Day 91

Introducing my life in the Thai islands with some pictures, more words to come soon!!!! Sending love to everyone!!

The Whole Foods of Thailand: 

Day 81

After a cold  month in Europe, I flew to Thailand a week and a half ago yearning for sun and the soul penetrating joy I felt in Nepal. Instead, I was given Bangkok, a big city, skyscrapers and all, where my body is constantly sticky and heat isn't as enjoyable as I remember it being. Carts of street food cover the sidewalks with each dish spicier than the next. Pork is unavoidable, the one meat I told myself I would never try I have given in to, and it's disapointingly delicious. Thankfully, just a couple days later I escaped the pork crazed city for Vang Vieng, Laos. My friend, Aaron (who is studying abroad in Bangkok) and I got some of the last seats available (unbelievably uncomfortable plastic benches) on an overnight train to the Thai-Lao border. After many more hours of confusion and travel we made it to Vang Vieng, a small town among big mountains and a river flwoing with life. "This is exactly where I'm supposed to be," I thought. We spent our days exploring the river, the mountains, and local caves. I have never felt so happy and content to simply walk as I did then. Zig-zagging through the red dirt roads, I was greeted with smiles by every person I passed. We found an organic mulberry farm outside of town, run by a man named Mr. T, and we enjoyed his company for many meals of mulberry pancakes and starfruit wine. We also met a couple from London who are taking two years to tandem bike from New Zealand all the way back home. Wow they were so rad!! We talked with them a ton and the woman, Kat, said if she could do it, so could I, so hey maybe one day I'll do a bike trip too! (You can read more about what they're doing on their blog: tandemturners.com). When the time came to leave Vang Vieng we were all pretty sad. Looking back it almost feels like a dreamy paradise, I can't believe how lucky I am to have been there. Getting back to Bangkok was a bit of a fiasco, but we eventually found an overnight bus and all worked out (as it always does when you stay positive). And that same day I got on a plane to Siem Reap, Cambodia! To give a little background, I didn't realize that upon coming to Thailand  I would need a visa to stay longer than 30 days. A part of me even worried that I would get deported in the Bangkok airport. But of course that didn't happen, and I spent a day at Immigration to sort things out. The only option they gave me was to again fly into Thailand to renew my 30 days and then apply for a 7 day extension to cover my last week in April. So this is how I got to Cambodia, and wow am I so thankful for Thailand's crazy visa rules.
Getting on my plane that day was nothing short of terrifying. Many times now I've traveled from point A to point B on my own, but never before have I entered new and unknown territory without any sort of companion or a plan to guide me. The days ahead felt like eternity, how would I possibly keep myself busy? But getting off the plane in Siem Reap I knew I had done right. What was coming would be hard, the uncertainty felt scary, but at the same time so beautiful. All is in my hands! The next morning at 5 am I got on a motorcycle taxi to Angkor Wat, an ancient temple now in ruins. Riding with Poh, my motorcycle driver and guest house receptionist, I looked up at the stars and smiled so big. "Emily you are the cat's pajamas," I thought. I watched the sun rise over Angkor and then set off to explore. Poh would meet me at the end and drive me to the next temples. (These ten minute motorcycle stints every hour were crucial because it was so damn hot outside). I visited Angkor Wat, Bayon, and Ta Phrom, and I highly suggest looking them up on google images because they're insanely beautiful and my iphone didn't take any good pictures. Wandering that morning I really enjoyed my solitude. I could go at my own pace, and let the beauty of my surroundings sink into my head without having to constantly express how beautiful it was to people around me. I talked to all the Cambodian kids begging tourists to buy their postcards and magnets. To distract them from their young entrepreneurship I would ask them their names, their ages, and what they liked to do for fun. The anthropologist/camp counselor in me had a great time. By noon I was sweaty and tired, and after the last temple we headed back to the guest house. A few hours later  I woke up from a nap feeling intensely lonely. It hit me that no one was waiting for me, no one was wondering where I was. It was just me. I tried to go on a walk but the city center of Siem Reap is so touristy that it wasn't really enjoyable. I started to get into a negative frame of mind, the hours were moving so slowly. I just wanted to cry (and I did), I've never felt so unhappy to be alone with myself. Thankfully, a few weeks ago my dad sent me a website called journeywoman.com. It's a resource of stories and tips for female travelers, and  I got on a computer to check it out for fun. I found a section on advice for solo traveling, and I came across this contribution:

"I am 68 and have travelled in my motorhome for months at a time, and I relish my solitude the most of all my treasures. Loneliness happens when my relationship to myself is incomplete, when I'm not my own best friend, when I talk in negatives to myself instead of appreciatively, and when I don't listen carefully to the quietness inside me. Thinking of being alone as lonely is very different from perceiving it as solitude. For starters, solitude is healing, restorative, and self nurturing. Therefore the experience of loneliness is an opportunity to get to know yourself better, deeper, more intimately. When this feels scary or impossible it is an extra special gift. How productive it is to sit quietly alone, empty your mind, listen for the whispers of your unconscious, your deeper self, your soul..." -anonymous journey woman warrior goddess

