An email to my friends
Trip Start
May 18, 2008
1
13
18
Trip End
Jun 16, 2008
Jakarta,
Java,
Indonesia
Friday, June 6, 2008
so i've come to an interesting juncture on my explorations - coinciding with some downtime in jakarta today before i head to singapore and then papua new guinea tomorrow. i've now been through parts of thailand, cambodia and indonesia. i would have loved to do most of this by land and boat - as i hate flying - but that would require a lot more time than i've allocated. i won't bore with the day to day explorations and travails. suffice it to say, the wackiest stuff happens in southeast asia - mostly due to widespread corruption and lackadaisical enforcement of standards and laws, if you can even call them laws. the only ones regulated appear to be sex and drug trafficking (technically). everything else, fair game!
i think i left on this trip with the intent to search for that ever enigmatic sense of "self." on a secondary level, i wanted to break free from a lifetime of planning and structure. of the former, i've come to realize that my "self" is just latent. so, i've stopped trying to find meaning in everything but rather choosing simply, to live. of the latter, i think i have made significant progress. i have certainly become a bit obsessed with the bohemian aspect of backpacking and the bonds made along the way. i know many cannot imagine that i of all people am living just out of a 6.5 kilo bag on my back, but it is true. i have come to realize that in this area of the world, planning means nothing except possibly wasted money, and that it is simply best to just point yourself in the direction you want to go and figure it out along the way. even basic elements that are elsewhere considered the necessities of life, i.e. shelter - are better left to be discovered upon arrival. i really admire the tenacity of the friends i've met that are traveling for 6 months, a year, even longer with only a vague trajectory, a desire to explore, and not much else.
maybe i went to the wrong places in thailand, but it was cambodia that really spoke to me. after weeding through scam after scam in thailand, cambodia was a welcome breath of fresh air. Despite its long often dark history of colonialism, dictatorship and genocide, the people were lovely. i went by land over the thai border, quite an experience itself dealing with corrupt border officials and an unpaved road on a korean bus (i am sure, remnant of the cold war) with no AC. Mud and rain flew at us through our open windows. i emerged dirtier than i ever have been, but with a big smile on my face. it was also in cambodia, that i got off my republican high horse and acknowledged that maybe, the world really is not fair, equitable or merit based. i'm still not voting for obama though :)
i went to bali on a whim and was luckily adopted by some nice kids, some of whom are ex pats living in indonesia, so i got to see bali from a more local perspective. it was a harrowing, yet typical indonesian flight experience - an 8 hour delay punctuated by a loss of luggage. i was strangely, non plussed and amused by everything. i didn't have a hostel either - so my new friends directed me towards a nice one (albeit outside my budget - but what can you do at 2am in a new city?). i moved to a much more affordable, much more ghetto hostel the next day.
and i decided to forgo vietnam for papua new guinea, torn between going off the beaten path and continuing to bond with other travelers. but the lure of warring tribes, a land with 850 indigenous languages, and a vast ecological haven just waiting to be explored could not be turned down.
so far the casualties have been my debit card (eaten by a pukhet ATM), my cell phone (swiped from an internet cafe in bali), a cheap watch (left in pukhet), my retail math calculator (that chapter is closed anyway), and i ditched my travel buddy in siem reap. all other valuables are strapped to my body, literally..i'm trying to be less lackadaisical and more responsible...but it proves hard to do.
and ultimately traveling alone as a single female has its own caveats - safety and the occasional bout of loneliness. but in every instance, where i have been nervous, the spontaneous gods have provided me with companions to meet and new life stories to hear. i have been reading blue highways, and i hope that my mistakes are only teaching me more:
If a man can keep alert and imaginative, an error is a possibility, a chance at something new; to him wandering and wondering are part of the same process, and he is most mistaken, most in error, whenever he quits exploring.
as i conclude this, the sunset contact prayer is being chanted outside my window...hello from muslim indonesia . i will return to you very poor and very mosquito bitten in a couple weeks time.
