Saturday, October 25, 2003
10:19 p.m. Tuesday, October 21, 2003
Sarvodaya Center, Colombo
Sitting here in the common room, frustrated, tense, feeling very stressed out after the last couple of days of dealing with one thing after another from the five-hour bridge repair by the very nice dentist in Dehiwila on my one full day off, to the hassle of getting money to pay him, having to travel all the way out to Moratowa because none of the downtown branches were open, to the moving from the Ocean View Inn getting lost with Angie and the luggage and adjusting to one other location to live out of a suitcase again, to the missing of a three-wheeler with three of the team members while going to CITA for the lecture on Human Rights by Joe Williams, me feeling personally so over-responsible like I did 36 years ago in Vietnam for the boy-men I was “in charge of”, to the feeling overwhelmed by the Tamil class, to finding out that the DMFCU ATM card has been lost in the land of FEDEX for the past two weeks, and it will take a couple of weeks to trace it, to now the final blow, the inability since last night to hook into the Internet because the modem has stopped working after hassling for a couple of hours last night switching one more time back to earthlink.net because I can’t figure out how to configure Entourage to download email off the mac.com server, and I can’t just pick up the phone to call Support for assistance from Sri Lanka.
The lesson is to keep breathing and watching my darker self rant and rail against the fates of my existence, feeling the same old feelings of inadequacy and insecurity, feeling less than, that something is wrong with me, that life works for everyone else but not for me – all the same old stuff that I’ve been hassling internally and externally for lo these oh so many, many years, decades even, and not DO ANYTHING. Just to watch it. And breath. And pray. And chant Namo quan sith yin pusa. And do no thing violent against self or other.
It was very good a moment ago to pray/chant away my resentment that one of the team members asked to break the queue for the phone ahead of me to call her Mom, whom she’s been so desperately out of touch with for the past week. Instead of sitting in my stewed snit, I choose to go out and try to help her make the call, which she still wasn’t able to do even with my card. Nor was I again able to connect -- meMacMojo modem just won’t connect.
So, I’m very grateful that I can this moment, listening to Diane Krall scat “Don’t go changing”, continue to choose to be more than less accepting of the frustration I experience of not being able to get or send email, most grateful to have a Plan B to call the Mac contact William’s friend Kamil got for me and go to Galle Face Green Court tomorrow , if possible, to check it out.
8:08 a.m., Wednesday, October 22, 2003
Colombo Sarvodaya Center
Much better, more accepting, more grateful space after a good night’s rest, a 40 minute run through Colombo to the Main Train Station and back, and a clean bod with tea overlooking downtown. Before me is a pretty view of the Colombo skyline, the WTC in the distance, the Victorian Gothic spires of All Saints Cathedral just across the soccer field where several people do their morning exercises. To the left in the distance is a school year full now with ranks of white shirts, blue shorts, hearing school announcements over a loudspeaker also playing martial music. Earlier they were running around the school yard in a helter-skelter of motion, tear-assing around like sixty with the inexorable exuberance of all youth in the full blush of the Springtime of their lives. Close by in the soccer field a team is practicing. To the right is a beautiful tall tree with a profusion of lovely soft pink blossoms. The toll of school, church bells harmonizes with the cacophony of rush hour traffic sounds. A cooling morning breeze soothes.
Always the wonder of the incongruous moment, like yesterday in Tamil Class when I happened to look up and out the window and see just the momentary glimpse of a pelican, large-billed, graceful-winged, serenely floating among distant clouds, billowing with multi-shades of white-grays and like this morning on my run seeing a souped-up, dark blue Daihatsu on a used car lot with a Millennium year 2000 Georgia on my mind license plate complete with peach blossom symbol . . .
11:53 a.m., Saturday, October 25, 2003
Crescat Plaza Food Court
Welp time has passed and as is always the case most of my conundrums have revealed themselves to an acceptable solution – only my DMFCU Visa Card is among the missing, but shortly I will go the Wellwatha HSBC Branch to see if I can somehow get money off my defective card for Rita.
Sitting in the very upscale Crescat Plaza Food Court, completely cosmopolitanized in Western motifs, styles and fancies. Many expats, many upper echelon Sri Lankans, a profusion of Western scents, sights, fashions and pretensions. No matter – I’m one, and I’m here too. The reality is that I am on a scale higher than most Sri Lankans as most of the high flyers here are from me.