 These words could not be more true. As I read, I knew the cause of my struggle. These past couple of months I have undoubtedly gained some weight. I've eaten a lot of really good food but haven't kept up the exercise to balance things out. Growing up I never had any serious body issues beyond being a typical teenage girl, but now I feel more uncomfortable in my own skin than ever. And as a yogi, I'm used to feeling a connection to my body, in touch with my muscles and limbs and the pulse of my veins. But now I can recognize that that connection has been diminished. I keep saying I'll go on a run or practice yoga, but it's so hard when I haven't had a stable routine or comfortable space of my own in so many months. I know what it feels like to be my own best friend, and to speak to myself appreciatively rather than negatively. I just need to get back to that space, and I know I'm the only one who can make a change and get me there. So though these days on my own in Cambodia are scary at times, even a little daunting,  I know I'm here for a reason, to heal and restore my relationship to myself. This morning I took a yoga class at a studio nearby and I already feel like I'm headed in the right direction. As my teacher, Maria Cristina Jimenez, taught me, Om Namah Shivaya, I am divine and complete as I am. Thank you Thai visa rules for forcing me to come to Cambodia and spend these days with myself! 

my new heroes, The Tandem Turners!!!!!

Omen!!!! There were more butterflies than I've ever seen in Laos

Omen #2 on the wall of my room in Cambodia

Day 70

I just listened to my best friend, Callie's song "Family Portrait of my Friends" and I was reminded how insanely lucky I am to have the most amazing community in the entire infinite universe (you can listen to her song here: http://callieryan.bandcamp.com/album/love-songs-and-other-stupid-stuff). Even though the times have been rough lately, you guys give me all the strength I could ever need in the world and I am so thankful for that. I miss talking to you everyday and I wish I could be a bigger part of your lives this year but I know that you guys are thinking about me as much as I'm thinking about you. So thank you for rooting me on wherever you are, believe me I feel all the love and joy and courage that you're sending me.

Endless gratitude,

Em


And now I lech lecha!!!!!!

GOODBYE HOLLAND!!!!!!!

Day 68

I just skyped with my parents and I'm feeling a little weird. I don't know why. I've been trying to explain the way I feel to all sorts of people recently but I feel like no one actually understands. Maybe I don't even really understand. I'm bored, I'm frustrated, I'm confused. All the clarity that I found in Nepal, Europe has stolen. Who am I anymore anyway. I miss Asha. I don't think I'm unhappy, but I think my instincts are trying to tell me something. Where are you wolf woman?! I know you're somewhere deep inside. Please give me some direction, I need you so badly. Why do I feel so lost, without a purpose? I have only two days left here. I know I'll make it, of course I will. But what if Thailand doesn't give me all I hope it will. I am counting down the hours as if my savior were coming, but who knows if it will actually renew in me that harmonic life force of passionate adventure and discovery that I've been yearning for. Who in this infinite universe knows. I don't. All I can do is wait and see. "Go out in the woods, go out. If you don't go out in the woods, nothing will ever happen and your life will never begin." -Dr. Estes

Day 62

While I was shoveling horse poop yesterday I realized just how much time I have to think these days. It is a hell of a lot of time. Half the day I spend singing "Bring It On Home" by Sam Cooke in my head, but still I always find my thoughts wandering farther and father away from what's happening in reality; I'm re-living past events, I'm envisioning myself a month from now, a year from now. And the ever expanding green fields, now sprinkled with snow, seem to give my mind all the space it could ever want to run wild. Sometimes it's nice to reminisce or plan, but right now it's frustrating. I've done this great thing for myself, I've taken a gap year with the intention of discovering all that my soul has to offer me. Yet, for some foolish reason, my mind prefers to be elsewhere, while it should be soaking up the present moment as much as it can before this year ends and I'm stuck wishing I could go back. So what to do. I guess first off I need to stop calling my mind "it" and realize that I am my mind, and no one has control over my mind but me. Meaning, only I can solve this problem, no one can do it for me. Abatiwaha, so is life.
I think things started to get weird in my head a few days into being on the farm. Maybe you can tell by now but Europe isn't really for me (at least at this point in my life) and I've been struggling to establish a connection to the cultures, people, etc. As much as I've enjoyed working with Neinke and Auke, the lack of direction that I've felt since being in Europe has started to weigh on me, making me feel even a little anxious (I hate that word) to move on to the next trip. This aimlessness has led me, I think, to distract myself with visions of past events or with grand ideas for the future, and surprisingly, to yearn for structure. Whereas in Nepal, one intense and challenging experience was followed by the next, this semester everything is in my hands, and naturally I decided to sort of plan as I go. So here I am in Holland working on a farm but simultaneously planning out what I'll do in Thailand and where I'll visit and what I'll eat and so on. And as exciting as all of that is, I've been losing sight of the present moment. Even if, at present, I'm not overwhelmed by joy or so in love with my surroundings, the present is where I must dwell and must stay. Past Emily is climbing the Himalayas and exploring the desert, while future Emily is hangin with the gibbons in Thailand and meditating in India (?). So all present Emily needs to do is be on the farm with Neinke and Auke and their dogs and their two-day-old goat babies and their horse poop.
I said to my mom the other day that I'm not feeling challenged enough, and she responded, "You are traveling the world completely on your own, how can you not feel challenged?" And hey she's right, maybe I ought to give myself a little more credit. Challenge won't always come in the form of eating frog in a rural Nepali village. So the challenge that I need to face for now is letting go of my wandering thoughts about the past and the future and just be in the now, and take it a day at a time. I want to leave the farm feeling proud of how hard I worked and feeling at peace with my environment here. So that's exactly what I'll do, I'll keep shoveling poop and making goat cheese and I'll use the simple landscape to calm my mind and reign in my thoughts to the present. And of course the wolf woman in me will always keep howling.


