by AJ/Skald
During the summer of 1996 I worked as a security guard in Athens, GA for the olympics. I was paired with a National Guardsman or Reservist and we guarded Sandford Stadium... which hosted soccer games.
I learned a lot about the military mentality from that experience. The folks I worked with were some of the most aggressive morons I have ever encountered. They regaled me with tales of "shooting ragheads", beating up "fags", getting drunk, etc. They talked glowingly of murdering people and "kicking ass".
Actually, I think most of them were full of shit and had never been close to combat... but the mentality was illustrative. These are the types of folks that fill our military. These are the people leading the invasion, shooting civilians, torturing prisoners, and the like. After Abu Ghraib, I had no problem believing that Americans had done those things. Im sure they are doing much worse. These are vicious people who glorify violence.
Sure, there are many who are not sadistic bullies. But are they human beings or wooden soldiers? Must they blindly do as they are told like small children? Do they have no conscience or self-reliance? They do have a choice. I don't share Micheal Moore's sympathy for them. I've known too many. Rather than kill people on someone else's orders, they can refuse. They can choose discharge or jail instead. But most, apparently, believe that obedience is more important than the lives of the people they kill. Obedience is a good trait for a dog. But one would hope that human beings would aspire to something more.
Friday, February 04, 2005
Thursday, February 03, 2005
The Social Justice Coalition
by AJ/Skald
A quick recommendation for an excellent blog: The Social Justice Coalition (also see link under freedom fighters). Kris subtitles the site, "The liberal answer to the christian coalition." Its a great site with a lively ongoing dialogue about spirituality and social justice.
While the recent debate among Democrats about "values" strikes me as pathetic, the deeper issue of spirituality as a base for social movements is right on track. As I've mentioned earlier, its not by accident that MLK and Gandhi were highly spiritual people. Their power came from deep convictions and personal integrity.... something all the smug, suit-clad Democrats will never be able to spin-- no matter how much they blather on about values.
Kris' site gets to the heart of the matter. In my opinion, any "religion" or spiritual practice that does not refine the character of those practicing it is worthless. And by refine I mean to help the person become more open, more aware, more tolerant, more accepting, kinder, wiser... and to have a greater grasp of the nature of life, existence, and "the Infinite" AT AN EXPERIENTIAL LEVEL.
Only retards and idiots recite sentences from books and consider that "morality" or religion. True spirituality (the term I prefer) is about EXPERIENCE. That's why I favor Eastern and Shamanic practices, because these paths emphasize a direct encounter with the universe/Tao. Also, these paths are not obseesed with a view of some "God" who is a childish, humanlike, spoiled Dictator... who we must all kiss up to and grovel before. Is this really that different than the religions of the Vikings, the Greeks, or the Romans? Instead of a pantheon of nuerotic Gods... Judiasm, Christianity, and Islam have one. But "he" is just as arbitrary, cruel, and infantile as the Gods of the Norse and Greeks.
Haven't we evolved past this sort of childish thinking yet? Do we still need to cling to the idea of a comic book superhero ruling the universe... a ridiculous idea that breaks down with even the simplest examination. Do we still need to cling to the equally idiotic idea that this super hero wrote one (or more) "holy books" which we must obey as if they were a supernatural legal code?
The world, this life, and the universe are far, far more complex and mysterious than that.... as any decent shaman, meditator, mystic, or scientist will tell you. But, of course, these are people who have had experiences... who are dedicated to various forms of empirical investigation. But as Joseph Campbell noted, a priest/minister is a functionary-- someone who has NOT had an experience... a reciter of sentences, a performer of rituals, a politician, a fundraiser.
I think its time we put our trust in ourselves and our own experience and stop looking to these ambitious boobies for simplistic answers.
A quick recommendation for an excellent blog: The Social Justice Coalition (also see link under freedom fighters). Kris subtitles the site, "The liberal answer to the christian coalition." Its a great site with a lively ongoing dialogue about spirituality and social justice.
While the recent debate among Democrats about "values" strikes me as pathetic, the deeper issue of spirituality as a base for social movements is right on track. As I've mentioned earlier, its not by accident that MLK and Gandhi were highly spiritual people. Their power came from deep convictions and personal integrity.... something all the smug, suit-clad Democrats will never be able to spin-- no matter how much they blather on about values.
Kris' site gets to the heart of the matter. In my opinion, any "religion" or spiritual practice that does not refine the character of those practicing it is worthless. And by refine I mean to help the person become more open, more aware, more tolerant, more accepting, kinder, wiser... and to have a greater grasp of the nature of life, existence, and "the Infinite" AT AN EXPERIENTIAL LEVEL.
Only retards and idiots recite sentences from books and consider that "morality" or religion. True spirituality (the term I prefer) is about EXPERIENCE. That's why I favor Eastern and Shamanic practices, because these paths emphasize a direct encounter with the universe/Tao. Also, these paths are not obseesed with a view of some "God" who is a childish, humanlike, spoiled Dictator... who we must all kiss up to and grovel before. Is this really that different than the religions of the Vikings, the Greeks, or the Romans? Instead of a pantheon of nuerotic Gods... Judiasm, Christianity, and Islam have one. But "he" is just as arbitrary, cruel, and infantile as the Gods of the Norse and Greeks.
Haven't we evolved past this sort of childish thinking yet? Do we still need to cling to the idea of a comic book superhero ruling the universe... a ridiculous idea that breaks down with even the simplest examination. Do we still need to cling to the equally idiotic idea that this super hero wrote one (or more) "holy books" which we must obey as if they were a supernatural legal code?
The world, this life, and the universe are far, far more complex and mysterious than that.... as any decent shaman, meditator, mystic, or scientist will tell you. But, of course, these are people who have had experiences... who are dedicated to various forms of empirical investigation. But as Joseph Campbell noted, a priest/minister is a functionary-- someone who has NOT had an experience... a reciter of sentences, a performer of rituals, a politician, a fundraiser.
I think its time we put our trust in ourselves and our own experience and stop looking to these ambitious boobies for simplistic answers.
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
Super Cop
by AJ/Skald
"Fucking asshole cop", I thought to myself. I sneered and scowled towards the strutting peacock with the whistle.... "A typical corrupt idiot Thai policeman", I whispered under my breath and shook my head.
He was a tall man with a rough face... somewhat potmarked. He wore a tight brown uniform, a brown helmet, long brown polyester pants, and tall black boots. He was blowing on his whistle like a runaway train and waving his arms frantically at slowing cars. Standing at the entrance of Khao San Road-- he ran towards any car or taxi that dared to stop and block the road. While a sign clearly indicated that this was a no-dropoff zone, the rule (like most in Thailand) was routinely ignored. But now super cop was on the beat. "Gestapo bastard", I thought to myself.
He stared menacingly and threatened drivers who started to slow.
Since that first day, I've seen him many times. Always blowing on that damn whistle nonstop. Always strutting and waving frantically.... keeping the goddam traffic moving. He's relentless. And every time I"d curse under my breath and rehearse a mental diatribe about cops in general: the evil cop mentality, the abuse of power, the arrogance, the corruption, etc...
A few days ago I was strolling by with Kristin and she too noticed super cop. She started to laugh and said, "He's not a real policeman you know".
"What?"
"Yeah, Wat told me he has been here for years. He's mentally ill. He wanted to be a cop, so the police gave him a uniform and let him direct traffic"
I laughed, widened my eyes, and gave him a good look. Sure enough, he did not have a gun or nightstick-- standard issue for all Thai police. I shook my head and laughed louder.
All my nasty preconceptions evaporated. I now saw a humorous and sympathetic figure... here is one guy in a cop uniform who takes his job seriously..., "probably the only honest cop in Thailand", I chuckled. I crossed the street to Burger King, clogged my arteries with french fries, and watched him earnestly direct traffic: a man on a mission!
"Only in Thailand", I thought. This could never happen in America. Never in a million years would a police force let a mentally unbalanced man wear a uniform- just to give him a sense of purpose.
Now I felt like an asshole. All my nasty judgements were wrong. This was not a power hungry bastard. And the local police also seemed to have hearts... at least in relation to this man. The Thai merchants on Khao San tolerated him too. They smiled to the man, chatted with him. Only the tourists and quick-to-judge expats, like me, snarled.
All is not always as it seems.
"Fucking asshole cop", I thought to myself. I sneered and scowled towards the strutting peacock with the whistle.... "A typical corrupt idiot Thai policeman", I whispered under my breath and shook my head.
He was a tall man with a rough face... somewhat potmarked. He wore a tight brown uniform, a brown helmet, long brown polyester pants, and tall black boots. He was blowing on his whistle like a runaway train and waving his arms frantically at slowing cars. Standing at the entrance of Khao San Road-- he ran towards any car or taxi that dared to stop and block the road. While a sign clearly indicated that this was a no-dropoff zone, the rule (like most in Thailand) was routinely ignored. But now super cop was on the beat. "Gestapo bastard", I thought to myself.
He stared menacingly and threatened drivers who started to slow.
Since that first day, I've seen him many times. Always blowing on that damn whistle nonstop. Always strutting and waving frantically.... keeping the goddam traffic moving. He's relentless. And every time I"d curse under my breath and rehearse a mental diatribe about cops in general: the evil cop mentality, the abuse of power, the arrogance, the corruption, etc...
A few days ago I was strolling by with Kristin and she too noticed super cop. She started to laugh and said, "He's not a real policeman you know".
"What?"
"Yeah, Wat told me he has been here for years. He's mentally ill. He wanted to be a cop, so the police gave him a uniform and let him direct traffic"
I laughed, widened my eyes, and gave him a good look. Sure enough, he did not have a gun or nightstick-- standard issue for all Thai police. I shook my head and laughed louder.
All my nasty preconceptions evaporated. I now saw a humorous and sympathetic figure... here is one guy in a cop uniform who takes his job seriously..., "probably the only honest cop in Thailand", I chuckled. I crossed the street to Burger King, clogged my arteries with french fries, and watched him earnestly direct traffic: a man on a mission!
"Only in Thailand", I thought. This could never happen in America. Never in a million years would a police force let a mentally unbalanced man wear a uniform- just to give him a sense of purpose.
Now I felt like an asshole. All my nasty judgements were wrong. This was not a power hungry bastard. And the local police also seemed to have hearts... at least in relation to this man. The Thai merchants on Khao San tolerated him too. They smiled to the man, chatted with him. Only the tourists and quick-to-judge expats, like me, snarled.
All is not always as it seems.
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
Vagrant Scholar
The sun is burning as cool days give way to the coming hot season. The nights too will soon give way. By April Bangkok will bake under 100 degree heat. I won't miss that but I will miss this country and this city.
I'll miss the fresh fruit vendors on the sidewalks... my morning breakfast of fresh pineapple. I'll miss the noodle stalls, spicy papaya salad (som tam), and rat na (spicy noodle soup). I will miss the endless summer and the buzzing chaos.
I'll miss the laid back (some might say lazy) attitude of the Thai people... their incredible ability to absorb any event and keep on going, with the shrug of the shoulders and a "mai pen rai" ("no worries").
I'll miss my tiny cubicle apartment and its defective fan. I'll miss the bathroom that has no hot water.
I've enjoyed my vagrant scholar days here. I've enjoyed squandering my time reading, writing, and studying. I've enjoyed the frequent visits to the islands and the mountains.
There are much worse ways to live. That's what powers my rage. Its the tragedy, the heart breaking tragedy, of so many compromised lives. It breaks my heart to see people abandon their dreams and principles... or worse, to never even investigate what they might be. It breaks my heart to encounter so many people who feel trapped by their jobs and the expectations of "society".... People who tell me they'd rather be painting or travelling or writing or helping people. Instead they live lives of "quiet desperation"... and look to that imaginary promised land called "retirement" when they will be delivered unto freedom.
I suppose I embody the overzealous reformer syndrome cited by Thoreau. Having once felt trapped myself, I can't help but rant and cajole others who are as I was. Its an insufferable quality, I know, but one I can't seem to resist.
For the strange mutants who actually enjoy corporate jobs and routine lives-- more power to you. I have nothing to say to such folks and they have nothing for me. We are different species.
But to the others... to those who have compromised their souls.... I will remain insufferable and say, don't wait another minute. Don't wait. Don't put off life and don't run from it.
Freedom is possible. Now.
I'll miss the fresh fruit vendors on the sidewalks... my morning breakfast of fresh pineapple. I'll miss the noodle stalls, spicy papaya salad (som tam), and rat na (spicy noodle soup). I will miss the endless summer and the buzzing chaos.
I'll miss the laid back (some might say lazy) attitude of the Thai people... their incredible ability to absorb any event and keep on going, with the shrug of the shoulders and a "mai pen rai" ("no worries").
I'll miss my tiny cubicle apartment and its defective fan. I'll miss the bathroom that has no hot water.
I've enjoyed my vagrant scholar days here. I've enjoyed squandering my time reading, writing, and studying. I've enjoyed the frequent visits to the islands and the mountains.
There are much worse ways to live. That's what powers my rage. Its the tragedy, the heart breaking tragedy, of so many compromised lives. It breaks my heart to see people abandon their dreams and principles... or worse, to never even investigate what they might be. It breaks my heart to encounter so many people who feel trapped by their jobs and the expectations of "society".... People who tell me they'd rather be painting or travelling or writing or helping people. Instead they live lives of "quiet desperation"... and look to that imaginary promised land called "retirement" when they will be delivered unto freedom.
I suppose I embody the overzealous reformer syndrome cited by Thoreau. Having once felt trapped myself, I can't help but rant and cajole others who are as I was. Its an insufferable quality, I know, but one I can't seem to resist.
For the strange mutants who actually enjoy corporate jobs and routine lives-- more power to you. I have nothing to say to such folks and they have nothing for me. We are different species.
But to the others... to those who have compromised their souls.... I will remain insufferable and say, don't wait another minute. Don't wait. Don't put off life and don't run from it.
Freedom is possible. Now.
Should You Stay or Should You Go?
by AJ/Skald
The media machine in America keeps turning out the lies and the bottle-fed masses keep sucking them up. Everywhere else in the world, we're seeing dead civilians. Babies killed by American bombs. Parents and children gunned down by trigger happy marines. Houses destroyed. Hospitals razed. Doctors killed. Nurses killed. This is the full bloody face of America's murderous campaign.
But back home the fat & contented plug into Fox and yell "ditto" as plastic haired commentators tell them how great America is: how free they are, how strong they are, how righteous they are, how religious they are, how generous they are, how wealthy they are. Envy, they are told, is why the rest of the world suddenly despises the United States.
But there's that cliche: If everyone tells you that you are wrong, perhaps you should listen. In personal matters, we recognize the wisdom of this saying. If every one of my friends tells me I'm being an asshole-- there's a good chance they are right.
But Americans plug their ears and keep plugging along. The willful ignorance is simply astounding. From the outside perspective... looking at the country... its almost inconceivable-- how utterly smug and ignorant most Americans are. Is it that they feel too guilty to admit the murderous carnage they are unleashing on brown skinned foreigners? Or is it, as I suspect, that they really don't consider these people to be fully human-- and certainly not as human as upstanding Americans. Some people are more human than others, it seems.
The utterly strange thing about this is that its done with an emotionally retarded amiability. At least the Germans were grim and serious as they went about the work of world domination. But Americans smile and chuckle and backslap as they "support the troops". So long as gas stays cheap, cars stay huge, and McDonalds value meals are readily available--- Americans stay fat and happy. There's simply no penetrating the self-righteious smug.
The sad thing. The thing that angers me... the reason I care, is that I do love things about the States. But those nobler qualities have been extinguished: Self reliance, independence, distrust of authority, an adventurous spirit, a "live and let live" attitude. Its hard to believe that the current nation of bloated SUV drivers once spawned the likes of Thoreau, Whitman, Emerson, Kerouac, Ginsberg, Mother Jones, MLK, Malcolm X, Steinbeck, and Hemingway. Their sober reflection, their defiant independence, their distrust of authority, their exuberant passion for life, and their radical self-reliance are now despised.
The puritans have taken over..... their long arms reaching through the centuries to impose a fanatical brand of religious hypocrisy upon the whole country. Corporate profits and Christian conformity are now the twin pillars of the nation.
At such a time, what are we to do? What are liberty loving, authority hating, self-reliant Hobopoets to do?
Do we stay and get ploughed under? Or do we flee?
I've chosen to flee because Im a selfish bastard. Im not content to wait for some faroff imaginary utopia or revolution. I don't have the stomach for trying to convince ignorant jackasses to open their minds or realize their economic self interest. I'll leave that to activists more commited and patient than I.
I want freedom and ecstacy now. In this life.
And I've found that its much easier to find outside of the United States.
The media machine in America keeps turning out the lies and the bottle-fed masses keep sucking them up. Everywhere else in the world, we're seeing dead civilians. Babies killed by American bombs. Parents and children gunned down by trigger happy marines. Houses destroyed. Hospitals razed. Doctors killed. Nurses killed. This is the full bloody face of America's murderous campaign.
But back home the fat & contented plug into Fox and yell "ditto" as plastic haired commentators tell them how great America is: how free they are, how strong they are, how righteous they are, how religious they are, how generous they are, how wealthy they are. Envy, they are told, is why the rest of the world suddenly despises the United States.
But there's that cliche: If everyone tells you that you are wrong, perhaps you should listen. In personal matters, we recognize the wisdom of this saying. If every one of my friends tells me I'm being an asshole-- there's a good chance they are right.
But Americans plug their ears and keep plugging along. The willful ignorance is simply astounding. From the outside perspective... looking at the country... its almost inconceivable-- how utterly smug and ignorant most Americans are. Is it that they feel too guilty to admit the murderous carnage they are unleashing on brown skinned foreigners? Or is it, as I suspect, that they really don't consider these people to be fully human-- and certainly not as human as upstanding Americans. Some people are more human than others, it seems.
The utterly strange thing about this is that its done with an emotionally retarded amiability. At least the Germans were grim and serious as they went about the work of world domination. But Americans smile and chuckle and backslap as they "support the troops". So long as gas stays cheap, cars stay huge, and McDonalds value meals are readily available--- Americans stay fat and happy. There's simply no penetrating the self-righteious smug.
The sad thing. The thing that angers me... the reason I care, is that I do love things about the States. But those nobler qualities have been extinguished: Self reliance, independence, distrust of authority, an adventurous spirit, a "live and let live" attitude. Its hard to believe that the current nation of bloated SUV drivers once spawned the likes of Thoreau, Whitman, Emerson, Kerouac, Ginsberg, Mother Jones, MLK, Malcolm X, Steinbeck, and Hemingway. Their sober reflection, their defiant independence, their distrust of authority, their exuberant passion for life, and their radical self-reliance are now despised.