So it turns out that the lead I got from the Apple store goes to naught. There is no wireless network I can hook in to, so back to plan B of dial-up until Jan can connect us with William’s friend who has a cable modem. At least, with the techie-hacker skills, which diminutive little Susan from the Philippines so impressed me with last night, I have been able to both receive and send email on William’s wow connection. Plus, I know now how to configure meMojomac for other dial-up connections – late tonight I shall try the 150 slt connection. It’s all good. Still can’t figure out the weird reality that for the past couple of weeks I had been able to do it with the smptauth.earthlink.net configuration and that it just stopped – hurts my head, and I surrender trying to figure it out, accepting with gratitude the grace that it is working now.
Monday Soraia, Karen and I go back to Trinco and Muthur, by ourselves with no one known to us to serve as an interpreter – hopefully we will be able to get one from William’s previous employer, PCA. If not we will manage. We have our first night’s accommodation set up at Father Leo’s, so I’ll get to do another beautiful sunrise run on the beach. We’ll find a Guest House, on of the ones Anneka recommended near the ferry. Gratefully, although we are all way outside our comfort zones, I am not fearful or worried, I’m in a very accepting place and curiously eager to meet the day to day, moment to moment challenges in this incredible different new place. One of the things that I reflected on this week is that through age and the past 30 or so years of spiritual practice I am much more prepared to live as a stranger in this strange, strange land than I was as a young man, shave-tail brown bar on my first active duty assignment in Vietnam 36 years ago – I’ll take this level of uncertainty facing the unknown any day, week, month, year, decade or lifetime . . .
Sarvodaya Center, Colombo
Sitting here in the common room, frustrated, tense, feeling very stressed out after the last couple of days of dealing with one thing after another from the five-hour bridge repair by the very nice dentist in Dehiwila on my one full day off, to the hassle of getting money to pay him, having to travel all the way out to Moratowa because none of the downtown branches were open, to the moving from the Ocean View Inn getting lost with Angie and the luggage and adjusting to one other location to live out of a suitcase again, to the missing of a three-wheeler with three of the team members while going to CITA for the lecture on Human Rights by Joe Williams, me feeling personally so over-responsible like I did 36 years ago in Vietnam for the boy-men I was “in charge of”, to the feeling overwhelmed by the Tamil class, to finding out that the DMFCU ATM card has been lost in the land of FEDEX for the past two weeks, and it will take a couple of weeks to trace it, to now the final blow, the inability since last night to hook into the Internet because the modem has stopped working after hassling for a couple of hours last night switching one more time back to earthlink.net because I can’t figure out how to configure Entourage to download email off the mac.com server, and I can’t just pick up the phone to call Support for assistance from Sri Lanka.
The lesson is to keep breathing and watching my darker self rant and rail against the fates of my existence, feeling the same old feelings of inadequacy and insecurity, feeling less than, that something is wrong with me, that life works for everyone else but not for me – all the same old stuff that I’ve been hassling internally and externally for lo these oh so many, many years, decades even, and not DO ANYTHING. Just to watch it. And breath. And pray. And chant Namo quan sith yin pusa. And do no thing violent against self or other.
It was very good a moment ago to pray/chant away my resentment that one of the team members asked to break the queue for the phone ahead of me to call her Mom, whom she’s been so desperately out of touch with for the past week. Instead of sitting in my stewed snit, I choose to go out and try to help her make the call, which she still wasn’t able to do even with my card. Nor was I again able to connect -- meMacMojo modem just won’t connect.
So, I’m very grateful that I can this moment, listening to Diane Krall scat “Don’t go changing”, continue to choose to be more than less accepting of the frustration I experience of not being able to get or send email, most grateful to have a Plan B to call the Mac contact William’s friend Kamil got for me and go to Galle Face Green Court tomorrow , if possible, to check it out.
8:08 a.m., Wednesday, October 22, 2003
Colombo Sarvodaya Center
Much better, more accepting, more grateful space after a good night’s rest, a 40 minute run through Colombo to the Main Train Station and back, and a clean bod with tea overlooking downtown. Before me is a pretty view of the Colombo skyline, the WTC in the distance, the Victorian Gothic spires of All Saints Cathedral just across the soccer field where several people do their morning exercises. To the left in the distance is a school year full now with ranks of white shirts, blue shorts, hearing school announcements over a loudspeaker also playing martial music. Earlier they were running around the school yard in a helter-skelter of motion, tear-assing around like sixty with the inexorable exuberance of all youth in the full blush of the Springtime of their lives. Close by in the soccer field a team is practicing. To the right is a beautiful tall tree with a profusion of lovely soft pink blossoms. The toll of school, church bells harmonizes with the cacophony of rush hour traffic sounds. A cooling morning breeze soothes.