"This is what you shall do: Love the Earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or any number of men, go freely with the powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.."
- from Walt Whitman's introduction to his book "Leaves of Grass"

Day 59

Today was very long. In the morning I shoveled more horse poop (it is endless), fed the animals, and learned how to mold the cheese so that it can be sold tomorrow at the farmer's market in the nearest city, Groningen. To mold the cheese I stuffed it into these various shaped cups that had little holes in them. (If cheese was squeezing out of the holes that meant it was compacted enough.) I would then run the cheese filled cup under hot water, and shake. I would shake and shake and shake for dear life. And 57 cheese molds later, my arms were ready to fall off. I thought I could have started crying at any moment, I don't know why. I think I'm just still adjusting to work life/farm life/dutch life here, and adjusting periods are always the toughest for me. But on the upswing, I learned how to chop wood today and that was thrilling, not to mention very difficult after shaking all those cups of cheese. It took a long time, but eventually I slit the wood right down the middle. I'm a warrior goddess!

Day 58

Well here I am out in the middle of nowhere, on a goat cheese farm in northern Holland. Why the heck am I here? You may ask. For some odd reason, I decided that "hard physical labor" was one of my goals for this gap year, and I'd say there's no better way to get your fill of hard physical labor than working on a farm. So I signed up with the organization WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms www.wwoof.org) and found Neinke and Auke, a Dutch couple who live with their five children on a farm in a village called Sebaldeburen. WWOOF is really really groovy because while I offer them my labor, they give me hearty Dutch food and shelter in their Ikea dream house (and I get to play with their dogs!). So it's a win-win-win sort of deal. And here I am at De-Mekkerkast Farm (www.de-mekkerkast.nl)! Because they're in the goat cheese business, they have lots of sweet little goats, as well as cows, pigs, and horses just for fun. Their home and barns are surrounded by sprawling green fields speckled with leafless trees, and there are no mountains or hills so the land feels like it goes on forever. That being said, it feels good to be out of the city. I have space to breathe again. As much as I soaked up every moment I had with Alex, Paris revealed to me some inner conflicts that I couldn't seem to reconcile. Yeah the city has a lot going for it, the history, the art, an efficient metro system, but I just couldn't get into it. While the other girls gaggled over the Eiffel Tower, after a minute I thought, okay cool I'm ready to move on. Is something wrong with me? I don't know. But I felt like a piece was missing. My surroundings weren't reaching into my soul or making joy flow through my veins (a feeling I've come to know and love on this gap year). I felt like such a hypocrite, I say all the time that I can find joy anywhere no matter what. "So where the hell is it!?" I thought to my self... AH! MY BEST FRIEND ALEX STILLS! All the joy I could ever want is in this beautiful gal I get to call my soul sister! Wow how lucky am I! So who cares where we are, I get to spend time with my best friend and eat a couple baguettes while we're at it.
So that's how Paris went. And now I'm on the farm doing what I do best, shovel things around and play in the dirt. Here's a list of some of the work I've done thus far (it's only been two days mind you).
Package fresh strips of meat into vacuum sealed bags.
Wheel barrow chopped wood across the farm.
Feed the animals their various types of hay and pellets and grains and food scraps.
Shovel horse poop.
Pull all of the dead plants out of the garden and feed them to the goats.
Cut back tree branches and build an absurdly large pile of dried wood, to be burned later.
Go to Neinke and Auke's daughter's horse back riding competition (she got disqualified because the horse pooped while she was competing).
So all is well and fun! Of course it's freezing outside and the weather is predicted to be in the 30s all week, but hey it's only temporary. May I go forth, lech lecha, and shovel all the horse poop I can.