The puritans have taken over..... their long arms reaching through the centuries to impose a fanatical brand of religious hypocrisy upon the whole country. Corporate profits and Christian conformity are now the twin pillars of the nation.
At such a time, what are we to do? What are liberty loving, authority hating, self-reliant Hobopoets to do?
Do we stay and get ploughed under? Or do we flee?
I've chosen to flee because Im a selfish bastard. Im not content to wait for some faroff imaginary utopia or revolution. I don't have the stomach for trying to convince ignorant jackasses to open their minds or realize their economic self interest. I'll leave that to activists more commited and patient than I.
I want freedom and ecstacy now. In this life.
And I've found that its much easier to find outside of the United States.
A Noble Tradition
by AJ/Skald
The new nomads... Hobopoets, Young Homeless Professionals, Retired RVers tooling around the nation like a tribe of wandering mongols.... there is a large and powerful movement underfoot. A new restlessness. Unseen, perhaps, undocumented and uncelebrated. Perhaps because of its eclectic diversity, it is not seen for what it is: neo (new) nomadism.
There are the Rainbow tribe... the classic hippy dead-head phish-head peace lovers. But so too is there a growing wave of cyber hoboes... wired nomads with lucrative jobs-- plugged in, and on the move: freelancing from every corner of the world.
The American decades since WWII have celebrated stability. Ours is the age of the suburb. Mom and Dad and two kids in a sterile landscape... a rigid schedule..... a stable job. That was the official lie anyway. It was never true... but now, even the facade is crumbling. Americans have always been restless. New technology, new (old) philosophies, new lifestyles are once again opening the road... opening the world... to a life of nomadism.
These neo-nomads take many forms. There is the Itinerate Poet. Basho walking the road to the far north. The restless artist on the move... ever searching for inspiraiton. This is a long and noble tradition. Nomadism, in all its forms, is in fact as old as the human species itself. Over the centuries many archtypes have developed.... many ancient lineages of wanderers-- who continue to live and thrive today: oftentimes unaccepted.... sometimes even despised... by the crumbling, ever-fearful sedentary hordes in the suburbs. Nevertheless, we are growing.
There is the adventurer... the adrenaline junky.... the restless wandering spirit in search of the next mountain, the next dive, the next wave, the next run. Centuries ago... this was a noble undertaking. Scores of aristocratic explorers spread across the globe.... they topped Everest, raced to the poles, drove into Africa... every remote and dangerous nook and cranny of the planet. In other ages, these reckless, rakish, daring folks were celebrated. Today, they still exist..... in the form of the wealthy adventurers of old... and also in a new form: the ski bum, the climbing bum, the surf bum. ìBumî implying a negative judgement to most-- someone who refuses to ìget a real jobî or ìjoin the rat raceî. But these people are of the same aristocratic lineage as the explorers of old.... they may lack wealth... but the relentless urge to push the envelope... to seek the next adventure.. is the same.
Then there are the troubadours. Wandering musicians and performers.... the minstrels of the middle-ages..... the vaudeville acts of more recent centuries. The meek and sedentary have always held both fear and fascination for these folks. Fear of their freedom.... and a secret yearning for it as well. Today they are called ìbuskersî or ìbandsî but the essential lifestyle is still the same. Going from town to town---- settling for a time perhaps-- but ever drawn onward by the next gig, the next performance,.... the next magical connection to an audience. They are held with the same fascination and contempt as their ancestors.... this is the archtype of the Rock God: the unbridled, barbaric hedonist..... new name, new music... but not really new at all.
There is, of course, the most famous American tradition of all: the car nomad..... what is this but a revved up version of the mongol, the crusader, the Berber.... an engine instead of a stead. On the road- that is the story of America from its founding..... from horseback, to wagon train, to steam train, the automobile..... ever onwards: nothing symbolizes freedom to an American like a long stretch of open road. What happened? When did we become a nation of idle bumpkins? Gated communities. Grid-like McMansions. Strip malls. Stability and safety are the enemies of freedom.
There is the hobo-philosopher... the recluse, the dropout. Our most famous, and perhaps the sanest American who ever lived: Henry David Thoreau. The man of conscious who leaves the comfort and conformity of mainstream society in search of higher and deeper truths. This too has long long long roots....... one of the noblest and oldest lineages of mankind. This is the tradition of Jesus walking into the desert, of the Buddha leaving the palace, of Milarepa in his high mountain cave. Today, it is the homesteader, the back-to-nature movement of fed up urbanites: heading to the hills.... back to the land.... find your own truth.
There are, of course, the hobopoets themselves..... the beats: Kerouac, Cassaday, Ginsberg-- the literate wanderer. The poet walking a lonely road: Basho, straw sandals on his feet, treading the lonely path to the far north. My nickname is derived from just such a tradition: the viking skalds of the middle-ages.... mobile poet-shamans. Composers to kings and peasants,... servant to none. This is Hemingway and Fitzgerald in Paris. Itís every writer whose left home in search of a voice, a character, a story, or an inspiration.
And on, and on, and on. Weíre a nation and society enamored with the new. But none of these movements are new..... all that is new is the spin.... the circumstances. Technology has transformed the nature of the nomadic lifestyle, but not its spirit. In fact, technology is opening the way to an explosion of nomadology.....
Cars, computers, global travel, the internet, cell phones-- all make it possible for the mobile explorer, poet, musician, philosopher, & seeker to keep on the move AND stay connected. There are a host of tools available to the restless spirit that have no precedent in human history. The nation.... the world,.. is now open to every type of temperment and motive. It is possible to make a living and wander the world. It is possible to be a penniless hobo riding the rails or a wired professional with a laptop and expense account.
The new nomads... Hobopoets, Young Homeless Professionals, Retired RVers tooling around the nation like a tribe of wandering mongols.... there is a large and powerful movement underfoot. A new restlessness. Unseen, perhaps, undocumented and uncelebrated. Perhaps because of its eclectic diversity, it is not seen for what it is: neo (new) nomadism.
There are the Rainbow tribe... the classic hippy dead-head phish-head peace lovers. But so too is there a growing wave of cyber hoboes... wired nomads with lucrative jobs-- plugged in, and on the move: freelancing from every corner of the world.
The American decades since WWII have celebrated stability. Ours is the age of the suburb. Mom and Dad and two kids in a sterile landscape... a rigid schedule..... a stable job. That was the official lie anyway. It was never true... but now, even the facade is crumbling. Americans have always been restless. New technology, new (old) philosophies, new lifestyles are once again opening the road... opening the world... to a life of nomadism.
These neo-nomads take many forms. There is the Itinerate Poet. Basho walking the road to the far north. The restless artist on the move... ever searching for inspiraiton. This is a long and noble tradition. Nomadism, in all its forms, is in fact as old as the human species itself. Over the centuries many archtypes have developed.... many ancient lineages of wanderers-- who continue to live and thrive today: oftentimes unaccepted.... sometimes even despised... by the crumbling, ever-fearful sedentary hordes in the suburbs. Nevertheless, we are growing.
There is the adventurer... the adrenaline junky.... the restless wandering spirit in search of the next mountain, the next dive, the next wave, the next run. Centuries ago... this was a noble undertaking. Scores of aristocratic explorers spread across the globe.... they topped Everest, raced to the poles, drove into Africa... every remote and dangerous nook and cranny of the planet. In other ages, these reckless, rakish, daring folks were celebrated. Today, they still exist..... in the form of the wealthy adventurers of old... and also in a new form: the ski bum, the climbing bum, the surf bum. ìBumî implying a negative judgement to most-- someone who refuses to ìget a real jobî or ìjoin the rat raceî. But these people are of the same aristocratic lineage as the explorers of old.... they may lack wealth... but the relentless urge to push the envelope... to seek the next adventure.. is the same.
Then there are the troubadours. Wandering musicians and performers.... the minstrels of the middle-ages..... the vaudeville acts of more recent centuries. The meek and sedentary have always held both fear and fascination for these folks. Fear of their freedom.... and a secret yearning for it as well. Today they are called ìbuskersî or ìbandsî but the essential lifestyle is still the same. Going from town to town---- settling for a time perhaps-- but ever drawn onward by the next gig, the next performance,.... the next magical connection to an audience. They are held with the same fascination and contempt as their ancestors.... this is the archtype of the Rock God: the unbridled, barbaric hedonist..... new name, new music... but not really new at all.
There is, of course, the most famous American tradition of all: the car nomad..... what is this but a revved up version of the mongol, the crusader, the Berber.... an engine instead of a stead. On the road- that is the story of America from its founding..... from horseback, to wagon train, to steam train, the automobile..... ever onwards: nothing symbolizes freedom to an American like a long stretch of open road. What happened? When did we become a nation of idle bumpkins? Gated communities. Grid-like McMansions. Strip malls. Stability and safety are the enemies of freedom.
There is the hobo-philosopher... the recluse, the dropout. Our most famous, and perhaps the sanest American who ever lived: Henry David Thoreau. The man of conscious who leaves the comfort and conformity of mainstream society in search of higher and deeper truths. This too has long long long roots....... one of the noblest and oldest lineages of mankind. This is the tradition of Jesus walking into the desert, of the Buddha leaving the palace, of Milarepa in his high mountain cave. Today, it is the homesteader, the back-to-nature movement of fed up urbanites: heading to the hills.... back to the land.... find your own truth.
There are, of course, the hobopoets themselves..... the beats: Kerouac, Cassaday, Ginsberg-- the literate wanderer. The poet walking a lonely road: Basho, straw sandals on his feet, treading the lonely path to the far north. My nickname is derived from just such a tradition: the viking skalds of the middle-ages.... mobile poet-shamans. Composers to kings and peasants,... servant to none. This is Hemingway and Fitzgerald in Paris. Itís every writer whose left home in search of a voice, a character, a story, or an inspiration.
And on, and on, and on. Weíre a nation and society enamored with the new. But none of these movements are new..... all that is new is the spin.... the circumstances. Technology has transformed the nature of the nomadic lifestyle, but not its spirit. In fact, technology is opening the way to an explosion of nomadology.....
Cars, computers, global travel, the internet, cell phones-- all make it possible for the mobile explorer, poet, musician, philosopher, & seeker to keep on the move AND stay connected. There are a host of tools available to the restless spirit that have no precedent in human history. The nation.... the world,.. is now open to every type of temperment and motive. It is possible to make a living and wander the world. It is possible to be a penniless hobo riding the rails or a wired professional with a laptop and expense account.
First Battle
by AJ/Skald
A howl from the opposing army..... swords thudded against shields... thunder beat in unison. Hearts pounded. I gripped my sword... and braced the shield against my shoulder. Giddy tendrils raced through my gut and chest....... a wild grin broke upon my face. I began to bounce.... knees spring-like.....standing on toes. A racehorse in the gate.
A wild shout went up to my left..... I turned to see a wiry warrior clad in sparkling scale and a green cape..... carrying a coffin shaped shield. He strode the front of our lines, turned to our enemies and threw insults against them, ìCowardly vermin of Trimaris, prepare to dieî... he shook his sword and our army let out a cackling howl. Goose bumps spread across arms and belly..... I thudded the butt of my (rattan) sword on the inside of the shield.... our lines advanced.
The enemy continued drumming their shields, and likewise strode forward. Nerves shot with adrenaline, eyes wide with awe, muscles tense as steel....... I approached my first battle... almost forgetting that none of this was ìrealî. No one would die. No one would kill.
This was my introduction to the SCA, or the ìSociety for Creative Anachronismî. The SCA is a collection of eccentric oddballs who dress in medieval clothing, strap on armor, and beat each other with wooden swords. They also dance, sing, and create works of art. The group is a repository of outlandish creatives, hyper-intelligent geeks, talented artists, hammish performers, history buffs, academics, poets, social misfits, and folks who simply refuse to succumb to the drudgery of being ìnormalî. I was a member for nearly ten years.... and loved every minute.
The heart of the SCA is the weekend ìeventî..... an affair that revolves around a number of semi-historic activities, usually held at a state park. Typically, a battle or tournament is the centerpiece of the ìeventî. My first battle was small by todayís standards..... each army had only 100 people. The group now hosts battles which involve thousands of participants... the largest is held annually in Pennsylvania, in August, and is known as the ìPennsics Warî. As the Pennsics example implies, SCA groups and events are spread throughout the United States. In fact, the group is growing internationally, especially in Europe.
The SCA divides the US, and the world, into a patchwork of regional organizations, called ìkingdomsî. Georgia, for example, is part of the ìKingdom of Meridiesî, which also includes Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi. North and South Carolina are the ìKingdom of Atlantiaî. California is in the ìWest Kingdomî. Each Kingdom is further divided into local groups, called Baronies or Shires.
The function of local groups is to host events, welcome newcomers, and teach medeival skills. Skills include artistic arts such as calligraphy, jewelry making, woodworking, and costuming; craft arts such as armoring & blacksmithing; performing arts such as medeival dancing and singing; and martial arts such as hand-to-hand fighting and archery. Most groups host a weekly business meeting and various ìguild meetingsî to practice these arts.
Since I joined, the organization has expanded tremendously and is now a full-fledged counter society: with its own government (a monarchy- with rulers chosen by combat), its own economy (some members make a full-time living selling their arts), and its own social system (a system of titles, clans, knights, and nobles). Every member of the SCA develops an alternate persona: a medieval character they become during events.
The combined effects are stunning. At times, I felt Iíd been transported back in time. My first SCA battle produced all the nerves, all the excitement, all the intensity of entering a ìrealî battle: pounding heart and manic energy and fear of being ìkilledî. These feelings intensified as our line strode towards the enemy.
As the armies neared, each gathered speed-- then slammed together with a mighty crunch.... wood against wood--- storm and thunder. I was surrounded by a sea of swinging clubs (rattan ìswordsî), fierce metal helms, glittering armor, and hedges of spear points. Swords crashed on my shield. Warriors jostled. Lines pushed back and forth. In the churning humanity I caught sight of a monstrous man in black leather.... with the build of a middle linebacker... who likewise saw me. He dropped his shoulder and charged. I braced, crouched low, and swung wildly, but my sword caught a spear and the viking pounded into me dead-on. I staggered backwards, sword flailing, shield flapping. He raised back and hammered a blow directly atop my helmet.... bells rang. I dropped to the ground- dead.
But never have the dead been so joyful. Lying in the heart of swirling chaos, I watched the battle unfold. Warriors flowed back and forth. Lines broke and re-formed. Shouts rang out.... banners flew... then dropped. In the end, the field was littered with bodies. Some were still. Others writhed or crawled or hid under shields- a scene of mass carnage. I looked overhead for crows, but there were none.
My eyes dropped back to the field and at that moment the marshals called ìholdî..... instantly the battle was over. The twisted waves of carnage... the littered bodies of the dead, gave an exuberant cheer and jumped to their feet. Enemies embraced... shook hands...patted one another on the back. They clustered in groups- and though it had all ended seconds before, the tall tales began immediately. Fighters traded stories of glory, victory, and defeat. ìNo shit, there I was......î. This was the post-battle pow-wow, an SCA tradition.
Some ten minutes later.... tales told, foes praised... the lines re-formed: Time for the next battle. I couldnít get enough. The wild, psychedelic, adrenaline-rushed fantasy had me in a giddy mania. I rushed from fight to fight. When the war finished, I lingered on the field for another two hours... challenging individual warriors to single combat. I was lost-- completely and blissfully lost in the play world of the SCA..... transported back to those magical days of childhood; playing for the sake of play.
Eventually, the setting sun forced me from the field. I showered (thankfully the SCA retains a number of modern conveniences... thus ìanachronismî). Once clean, I donned a simple costume and bounced to the feast hall..... a wooden pavilion lit by lamp light. Night fallen..... candle & lamp lit.... the scene blurred. Once more I felt the sensation of time travel.... I joined my friends at a rough wooden table. As we ate, we again shared our exploits from the dayís fighting.... each growing more fantastic and heroic with the re-telling.
Following the feast, tables were cleared and pushed aside... musicians entered... and a long night of dancing began. Medieval dances generally fall into two categories: folk dances and court dances. Folk dances are rigorous and athletic-- the forerunners of modern square and contra dancing.... while the court dances are staid and stately affairs. The hall filled, music flowed, and the floor shook from stomping feet.
My body ached from the long dayís fighting. I had bruises on my legs and a lumpy welt on my right arm. Hours of wearing armor in bright sun had dehydrated me. My mind was blank with exhaustion. But still I danced. And danced. And danced..... a dizzying whirl of dress hems, thudding feet, clapping hands, and beautiful girls. On and on it went..... deep into the night. My legs grew wobbly- my mind hazy. But magic and enthusiasm bouyed me and kept me going.
When the music stopped..... hours later... I stumbled back to bed.... and truly slept like the dead; with that sweet exhuastion of a child after a full dayís play.
For some, the SCA is an exercise in living history. Many members are meticulous researchers- accomplished experts in a chosen discipline of history. Others join the group for its unique social characteristics-- its embracement of eccentricity.... its community and cameraderie. But for me, the SCA was an act of jubuliant defiance: an enthusiastic refusal to surrender to tedium.
I did not, and do not, want to abandon the creative flow of childhood. I am convinced that play.... fantasy and creativity for its own sake... is a deep and profound human need; one we, as adults, must nurture and maintain. Play is not an escape.... it is a celebration. Play is the essence of creativity.
We, as adults-- for the sake of our happiness and our souls, would be well advised to re-discover it.
A howl from the opposing army..... swords thudded against shields... thunder beat in unison. Hearts pounded. I gripped my sword... and braced the shield against my shoulder. Giddy tendrils raced through my gut and chest....... a wild grin broke upon my face. I began to bounce.... knees spring-like.....standing on toes. A racehorse in the gate.
A wild shout went up to my left..... I turned to see a wiry warrior clad in sparkling scale and a green cape..... carrying a coffin shaped shield. He strode the front of our lines, turned to our enemies and threw insults against them, ìCowardly vermin of Trimaris, prepare to dieî... he shook his sword and our army let out a cackling howl. Goose bumps spread across arms and belly..... I thudded the butt of my (rattan) sword on the inside of the shield.... our lines advanced.
The enemy continued drumming their shields, and likewise strode forward. Nerves shot with adrenaline, eyes wide with awe, muscles tense as steel....... I approached my first battle... almost forgetting that none of this was ìrealî. No one would die. No one would kill.
This was my introduction to the SCA, or the ìSociety for Creative Anachronismî. The SCA is a collection of eccentric oddballs who dress in medieval clothing, strap on armor, and beat each other with wooden swords. They also dance, sing, and create works of art. The group is a repository of outlandish creatives, hyper-intelligent geeks, talented artists, hammish performers, history buffs, academics, poets, social misfits, and folks who simply refuse to succumb to the drudgery of being ìnormalî. I was a member for nearly ten years.... and loved every minute.