Always the wonder of the incongruous moment, like yesterday in Tamil Class when I happened to look up and out the window and see just the momentary glimpse of a pelican, large-billed, graceful-winged, serenely floating among distant clouds, billowing with multi-shades of white-grays and like this morning on my run seeing a souped-up, dark blue Daihatsu on a used car lot with a Millennium year 2000 Georgia on my mind license plate complete with peach blossom symbol . . .
11:53 a.m., Saturday, October 25, 2003
Crescat Plaza Food Court
Welp time has passed and as is always the case most of my conundrums have revealed themselves to an acceptable solution – only my DMFCU Visa Card is among the missing, but shortly I will go the Wellwatha HSBC Branch to see if I can somehow get money off my defective card for Rita.
Sitting in the very upscale Crescat Plaza Food Court, completely cosmopolitanized in Western motifs, styles and fancies. Many expats, many upper echelon Sri Lankans, a profusion of Western scents, sights, fashions and pretensions. No matter – I’m one, and I’m here too. The reality is that I am on a scale higher than most Sri Lankans as most of the high flyers here are from me.
So it turns out that the lead I got from the Apple store goes to naught. There is no wireless network I can hook in to, so back to plan B of dial-up until Jan can connect us with William’s friend who has a cable modem. At least, with the techie-hacker skills, which diminutive little Susan from the Philippines so impressed me with last night, I have been able to both receive and send email on William’s wow connection. Plus, I know now how to configure meMojomac for other dial-up connections – late tonight I shall try the 150 slt connection. It’s all good. Still can’t figure out the weird reality that for the past couple of weeks I had been able to do it with the smptauth.earthlink.net configuration and that it just stopped – hurts my head, and I surrender trying to figure it out, accepting with gratitude the grace that it is working now.
Monday Soraia, Karen and I go back to Trinco and Muthur, by ourselves with no one known to us to serve as an interpreter – hopefully we will be able to get one from William’s previous employer, PCA. If not we will manage. We have our first night’s accommodation set up at Father Leo’s, so I’ll get to do another beautiful sunrise run on the beach. We’ll find a Guest House, on of the ones Anneka recommended near the ferry. Gratefully, although we are all way outside our comfort zones, I am not fearful or worried, I’m in a very accepting place and curiously eager to meet the day to day, moment to moment challenges in this incredible different new place. One of the things that I reflected on this week is that through age and the past 30 or so years of spiritual practice I am much more prepared to live as a stranger in this strange, strange land than I was as a young man, shave-tail brown bar on my first active duty assignment in Vietnam 36 years ago – I’ll take this level of uncertainty facing the unknown any day, week, month, year, decade or lifetime . . .
Saturday, October 18, 2003
7:38 a.m., Monday, October 13, 2003
Sarvodaya Center Room
Thirty-one years sober today, and I can’t think of anything more splendid than to be in the final stages of preparation for going into the field again. The next phase of my life begins as we journey today for our field locations in Sri Lanka. In some ways it’s so much the same and, thank all gods/goddesses, it’s so radically different than when I went to the field in Vietnam.
Yesterday was the twenty-fourth anniversary from when Sara-then-Cathy and I met on that incredibly spectacular fall weekend in October of ’79 in Renssalaerville. As Enya sweetly sings “Who can say where the road goes,” I just gently acknowledge that that was then, this is now, and “Only Time Can Tell” has spun us on our very separate ways. I called her last night, waking her up at 11:30 a.m., her time Sunday morning, and we shared kindly for awhile. I was so sincere, feeling it deep in my heart-consciousness, when I hoped for her that she finds with Chuck a “connected knowledge” of being dialogical, such as she related that Helen had spoken about at the Omega Imago weekend they experienced a couple of weeks ago. I can cherish what we had from a distance of time and memory while celebrating that, indeed, through “Only Time”, I have moved on to explore another relationship with Bonnie. Of course, as is symbolic of so much of our relationship, my unconsciousness cut the phone call short without exchanging “I love yous,” when I accidentally unplugged the telephone. There was no need to call her back . . .
