning.
Rose and i explored the mountain springs of the Krabi-province. Blue pools and hot waterfalls were awaiting us in midst a beautiful jungle.
We were quite enjoying these natural wonders and relaxed a little before we took a bus that took us straight into a spooky Bangkok.
We met up with old friends Nico from Infinity and my friend Rawi that i met last time i was in Bangkok. Together we jumped into the Halloween parade on Khaosan Rd.
After Halloween war over we readied ourselves for the North.
Our Hotel-concierge recommended to go up early as the festival of lights “Loy Krathong” would be in full flow. So we jumped in the next available bus to Chiang Mai to catch a view of the lantern fest. It was breathtaking.
Like ghosts or ascending souls all over the sky the lanterns were flying.
In columns of thousands, never ending.
They were rising up to the clouds where the flames where extinguished by the moisture.
On their way up however they created a second starry sky.
The river was full with little floating candles which were joined by descending lantern paper.
Of course we joined the madness and wrote our wishes on a skylight and let it fly to unknown heights.
The next day, we were not really expecting anything and had just changed hostels, we got notice from the monastery: “Now is the time, the next opening is in a week”
We were confused, as a couple days later we got information, that we could just walk in.
But we quickly packed our necessities and i tried to contact my parents, so they wouldn’t be worried when their son suddenly disappeared from the face of the earth for a month 🙂

The monastery was intense to say the least.
Feelings that have boiled unknown, ideas and thoughts that presented themselves and memories well remembered and also long forgotten all tried to keep me from the present moment. Some still do.
Meditation is a great exercise to get calm, to discover inner truths and to build up grey matter in the brain. I hope it will be seen as necessary as brushing our teeth in the future.
But enough of that.
Now i am out and on my way to the next adventure 🙂

So Long
Ole

p.s. Pictures will follow soon.

Water! – Mekong and Buddist New Year

Wow the last few days were so rich of events…could you even say that? “rich of” or “poor of” events? Anyhow you get the point, i crossed the Thai-Laos boarder, i slept i a dodgy guesthouse in a boarder town (Muang Ngoen…or something like this 😀 from Nan to Pakbeng)…had a amazing busride through the mountains of northern laos, saw a lot of burned hill sides, took a very old looking ferry over the Mekong and spend the night in Pakbeng…a very strange place.
I arrived around 2pm and the little town or big village was like a ghost town…almost nobody was around all the restaurants seemed pointless, as they were closed anyhow…but the boats arrived at 6 and it broke loose a massive change in the village.
It was a strange experience to see the 2 faces of such a touristic place.
But i can not say this often enough:
I can totally understand all the tourists, as i am one myself, because it is really beautiful! The only important thing is the mentality of the tourists. Do they try to adapt to the country they are in, or if they are bringing their own country with them.

The Next day i took a “slow” boat to Luang Prabang for the buddhist new year celebration.
The Mekong is amazingly beautiful…white sand beaches next to the river, lush jungle behind it and sparkles of bamboo huts that simmer through the leaves. And the traditional long fisher boats…WOW
The only downpoint is all the trash that floats in the middle…styrofoam, plastic, burned woods from all the forest fires (which i still haven’t decided if i can like them or not 🙂 ) and other unidentifiable stuff…that makes me not take a bath on one of these beaches 😉

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When we finally arrived after 7h sitting on the floor in the back (i don’t know what crazy voice in my head told me that i will be more relaxed in the back than on the comfortable seat i was sitting on first 😀 )
There was a big confusion, because instead of taking us to Luang Prabang they took us to a station about 5km before…obviously they had some kind of deal with the TukTuk drivers 🙂 tss..
Ole decided to walk…after 5 minutes a i was able to hitchhike…sometimes you just have to take a dare.
While sitting on the back of the Pickup i had the first experience why the New Year here is called water festival 😀
My driver stopped at every place on the street with people standing and the soaked me completely 😀
It was such a nice and liberating feeling. Everybody was smiling and dancing on the street…and it still continues…loud musik everywhere, lots of beer, water and foodcolor 😀 but please, see for yourself 😉

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I decided not to write anything about my plans anymore, because everytime i do that, something happens, that makes me change them completely! 😀 Which is not necessarily a bad thing…
“If you want to make destiny laugh, tell it your plans”

So Long Ole

p.s. i am so sorry for the felt 100pictures, but i just could not decide which one i did not want to share with you 🙂

p.p.s. As always, thank you for reading, and please feel free to comment and ask crazy questions, i don’t bite (at least not if i don’t know you that well 😉 )