The heart of the SCA is the weekend ìeventî..... an affair that revolves around a number of semi-historic activities, usually held at a state park. Typically, a battle or tournament is the centerpiece of the ìeventî. My first battle was small by todayís standards..... each army had only 100 people. The group now hosts battles which involve thousands of participants... the largest is held annually in Pennsylvania, in August, and is known as the ìPennsics Warî. As the Pennsics example implies, SCA groups and events are spread throughout the United States. In fact, the group is growing internationally, especially in Europe.
The SCA divides the US, and the world, into a patchwork of regional organizations, called ìkingdomsî. Georgia, for example, is part of the ìKingdom of Meridiesî, which also includes Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi. North and South Carolina are the ìKingdom of Atlantiaî. California is in the ìWest Kingdomî. Each Kingdom is further divided into local groups, called Baronies or Shires.
The function of local groups is to host events, welcome newcomers, and teach medeival skills. Skills include artistic arts such as calligraphy, jewelry making, woodworking, and costuming; craft arts such as armoring & blacksmithing; performing arts such as medeival dancing and singing; and martial arts such as hand-to-hand fighting and archery. Most groups host a weekly business meeting and various ìguild meetingsî to practice these arts.
Since I joined, the organization has expanded tremendously and is now a full-fledged counter society: with its own government (a monarchy- with rulers chosen by combat), its own economy (some members make a full-time living selling their arts), and its own social system (a system of titles, clans, knights, and nobles). Every member of the SCA develops an alternate persona: a medieval character they become during events.
The combined effects are stunning. At times, I felt Iíd been transported back in time. My first SCA battle produced all the nerves, all the excitement, all the intensity of entering a ìrealî battle: pounding heart and manic energy and fear of being ìkilledî. These feelings intensified as our line strode towards the enemy.
As the armies neared, each gathered speed-- then slammed together with a mighty crunch.... wood against wood--- storm and thunder. I was surrounded by a sea of swinging clubs (rattan ìswordsî), fierce metal helms, glittering armor, and hedges of spear points. Swords crashed on my shield. Warriors jostled. Lines pushed back and forth. In the churning humanity I caught sight of a monstrous man in black leather.... with the build of a middle linebacker... who likewise saw me. He dropped his shoulder and charged. I braced, crouched low, and swung wildly, but my sword caught a spear and the viking pounded into me dead-on. I staggered backwards, sword flailing, shield flapping. He raised back and hammered a blow directly atop my helmet.... bells rang. I dropped to the ground- dead.
But never have the dead been so joyful. Lying in the heart of swirling chaos, I watched the battle unfold. Warriors flowed back and forth. Lines broke and re-formed. Shouts rang out.... banners flew... then dropped. In the end, the field was littered with bodies. Some were still. Others writhed or crawled or hid under shields- a scene of mass carnage. I looked overhead for crows, but there were none.
My eyes dropped back to the field and at that moment the marshals called ìholdî..... instantly the battle was over. The twisted waves of carnage... the littered bodies of the dead, gave an exuberant cheer and jumped to their feet. Enemies embraced... shook hands...patted one another on the back. They clustered in groups- and though it had all ended seconds before, the tall tales began immediately. Fighters traded stories of glory, victory, and defeat. ìNo shit, there I was......î. This was the post-battle pow-wow, an SCA tradition.
Some ten minutes later.... tales told, foes praised... the lines re-formed: Time for the next battle. I couldnít get enough. The wild, psychedelic, adrenaline-rushed fantasy had me in a giddy mania. I rushed from fight to fight. When the war finished, I lingered on the field for another two hours... challenging individual warriors to single combat. I was lost-- completely and blissfully lost in the play world of the SCA..... transported back to those magical days of childhood; playing for the sake of play.
Eventually, the setting sun forced me from the field. I showered (thankfully the SCA retains a number of modern conveniences... thus ìanachronismî). Once clean, I donned a simple costume and bounced to the feast hall..... a wooden pavilion lit by lamp light. Night fallen..... candle & lamp lit.... the scene blurred. Once more I felt the sensation of time travel.... I joined my friends at a rough wooden table. As we ate, we again shared our exploits from the dayís fighting.... each growing more fantastic and heroic with the re-telling.
Following the feast, tables were cleared and pushed aside... musicians entered... and a long night of dancing began. Medieval dances generally fall into two categories: folk dances and court dances. Folk dances are rigorous and athletic-- the forerunners of modern square and contra dancing.... while the court dances are staid and stately affairs. The hall filled, music flowed, and the floor shook from stomping feet.
My body ached from the long dayís fighting. I had bruises on my legs and a lumpy welt on my right arm. Hours of wearing armor in bright sun had dehydrated me. My mind was blank with exhaustion. But still I danced. And danced. And danced..... a dizzying whirl of dress hems, thudding feet, clapping hands, and beautiful girls. On and on it went..... deep into the night. My legs grew wobbly- my mind hazy. But magic and enthusiasm bouyed me and kept me going.
When the music stopped..... hours later... I stumbled back to bed.... and truly slept like the dead; with that sweet exhuastion of a child after a full dayís play.
For some, the SCA is an exercise in living history. Many members are meticulous researchers- accomplished experts in a chosen discipline of history. Others join the group for its unique social characteristics-- its embracement of eccentricity.... its community and cameraderie. But for me, the SCA was an act of jubuliant defiance: an enthusiastic refusal to surrender to tedium.
I did not, and do not, want to abandon the creative flow of childhood. I am convinced that play.... fantasy and creativity for its own sake... is a deep and profound human need; one we, as adults, must nurture and maintain. Play is not an escape.... it is a celebration. Play is the essence of creativity.
We, as adults-- for the sake of our happiness and our souls, would be well advised to re-discover it.
Fish In a Bowl
by Skald
The Rickshaw stopped on the corner and I stepped out.... handed over 300 rupees and looked around: instant panic. A thousand eyes were on me. Bold black & unblinking. Pressure closing in. Busy intersection in the north suburbs of Bombay... off... way off the guidebook maps. Freak in a freak show.... the whole neighborhood stopped to stare at the bald, white foreigner. Cars slowed . children pointed. Conversations broke in mid-sentence.... heads turned towards me. whispers and scrunched eyebrows. shop owners peered from their doors.... busy commuters stopped in midstride.
I strained the backpack onto my shoulders, and I grumbled "I am a huge, white, skinhead, turtlish freak...." Short rabbit-like breaths. Darting eyes searched desperately for the hotel sign. "where is it, where is it?".... I scanned the sidewalks and intersection.... .and set off to my right.... better to keep moving... flee the unflinching eyes.
But no escape... every corner turned presented another pool of Indians.... more stares, more pointing, more whispers. Dark thoughts, ìthey hate Americans.... Iíve got to find the hotelî. I hurried.... faster and faster down a side street to nowhere, then a dead end. "Fuck fuck fuck" I thought and pirhouetted... knees buckled from the weight of the backpack. I sped back to the main intersection and chose the next road to the right....
And there it was... the Hotel Gupta. Sanctuary. I leapt for the doorway... bounded up the stairs to the check in desk. A greasy-haired man with a thick paunch scowled... scanned me... and said, "Hmmmm, can I help you?" "I have a reservation", I stammered, "Skald". He did not move, nor look to the reservation book... held my gaze and said, "we donít have a reservation for that name, sir". Tense voice. Taut lips. "But.. I called... I called. From America. Two weeks ago. And made a reservation".
Throat tightened in fear. My first trip... my first day abroad... and already- disaster. Where would I stay? How would I find a place? Could I get a taxi way out here? Why had I let my Indian friend in Georgia convince me to stay here.... I should have stuck with the safe backpacker joints listed in Lonely Planet.
The clerk wobbled his head...îvery well, we have a double room for 600 rupees... you will have to take thatî .... he squinted, leaned forward, and slid the guest book towards me. "Ok. No problem" I said and lunged for the book. Thank god. I whipped out my passport, which I'd cleverly hidden in a pouch around my neck, just as the guidebook suggested. Filled out the guestbook... was led to my room.
My first hotel room in India. As the clerk opened the door, I prepared for the worst: mental flashes of roaches, bedbugs, decay, and filth. I was in an exhausted jet-lagged stupor. He swung the door wide and I stepped in, "whoa". Clean tile floor. Double bed with immaculate white sheets. Bright lighting. "Great. This is great", I mumbled as he handed me the key. I locked the door lightning fast and slid the bolt for good measure. I was safe... locked in a tidy, clean, room. A room, I suddenly realized, with AIR CONDITIONING! I was safe from the staring hordes. I was safe from the flinty clerk. I was safe from India.
I threw the pack to the floor in front of the bed and shuffled to the bathroom. No roaches. No dirt. Immaculate porcelain. Western toilet. Shower with hot water. Long, deep conscious sigh....... release of terror and anxiety. Turned and shuffled back to the bed and fell to it. Thoughts: "should take a shower"..... but in minutes I was out. An exhuasted valium-like coma after a 24 hour journey of flights and layovers.
Thus concluded my first day abroad.
The Rickshaw stopped on the corner and I stepped out.... handed over 300 rupees and looked around: instant panic. A thousand eyes were on me. Bold black & unblinking. Pressure closing in. Busy intersection in the north suburbs of Bombay... off... way off the guidebook maps. Freak in a freak show.... the whole neighborhood stopped to stare at the bald, white foreigner. Cars slowed . children pointed. Conversations broke in mid-sentence.... heads turned towards me. whispers and scrunched eyebrows. shop owners peered from their doors.... busy commuters stopped in midstride.
I strained the backpack onto my shoulders, and I grumbled "I am a huge, white, skinhead, turtlish freak...." Short rabbit-like breaths. Darting eyes searched desperately for the hotel sign. "where is it, where is it?".... I scanned the sidewalks and intersection.... .and set off to my right.... better to keep moving... flee the unflinching eyes.
But no escape... every corner turned presented another pool of Indians.... more stares, more pointing, more whispers. Dark thoughts, ìthey hate Americans.... Iíve got to find the hotelî. I hurried.... faster and faster down a side street to nowhere, then a dead end. "Fuck fuck fuck" I thought and pirhouetted... knees buckled from the weight of the backpack. I sped back to the main intersection and chose the next road to the right....
And there it was... the Hotel Gupta. Sanctuary. I leapt for the doorway... bounded up the stairs to the check in desk. A greasy-haired man with a thick paunch scowled... scanned me... and said, "Hmmmm, can I help you?" "I have a reservation", I stammered, "Skald". He did not move, nor look to the reservation book... held my gaze and said, "we donít have a reservation for that name, sir". Tense voice. Taut lips. "But.. I called... I called. From America. Two weeks ago. And made a reservation".
Throat tightened in fear. My first trip... my first day abroad... and already- disaster. Where would I stay? How would I find a place? Could I get a taxi way out here? Why had I let my Indian friend in Georgia convince me to stay here.... I should have stuck with the safe backpacker joints listed in Lonely Planet.
The clerk wobbled his head...îvery well, we have a double room for 600 rupees... you will have to take thatî .... he squinted, leaned forward, and slid the guest book towards me. "Ok. No problem" I said and lunged for the book. Thank god. I whipped out my passport, which I'd cleverly hidden in a pouch around my neck, just as the guidebook suggested. Filled out the guestbook... was led to my room.
My first hotel room in India. As the clerk opened the door, I prepared for the worst: mental flashes of roaches, bedbugs, decay, and filth. I was in an exhausted jet-lagged stupor. He swung the door wide and I stepped in, "whoa". Clean tile floor. Double bed with immaculate white sheets. Bright lighting. "Great. This is great", I mumbled as he handed me the key. I locked the door lightning fast and slid the bolt for good measure. I was safe... locked in a tidy, clean, room. A room, I suddenly realized, with AIR CONDITIONING! I was safe from the staring hordes. I was safe from the flinty clerk. I was safe from India.
I threw the pack to the floor in front of the bed and shuffled to the bathroom. No roaches. No dirt. Immaculate porcelain. Western toilet. Shower with hot water. Long, deep conscious sigh....... release of terror and anxiety. Turned and shuffled back to the bed and fell to it. Thoughts: "should take a shower"..... but in minutes I was out. An exhuasted valium-like coma after a 24 hour journey of flights and layovers.
Thus concluded my first day abroad.
Nobody Knows
by AJ/Skald
A wizened woman sat cross-legged on the pavement in Athens, GA- a plastic cup in her hand. She bowed low as I passed, ìPlease help me, sirî she moaned. Broke and living in my car myself... I snapped my eyes forward and hurried past. ìSorryî, I muttered. Three, four five steps- and then I stopped. I let out a slow, deep breath. My hand fished around my pocket. I grunted to myself, turned around, hurried back, and dropped a quarter in her cup. ìGod bless youî, her eyes lit up with gratitude. I nodded and walked away.
Then there was the crying man in Bangkok. He sat on his knees and tears poured from his eyes. As I approached he put his hands together in the position of prayer (a ìwaiî) and bowed his head to the sidewalk.... hands outstretched. I reached into my pocket, but this time I had no change. Only bills. I kept walking but guilt gnawed me with every step. Thirty paces more and a thin mother with a baby confronted me--- ìplease sirî she muttered and opened her hands. I sped faster.
ìNobody Knowsî is the name of a Japanese film about four children who are abandoned by their Mother. They live together alone in an apartment and do all right for a while, but slowly their remaining money runs out. Then power is turned off. Then the water. They scrounge expired food at the local convenience store. They get water from the park. They survive; but bit by bit their health and appearance degrades. Itís both a gut-wrenching, and surprisingly hopeful movie. Gut-wrenching because ìnobody knowsî what is happening to the children. Nobody notices. Nobody cares. Nobody understands their experience. Hopeful because somehow the kids survive despite all of that.
When I watched the movie, I thought of the slow degradation most homeless people suffer. People who often start, just like the children, as clean, bright, healthy people; but some tragedy sets disaster in motion. This may come in the form of a car accident, for example... a common initiator of homelessness.
Some are immediately thrown out of work, out of an apartment, and out on the street. They lack resources and family support and are one accident from the street. For others it is a slow process. A gradual dissolution of a formerly stable life. One by one the pieces fall away: health, job, mental state, spouse, family, friends, apartment, car. It may take weeks, months, or years.
Stan is the good example. He was a client of mine when I managed a transitional housing shelter. He had a solid work history- ten years as the manager of a construction company. One day he came down with a strong flu he could not shake. His health deteriorated and he was admitted to the hospital- where he was diagnosed with HIV. Stanís employer learned of the diagnosis and fired him. He lost his paycheck and insurance coverage. Medical bills piled up. Eventually he was released from the hospital, but his health was not what it used to be. He turned to his family for help, but when they learned he was gay, they too turned their back on him. Stan decided to sell his house and move into a cheap apartment. He lived off of the money for a year, while he fought off the hospitalís bill collectors. During this time, his mental state worsened. He became severely, clinically depressed. He had lost his job of ten years, his family, and his house. Convinced that no one would employ him, he became a recluse- venturing out only to buy food. After a year, the money ran out and Stan was unable to pay the rent. He begged the landlord for extensions, but four months later he was evicted. He had no one to turn to and no where to go.
He went to a homeless shelter run by a Christian church and was offered a bed. He stayed for two weeks and began to gather hope. The shelter staff assured him they would help him find work and subsidized housing. His spirits lifted. Then he told them he was HIV positive and needed medication. The staff turned cold and hostile. A week later he was ejected from the shelter.
Stan ended up on the street. Subjected to the harshness of homelessness, he grew weaker. Four months later he was back at the hospital, suffering from pnumonia... nearly dead. With treatment he again rallied back to health. He was referred to our program by the hospital and accepted. That was how I learned his story.
It is a common story. The particulars are different from one person to another. One flees an abusive spouse and ends up on the street. One is injured in a car accident. One is laid off and cannot find more work. One suffers a schizophrenic break. Yet one by one,... one way or another, the strands of the safety net are cut. Eventually, they fall through.
The beggars you see on the street were not born there. Every one of them has a story. Every one of them has suffered and struggled. I know this because I was a social worker who worked with homeless people for many years. I know this because I chose to live homeless myself. Both experiences helped me see the people behind the concept. And both experiences helped me realize that it could be any one of us... at any time.
A wizened woman sat cross-legged on the pavement in Athens, GA- a plastic cup in her hand. She bowed low as I passed, ìPlease help me, sirî she moaned. Broke and living in my car myself... I snapped my eyes forward and hurried past. ìSorryî, I muttered. Three, four five steps- and then I stopped. I let out a slow, deep breath. My hand fished around my pocket. I grunted to myself, turned around, hurried back, and dropped a quarter in her cup. ìGod bless youî, her eyes lit up with gratitude. I nodded and walked away.
Then there was the crying man in Bangkok. He sat on his knees and tears poured from his eyes. As I approached he put his hands together in the position of prayer (a ìwaiî) and bowed his head to the sidewalk.... hands outstretched. I reached into my pocket, but this time I had no change. Only bills. I kept walking but guilt gnawed me with every step. Thirty paces more and a thin mother with a baby confronted me--- ìplease sirî she muttered and opened her hands. I sped faster.
ìNobody Knowsî is the name of a Japanese film about four children who are abandoned by their Mother. They live together alone in an apartment and do all right for a while, but slowly their remaining money runs out. Then power is turned off. Then the water. They scrounge expired food at the local convenience store. They get water from the park. They survive; but bit by bit their health and appearance degrades. Itís both a gut-wrenching, and surprisingly hopeful movie. Gut-wrenching because ìnobody knowsî what is happening to the children. Nobody notices. Nobody cares. Nobody understands their experience. Hopeful because somehow the kids survive despite all of that.
When I watched the movie, I thought of the slow degradation most homeless people suffer. People who often start, just like the children, as clean, bright, healthy people; but some tragedy sets disaster in motion. This may come in the form of a car accident, for example... a common initiator of homelessness.
Some are immediately thrown out of work, out of an apartment, and out on the street. They lack resources and family support and are one accident from the street. For others it is a slow process. A gradual dissolution of a formerly stable life. One by one the pieces fall away: health, job, mental state, spouse, family, friends, apartment, car. It may take weeks, months, or years.
Stan is the good example. He was a client of mine when I managed a transitional housing shelter. He had a solid work history- ten years as the manager of a construction company. One day he came down with a strong flu he could not shake. His health deteriorated and he was admitted to the hospital- where he was diagnosed with HIV. Stanís employer learned of the diagnosis and fired him. He lost his paycheck and insurance coverage. Medical bills piled up. Eventually he was released from the hospital, but his health was not what it used to be. He turned to his family for help, but when they learned he was gay, they too turned their back on him. Stan decided to sell his house and move into a cheap apartment. He lived off of the money for a year, while he fought off the hospitalís bill collectors. During this time, his mental state worsened. He became severely, clinically depressed. He had lost his job of ten years, his family, and his house. Convinced that no one would employ him, he became a recluse- venturing out only to buy food. After a year, the money ran out and Stan was unable to pay the rent. He begged the landlord for extensions, but four months later he was evicted. He had no one to turn to and no where to go.