It was also most very good to surprise Bonnie with a call and to hear her still sleep in bed, sounding so close and warm and sweet. I am grateful to the healing power of universal love to be deepening in my heart-vision some kind of a life with her, either in NP or on the road in an RV, working in National Parks or in an intentional community somewhere. Momma sounded so old, as she realizes that her fate is also carved in the karmic stone of her living to the end of her days in St. Catherine’s – change just inexorably is for all of us. Tommy also sounded good, though sick again, having gotten the promotion to Team Leader of Pima House.
So, all in my various heavens on the illusory plane of earthly being are in their rightful and most blessed space, and I can go into the field, commencing a new adventure, with a clear mind and a glad heart . . .
7:16 a.m., Tuesday, October 14, 2003
Room at Fr. Leo’s, Trincomalee
In the East. Just took a short walk down to the sea. Wanted to do a run, but in my transitory state don’t want to be carrying sweaty, dirty clothes. Many crows. Fishing boats from the fishing village on the sea. A group of little boys taking their morning constitutional in a patch of sand. The promontory of Lover’s Leap in the distance. Small waves lapping the shore while behind me a group of children sing morning Mass.
Yesterday was a day of travel, getting out into the bush of Sri Lanka, leaving the crowded city of Columbo. Late, snafu of the vans, but I got a change to see that the gints lost 17 to 6 up in New England – don’t know what happened to their powerful, overwhelming offense.
The ride over in the two vans was long and most interesting. Sri Lanka is more like Vietnam of 36 years ago than Vietnam is today. The jungled hills were beautifully serene, the people largely living the same kinds of lives that they have lived for generations. Though there is scant direct evidence of the troubles, the lack of progress and development is a direct result. It was wonderful watching the setting sun over the large, manmade lake, which I guess they call Tanks here in Sri Lanka, which for centuries they have built to irrigate their fields. An absolute utter delight also to see elephants in the wild as well as peacocks. Quite a trip seeing the large buddha up on the hill with tall cell phone towers behind him – reminded me of the Happy Buddha with latte and cell phone Vince and I got down in the Village during one of our long “Dinner with Andre” evenings.
A wonderful meal of prawns as big as rock lobsters, chicken, pasta and potatoes – just struck with a memory of cooking the meal of cannelloni beans, potatoes and pasta, guess I won’t be able to get cannelloni beans here in Sri Lanka.
So the day will be spent making our first contacts with people, and hopefully I can get to a dentist to have the bridge re-glued. Maybe so, maybe not. All is well.
10:41 p.m., Thursday, October 16, 2003
Room in Fr. Leo’s, Uppuveli Pastoral Center, Trincomalee
Julie sings sweetly “Send in the Clouds.” I’m in a very centered, mostly accepting place after several long, packed days beginning the new adventure in Muthur. It will be hard – Muthur is a very dirty, war-torn, undeveloped place where the average technological development averages sometime in the mid-1700s. Oh yes, there are motor driven machines and telephones, even mobile, but overall the standard of living is quite primitive. There are many more cow driven two-large-wheeled carts than pick-up trucks, scores more bicycles than motorbikes, open sewers and many burning garbage piles. The GTZ house that we stayed in was primitive as well with only a squat toilet and a very antiquated and dirty shower stall with no kitchen. The power went out twice yesterday for extended periods of time. No Internet Cafes. Only open markets with much dust and many flies, like what most of the world has lived through for the past several millennia, no nice supermarkets. It will be a trip learning to buy food to be able to cook for ourselves. I am, indeed, back in the bush with many burned out and war destroyed houses along with the New Imperium Theatre, only a bombed out shell of the glory it must once have been Many police and Security Forces walking about with weapons fully loaded and hopefully locked or on guard in sand-bagged, old tire and log bunkers – everywhere the ubiquitous green sand bags, some rotting, spilling their contents on the ground. I create quite a stir with all members of the community on my early morning runs or when we walk around the ville, especially with the plethora of bright-smiling children, who laugh and giggle at and want to touch my prominent now grey beard.
Nevertheless, I’m finding the work that we are doing, making our introductions with key members in the community most rewarding and exciting, most very interesting and challenging to empathetically just listen and try to understand the complexities of the war against themselves they have been surviving traumatically for the past 20 years. I can be of service here; I can practice a growing ability “to live, to love, to serve.” One of the things I’ve been thinking about is doing some work on PTSD, both with the soldiers on all sides as well as the civilians – everyone has been so traumatized by the two decades of brutal war, especially the children.
Got connected to the Internet for the first time this afternoon, a most frustrating experience, as the time it takes to download and send replies takes sooooooooo long; I waited over five minutes to download the NY Times Headline email for today – will have to see this weekend in Colombo if there is a print only version for here. In an hour and a half I was only able to open, read and reply to about 20 of my 60 some emails. Hopefully this weekend I can configure meMacMojo for the mac.com server and see if I can hook my machine up to one of the Trimcolee’s dial-ups so that I can download all my email in Entourage to work with off-line. Later when we got back here to Father Leo’s, it was wonderful to go for a brief swim in the Caribbean-like Indian Ocean and to collect my first Sri Lankan shells. One thing I will have to learn to be less judgmentally intolerant of is their community habit of taking large dumps, the men and the children anyway, on the beach, something, I guess, about ashes to ashes, dust to dust, and shit to sea . . .
Welp, sitting here in the full swing of morning with clouds scuttling across a blue
sky and the ever-squawking cacophony of always-circling and swirling crows, I
envision that a way shall be shown for every dilemma, and that as always I get
exactly everything I need precisely as I need it. So, this weekend I will either get my
bridge re-glued or not; get my new DMFCU card or not; get some cash to pay Rita
back or not. Very grateful to acknowledge that I was able to suffer through and have
pass my first bout of running stomach .
Sarvodaya Center Room
Thirty-one years sober today, and I can’t think of anything more splendid than to be in the final stages of preparation for going into the field again. The next phase of my life begins as we journey today for our field locations in Sri Lanka. In some ways it’s so much the same and, thank all gods/goddesses, it’s so radically different than when I went to the field in Vietnam.
Yesterday was the twenty-fourth anniversary from when Sara-then-Cathy and I met on that incredibly spectacular fall weekend in October of ’79 in Renssalaerville. As Enya sweetly sings “Who can say where the road goes,” I just gently acknowledge that that was then, this is now, and “Only Time Can Tell” has spun us on our very separate ways. I called her last night, waking her up at 11:30 a.m., her time Sunday morning, and we shared kindly for awhile. I was so sincere, feeling it deep in my heart-consciousness, when I hoped for her that she finds with Chuck a “connected knowledge” of being dialogical, such as she related that Helen had spoken about at the Omega Imago weekend they experienced a couple of weeks ago. I can cherish what we had from a distance of time and memory while celebrating that, indeed, through “Only Time”, I have moved on to explore another relationship with Bonnie. Of course, as is symbolic of so much of our relationship, my unconsciousness cut the phone call short without exchanging “I love yous,” when I accidentally unplugged the telephone. There was no need to call her back . . .
It was also most very good to surprise Bonnie with a call and to hear her still sleep in bed, sounding so close and warm and sweet. I am grateful to the healing power of universal love to be deepening in my heart-vision some kind of a life with her, either in NP or on the road in an RV, working in National Parks or in an intentional community somewhere. Momma sounded so old, as she realizes that her fate is also carved in the karmic stone of her living to the end of her days in St. Catherine’s – change just inexorably is for all of us. Tommy also sounded good, though sick again, having gotten the promotion to Team Leader of Pima House.
So, all in my various heavens on the illusory plane of earthly being are in their rightful and most blessed space, and I can go into the field, commencing a new adventure, with a clear mind and a glad heart . . .
7:16 a.m., Tuesday, October 14, 2003
Room at Fr. Leo’s, Trincomalee
In the East. Just took a short walk down to the sea. Wanted to do a run, but in my transitory state don’t want to be carrying sweaty, dirty clothes. Many crows. Fishing boats from the fishing village on the sea. A group of little boys taking their morning constitutional in a patch of sand. The promontory of Lover’s Leap in the distance. Small waves lapping the shore while behind me a group of children sing morning Mass.
Yesterday was a day of travel, getting out into the bush of Sri Lanka, leaving the crowded city of Columbo. Late, snafu of the vans, but I got a change to see that the gints lost 17 to 6 up in New England – don’t know what happened to their powerful, overwhelming offense.