He went to a homeless shelter run by a Christian church and was offered a bed. He stayed for two weeks and began to gather hope. The shelter staff assured him they would help him find work and subsidized housing. His spirits lifted. Then he told them he was HIV positive and needed medication. The staff turned cold and hostile. A week later he was ejected from the shelter.
Stan ended up on the street. Subjected to the harshness of homelessness, he grew weaker. Four months later he was back at the hospital, suffering from pnumonia... nearly dead. With treatment he again rallied back to health. He was referred to our program by the hospital and accepted. That was how I learned his story.
It is a common story. The particulars are different from one person to another. One flees an abusive spouse and ends up on the street. One is injured in a car accident. One is laid off and cannot find more work. One suffers a schizophrenic break. Yet one by one,... one way or another, the strands of the safety net are cut. Eventually, they fall through.
The beggars you see on the street were not born there. Every one of them has a story. Every one of them has suffered and struggled. I know this because I was a social worker who worked with homeless people for many years. I know this because I chose to live homeless myself. Both experiences helped me see the people behind the concept. And both experiences helped me realize that it could be any one of us... at any time.
Virtual Reality
by Skald
How do I lift the veil on the terrifying, magical, dreadful, incredible face of truth? How does one convey even the barest glimpse in words? In fucking words. Words are weak, pathetic tools.
How do I convey the infinite unfolding visions of nightime ganga dreams? I canít. Canít be done. How do I convey the feelings, images, memories, and significance of a human life? Of Jessicaís life? Of her childrenís. Of mine? Words are entirely inadequate.... which is one of those cliches that writers always use... a cliche because its true but not in the sense that most understand. True because once youíve glimpsed something significant....
seen a sunset, or dropped into despair and terror, or been moved by a vision of the Infinite... what the fuck do you say or write? These experiences are far beyond the ability of finite words to express..... or any other symbols (numbers, equations,..) for that matter.
We are lost in these symbols and take them for reality. How many live and breath their entire waking lives within these word prisons? I think of the pathetic dregs who make their living as political commentators. Gossip hounds. They talk and write and debate the doings of events they have never experienced. Just how many fucking experts do we have to listen to, say, about Iraq,... who have never once been there.
Or for that matter, how many ìdrug expertsî have never experienced the drugs they so zealously want to ban. Modern culture is one in which the virtual reality of media is valued more than the immediate experiences of oneís life. Instead of bemoaning the evils of faraway people wouldnít we be better served by rooting out the evils in our own minds? Instead of seeking freedom and liberation for people halfway across the globe, wouldnít we be better served by seeking our own freedom and liberation? There is no odor so foul as that of goodness tainted (Thoreau). I imagine the people of Iraq would be much happier if we would stop forcing so much ìgoodî upon them.
I want to do drugs. I want to have sex and enjoy it. I want to cry like a helpless baby in the face of loss and death. I want to live my life--- not suck vicariously at the tit of TV. I want to love a real human being and struggle with every one of my imperfections reflected in her. I want to taste my food. I want to freeze and burn. I want a life thatís juicy with experience.... from which pain and wonder drip, ooze, and pustulate.
I want dirt and I want dance. Because that is life. There is no ecstacy without terror. No sex without sweat. No love without loss. The earth is a stewing organic cauldron of life... but what do we do? Hide away in cardboard boxes, eat food from sterilized plastic wrappers, and waste our ìfree timeî plugged to video monitors-- searching for a vicarious rush through imaginary lives.
Our lives are stale and monotonous. Most of us get paid for putting up with that monotony-- its called ìworkingî. And after 8,9, 10 or more hours of that, we come home and plug in to gossip and childrenís stories and stimulation that turns us into emotional and intellectual retards.
The world is filled with people more concerned with faraway events than with the details of their own life... more worried about the situation in Iraq or the state of the abortion debate than with the status of their own spirit and soul.
I sense a nation terrified of looking inward--- doing everything possible to distract itself from ugly truths lying just below the surface. And so these people shuffle off to dreadful jobs every day and call themselves ìresponsibleî. They feed their kids and pay their bills and congratulate themselves for being ìcaringî. They go to church, clutch the bible, and proclaim themselves ìblessedî.
But saying the words does not make it so.
How do I lift the veil on the terrifying, magical, dreadful, incredible face of truth? How does one convey even the barest glimpse in words? In fucking words. Words are weak, pathetic tools.
How do I convey the infinite unfolding visions of nightime ganga dreams? I canít. Canít be done. How do I convey the feelings, images, memories, and significance of a human life? Of Jessicaís life? Of her childrenís. Of mine? Words are entirely inadequate.... which is one of those cliches that writers always use... a cliche because its true but not in the sense that most understand. True because once youíve glimpsed something significant....
seen a sunset, or dropped into despair and terror, or been moved by a vision of the Infinite... what the fuck do you say or write? These experiences are far beyond the ability of finite words to express..... or any other symbols (numbers, equations,..) for that matter.
We are lost in these symbols and take them for reality. How many live and breath their entire waking lives within these word prisons? I think of the pathetic dregs who make their living as political commentators. Gossip hounds. They talk and write and debate the doings of events they have never experienced. Just how many fucking experts do we have to listen to, say, about Iraq,... who have never once been there.
Or for that matter, how many ìdrug expertsî have never experienced the drugs they so zealously want to ban. Modern culture is one in which the virtual reality of media is valued more than the immediate experiences of oneís life. Instead of bemoaning the evils of faraway people wouldnít we be better served by rooting out the evils in our own minds? Instead of seeking freedom and liberation for people halfway across the globe, wouldnít we be better served by seeking our own freedom and liberation? There is no odor so foul as that of goodness tainted (Thoreau). I imagine the people of Iraq would be much happier if we would stop forcing so much ìgoodî upon them.
I want to do drugs. I want to have sex and enjoy it. I want to cry like a helpless baby in the face of loss and death. I want to live my life--- not suck vicariously at the tit of TV. I want to love a real human being and struggle with every one of my imperfections reflected in her. I want to taste my food. I want to freeze and burn. I want a life thatís juicy with experience.... from which pain and wonder drip, ooze, and pustulate.
I want dirt and I want dance. Because that is life. There is no ecstacy without terror. No sex without sweat. No love without loss. The earth is a stewing organic cauldron of life... but what do we do? Hide away in cardboard boxes, eat food from sterilized plastic wrappers, and waste our ìfree timeî plugged to video monitors-- searching for a vicarious rush through imaginary lives.
Our lives are stale and monotonous. Most of us get paid for putting up with that monotony-- its called ìworkingî. And after 8,9, 10 or more hours of that, we come home and plug in to gossip and childrenís stories and stimulation that turns us into emotional and intellectual retards.
The world is filled with people more concerned with faraway events than with the details of their own life... more worried about the situation in Iraq or the state of the abortion debate than with the status of their own spirit and soul.
I sense a nation terrified of looking inward--- doing everything possible to distract itself from ugly truths lying just below the surface. And so these people shuffle off to dreadful jobs every day and call themselves ìresponsibleî. They feed their kids and pay their bills and congratulate themselves for being ìcaringî. They go to church, clutch the bible, and proclaim themselves ìblessedî.
But saying the words does not make it so.
Dog Food
by AJ/SKald
Whines and whimpers came from the cages... stacked three high. Each held a slender, tan colored dog. Black eyes stared into mine, tails tucked low, head down. Some spun in their cages frantically. Others sat, looking dejected. A queasy feeling birthed in my gut and shot up my throat-- my eyes misted. I put my head down and hurried through the cage-crowded alley, took the first right, and opened onto a wide street barren of cars. It was lined with large stalls-- each fronted by a long tray filled with ice. Slabs of raw meat , mostly legs, were stacked on the ice. At the end of each skinned leg, a paw.
I stared in sickened fascination at the butchered dog legs.... rows of them. Korean men strolled the street, some strolled briskly while others paused to shop for dog meat. Iced melted from the trays and dripped onto the sidewalks.... the stink of raw meat hung in the air.
Whines and whimpers came from the cages... stacked three high. Each held a slender, tan colored dog. Black eyes stared into mine, tails tucked low, head down. Some spun in their cages frantically. Others sat, looking dejected. A queasy feeling birthed in my gut and shot up my throat-- my eyes misted. I put my head down and hurried through the cage-crowded alley, took the first right, and opened onto a wide street barren of cars. It was lined with large stalls-- each fronted by a long tray filled with ice. Slabs of raw meat , mostly legs, were stacked on the ice. At the end of each skinned leg, a paw.
I stared in sickened fascination at the butchered dog legs.... rows of them. Korean men strolled the street, some strolled briskly while others paused to shop for dog meat. Iced melted from the trays and dripped onto the sidewalks.... the stink of raw meat hung in the air.
The Evils of Work, Part 879
by AJ/Skald
I am reminded of Hakim Beyís quote. Work is the single most oppressive reality we face. Far more than legislative politics and the evils of the Bush regime, it is work which makes us miserable. It is work that corrupts our daily lives. It is work which exhuasts us, drains us of creativity, and lobotomizes us with boredom.
This is, in fact, the big elephant in the living room. Its the subject no politician-- Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, or Green, will address. They all speak of employment as a positive-- as a boon to humanity- as a solution to our problems. But for most of us, employment is the problem.
Barnes & Noble: Everyday I stood for eight, nine, ten hours. By the end of a shift my back screamed in pain, my knees hurt, and my ankles ached. I asked the manager for a stool to sit on but he said ìchairs and stools are against company policyî. Other employees, usually older than me, suffered substantially more.
But the physical discomfort was mild compared to the mental agony of motony. For most of my day I stood and repeated the same simple tasks... scan books, flash a fake smile, collect cash. Company literature assured me that I was a valuable ìassociateî. Yet ìassociatesî were not allowed to make any decision. For every customer question, for every customer complaint, for every returned item, we had to call a manager. Irritated customers fidgeted as we waited for a supervisor to put their signature to even the most straightforward return.
Overhead, cameras monitored our every move. But the music was perhaps the worst aspect of the job. The same music repeated day after day. Employees were not allowed to bring music or suggest selections. Each song at Barnes & Noble was a piece of revenue- music companies paid the company to play their songs in hopes of boosting sales. From California to Georgia, the same banal tripe pipes from the chainís stores. But it could be worse. At Senor Wraps, in Greenville, SC, hidden microphones record every employee conversation. This is done, according to the company, for ìquality controlî.
Monotony, standardization, efficiency, low pay, obedience, surveillance. These are the hallmarks of the American job market. Alan Watts wrote, ìmost people are paid to put up with monotonyî. He was right.
I am reminded of Hakim Beyís quote. Work is the single most oppressive reality we face. Far more than legislative politics and the evils of the Bush regime, it is work which makes us miserable. It is work that corrupts our daily lives. It is work which exhuasts us, drains us of creativity, and lobotomizes us with boredom.
This is, in fact, the big elephant in the living room. Its the subject no politician-- Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, or Green, will address. They all speak of employment as a positive-- as a boon to humanity- as a solution to our problems. But for most of us, employment is the problem.
Barnes & Noble: Everyday I stood for eight, nine, ten hours. By the end of a shift my back screamed in pain, my knees hurt, and my ankles ached. I asked the manager for a stool to sit on but he said ìchairs and stools are against company policyî. Other employees, usually older than me, suffered substantially more.
But the physical discomfort was mild compared to the mental agony of motony. For most of my day I stood and repeated the same simple tasks... scan books, flash a fake smile, collect cash. Company literature assured me that I was a valuable ìassociateî. Yet ìassociatesî were not allowed to make any decision. For every customer question, for every customer complaint, for every returned item, we had to call a manager. Irritated customers fidgeted as we waited for a supervisor to put their signature to even the most straightforward return.
Overhead, cameras monitored our every move. But the music was perhaps the worst aspect of the job. The same music repeated day after day. Employees were not allowed to bring music or suggest selections. Each song at Barnes & Noble was a piece of revenue- music companies paid the company to play their songs in hopes of boosting sales. From California to Georgia, the same banal tripe pipes from the chainís stores. But it could be worse. At Senor Wraps, in Greenville, SC, hidden microphones record every employee conversation. This is done, according to the company, for ìquality controlî.
Monotony, standardization, efficiency, low pay, obedience, surveillance. These are the hallmarks of the American job market. Alan Watts wrote, ìmost people are paid to put up with monotonyî. He was right.
The Good Life
by Skald/AJ
Seven degrees and an empty stomach-- this was the bottom. My guts twisted and ached... head dizzy and buzzing..... Third straight day without food. Coffee in the gut, burning like acid. Ceramic cup shaking in unsteady hands-- stared through the window-- trees swaying. Seven degrees. The coldest day of the year.
I was broke. I was hungry. I was homeless. A caffeine cramp gripped my stomach and I grabbed my sides. I hunched over the table and shook my head. It wasnít supposed to be like this. This was meant to be a grand adventure. This was supposed to be the good life.
It started as a Thoreau-on-wheels experiment. In place of a cabin, I had a van. I began in luxury: ripped out the back seats and built a bed. Built another one, for my dog Athena. Used plastic bins to store clothes and food. Had a cell phone. Had warm clothes.
For privacy, I tinted all windows (in the back) solid black...then backed them with foam insulation. I also installed an extra Marine battery and wired it to the carís electrical system. In summer it powered two fans that kept me cool. I lived all summer in style and comfort.... even joined a 24 hour gym, which gave me hot showers, clean bathrooms, and an excuse to exercise. I had a cook stove but rarely used it. I was flush with money from a stint of teaching English in Japan. I was set. I ate out every meal.
For seven months I lived the good life. Basic expenses were low. I splurged on luxuries-- good food, live music, movies, books.... I wrote, ran in the woods with Freya, and lounged with friends. Life was unhurried and unregimented. Unemployed, living in a van, flush with cash.... I was free. I got up when I woke up. I ate when I was hungry. When tired, I rested. When energized, I ran or wrote or danced. If I craved solitude... I went to the mountains and camped alone. If I craved society.... I drank and talked with friends. I slept when sleep overtook me.
Drove to The Grit and had a gargantuan feast: Large Golden Bowl with Veggies, Broccoli with Peanut Sauce, Garlic-Parsley Mashed Potatoes, and a piece of ìLil Jimís Puddin Cakeî.... just to prove the good times.
I often congratulated myself, ìThis is what Thoreau had in mind--- life as a past-time... the zen ideal: eat when hungry, sleep when tired. For the first time in my life I was truly free. I thought of Thoreau in his cabin. I thought of Kerouac on his mountain. I thought of Basho strolling the road to the far north. I did not feel deprived- I felt fortunate. I felt blessed. I was blessed. For seven months I was a noble tramp. For seven months life was sublime. For seven months I was fat, happy, and free.
Then the money ran out.
The weather turned cold. Hunger set in. Iíd never been truly hungry in my life. But for the next two months hunger was chronic. While Athena continued to eat well, I scrounged from friends who worked in restaurants. Belly ached when I awoke in the morning and never stopped aching. With an empty stomach, the cold seemed to bite harder.
Determined to continue with the experiment, I made a deal with a coffee shop-- I recycled their paper and plastic in exchange for free coffee and stale snack food. The coffee warmed me; the pastries supplied calories, the caffeine held off fatigue. But my guts never stopped churning.
Boredom was another serious problem. Without money I could not eat at restaurants, nor go out with friends, nor see movies. I sometimes walked at the park, but chill winds often drove me indoors. I sat in the coffee shop. Mind grew fuzzy and distracted. Some days I sat and stared for hours.... sipping coffee... lost in daydreams. Friends stopped calling. Depression set in. The romance of the experiment quickly faded. I tasted impoverished homelessness for the first time. ìThis is what its likeî, I thought.
I wish Iíd been tougher. For many years I had worked with homeless people. I counselled them. I tried to find them homes. I tried to find them work. I tried to understand their experience but in truth I never did. I was, in the end, a spoiled middle class boy who had never, up to that point, suffered a day of deprivation in his life. When it came, I flinched.
Seven degrees and an empty stomach-- this was the bottom. My guts twisted and ached... head dizzy and buzzing..... Third straight day without food. Coffee in the gut, burning like acid. Ceramic cup shaking in unsteady hands-- stared through the window-- trees swaying. Seven degrees. The coldest day of the year.
I was broke. I was hungry. I was homeless. A caffeine cramp gripped my stomach and I grabbed my sides. I hunched over the table and shook my head. It wasnít supposed to be like this. This was meant to be a grand adventure. This was supposed to be the good life.
It started as a Thoreau-on-wheels experiment. In place of a cabin, I had a van. I began in luxury: ripped out the back seats and built a bed. Built another one, for my dog Athena. Used plastic bins to store clothes and food. Had a cell phone. Had warm clothes.
For privacy, I tinted all windows (in the back) solid black...then backed them with foam insulation. I also installed an extra Marine battery and wired it to the carís electrical system. In summer it powered two fans that kept me cool. I lived all summer in style and comfort.... even joined a 24 hour gym, which gave me hot showers, clean bathrooms, and an excuse to exercise. I had a cook stove but rarely used it. I was flush with money from a stint of teaching English in Japan. I was set. I ate out every meal.
For seven months I lived the good life. Basic expenses were low. I splurged on luxuries-- good food, live music, movies, books.... I wrote, ran in the woods with Freya, and lounged with friends. Life was unhurried and unregimented. Unemployed, living in a van, flush with cash.... I was free. I got up when I woke up. I ate when I was hungry. When tired, I rested. When energized, I ran or wrote or danced. If I craved solitude... I went to the mountains and camped alone. If I craved society.... I drank and talked with friends. I slept when sleep overtook me.
Drove to The Grit and had a gargantuan feast: Large Golden Bowl with Veggies, Broccoli with Peanut Sauce, Garlic-Parsley Mashed Potatoes, and a piece of ìLil Jimís Puddin Cakeî.... just to prove the good times.
I often congratulated myself, ìThis is what Thoreau had in mind--- life as a past-time... the zen ideal: eat when hungry, sleep when tired. For the first time in my life I was truly free. I thought of Thoreau in his cabin. I thought of Kerouac on his mountain. I thought of Basho strolling the road to the far north. I did not feel deprived- I felt fortunate. I felt blessed. I was blessed. For seven months I was a noble tramp. For seven months life was sublime. For seven months I was fat, happy, and free.
Then the money ran out.
The weather turned cold. Hunger set in. Iíd never been truly hungry in my life. But for the next two months hunger was chronic. While Athena continued to eat well, I scrounged from friends who worked in restaurants. Belly ached when I awoke in the morning and never stopped aching. With an empty stomach, the cold seemed to bite harder.
Determined to continue with the experiment, I made a deal with a coffee shop-- I recycled their paper and plastic in exchange for free coffee and stale snack food. The coffee warmed me; the pastries supplied calories, the caffeine held off fatigue. But my guts never stopped churning.
Boredom was another serious problem. Without money I could not eat at restaurants, nor go out with friends, nor see movies. I sometimes walked at the park, but chill winds often drove me indoors. I sat in the coffee shop. Mind grew fuzzy and distracted. Some days I sat and stared for hours.... sipping coffee... lost in daydreams. Friends stopped calling. Depression set in. The romance of the experiment quickly faded. I tasted impoverished homelessness for the first time. ìThis is what its likeî, I thought.
I wish Iíd been tougher. For many years I had worked with homeless people. I counselled them. I tried to find them homes. I tried to find them work. I tried to understand their experience but in truth I never did. I was, in the end, a spoiled middle class boy who had never, up to that point, suffered a day of deprivation in his life. When it came, I flinched.
A Foul & Evil Agency
by AJ/Skald
I started work in mid-December-- arrived at 8:30 and was escorted back to my unit for orientation. Tara, a wire thin blond with John Lennon glasses, greeted me and escorted me to a small meeting room. A 20-something girl was sitting at the table-- the other new employee. I sat down and Tara began the orientation: ìThe first thing you need to know is that most of our clients are stupid, you need to treat them like children. You are the parent and need to lay down the lawî, were her first words. I looked down at the table. I imagined another month of starving. ìI mean it, youíve got to be firm, you arenít dealing with the best and brightest hereî..... and so it went. She continued like this for over an hour and then left us to read policy manuals for the rest of the day.
It was the same schedule for the next four days: a ìpep talkî followed by hours of reading manuals. To pass the time, each hour I would tabulate the money Iíd just made, and the amount of food it would buy. That kept me going. But I was still hungry. I had to wait a full month for the first paycheck. During that time I was constantly hungry. Co-workers asked me to lunch. I declined and snuck into the break room to devour popcorn, cookies, rolls, and Christmas candy.
The second week was spent ìshadowingî other workers. My first observation was with Lorena, an overweight frumpy woman in her mid-30s who took child abuse reports. Like Tara, she began by warning that most DFACS clients are ìidiotsî. My first observation was of an old man who came to the office to report a case of child abuse. ìOh God, its some old man. I guarantee this is a bogus reportî, Lorena whispered to me.
The man was tall and moved slowly. His face was thin-- as was his skin.
ìName?î, Lorena snarled, as soon as he was seated.
He responded and Lorena continued with the questions, making her way through the intake form as rapidly as possible. When she came to the section on alleged abuse, the Old Man glanced at me.
ìIím sorryî, I said, ìIím training for a job and am observing Lorena. I can leave if it would make you more comfortableî, I said. Lorena shot me an eat-shit look.
ìYes.... if its OK.... yes, that would be good. I donít mean anything by it,... its just that I would feel more comfortable with one personî.
ìNo problemî, I said, and left the room. I waited for twenty minutes and then the door opened, the old man shuffled out, and Lorena motioned me in.
ìI knew it, totally bogus,î she huffed. ìNo bruises, no burns, nothing. What an idiot.î She told me that old people always think their grandchildren are being abused. I smiled and nodded and said nothing. I was hungry and irritible. What bothered me, however, was her contempt for the clients.
This attitude was the norm at DFACS. With few exceptions, the social workers viewed their clients with great scorn. They hated most. Such was the underlying philosophy of the agency.
After that first day of observation, I returned to my original premise: better to starve. I decided to quit. But then I got to thinking.... my orientation was scheduled to run for another three weeks. I had one more week of general training followed by two weeks in the Foster Care unit. Furthermore, Christmas break fell within this period, so actual work time would be only three weeks. I realized I could rake in another three weeks salary... a very good salary by homeless standards... without contributing to the agency in any way. In fact, Iíd be taking their money without doing appreciable work- surely that would be a good deed, especially at Christmas.
I hung around. I feigned interest in policy manuals. I shadowed foul-mouthed workers and nodded to their advice. I admit it, it was fun. I had felt contempt for the agency and the people who worked there. It was fun to take their money knowing I was soon headed out the door. I wish I could have caused them more damage.
I wish I could subject them to the same humiliation they regularly heap upon people who are poor and struggling. As it was, escape was my best option.
I started work in mid-December-- arrived at 8:30 and was escorted back to my unit for orientation. Tara, a wire thin blond with John Lennon glasses, greeted me and escorted me to a small meeting room. A 20-something girl was sitting at the table-- the other new employee. I sat down and Tara began the orientation: ìThe first thing you need to know is that most of our clients are stupid, you need to treat them like children. You are the parent and need to lay down the lawî, were her first words. I looked down at the table. I imagined another month of starving. ìI mean it, youíve got to be firm, you arenít dealing with the best and brightest hereî..... and so it went. She continued like this for over an hour and then left us to read policy manuals for the rest of the day.
It was the same schedule for the next four days: a ìpep talkî followed by hours of reading manuals. To pass the time, each hour I would tabulate the money Iíd just made, and the amount of food it would buy. That kept me going. But I was still hungry. I had to wait a full month for the first paycheck. During that time I was constantly hungry. Co-workers asked me to lunch. I declined and snuck into the break room to devour popcorn, cookies, rolls, and Christmas candy.
The second week was spent ìshadowingî other workers. My first observation was with Lorena, an overweight frumpy woman in her mid-30s who took child abuse reports. Like Tara, she began by warning that most DFACS clients are ìidiotsî. My first observation was of an old man who came to the office to report a case of child abuse. ìOh God, its some old man. I guarantee this is a bogus reportî, Lorena whispered to me.
The man was tall and moved slowly. His face was thin-- as was his skin.
ìName?î, Lorena snarled, as soon as he was seated.
He responded and Lorena continued with the questions, making her way through the intake form as rapidly as possible. When she came to the section on alleged abuse, the Old Man glanced at me.
ìIím sorryî, I said, ìIím training for a job and am observing Lorena. I can leave if it would make you more comfortableî, I said. Lorena shot me an eat-shit look.
ìYes.... if its OK.... yes, that would be good. I donít mean anything by it,... its just that I would feel more comfortable with one personî.
ìNo problemî, I said, and left the room. I waited for twenty minutes and then the door opened, the old man shuffled out, and Lorena motioned me in.
ìI knew it, totally bogus,î she huffed. ìNo bruises, no burns, nothing. What an idiot.î She told me that old people always think their grandchildren are being abused. I smiled and nodded and said nothing. I was hungry and irritible. What bothered me, however, was her contempt for the clients.
This attitude was the norm at DFACS. With few exceptions, the social workers viewed their clients with great scorn. They hated most. Such was the underlying philosophy of the agency.
After that first day of observation, I returned to my original premise: better to starve. I decided to quit. But then I got to thinking.... my orientation was scheduled to run for another three weeks. I had one more week of general training followed by two weeks in the Foster Care unit. Furthermore, Christmas break fell within this period, so actual work time would be only three weeks. I realized I could rake in another three weeks salary... a very good salary by homeless standards... without contributing to the agency in any way. In fact, Iíd be taking their money without doing appreciable work- surely that would be a good deed, especially at Christmas.
I hung around. I feigned interest in policy manuals. I shadowed foul-mouthed workers and nodded to their advice. I admit it, it was fun. I had felt contempt for the agency and the people who worked there. It was fun to take their money knowing I was soon headed out the door. I wish I could have caused them more damage.
I wish I could subject them to the same humiliation they regularly heap upon people who are poor and struggling. As it was, escape was my best option.
Forget the Camera
by Skald
Golden star-sparkle of a mushroom high...... buzzing hum .... a slow motion orchestra of tuk-tuks and neon tiles. Shining mirrors. The aqua sheen of a plastic cup. A sip of coffee, a folding table; sharp spires threatening heaven.
Sitting across from The Temple of the Reclining Buddha (Wat Po) but not my usual self. My perceptions- my connection to the place- had been altered. Wat Po is one of Bangkokís biggest tourist attractions, but this was no normal tourist experience. A profound shift had occurred. I no longer felt like a ìtouristî. There was no dis-connect, no hankering after commodities, no alienation. At that moment I was connected. I was not an outsider- I belonged.
This transformation of perception required no drugs or meditative techniques. My only tools were a pencil and an open sketchbook. That day, I left my camera behind.. and it made all the difference. On that day, I realized that the grand travellers of old were on to something with their journals and sketchbooks. Sketching is not just a form of imaging taking.... it is a process that transforms the act of travel.
The camera can be a barrier to meaningful travel.. It trains us to scour for images... to collect them like cheap trinkets. When I carried a camera, the pictures took over. I was so focused on getting the shot that I failed to see anything. With a camera, touring became an exercise in cataloguing images rather than exploring cultures. ìHere I am at the Grand Palace î I told my friends and pointed to the photo. They politely uttered, ìAhh, thatís niceî. But had I actually been to the Grand Palace? Had I really seen or heard or felt it at all? I had a picture, but no feeling for the essence of the place.
Of all the tools of mass market tourism- the camera is the most common and thus the most insidious. The gadget, quite literally, can obscure the eyes and dull the senses. Encumbered by this thick barrier, I pointed, clicked, snapped..... and moved on. No connection. No taste for the flavor of the people. No encounter. No awareness.
A century and more ago, travellers relied on more sublime means of recording images-- sketching. At Wat Po I decided to revive this practice and it has completely transformed my travel experience since. Sketching is an activity truly in the spirit of the Grand Tour and has many advantages over photography. The first, and most important, is that sketching takes time. It slows you down, and that is the first step towards noticing.
For this first sketching expedition to Wat Po I arrrived early, about seven in the morning, and found a small streetside cafe directly across from the temple. I took a seat on the sidewalk, one with a wide view of the temple and the busy street in front of it. I ordered an ice coffee (ìgafe yenî), arranged my chair to face the temple- then took my journal, pencil and eraser and arranged them on the table. I took a deep breath. As I waited for the coffee, I did not touch the pencil... just sat back, relaxed, and took in the details of the scene-- the structures of the wall and rooftops beyond, the glittering sparkle of mirrored columns, the vibrant golds, greens, reds, and blues of roof tiles. My eyes caught the sharp spires, .......the faces of people on the street, the texture of their clothing, the swaying branches of the courtyard trees.
When the coffee arrived, I took a slow sip but continued in my reverie- shut my eyes for a time and listened to the hum of the traffic... caught bits of conversation from Thais and tourists passing by. I drew another deep breath to absorb the sharp aroma of the coffee and I shifted focus to tactile sensations-- the morning sun on my skin, the caress of a cool breeze, sweat sliding down my neck, ice cube on tongue.
I took a last swig of coffee and picked up the pencil. I chose a small doorway in the temple wall as my subject and traced its contours on the sketchpad... trying to capture the shapes exactly as I saw them. This took five minutes. I drew without hesitation, with no particular concern for accuracy. Once I had the shapes, I switched to a soft pencil and focused on the lights and shadows. This was much like painting in black and white..... using my finger tip, I smudged the graphite then used the eraser to ìpaintî highlights. The drawing took twenty minutes to complete.
And the end result was.... awful. From an artists perspective, it was terrible. The proportions were wrong. The lines looked hesitant and unsure. In fact, my sketch looked nothing like the doorway at all. I would never show it to friends. But the end product was not the goal. The true goal for sketching was an intense engagement with the immediate experience of the moment, and in this goal I succeeded. Sketching is a meditative process- a mental snapshot far more powerful than that of a camera.
I still remember the color and texture of the coffee cup (aqua blue plastic), I remember the woman who served it to me, I remember the three wheeled tuk-tuks buzzing by, I remember the glitter of sunlight on mirrored columns, I remember the exact hue of the mosaic tiles.
Simply put, the point of travel sketching is not the sketch. The actual drawing is a tool-- a means of slowing down and connecting deeply with an immediate experience. This technique does not necessarily require drawing. I have used word sketches for the same purpose... a free flowing stream of consciousness.... an unstopping flow of perceived details. For example, a coffee shop in Bangkok: oak chair with tangled back, crumpled pack crunched in a corner, black bag on top.... spike haired muscle boy snaps picture of pale skinned friend.... big smiles.... eating cheese croissant.... crystal blue chandelier.... mushroom blue..... globe lights sparkle. Latte drift in the air. Keyboard hard and warm and getting warmer. Feet tap, knees bop, heads shake-- James Brown grunts from intercom. Tile floor.... sheen polish..... liquid brown.
Obviously this is not great prose, nor was it meant to be. The key is to never stop moving the pen. The goal of a word sketch is the same as that of a drawing: slow down, expand awareness, connect. The process of connection can yield surprising results. As a photographer, I felt like an intruder. Many locals resent camera toting strangers, but react differently to a pen and paper.
Sitting quietly with a pencil and journal outside of Wat Po, I was frequently approached by curious locals. They asked to see what I was drawing and sat to chat for a few minutes. The locals treated me different despite my terrible skills. I was transformed, in their eyes, from a tourist into an artist. I suspect the reason for this is that they appreciated a visitor who took time to stop and see them. They understood, intuitively, that I was not viewing them as a commodity. They chatted a bit about their daily lives, about art or about politics and then moved on. These were short conversations, but more authentic than the tourist-speak normally encountered at popular attractions.
The inescapable truth is that I am a goddawful wretch of an artist. My sketches lack perspective, are out of proportion, and look nothing like the objects I am trying to draw. But I am after a deeper art- the art of travel. I aim to etch deep lines of perception and emotion. I want to capture the flavor... the essence.... the profound tenor of a travel experience. I judge my sketches by the breadth of my awareness while making them... not by the accuracy of the squiggles.
I recommend this practice for every would-be traveller. For a day, for a week, for an entire journey, consider giving up the camera. Travel in the spirit of the Grant Tours of old- you need only an unlined sketchbook, a pencil, an eraser, and an open mind.
Golden star-sparkle of a mushroom high...... buzzing hum .... a slow motion orchestra of tuk-tuks and neon tiles. Shining mirrors. The aqua sheen of a plastic cup. A sip of coffee, a folding table; sharp spires threatening heaven.
Sitting across from The Temple of the Reclining Buddha (Wat Po) but not my usual self. My perceptions- my connection to the place- had been altered. Wat Po is one of Bangkokís biggest tourist attractions, but this was no normal tourist experience. A profound shift had occurred. I no longer felt like a ìtouristî. There was no dis-connect, no hankering after commodities, no alienation. At that moment I was connected. I was not an outsider- I belonged.
This transformation of perception required no drugs or meditative techniques. My only tools were a pencil and an open sketchbook. That day, I left my camera behind.. and it made all the difference. On that day, I realized that the grand travellers of old were on to something with their journals and sketchbooks. Sketching is not just a form of imaging taking.... it is a process that transforms the act of travel.
The camera can be a barrier to meaningful travel.. It trains us to scour for images... to collect them like cheap trinkets. When I carried a camera, the pictures took over. I was so focused on getting the shot that I failed to see anything. With a camera, touring became an exercise in cataloguing images rather than exploring cultures. ìHere I am at the Grand Palace î I told my friends and pointed to the photo. They politely uttered, ìAhh, thatís niceî. But had I actually been to the Grand Palace? Had I really seen or heard or felt it at all? I had a picture, but no feeling for the essence of the place.
Of all the tools of mass market tourism- the camera is the most common and thus the most insidious. The gadget, quite literally, can obscure the eyes and dull the senses. Encumbered by this thick barrier, I pointed, clicked, snapped..... and moved on. No connection. No taste for the flavor of the people. No encounter. No awareness.
A century and more ago, travellers relied on more sublime means of recording images-- sketching. At Wat Po I decided to revive this practice and it has completely transformed my travel experience since. Sketching is an activity truly in the spirit of the Grand Tour and has many advantages over photography. The first, and most important, is that sketching takes time. It slows you down, and that is the first step towards noticing.
For this first sketching expedition to Wat Po I arrrived early, about seven in the morning, and found a small streetside cafe directly across from the temple. I took a seat on the sidewalk, one with a wide view of the temple and the busy street in front of it. I ordered an ice coffee (ìgafe yenî), arranged my chair to face the temple- then took my journal, pencil and eraser and arranged them on the table. I took a deep breath. As I waited for the coffee, I did not touch the pencil... just sat back, relaxed, and took in the details of the scene-- the structures of the wall and rooftops beyond, the glittering sparkle of mirrored columns, the vibrant golds, greens, reds, and blues of roof tiles. My eyes caught the sharp spires, .......the faces of people on the street, the texture of their clothing, the swaying branches of the courtyard trees.
When the coffee arrived, I took a slow sip but continued in my reverie- shut my eyes for a time and listened to the hum of the traffic... caught bits of conversation from Thais and tourists passing by. I drew another deep breath to absorb the sharp aroma of the coffee and I shifted focus to tactile sensations-- the morning sun on my skin, the caress of a cool breeze, sweat sliding down my neck, ice cube on tongue.
I took a last swig of coffee and picked up the pencil. I chose a small doorway in the temple wall as my subject and traced its contours on the sketchpad... trying to capture the shapes exactly as I saw them. This took five minutes. I drew without hesitation, with no particular concern for accuracy. Once I had the shapes, I switched to a soft pencil and focused on the lights and shadows. This was much like painting in black and white..... using my finger tip, I smudged the graphite then used the eraser to ìpaintî highlights. The drawing took twenty minutes to complete.
And the end result was.... awful. From an artists perspective, it was terrible. The proportions were wrong. The lines looked hesitant and unsure. In fact, my sketch looked nothing like the doorway at all. I would never show it to friends. But the end product was not the goal. The true goal for sketching was an intense engagement with the immediate experience of the moment, and in this goal I succeeded. Sketching is a meditative process- a mental snapshot far more powerful than that of a camera.
I still remember the color and texture of the coffee cup (aqua blue plastic), I remember the woman who served it to me, I remember the three wheeled tuk-tuks buzzing by, I remember the glitter of sunlight on mirrored columns, I remember the exact hue of the mosaic tiles.
Simply put, the point of travel sketching is not the sketch. The actual drawing is a tool-- a means of slowing down and connecting deeply with an immediate experience. This technique does not necessarily require drawing. I have used word sketches for the same purpose... a free flowing stream of consciousness.... an unstopping flow of perceived details. For example, a coffee shop in Bangkok: oak chair with tangled back, crumpled pack crunched in a corner, black bag on top.... spike haired muscle boy snaps picture of pale skinned friend.... big smiles.... eating cheese croissant.... crystal blue chandelier.... mushroom blue..... globe lights sparkle. Latte drift in the air. Keyboard hard and warm and getting warmer. Feet tap, knees bop, heads shake-- James Brown grunts from intercom. Tile floor.... sheen polish..... liquid brown.