The ride over in the two vans was long and most interesting. Sri Lanka is more like Vietnam of 36 years ago than Vietnam is today. The jungled hills were beautifully serene, the people largely living the same kinds of lives that they have lived for generations. Though there is scant direct evidence of the troubles, the lack of progress and development is a direct result. It was wonderful watching the setting sun over the large, manmade lake, which I guess they call Tanks here in Sri Lanka, which for centuries they have built to irrigate their fields. An absolute utter delight also to see elephants in the wild as well as peacocks. Quite a trip seeing the large buddha up on the hill with tall cell phone towers behind him – reminded me of the Happy Buddha with latte and cell phone Vince and I got down in the Village during one of our long “Dinner with Andre” evenings.
A wonderful meal of prawns as big as rock lobsters, chicken, pasta and potatoes – just struck with a memory of cooking the meal of cannelloni beans, potatoes and pasta, guess I won’t be able to get cannelloni beans here in Sri Lanka.
So the day will be spent making our first contacts with people, and hopefully I can get to a dentist to have the bridge re-glued. Maybe so, maybe not. All is well.
10:41 p.m., Thursday, October 16, 2003
Room in Fr. Leo’s, Uppuveli Pastoral Center, Trincomalee
Julie sings sweetly “Send in the Clouds.” I’m in a very centered, mostly accepting place after several long, packed days beginning the new adventure in Muthur. It will be hard – Muthur is a very dirty, war-torn, undeveloped place where the average technological development averages sometime in the mid-1700s. Oh yes, there are motor driven machines and telephones, even mobile, but overall the standard of living is quite primitive. There are many more cow driven two-large-wheeled carts than pick-up trucks, scores more bicycles than motorbikes, open sewers and many burning garbage piles. The GTZ house that we stayed in was primitive as well with only a squat toilet and a very antiquated and dirty shower stall with no kitchen. The power went out twice yesterday for extended periods of time. No Internet Cafes. Only open markets with much dust and many flies, like what most of the world has lived through for the past several millennia, no nice supermarkets. It will be a trip learning to buy food to be able to cook for ourselves. I am, indeed, back in the bush with many burned out and war destroyed houses along with the New Imperium Theatre, only a bombed out shell of the glory it must once have been Many police and Security Forces walking about with weapons fully loaded and hopefully locked or on guard in sand-bagged, old tire and log bunkers – everywhere the ubiquitous green sand bags, some rotting, spilling their contents on the ground. I create quite a stir with all members of the community on my early morning runs or when we walk around the ville, especially with the plethora of bright-smiling children, who laugh and giggle at and want to touch my prominent now grey beard.
Nevertheless, I’m finding the work that we are doing, making our introductions with key members in the community most rewarding and exciting, most very interesting and challenging to empathetically just listen and try to understand the complexities of the war against themselves they have been surviving traumatically for the past 20 years. I can be of service here; I can practice a growing ability “to live, to love, to serve.” One of the things I’ve been thinking about is doing some work on PTSD, both with the soldiers on all sides as well as the civilians – everyone has been so traumatized by the two decades of brutal war, especially the children.
Got connected to the Internet for the first time this afternoon, a most frustrating experience, as the time it takes to download and send replies takes sooooooooo long; I waited over five minutes to download the NY Times Headline email for today – will have to see this weekend in Colombo if there is a print only version for here. In an hour and a half I was only able to open, read and reply to about 20 of my 60 some emails. Hopefully this weekend I can configure meMacMojo for the mac.com server and see if I can hook my machine up to one of the Trimcolee’s dial-ups so that I can download all my email in Entourage to work with off-line. Later when we got back here to Father Leo’s, it was wonderful to go for a brief swim in the Caribbean-like Indian Ocean and to collect my first Sri Lankan shells. One thing I will have to learn to be less judgmentally intolerant of is their community habit of taking large dumps, the men and the children anyway, on the beach, something, I guess, about ashes to ashes, dust to dust, and shit to sea . . .
Welp, sitting here in the full swing of morning with clouds scuttling across a blue
sky and the ever-squawking cacophony of always-circling and swirling crows, I
envision that a way shall be shown for every dilemma, and that as always I get
exactly everything I need precisely as I need it. So, this weekend I will either get my
bridge re-glued or not; get my new DMFCU card or not; get some cash to pay Rita
back or not. Very grateful to acknowledge that I was able to suffer through and have
pass my first bout of running stomach .