Obviously this is not great prose, nor was it meant to be. The key is to never stop moving the pen. The goal of a word sketch is the same as that of a drawing: slow down, expand awareness, connect. The process of connection can yield surprising results. As a photographer, I felt like an intruder. Many locals resent camera toting strangers, but react differently to a pen and paper.
Sitting quietly with a pencil and journal outside of Wat Po, I was frequently approached by curious locals. They asked to see what I was drawing and sat to chat for a few minutes. The locals treated me different despite my terrible skills. I was transformed, in their eyes, from a tourist into an artist. I suspect the reason for this is that they appreciated a visitor who took time to stop and see them. They understood, intuitively, that I was not viewing them as a commodity. They chatted a bit about their daily lives, about art or about politics and then moved on. These were short conversations, but more authentic than the tourist-speak normally encountered at popular attractions.
The inescapable truth is that I am a goddawful wretch of an artist. My sketches lack perspective, are out of proportion, and look nothing like the objects I am trying to draw. But I am after a deeper art- the art of travel. I aim to etch deep lines of perception and emotion. I want to capture the flavor... the essence.... the profound tenor of a travel experience. I judge my sketches by the breadth of my awareness while making them... not by the accuracy of the squiggles.
I recommend this practice for every would-be traveller. For a day, for a week, for an entire journey, consider giving up the camera. Travel in the spirit of the Grant Tours of old- you need only an unlined sketchbook, a pencil, an eraser, and an open mind.
Divinorum
by AJ/Skald
The little people come to me in every one of the visions... At first, there is always fear. Ego, identity, and certainty dissolve into a pixelated vision: small creatures and atom-points. These plasticine creatures are vaguely humanoid.... with black triangular heads atop two dimensional, cartoon bodies.
They do not speak to me verbally. Rather, they arrange themselves into pictures. And always pictures on a similar theme: a suburban neighborhood at first. Then a house in that neighborhood. Then a blond woman and a black dog in front of the house. Then a shed/barn to the back of the house. Then a tool barrel beside the barn. Each of these details revealed in a separate trip-- spanning more than a yearís time experimenting.
Just what the hell is going on here? Why the little people everytime? Why the continuous theme for every vision? Is this some long buried image from my subconcious? Is it an archtypal dream... a psychological riddle to be solved? The woman and dog appeared a couple of weeks before the death of my first girlfriend, Jessica Hanna. She is blond and had a black dog, a house in the country, and a barn behind the house. A strange coincidence?
Three of us met secretly to experiment with Salvia Divinorum.... a common nursery plant that, when prepared and smoked correctly, strips the ego naked in an instant. Psychedelic crack. We took turns during each session. One would smoke while the other two took notes. Occaisonally the smoker spoke, yelled, or gestured. We wrote down everything and also kept a tape recorder running.
Todd went first. Ten seconds after smoking he laid out on the carpet and seemed to go into a deep coma. He lay motionless for perhaps five minutes. The room was dark, lit only by a candle. I closed my eyes, notebook in hand, and leaned against the wall when Todd snapped a horrowing cackle from his throat. The mad laughter continued for almost ten minutes, interspersed with inarticulate mumbling. He was lost in another world and had no awareness of Lewis, me, or the room. Ten minutes later he eased back into his own skin.
ìWhat were you laughing about?î, I asked. ìHuh, was I laughing?î, he mumbled.
ìYou were cackling like a crazy manî, said Lewis. Todd shook his head and shrugged his shoulders.
ìSo what happened?î, I asked. He described a scene similar to hundreds of documented near-death experiences: a doorway of light, an attempt to pass through its veil, and then a return to this world. ìI wanted to go through the doorway but it felt like the floor was grabbing me and pulling me back and downwardsî.
I went next. It was the first time I saw the dancing pixel-people.... the first time they arranged themselves into a perfect suburban picture. Following every subsequent foray into the pixel madness, I tried to make sense of what I saw. Once, I went so far that I penetrated the picture and became ìlostî. I forgot myself completely.... forgot that I was a human being... forgot that I was a separate entity... forgot that there was an ìIî at all. Its the experience I was seeking. For Divinorum smoke, more than any other meditative technique or drug, annihilates the Self.... that long held goal of mystic traditions the world over. This is a dance with the dark void. This is a glimpse of death. And while it can be terrifying, it was not altogether unpleasant.
The little people come to me in every one of the visions... At first, there is always fear. Ego, identity, and certainty dissolve into a pixelated vision: small creatures and atom-points. These plasticine creatures are vaguely humanoid.... with black triangular heads atop two dimensional, cartoon bodies.
They do not speak to me verbally. Rather, they arrange themselves into pictures. And always pictures on a similar theme: a suburban neighborhood at first. Then a house in that neighborhood. Then a blond woman and a black dog in front of the house. Then a shed/barn to the back of the house. Then a tool barrel beside the barn. Each of these details revealed in a separate trip-- spanning more than a yearís time experimenting.
Just what the hell is going on here? Why the little people everytime? Why the continuous theme for every vision? Is this some long buried image from my subconcious? Is it an archtypal dream... a psychological riddle to be solved? The woman and dog appeared a couple of weeks before the death of my first girlfriend, Jessica Hanna. She is blond and had a black dog, a house in the country, and a barn behind the house. A strange coincidence?
Three of us met secretly to experiment with Salvia Divinorum.... a common nursery plant that, when prepared and smoked correctly, strips the ego naked in an instant. Psychedelic crack. We took turns during each session. One would smoke while the other two took notes. Occaisonally the smoker spoke, yelled, or gestured. We wrote down everything and also kept a tape recorder running.
Todd went first. Ten seconds after smoking he laid out on the carpet and seemed to go into a deep coma. He lay motionless for perhaps five minutes. The room was dark, lit only by a candle. I closed my eyes, notebook in hand, and leaned against the wall when Todd snapped a horrowing cackle from his throat. The mad laughter continued for almost ten minutes, interspersed with inarticulate mumbling. He was lost in another world and had no awareness of Lewis, me, or the room. Ten minutes later he eased back into his own skin.
ìWhat were you laughing about?î, I asked. ìHuh, was I laughing?î, he mumbled.
ìYou were cackling like a crazy manî, said Lewis. Todd shook his head and shrugged his shoulders.
ìSo what happened?î, I asked. He described a scene similar to hundreds of documented near-death experiences: a doorway of light, an attempt to pass through its veil, and then a return to this world. ìI wanted to go through the doorway but it felt like the floor was grabbing me and pulling me back and downwardsî.
I went next. It was the first time I saw the dancing pixel-people.... the first time they arranged themselves into a perfect suburban picture. Following every subsequent foray into the pixel madness, I tried to make sense of what I saw. Once, I went so far that I penetrated the picture and became ìlostî. I forgot myself completely.... forgot that I was a human being... forgot that I was a separate entity... forgot that there was an ìIî at all. Its the experience I was seeking. For Divinorum smoke, more than any other meditative technique or drug, annihilates the Self.... that long held goal of mystic traditions the world over. This is a dance with the dark void. This is a glimpse of death. And while it can be terrifying, it was not altogether unpleasant.
Koh Chang
by AJ/Skald
I stared into the sea spray as the thump of the 8 cylinder droned trance-like. The long wooden boat moved up and down rythmically with the waves. Water sloshed back and forth at my feet..... slowly leaking in from tiny unseen holes. Behind me, the driver stood tall at the stern clutching a long pole connected to a massive engine. A long drive shaft extended from the engine into the sea-- at the end a small propeller pushed us towards Aoe Said Bay, a remote area of Andaman Koh Chang island (not to be confused with the more famous island of the same name in the Gulf of Thailand).
My body bucked and bobbed as if I was riding a horse.... and immediately I thought of the tsunami which had hit the area a few days before. It had come without warning on a bright clear day. I turned and scanned the sea, trying to imagine what it had looked like. A flash of fear gripped my gut. I shook it off and muttered to myself, ìmai pen raiî.... which is Thai for ìno worriesî, then turned back and caught the distintive mast-like tower of Kokkram Resort- our destination.
The engine revved higher as we plowed into the bay, then the boatman cut the engine. The long, narrow, battered boat slid onto the sand in the shallows and crunched to a halt. A Japanese girl in blue batiked pants, a Thai woman in shorts and a t-shirt, and a bare chested ìfarangî (Westerner) popped out from the coconut trees and ambled to meet us. Our driver skipped along the side edge and began to unload boxes of food and sacks of ice meant for the remote inhabitants. I grabbed by small backpack and slung it over one shoulder... Tip, my girlfriend, grabbed her bag and eyed the water warily.
Wobbling, I stepped on the side rail- then jumped into the shallows.... extended my hand, grabbed Tipís bag..... and she followed. The three bay residentís nodded- each had the same half grin and mellow, sleepy eyes. Tip and I nodded and then set off to the left towards Kokkramís tower... perched on a hill above the beach on the left bank of the bay. We passed a cement pavilion, the beachside bar- which now contained a broken longboat thrown by the tsunami. Luckily, this was the only damage suffered as the remaining tents, huts, and tower building are located on high ground. No one died on Koh Chang, as the island was sheltered from the worst of the wave by other islands in the Andaman Sea. Still, a somber quiet hung in the air.
We eyed the wreckage then climbed the stairs to the resort. ìResortî is a very ambitious name for Kokkram, for it is in fact a collection of dome tents and simple wooden huts. Each hut has an attached bath, but there is no hot water. The staff run a generator from 6pm to 10pm, otherwise there is no electricity. The building is built around the single mast of a large tree trunk: The structure is wide at the bottom (where the open air restaurant is located) but tapers to a small lookout tower at the very top-- a place that gives wide views of the bay and the beach.
A Thai man with two armfuls of tattoos waved to us as we topped the stairs. He too had the half grin. ìMy name is Changî, he said and then Tip chatted with him in Thai. Chang led us to a hut perched precariously on a small cliff above the beach. We dropped our bags under the mosquito net then briefly strolled the grounds.... followed by Kokkramís resident chihuahua and German shepherd (Namwan & Bubo). Three Thai women lounged in the main building, but otherwise the place was empty.... all tourists had fled following the tsunami and none had returned. We were the first visitors since the disaster.
Normally I would have revelled in the peace and quiet,..... a perfect place to reenergize and rejuvenate. But following the tsunami I felt an eerie lonliness-- as if we had sailed into a ghost town. I second-guessed the decision to come. Our friend Wat, who had helped build the resort, had encouraged us to come despite the tsunami. ìItís OK on Koh Chang.... I think you should go.î, heíd said.
After our stroll Tip and I sat in the restaurant without speaking. Chang lounged in a hammock while the other staff sat silently at another table. ìThis was a mistakeî. The thought cycled repeatedly. ìWe should go back to Bangkokî. Then I remembered- there would be no more boats that day.
In Bangkok it was easy to maintain an objective distance from the unfolding events. It was different on Koh Chang.... Even though no one had died there.... Even though there was no major damage. It was nevertheless much closer to the event. We didnít speak of it but the tsunamiís presence could be felt in the silence.
I grew restless and moved to the porch of our bungalow where I sat and stared at the sea. Two weeks ago I had finished reading Hemingwayís The Old Man and The Sea. He described the sea as a woman-- charming, fickle, terrifying. Those words meant something now. In a few days, Wat, Kristin, and other friends would arrive on the island to spend New Years. But for two days Tip and I were alone.
I strolled around the beach and grounds and took in the images: broken coral on the beach..... trash and debris piled and burned on the beach. an open and empty sea. termites crawling on the bungalowís handrail. Kokkramís resident pony charging up and down the empty beach trailing a rope. From end to end, no one on the beach. chairs hastily piled at the top of the stairs. candles burning on the beach at midnight. Namwan marching the grounds, nipping at invisible bugs. Half eaten jackfruit.... spikes moldy-black.... decomposing in the sun. Spacious empty sky. Spacious empty sea. Spacious empty beach. Empty huts and tents.
No music. No activities. Only an occaisional boat on the horizon. No sounds but the relentless push and pull of the surf... a sound now tinged with menace and dread..... evoking Thai newspaper images of bloated bodies on the beach and killer rogue waves that strike without warning.
Tip was scared to go snorkelling and nervous about walking on the beach. The staff were friendly but quiet.
I stared into the sea spray as the thump of the 8 cylinder droned trance-like. The long wooden boat moved up and down rythmically with the waves. Water sloshed back and forth at my feet..... slowly leaking in from tiny unseen holes. Behind me, the driver stood tall at the stern clutching a long pole connected to a massive engine. A long drive shaft extended from the engine into the sea-- at the end a small propeller pushed us towards Aoe Said Bay, a remote area of Andaman Koh Chang island (not to be confused with the more famous island of the same name in the Gulf of Thailand).
My body bucked and bobbed as if I was riding a horse.... and immediately I thought of the tsunami which had hit the area a few days before. It had come without warning on a bright clear day. I turned and scanned the sea, trying to imagine what it had looked like. A flash of fear gripped my gut. I shook it off and muttered to myself, ìmai pen raiî.... which is Thai for ìno worriesî, then turned back and caught the distintive mast-like tower of Kokkram Resort- our destination.
The engine revved higher as we plowed into the bay, then the boatman cut the engine. The long, narrow, battered boat slid onto the sand in the shallows and crunched to a halt. A Japanese girl in blue batiked pants, a Thai woman in shorts and a t-shirt, and a bare chested ìfarangî (Westerner) popped out from the coconut trees and ambled to meet us. Our driver skipped along the side edge and began to unload boxes of food and sacks of ice meant for the remote inhabitants. I grabbed by small backpack and slung it over one shoulder... Tip, my girlfriend, grabbed her bag and eyed the water warily.
Wobbling, I stepped on the side rail- then jumped into the shallows.... extended my hand, grabbed Tipís bag..... and she followed. The three bay residentís nodded- each had the same half grin and mellow, sleepy eyes. Tip and I nodded and then set off to the left towards Kokkramís tower... perched on a hill above the beach on the left bank of the bay. We passed a cement pavilion, the beachside bar- which now contained a broken longboat thrown by the tsunami. Luckily, this was the only damage suffered as the remaining tents, huts, and tower building are located on high ground. No one died on Koh Chang, as the island was sheltered from the worst of the wave by other islands in the Andaman Sea. Still, a somber quiet hung in the air.
We eyed the wreckage then climbed the stairs to the resort. ìResortî is a very ambitious name for Kokkram, for it is in fact a collection of dome tents and simple wooden huts. Each hut has an attached bath, but there is no hot water. The staff run a generator from 6pm to 10pm, otherwise there is no electricity. The building is built around the single mast of a large tree trunk: The structure is wide at the bottom (where the open air restaurant is located) but tapers to a small lookout tower at the very top-- a place that gives wide views of the bay and the beach.
A Thai man with two armfuls of tattoos waved to us as we topped the stairs. He too had the half grin. ìMy name is Changî, he said and then Tip chatted with him in Thai. Chang led us to a hut perched precariously on a small cliff above the beach. We dropped our bags under the mosquito net then briefly strolled the grounds.... followed by Kokkramís resident chihuahua and German shepherd (Namwan & Bubo). Three Thai women lounged in the main building, but otherwise the place was empty.... all tourists had fled following the tsunami and none had returned. We were the first visitors since the disaster.
Normally I would have revelled in the peace and quiet,..... a perfect place to reenergize and rejuvenate. But following the tsunami I felt an eerie lonliness-- as if we had sailed into a ghost town. I second-guessed the decision to come. Our friend Wat, who had helped build the resort, had encouraged us to come despite the tsunami. ìItís OK on Koh Chang.... I think you should go.î, heíd said.
After our stroll Tip and I sat in the restaurant without speaking. Chang lounged in a hammock while the other staff sat silently at another table. ìThis was a mistakeî. The thought cycled repeatedly. ìWe should go back to Bangkokî. Then I remembered- there would be no more boats that day.
In Bangkok it was easy to maintain an objective distance from the unfolding events. It was different on Koh Chang.... Even though no one had died there.... Even though there was no major damage. It was nevertheless much closer to the event. We didnít speak of it but the tsunamiís presence could be felt in the silence.
I grew restless and moved to the porch of our bungalow where I sat and stared at the sea. Two weeks ago I had finished reading Hemingwayís The Old Man and The Sea. He described the sea as a woman-- charming, fickle, terrifying. Those words meant something now. In a few days, Wat, Kristin, and other friends would arrive on the island to spend New Years. But for two days Tip and I were alone.
I strolled around the beach and grounds and took in the images: broken coral on the beach..... trash and debris piled and burned on the beach. an open and empty sea. termites crawling on the bungalowís handrail. Kokkramís resident pony charging up and down the empty beach trailing a rope. From end to end, no one on the beach. chairs hastily piled at the top of the stairs. candles burning on the beach at midnight. Namwan marching the grounds, nipping at invisible bugs. Half eaten jackfruit.... spikes moldy-black.... decomposing in the sun. Spacious empty sky. Spacious empty sea. Spacious empty beach. Empty huts and tents.
No music. No activities. Only an occaisional boat on the horizon. No sounds but the relentless push and pull of the surf... a sound now tinged with menace and dread..... evoking Thai newspaper images of bloated bodies on the beach and killer rogue waves that strike without warning.
Tip was scared to go snorkelling and nervous about walking on the beach. The staff were friendly but quiet.
Monday, January 31, 2005
True Believer
by Skald
"Mornin, Coffee's hot". That was Watson Jr.s standard greeting in the morning. It was usually followed by a slap on the back and a soulful look in the eyes. "Let's get to it", he'd say.
Watson Jr. was an IBM true believer. During my time at that temple of mediocrity, most people I met were drones and burnouts. They knew their jobs were meaningless and monotonous but couldn't imagine doing anything else. "There's no escaping the rat race", they claimed.
But Watson was different. He believed the IBM propaganda. Every day he arrived early and left late. He wore spotless suits and power ties. He volunteered for extra work. He clutched palms, winked, nodded, smirked, and joked his way to the top of the department. He seemed to love it.
This produced a philosophical crisis for me. I understood the pathetic burnouts-- I felt just like them at the time. I felt like a wolf in a trap ready to gnaw off its leg to escape. The sad bastards around me made it worse. Their passion for life had been crushed long long ago. They were doing time till retirement.
But everyday Watson bounded in and worked the room. He even smoozed me... a lowly intern with a bad attitude. Somehow, he seemed to love working 10-12 hour days. He seemed to love the tan and grey decor. He seemed to love directing training videos about thrilling topics such as "computer maintenence" or "copier repair". He didn't seem to notice the burnouts around him... they never got him down.