Sunday, October 12, 2003
7:53 a.m. Tuesday, October 7, 2002
NP Office, Columbo
Sitting here in the front foyer of the NP Colombo Office, where I spent the night last night, satiating my jonesing for connectivity, listening to Van de Man wail "Did Ye Get Healed", which yes I am !~!~! Hopefully I was able to straighten out the DMFCU Visa ATM Card snafu, and will have a new card fedexed to me here.
Last night was a lovely evening with William, attending my first Sri Lankan AA meeting, a collection of men many of whom have long-term sobriety but with a healthy sprinkling of newcomers -- no other ex-pats and no women. Then William and I had a delightful meal (me a tasty and healthy chicken salad) at The Cricket Club, where I began to get a rudimentary understanding of Cricket in our comparative discussion of it with baseball.
I also implemented a decision to go on and switch over to my ltbrin.mac.com email account, and was most gratified to see that somehow through the mysterious ethers of cyberspace my .mac address book has, likewise, healed itself, now synced from the Desktop address book.
So, shortly Jan and I go to Sarvodaya Center for another day of classes and then maybe off again tonight to hear Arthur C. Clarke give a lecture . . .
Life is sweet and most blessed -- oh yes, Bonnie forwarded a wonderful missive on "sacred unions."
10:21 p.m., October 10, 2003
Common Room, Sarvodaya
Whitney wails "I will always love you" in iTunes earphones, and I just let the bittersweet moments slide into the poignant hope of Bette's "From a distance, knowing that I don't have to be anything but what I am, content to be sitting here with Pepsi and fan blowing me cool, while just outside the bright full harvest moon shines such glory throughout this still dark night, back-lighting the full-puffed clouds in scattered rainbows of silver-grey-blacks as cicadae rub soft piercing harmonies of passion for each other. .
Just a little while ago I was filled with such utter contentment walking the dirty Moratowa streets, grooving on the silver dance of moonlight, listening to the plaintive sound of a monk chanting Buddhist rituals to a small gathering of devotees at one of the local shrines, eating with relish and a small spoon the Elephant House Vanilla Dream out of a sensibly small container. The hard edges of frustration about my technological challenges with connectivity to meMacMojo and the difficulty of wondering will I ever get the intricate mysteries of Tamil were melted, faded into the wind like the black splotches of diesel fumed smudge that burp and belch from the always-crowded Galle Road, teeming with a vibrant, Quuansequanaa(sp?)-like flow of humanity moving helter-skelter every which way to several Fridays through Sundays. I wasn't even disturbed that the crowded bus I was riding, having gotten the relative comfort of a seat even, got a flat tire a couple of kilometers from my stop, causing me to have to walk the dirty, garbage-strewn, dog/beggar-littered, still crowded streets even though most shops and businesses were closed.
Even now listening to the poignantly plaintive melodies of William Ackerman, which resonate for me such longing memories of upstate New York at this time of the fullest, deepest height of fall color, of those many years of jaunts up to Woodstock, or Greenville, or New London, or Lennox, or Williamsburg with Sara, doesn't disturb me. I am graced with complete acceptance of my life here now fully engaged in living an incredible adventure in Sri Lanka.
Earlier I spent a delightful dusk at the Galle Face Hotel, Colombo's oldest, built in 1864 as a posh testament to the glory of early Victorian Colonial British power, watching Japanese ceremonial drummers and young folk dong a dance combining traditional Japanese dance with hip-hop and the native Sri Lankan folk dancers as the sun splashed a full array of color across the cloud-splayed sky and the surging Indian Ocean.
For the past two days my spirits have been buoyed by the enthusiasm and the deep dedication to work for peace displayed by the large group of Japanese, Korean, Chinese activists who are participating in the activities and programs of the Peace Boat. Last night we had a delicious meal at the Carousel Restaurant where I spoke at length with Stacy, a California Surfer, most dedicated peace dude from Monterrey, who is a program coordinator for the Boat and several of the students as well as the head of NP Japan, who had come to visit the NP Project. Stacy has been to Vietnam several times, absolutely loving it, and asked me if I would be willing to come sometime as a lecturer -- ah doh !~!~! Like, I think I could dig it !~!~! That would be most super keen since I get plenty of leave time, and a flight wouldn't be that expensive, and I would share a bill with Lela Hayslip, author of the book, Heaven and Earth, which Oliver Stone made into another movie about our war.