"How could this be?", I asked myself. I had no frame of reference to understand the guy.... so I searched for pathological explanations. "Maybe he has low self-esteem and thrives on the attention".... "Maybe he's lonely and has nothing better to do". These were my working theories. But another thought crept in. What if he was sincere? I shuddered.
But it may be the case. Maybe guys like Watson Jr. are what keep the sorry system from collapsing under its own sagging weight. Maybe there are a few mutants... perhaps 1% of the population, who really believe in that shit and thrive on it. These pace setters drive the bored and belittled masses onwards-- keep em hustling and working for the man. Its possible.
Sometimes I wonder what happened to him... its been 15 years. Did he keep climbing that ladder? Is he now a vice-president? Or was he downsized when his salary got too big... Did he spiral into self-destruction? Is he still a middling white collar wage slave?
Or maybe the futility of it all finally sunk in. Maybe he's squatting in Amsterdam-- eating mushrooms every day.
I'd like to think so. I like to think that people can awaken to new possibilities. I like to believe that they can overcome conditioning. I like to think that deep inside, every human being recognizes that love and life are more important than money.
But I may be wrong.
"Mornin, Coffee's hot". That was Watson Jr.s standard greeting in the morning. It was usually followed by a slap on the back and a soulful look in the eyes. "Let's get to it", he'd say.
Watson Jr. was an IBM true believer. During my time at that temple of mediocrity, most people I met were drones and burnouts. They knew their jobs were meaningless and monotonous but couldn't imagine doing anything else. "There's no escaping the rat race", they claimed.
But Watson was different. He believed the IBM propaganda. Every day he arrived early and left late. He wore spotless suits and power ties. He volunteered for extra work. He clutched palms, winked, nodded, smirked, and joked his way to the top of the department. He seemed to love it.
This produced a philosophical crisis for me. I understood the pathetic burnouts-- I felt just like them at the time. I felt like a wolf in a trap ready to gnaw off its leg to escape. The sad bastards around me made it worse. Their passion for life had been crushed long long ago. They were doing time till retirement.
But everyday Watson bounded in and worked the room. He even smoozed me... a lowly intern with a bad attitude. Somehow, he seemed to love working 10-12 hour days. He seemed to love the tan and grey decor. He seemed to love directing training videos about thrilling topics such as "computer maintenence" or "copier repair". He didn't seem to notice the burnouts around him... they never got him down.
"How could this be?", I asked myself. I had no frame of reference to understand the guy.... so I searched for pathological explanations. "Maybe he has low self-esteem and thrives on the attention".... "Maybe he's lonely and has nothing better to do". These were my working theories. But another thought crept in. What if he was sincere? I shuddered.
But it may be the case. Maybe guys like Watson Jr. are what keep the sorry system from collapsing under its own sagging weight. Maybe there are a few mutants... perhaps 1% of the population, who really believe in that shit and thrive on it. These pace setters drive the bored and belittled masses onwards-- keep em hustling and working for the man. Its possible.
Sometimes I wonder what happened to him... its been 15 years. Did he keep climbing that ladder? Is he now a vice-president? Or was he downsized when his salary got too big... Did he spiral into self-destruction? Is he still a middling white collar wage slave?
Or maybe the futility of it all finally sunk in. Maybe he's squatting in Amsterdam-- eating mushrooms every day.
I'd like to think so. I like to think that people can awaken to new possibilities. I like to believe that they can overcome conditioning. I like to think that deep inside, every human being recognizes that love and life are more important than money.
But I may be wrong.
Thoughts on Becoming a Walking Hobopoet
by Sunwalker
No matter how liberating and exciting the hobo lifestyle is for you, I imagine it might be necessary to take work breaks now and then, not only to chill out for a while, but to make a nice wad of $$$. I might do the same myself, although I want to avoid it. I hate the whole concept of money, can't wait to scavenge my way through the cracks and fissures of this bizarre global zoo of humanity without having to play by its rules. Knowing some of the insane things the feds do with tax money, not to mention the fact I lean towards anarchy, I'm hating the idea of ever having to give those porbarreling bureaucrats a red cent again. So a goal of mine is to limit participation in the bloody system as much as possible. Who wants to have so much of their human interaction across a damned counter anyways? How degrading. But again, a bit of work and money might be necessary evils until it all collapses (I don't foresee this giant house of cards lasting too much longer, maybe it could drag on another 50 years, but I think the sooner it does, the less destruction it will have wreaked and the fewer species it will have taken with it )
[Skald: One of my favorite quotes related to travel is, "Never take a trip
you can afford". Its good advice.]
Love that quote! Reminds me of a quote in the movie 'Fight Club' when Tyler says "the things you own end up owning you". How true. That's why I'm starting to sell off and give away most of the stuffola I've accumulated, and when the time comes I'd fill a light pack with the essentials and hit the trail! Damn I relish that day, all that semi-life of being the living dead behind me, and a real vivacious life of experience ahead with a billion paths to pick from, no schedules, no oppressive clocks, no taking orders, no following anyone or anything (except the geese winging northwards and southwards). I know it's gonna feel pretty damned strange at first, probably like being cast out to sea, but I'll just remind myself that the entire continent (the whole planet) is my 'new' home. It would be tough to leave the relatives behind, but though they're nice, they're firmly planted in the conformist world of wage slavery, mortgages, ersatz entertainment and all that scat.
Yep I've read "Into the Wild" just about all in one sitting, as I was on the edge of my seat wondering what this wildman was going to do next. You're right, that Chris McCandless guy deserved more credit despite his background growing up in a soft rich bigcity/whitebread/uppercrust family. He realized how much of a tragic sham the system is, followed his dream and had the guts to take life by the horns and just go. But what an anticlimax that was at the end - killed by an oversight and a couple of handfuls of f*cking wild potato seeds! The fella could have used more common sense and a helluva lot more respect for the land though...
You know what, a decade ago I used to get such immature fantasies about taking off alone into the forest and living off fish, game and berries year round. I'd spend hours poring in all these damn books & maps looking for a remote spot in the hills with just the right climate - but something was missing and I just couldn't put my paw on it. It wasn't long before I realized, among other things, that a) I'm a social animal and b) I'm a nomadic animal dammit! Being stuck in the same lean-to in the woods without anyone else around would drive anyone stark raving loony, providing they manage to stay alive, of course.
Even living in 4 walls and a roof in the same place drives me nuts after a few months. I'm sick and tired of comfort and routine. Why the hell do so many people always want to get so cozy and luxuriantly comfortable all the time for anyhow? Down pillows and comforters and 3 foot thick mattresses and goretex sport suits and bottomless sofas and precision climate control and luxury dining....hell some of these sheeple even put plush padding in their coffins for crying out loud! They all might as well just crawl right into them, haul in a TV with an extension cord, and be done with it!
"Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming 'Wow - what a Ride!' " -Peter Sage
So this idea of mine of nomadically scavenging the edges and frontiers of the 'matrix' is much more up my alley. Of course I'd love to pack some grub and duck out into the hills for few days now and then when the trucks and trains start to get tiresome, but the "average" day would be following the tracks town to town - where most of the grub and fellow homo sapiens happen to be.
[Skald: Regarding whether to go on foot or wheels.... You can always upgrade to a bike or car or van until you reach that magical "enough" point that seems to fit.]
To tell you the truth I despise vehicles. If every vehicle on the face of the earth sputtered and died for all time, why I'd jump for joy and dance on the windshields, thankful all the noise, stench, frenzy destructiveness and ugliness of this car culture is over. (Even if they changed them all to hydrogen or whatever, the stench and noise part might vanish but the rest would remain) I can't say I like planes much either, they aren't exactly harmless when the 'environment' is concerned, and they're just another part of the whole unsustainable system that should go. But since it is the current reality, I won't sit here and vow to never use 'em. Thailand does sound awfully enticing, the way you describe it... but South America is much more convenient for now though, seeing as I could walk virtually the whole way. Some feel the almost religious need to penetrate all the way down to Tierra del Fuego, but that trek makes crossing N. America look like a little walk around the block. The logistics of going through all the f*cking borders and problems with food and malaria, the mayhem in Columbia and all that shit gives me the willies too, to be honest! But sure as shit from a horse's ass it would beat punching in my hours on the clock to line the pockets of some capitalist!
The Rio Grande or maybe Lake Chapala is about as far south as my radar wants to peer for now. Hell, a person could spend a million years exploring all the nooks and crannies just in the western usa alone! The thing I'm really going to be mindful about is staying aware of what climatic zones I'm heading into, especially the desert. It may be starkly stunning, but I can imagine the desert doesn't suffer foolishness. I know it surely doesn't suffer it from quite a few unprepared migrating Mexicans - they do the suffering, if they stay alive, that is! So there's no bloody excuse to drag my arse around places like southern Arizona and Texas (or Florida for that matter) in the summer when I should be far to the north. If I do end up stuck somehow in say Phoenix in July or Quebec in December, I sure would set aside my hatred of tombs-on- wheels and do some hitching or busriding! Not if I can help it, of course.
Good luck in Hiroshima!!! I always think of Japan as full of these vast crowded megacities and rice paddies but I do recall reading that in between them there's a sea of forest-covered mountains with dozens of tree species, maybe if you check out the woods you could let us know what its like up there if you decide to head up the slopes between classes. (Unless you already did and I missed it)
P.S. Have you heard of Nanao Sakaki? I just found out about him and I mentioned him in my edited copy of that first email below. He's this Japanese tramping poet who actually did just what I dream of - doing his own 'sacred drift' walking all across N. America even up into Alaska. The klincher is he managed to do it without money! Now that's what I'm aiming for. Maybe you could get ahold of him cause excerpts from his writings would fit very 'tramptastically' on your site.
--Sunwalker
"May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds."
Edward Abbey, naturalist and author 1927-1989
No matter how liberating and exciting the hobo lifestyle is for you, I imagine it might be necessary to take work breaks now and then, not only to chill out for a while, but to make a nice wad of $$$. I might do the same myself, although I want to avoid it. I hate the whole concept of money, can't wait to scavenge my way through the cracks and fissures of this bizarre global zoo of humanity without having to play by its rules. Knowing some of the insane things the feds do with tax money, not to mention the fact I lean towards anarchy, I'm hating the idea of ever having to give those porbarreling bureaucrats a red cent again. So a goal of mine is to limit participation in the bloody system as much as possible. Who wants to have so much of their human interaction across a damned counter anyways? How degrading. But again, a bit of work and money might be necessary evils until it all collapses (I don't foresee this giant house of cards lasting too much longer, maybe it could drag on another 50 years, but I think the sooner it does, the less destruction it will have wreaked and the fewer species it will have taken with it )
[Skald: One of my favorite quotes related to travel is, "Never take a trip
you can afford". Its good advice.]
Love that quote! Reminds me of a quote in the movie 'Fight Club' when Tyler says "the things you own end up owning you". How true. That's why I'm starting to sell off and give away most of the stuffola I've accumulated, and when the time comes I'd fill a light pack with the essentials and hit the trail! Damn I relish that day, all that semi-life of being the living dead behind me, and a real vivacious life of experience ahead with a billion paths to pick from, no schedules, no oppressive clocks, no taking orders, no following anyone or anything (except the geese winging northwards and southwards). I know it's gonna feel pretty damned strange at first, probably like being cast out to sea, but I'll just remind myself that the entire continent (the whole planet) is my 'new' home. It would be tough to leave the relatives behind, but though they're nice, they're firmly planted in the conformist world of wage slavery, mortgages, ersatz entertainment and all that scat.
Yep I've read "Into the Wild" just about all in one sitting, as I was on the edge of my seat wondering what this wildman was going to do next. You're right, that Chris McCandless guy deserved more credit despite his background growing up in a soft rich bigcity/whitebread/uppercrust family. He realized how much of a tragic sham the system is, followed his dream and had the guts to take life by the horns and just go. But what an anticlimax that was at the end - killed by an oversight and a couple of handfuls of f*cking wild potato seeds! The fella could have used more common sense and a helluva lot more respect for the land though...
You know what, a decade ago I used to get such immature fantasies about taking off alone into the forest and living off fish, game and berries year round. I'd spend hours poring in all these damn books & maps looking for a remote spot in the hills with just the right climate - but something was missing and I just couldn't put my paw on it. It wasn't long before I realized, among other things, that a) I'm a social animal and b) I'm a nomadic animal dammit! Being stuck in the same lean-to in the woods without anyone else around would drive anyone stark raving loony, providing they manage to stay alive, of course.
Even living in 4 walls and a roof in the same place drives me nuts after a few months. I'm sick and tired of comfort and routine. Why the hell do so many people always want to get so cozy and luxuriantly comfortable all the time for anyhow? Down pillows and comforters and 3 foot thick mattresses and goretex sport suits and bottomless sofas and precision climate control and luxury dining....hell some of these sheeple even put plush padding in their coffins for crying out loud! They all might as well just crawl right into them, haul in a TV with an extension cord, and be done with it!
"Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming 'Wow - what a Ride!' " -Peter Sage
So this idea of mine of nomadically scavenging the edges and frontiers of the 'matrix' is much more up my alley. Of course I'd love to pack some grub and duck out into the hills for few days now and then when the trucks and trains start to get tiresome, but the "average" day would be following the tracks town to town - where most of the grub and fellow homo sapiens happen to be.
[Skald: Regarding whether to go on foot or wheels.... You can always upgrade to a bike or car or van until you reach that magical "enough" point that seems to fit.]
To tell you the truth I despise vehicles. If every vehicle on the face of the earth sputtered and died for all time, why I'd jump for joy and dance on the windshields, thankful all the noise, stench, frenzy destructiveness and ugliness of this car culture is over. (Even if they changed them all to hydrogen or whatever, the stench and noise part might vanish but the rest would remain) I can't say I like planes much either, they aren't exactly harmless when the 'environment' is concerned, and they're just another part of the whole unsustainable system that should go. But since it is the current reality, I won't sit here and vow to never use 'em. Thailand does sound awfully enticing, the way you describe it... but South America is much more convenient for now though, seeing as I could walk virtually the whole way. Some feel the almost religious need to penetrate all the way down to Tierra del Fuego, but that trek makes crossing N. America look like a little walk around the block. The logistics of going through all the f*cking borders and problems with food and malaria, the mayhem in Columbia and all that shit gives me the willies too, to be honest! But sure as shit from a horse's ass it would beat punching in my hours on the clock to line the pockets of some capitalist!
The Rio Grande or maybe Lake Chapala is about as far south as my radar wants to peer for now. Hell, a person could spend a million years exploring all the nooks and crannies just in the western usa alone! The thing I'm really going to be mindful about is staying aware of what climatic zones I'm heading into, especially the desert. It may be starkly stunning, but I can imagine the desert doesn't suffer foolishness. I know it surely doesn't suffer it from quite a few unprepared migrating Mexicans - they do the suffering, if they stay alive, that is! So there's no bloody excuse to drag my arse around places like southern Arizona and Texas (or Florida for that matter) in the summer when I should be far to the north. If I do end up stuck somehow in say Phoenix in July or Quebec in December, I sure would set aside my hatred of tombs-on- wheels and do some hitching or busriding! Not if I can help it, of course.
Good luck in Hiroshima!!! I always think of Japan as full of these vast crowded megacities and rice paddies but I do recall reading that in between them there's a sea of forest-covered mountains with dozens of tree species, maybe if you check out the woods you could let us know what its like up there if you decide to head up the slopes between classes. (Unless you already did and I missed it)
P.S. Have you heard of Nanao Sakaki? I just found out about him and I mentioned him in my edited copy of that first email below. He's this Japanese tramping poet who actually did just what I dream of - doing his own 'sacred drift' walking all across N. America even up into Alaska. The klincher is he managed to do it without money! Now that's what I'm aiming for. Maybe you could get ahold of him cause excerpts from his writings would fit very 'tramptastically' on your site.
--Sunwalker
"May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds."
Edward Abbey, naturalist and author 1927-1989
Outlaw Hobopoet on Foot
by Sunwalker
Thanks so much for this site AJ/Skald!! I'm glued to all these addictive blog entries from you and Alan Watts and Hakim and all the others, a person could stuff a book with it all, there's so much good expression and info here. Been searching for a decent hobotramp oriented site and it's been slim pickings, but yours hits the spot! It's a bit of a downer to hear you're caving in to the lure of a fulltime job, maybe there's still a chance for you to pass on it and keep your freedom, or at least keep it to less than a few months.
I'm an unemployed (FREE, dammit!) young man up here in frozen Alberta, almost 30 years young, having mercifully quit my mind-crushing 3 year slaveterm last year as a 'debt collector'. (Even worse than the previous serfterms) I'm mystified as to how I survived even six months of that collections shit, working with all these stuffed shirts and crazy wenches who've become less than human. Some of them are closer to sanity than others - they're the ones who complain the most and the loudest, as opposed to the hordes of zombified ass-kissers. But some of the old goats have hung around for more than 10 bloody years and not only are they not human anymore, they've become cackling old machine-like things. Ugh...I looked at these wretched entities and saw my arid soul-sucking future looming like a desiccated, abandoned airport runway to nowhere.
Damn, I'm glad I had the guts to get the f*ck out of there! The thing is, I can't bring myself to demean my dignity and self-respect by taking orders from a boss or endure more monotonous tedious drudgery ever again. The thought of work makes my innards sag like the carcass of a beached whale and makes my mind erect a big warning sign: "Forbid hope all ye who enter here" and then of course thoughts switch to wild plans of taking to the trail up into the hills and leaving this maniacal work-consume deathrace behind pronto.
Hell, for years I've wanted to take off on a bike and just become a tramp on wheels, but only now do I have the guts and will to actually get off my a$$ and go for it. My days of running on the hamstermill with all the other drones chasing those pieces of meat on a stick called 'retirement' and 'wealth' are over. And my days of participating in this ever-growing machine that is so busy converting the living to the dead (in the words of Derrick Jensen) are history. If enough of us toiling minions lay down our pens, shovels, hammers, and keyboards and simply quit slaving for the profit of rich masters, the machine could grind to a merciful halt thereby ending the insanity!
Now I'm becoming lured by the idea of even going so far as ditching the damn bike and being an outlaw wandering hobopoet on foot; living out of my pack, sleeping under tarps, in hospital waiting rooms, airports, under bridges, beneath the stars... Permanently meandering around the Americas north and maybe even south over hill, dale, road and rail, north in the summer and far south in the winter - the ultimate in freedom. The ultimate in slowing down and being able to exist more in rhythm with living beings and cycles and truly experience them instead of putzing around past everything on some metal contraption. Sure I'd sacrifice a few miles per hour but I couldn't give a flying hoot. Tough to stop and sniff the flowers when you have to get off a damn machine every time... All the bikes I own usually end up being stolen soon enough anyhow!
The catch, (other than the obvious myriad risks like sunburn, storms, cold, blisters, fire ants, ticks, muggers etc) being that we're stuck in this damned 'civilization', is of course $$$. I'd end up starting out this spring with only a few thousand, but I know I could stretch it. I can rig my own shelter each night (so f*ck motel rooms except maybe once a month), plus there's free water to be had in faucets and mountain streams everywhere, bathing in lakes, rivers, free showers etc, and for food there's a little foraging for pine nuts, berries etc, the good old dumpster dive, foodbanks/FNB, plus the odd dollop of discreet on-the-house grocery bulkfood sampling (as long as I don't mind hopscotching over and around the lines of the "law" and keep out of sight of it's glassy lidless porcine eyes.)
But I haven't come across too many ultralongdistance walking hobopoets/tramps on this site or any other. There was that 'Alexander Supertramp' who made a decent go of it for quite a while except he mostly hitched around, but he f*cked up by striking off into the Alaska muskeg without enough respect for the land. I just found out about this Japanese poet named Nanao Sakaki who fared much better; he actually walked across N. America back and forth - without any $$$! Thank You
P.S. I love the books of Derrick Jensen - especially The Culture of Make Believe and A Language Older Than Words. He's kind of an "anarchoprimitivist/anti-civilization" author (although I hate to put him in a pigeon hole) You might want to take a look, as his ideas would seem to fit well with these hobopoet thoughts! There's also John Zerzan's works - lots more no- holds-barred critiques of this loonybin civilization and Daniel Qiunn's Ishmael, which is for somewhat less 'radical' folks.
--Sunwalker
Thanks so much for this site AJ/Skald!! I'm glued to all these addictive blog entries from you and Alan Watts and Hakim and all the others, a person could stuff a book with it all, there's so much good expression and info here. Been searching for a decent hobotramp oriented site and it's been slim pickings, but yours hits the spot! It's a bit of a downer to hear you're caving in to the lure of a fulltime job, maybe there's still a chance for you to pass on it and keep your freedom, or at least keep it to less than a few months.
I'm an unemployed (FREE, dammit!) young man up here in frozen Alberta, almost 30 years young, having mercifully quit my mind-crushing 3 year slaveterm last year as a 'debt collector'. (Even worse than the previous serfterms) I'm mystified as to how I survived even six months of that collections shit, working with all these stuffed shirts and crazy wenches who've become less than human. Some of them are closer to sanity than others - they're the ones who complain the most and the loudest, as opposed to the hordes of zombified ass-kissers. But some of the old goats have hung around for more than 10 bloody years and not only are they not human anymore, they've become cackling old machine-like things. Ugh...I looked at these wretched entities and saw my arid soul-sucking future looming like a desiccated, abandoned airport runway to nowhere.
Damn, I'm glad I had the guts to get the f*ck out of there! The thing is, I can't bring myself to demean my dignity and self-respect by taking orders from a boss or endure more monotonous tedious drudgery ever again. The thought of work makes my innards sag like the carcass of a beached whale and makes my mind erect a big warning sign: "Forbid hope all ye who enter here" and then of course thoughts switch to wild plans of taking to the trail up into the hills and leaving this maniacal work-consume deathrace behind pronto.
Hell, for years I've wanted to take off on a bike and just become a tramp on wheels, but only now do I have the guts and will to actually get off my a$$ and go for it. My days of running on the hamstermill with all the other drones chasing those pieces of meat on a stick called 'retirement' and 'wealth' are over. And my days of participating in this ever-growing machine that is so busy converting the living to the dead (in the words of Derrick Jensen) are history. If enough of us toiling minions lay down our pens, shovels, hammers, and keyboards and simply quit slaving for the profit of rich masters, the machine could grind to a merciful halt thereby ending the insanity!
Now I'm becoming lured by the idea of even going so far as ditching the damn bike and being an outlaw wandering hobopoet on foot; living out of my pack, sleeping under tarps, in hospital waiting rooms, airports, under bridges, beneath the stars... Permanently meandering around the Americas north and maybe even south over hill, dale, road and rail, north in the summer and far south in the winter - the ultimate in freedom. The ultimate in slowing down and being able to exist more in rhythm with living beings and cycles and truly experience them instead of putzing around past everything on some metal contraption. Sure I'd sacrifice a few miles per hour but I couldn't give a flying hoot. Tough to stop and sniff the flowers when you have to get off a damn machine every time... All the bikes I own usually end up being stolen soon enough anyhow!
The catch, (other than the obvious myriad risks like sunburn, storms, cold, blisters, fire ants, ticks, muggers etc) being that we're stuck in this damned 'civilization', is of course $$$. I'd end up starting out this spring with only a few thousand, but I know I could stretch it. I can rig my own shelter each night (so f*ck motel rooms except maybe once a month), plus there's free water to be had in faucets and mountain streams everywhere, bathing in lakes, rivers, free showers etc, and for food there's a little foraging for pine nuts, berries etc, the good old dumpster dive, foodbanks/FNB, plus the odd dollop of discreet on-the-house grocery bulkfood sampling (as long as I don't mind hopscotching over and around the lines of the "law" and keep out of sight of it's glassy lidless porcine eyes.)
But I haven't come across too many ultralongdistance walking hobopoets/tramps on this site or any other. There was that 'Alexander Supertramp' who made a decent go of it for quite a while except he mostly hitched around, but he f*cked up by striking off into the Alaska muskeg without enough respect for the land. I just found out about this Japanese poet named Nanao Sakaki who fared much better; he actually walked across N. America back and forth - without any $$$! Thank You
P.S. I love the books of Derrick Jensen - especially The Culture of Make Believe and A Language Older Than Words. He's kind of an "anarchoprimitivist/anti-civilization" author (although I hate to put him in a pigeon hole) You might want to take a look, as his ideas would seem to fit well with these hobopoet thoughts! There's also John Zerzan's works - lots more no- holds-barred critiques of this loonybin civilization and Daniel Qiunn's Ishmael, which is for somewhat less 'radical' folks.
--Sunwalker
Sunday, January 30, 2005
On the Edge of a Journey
Its an exhilerating feeling- to be on the verge of a new journey. A flood of emotions: nostalgia and sadness for all you will leave behind, a sense of emptiness as the apartment is cleaned out.
I just said goodbye to my oldest Thai friend, who I met on a trip here two years ago. And of course it will be extremely tough saying goodbye to my girlfriend Tip. Thailand has been very good to me.
Mixed with the nostagia is a giddy sense of anticipation. Its all starting to feel real... an ending and a new beginning. The plane ticket sits on my dresser... stares back at me every day and whispers of onsens, shinkansen, shinto temples, cedar trees, karaoke, and zen. Conjured images of Hiroshima drift behind my eyes.
I think of the airport, one of my favorite places in the world. I imagine the rush and hum of people crowding off to destinations worldwide. One of my favorite exercises is to sit in front of the departures board and scan the city names. I imagine, if I had a wad of money, picking one randomly and off I go.
I like this idea of sacred drift.... I love the ambiguity and the unknown. I love the idea that I may be surprised... that all of my expectations and predictions will most likely be wrong and in truth I have no idea what's in store for me. Its a bit scary and thrilling too. There is magic in it-- not knowing what is going to happen when you get up in the morning... not knowing what's in store. It facilitates a sense of mystery and awe for life.
Which is just what the crushing routines of "normal" life snuff out. Most folks know EXACTLY what is going to happen most days. They know they will wake up at a predetermined time, will go to work and do exactly the same thing they did every other day, will eat the same food, will talk to the same people, will come home and watch the same asinine TV shows... and will repeat this sorry excuse for a life every damn day. These people feel no mystery. They feel no awe for life. They rarely wonder. No ecstacy, no trembling fear.
Well, each to his own. But I say "No thanks" to that. I prefer this quivering fear and enthusiasm; standing on the edge of the unknown and preparing to cross the line. If we were really honest, we'd recognize that all of life is like that- That we know far less than we think... that these routines are delusions to hide the mystery, awe, terror, and ecstacy of living. Nothing is certain. Ambiguity pushes in from the edges.
And sooner or later, no matter how much you think you've got it under control, it will penetrate your life and change everything. Impermanence and change are universal truths.
The wise course is to embrace them and learn to love the mystery.
In my own small way, Im trying to do just that.
I just said goodbye to my oldest Thai friend, who I met on a trip here two years ago. And of course it will be extremely tough saying goodbye to my girlfriend Tip. Thailand has been very good to me.
Mixed with the nostagia is a giddy sense of anticipation. Its all starting to feel real... an ending and a new beginning. The plane ticket sits on my dresser... stares back at me every day and whispers of onsens, shinkansen, shinto temples, cedar trees, karaoke, and zen. Conjured images of Hiroshima drift behind my eyes.
I think of the airport, one of my favorite places in the world. I imagine the rush and hum of people crowding off to destinations worldwide. One of my favorite exercises is to sit in front of the departures board and scan the city names. I imagine, if I had a wad of money, picking one randomly and off I go.
I like this idea of sacred drift.... I love the ambiguity and the unknown. I love the idea that I may be surprised... that all of my expectations and predictions will most likely be wrong and in truth I have no idea what's in store for me. Its a bit scary and thrilling too. There is magic in it-- not knowing what is going to happen when you get up in the morning... not knowing what's in store. It facilitates a sense of mystery and awe for life.
Which is just what the crushing routines of "normal" life snuff out. Most folks know EXACTLY what is going to happen most days. They know they will wake up at a predetermined time, will go to work and do exactly the same thing they did every other day, will eat the same food, will talk to the same people, will come home and watch the same asinine TV shows... and will repeat this sorry excuse for a life every damn day. These people feel no mystery. They feel no awe for life. They rarely wonder. No ecstacy, no trembling fear.
Well, each to his own. But I say "No thanks" to that. I prefer this quivering fear and enthusiasm; standing on the edge of the unknown and preparing to cross the line. If we were really honest, we'd recognize that all of life is like that- That we know far less than we think... that these routines are delusions to hide the mystery, awe, terror, and ecstacy of living. Nothing is certain. Ambiguity pushes in from the edges.
And sooner or later, no matter how much you think you've got it under control, it will penetrate your life and change everything. Impermanence and change are universal truths.
The wise course is to embrace them and learn to love the mystery.
In my own small way, Im trying to do just that.
Friday, January 28, 2005
The American Dream
My strongest memory of life in America is not the convenience, nor the wealth, nor the conformity (per se). When I think of American life, I think of monotony. Most Americans live incredibly monotonous lives. They get up early, they shuffle off to boring jobs, they spend 8,9,10 or more hours doing meaningless routine tasks, they shuffle home, they turn on the tube, they zone out in TV virtual reality, they go to bed.
On weekends they mow the lawn or watch yet more TV or go to the movies... the few thrills they get in their lives are vicarious fictions. How do they do it? How does one sell insurance every damn day, year after year after year? How does a human being tolerate such an amazingly dull life? How do people survive at Wal-Mart or Barnes & Noble or a chicken plant for years... even decades?
We become what we habitually do. More than advertising, more than media influence, more than political power.. it is the mind-numbing monotony of work that has turned America into a nation of dull drones. How can you expect someone to spend 8+ hours a day punching a calculator and then suddenly transform into a sharp, critically thinking adult after work? The same can be said for people who spend most of their waking hours scanning groceries, programming computers, answering telephones, filing, typing, filling in forms, working on assembly lines, selling useless shit.
"Work is the single most oppressive reality we face"... that's my favorite Hakim Bey quote. It gets right to the heart of the matter... right at the big taboo that absolutely no one in public life will discuss. Forget Iraq and the Patriot Act... work is enslaving most Americans right now. Right now, most people are squandering their lives doing other people's work, sacrificing to make obscene profits for other people, grinding out long days for other people's agendas. Never do they question this. Never do they ask themselves what their lives mean or what freedom actually is or how they should align their vocation with their deepest principles. Like good drones they shuffle off to work and pat themselves on the back for being "responsible".
But I, like Thoreau, have a different definition of "responsible". It begins with the responsibility to live one's own life... not the life that's prescribed by one's authority figures and parents. It begins with the responsibility of identifying one's principles. It includes the responsibility of examining the nature of life and existence itself. It includes the responsibility of feeding, clothing, and housing oneself in a manner consistent with one's highest values. It means having the courage to risk for one's dreams rather than living from fear and conformity.
Unfortunately, I've seen the fate that awaits this vast majority of people who refuse to contemplate or reflect. I saw it too many times... in the ER, in the Cancer Ward, in Nursing Homes. These are the people who become bitter and broken in old age. These are the ones who will obsess over regrets. These are the ones who will discover, much too late, that money & status & conformity brought them nothing but an empty life. These are the ones who will sit with a young malcontent, like myself, and urge him... plead with him-- to "follow your dreams".
I've sat with so many. But harder still is it to sit with those who still have time but refuse to make use of it. "Maybe later, maybe later" they say; as they dig themselves ever deeper into monotony, debt, boredom and a wasted life.
One day, they tell me, they will retire. One day they will finally do what they really wanted to do. One day they will enjoy their life and follow their bliss. They call this fantasy "The American Dream". A dream, a delusion: that's all it will be for most.
On weekends they mow the lawn or watch yet more TV or go to the movies... the few thrills they get in their lives are vicarious fictions. How do they do it? How does one sell insurance every damn day, year after year after year? How does a human being tolerate such an amazingly dull life? How do people survive at Wal-Mart or Barnes & Noble or a chicken plant for years... even decades?
We become what we habitually do. More than advertising, more than media influence, more than political power.. it is the mind-numbing monotony of work that has turned America into a nation of dull drones. How can you expect someone to spend 8+ hours a day punching a calculator and then suddenly transform into a sharp, critically thinking adult after work? The same can be said for people who spend most of their waking hours scanning groceries, programming computers, answering telephones, filing, typing, filling in forms, working on assembly lines, selling useless shit.
"Work is the single most oppressive reality we face"... that's my favorite Hakim Bey quote. It gets right to the heart of the matter... right at the big taboo that absolutely no one in public life will discuss. Forget Iraq and the Patriot Act... work is enslaving most Americans right now. Right now, most people are squandering their lives doing other people's work, sacrificing to make obscene profits for other people, grinding out long days for other people's agendas. Never do they question this. Never do they ask themselves what their lives mean or what freedom actually is or how they should align their vocation with their deepest principles. Like good drones they shuffle off to work and pat themselves on the back for being "responsible".
But I, like Thoreau, have a different definition of "responsible". It begins with the responsibility to live one's own life... not the life that's prescribed by one's authority figures and parents. It begins with the responsibility of identifying one's principles. It includes the responsibility of examining the nature of life and existence itself. It includes the responsibility of feeding, clothing, and housing oneself in a manner consistent with one's highest values. It means having the courage to risk for one's dreams rather than living from fear and conformity.
Unfortunately, I've seen the fate that awaits this vast majority of people who refuse to contemplate or reflect. I saw it too many times... in the ER, in the Cancer Ward, in Nursing Homes. These are the people who become bitter and broken in old age. These are the ones who will obsess over regrets. These are the ones who will discover, much too late, that money & status & conformity brought them nothing but an empty life. These are the ones who will sit with a young malcontent, like myself, and urge him... plead with him-- to "follow your dreams".
I've sat with so many. But harder still is it to sit with those who still have time but refuse to make use of it. "Maybe later, maybe later" they say; as they dig themselves ever deeper into monotony, debt, boredom and a wasted life.
One day, they tell me, they will retire. One day they will finally do what they really wanted to do. One day they will enjoy their life and follow their bliss. They call this fantasy "The American Dream". A dream, a delusion: that's all it will be for most.
New Journey Ahead
Staring down the barrel of a gun..... called employment. In a month I will start my first full time job in three years. I can't say I am excited. Is this the right decision? Should I be doing this? Is this "part-time Hobopoet" strategy a wise one?
Or would I be better served by working a lazy part-time job here in Thailand.... teach Saturday and Sunday and have five days off to write, loaf, suck coffee, and make videos? Hmmmm. Its a tough choice really. I decided to go to Japan for strategic reasons-- to save enough money for an extended trip to South America. I'd like to head to Ecuador/Peru/Bolivia with a wad of cash... be able to live without working... study Spanish... take salsa lessons. Im hoping to buy a year or two of blissful unemployment by working full time in Japan.
The job in Japan at least looks tolerable. I'll be teaching 22 hours a week.... a tad much but the good news is that there are no office hours. When Im not teaching I am free. As I am a huge proponent of effortless language teaching (for the students and the teacher) I won't require much preparation time. So... as full time jobs in Japan go... this one looks to be more livable than most. But I've learned the hard way that there's no knowing for sure until you get there.
So off I go on February 25th... off to Hiroshima to teach English, study Japanese, and make friends. Im looking forward to cleaner air and less noise and in general a bit more tranquility than Bangkok offers. But I'll miss this city too. I'll miss Tip and friends and lazy days in Banglumpoo.
But there's no point looking back. The proper mindset for a new journey is one of expectant excitement mixed with fear.... what will it be like? What suprises await me? What new friends will I meet? Standing on the verge of a new journey is perhaps the most exciting stage.. when everything is pregnant with possibilities and uncertainties. At such a time, the only thing to do is have faith and leap. So leap I will.
Or would I be better served by working a lazy part-time job here in Thailand.... teach Saturday and Sunday and have five days off to write, loaf, suck coffee, and make videos? Hmmmm. Its a tough choice really. I decided to go to Japan for strategic reasons-- to save enough money for an extended trip to South America. I'd like to head to Ecuador/Peru/Bolivia with a wad of cash... be able to live without working... study Spanish... take salsa lessons. Im hoping to buy a year or two of blissful unemployment by working full time in Japan.
The job in Japan at least looks tolerable. I'll be teaching 22 hours a week.... a tad much but the good news is that there are no office hours. When Im not teaching I am free. As I am a huge proponent of effortless language teaching (for the students and the teacher) I won't require much preparation time. So... as full time jobs in Japan go... this one looks to be more livable than most. But I've learned the hard way that there's no knowing for sure until you get there.
So off I go on February 25th... off to Hiroshima to teach English, study Japanese, and make friends. Im looking forward to cleaner air and less noise and in general a bit more tranquility than Bangkok offers. But I'll miss this city too. I'll miss Tip and friends and lazy days in Banglumpoo.
But there's no point looking back. The proper mindset for a new journey is one of expectant excitement mixed with fear.... what will it be like? What suprises await me? What new friends will I meet? Standing on the verge of a new journey is perhaps the most exciting stage.. when everything is pregnant with possibilities and uncertainties. At such a time, the only thing to do is have faith and leap. So leap I will.
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