In this afternoon's session, I got a lot of satisfaction making the statement that the Peace Boat was reversing the cycle of violence, saluting them for their efforts, wishing that my country could learn to do the same not only with Vietnam, but with their country for Nagasaki and Hiroshima instead of continuing to wage war to demonstrate our superiority in killing and destruction so as to assuage ourselves for having lost in the Vietnam War despite our vast material and technological superiority. And it seems we seemed doomed to repeat from our failure to remember in Iraq -- so sad to skim-read in the NYT email today that another two GIs were killed in one other ambush in the quagmire of Baghdad. This morning I also enjoyed and felt good about doing the meditation on the theme of Walela's "Amazing Grace."
Wednesday night I was very moved watching the PBS "A Force More Powerful" segment on Outpour's successful mobilization of the Serbian people to overthrow Milosevic. It was so reminiscent in style, in humor, in symbols, in outrageousness, so similar to the movement of my youth during the 60s, except they were successful, whereas ours failed due to our own limited objective of only being anti-war. They were totally committed to nonviolence and were grounded in a common vision of a just democratic society, whereas we weren't grounded in proactive principles, but were mostly guided by our self-seeking motives to avoid going to the dirty, little war of our generation in Vietnam and the general malaise of youth just to rebel for the sake of rebellion. So I watched it with sadness, wondering why we don't have poll watchers in Florida, wondering if it would do any good. And so it goes . . .
Tired. Will read for a bit and go to bed, to awaken whenever and go for a long, slow run. I'm not too bummed I'm choosing sensibly not to take a holiday to Galle, which would be pushing it and myself since I have to be back here Sunday at 2:30 p.m. for our meeting concerning preparations for our trip next week to Mutar, where I will begin to learn what the next phase of my life shall be like.
Ahhh, most sweet, to just be out here on the veranda, dancing while listening to Neil Young wail "Harvest Moon" as look up into this enchanting evening at a full October moon, a part of me wishing, fantasizing I could be dancing in the desert with sweet Bonnie, something we've never done . . .
NP Office, Columbo
Sitting here in the front foyer of the NP Colombo Office, where I spent the night last night, satiating my jonesing for connectivity, listening to Van de Man wail "Did Ye Get Healed", which yes I am !~!~! Hopefully I was able to straighten out the DMFCU Visa ATM Card snafu, and will have a new card fedexed to me here.
Last night was a lovely evening with William, attending my first Sri Lankan AA meeting, a collection of men many of whom have long-term sobriety but with a healthy sprinkling of newcomers -- no other ex-pats and no women. Then William and I had a delightful meal (me a tasty and healthy chicken salad) at The Cricket Club, where I began to get a rudimentary understanding of Cricket in our comparative discussion of it with baseball.
I also implemented a decision to go on and switch over to my ltbrin.mac.com email account, and was most gratified to see that somehow through the mysterious ethers of cyberspace my .mac address book has, likewise, healed itself, now synced from the Desktop address book.
So, shortly Jan and I go to Sarvodaya Center for another day of classes and then maybe off again tonight to hear Arthur C. Clarke give a lecture . . .
Life is sweet and most blessed -- oh yes, Bonnie forwarded a wonderful missive on "sacred unions."
10:21 p.m., October 10, 2003
Common Room, Sarvodaya
Whitney wails "I will always love you" in iTunes earphones, and I just let the bittersweet moments slide into the poignant hope of Bette's "From a distance, knowing that I don't have to be anything but what I am, content to be sitting here with Pepsi and fan blowing me cool, while just outside the bright full harvest moon shines such glory throughout this still dark night, back-lighting the full-puffed clouds in scattered rainbows of silver-grey-blacks as cicadae rub soft piercing harmonies of passion for each other. .
Just a little while ago I was filled with such utter contentment walking the dirty Moratowa streets, grooving on the silver dance of moonlight, listening to the plaintive sound of a monk chanting Buddhist rituals to a small gathering of devotees at one of the local shrines, eating with relish and a small spoon the Elephant House Vanilla Dream out of a sensibly small container. The hard edges of frustration about my technological challenges with connectivity to meMacMojo and the difficulty of wondering will I ever get the intricate mysteries of Tamil were melted, faded into the wind like the black splotches of diesel fumed smudge that burp and belch from the always-crowded Galle Road, teeming with a vibrant, Quuansequanaa(sp?)-like flow of humanity moving helter-skelter every which way to several Fridays through Sundays. I wasn't even disturbed that the crowded bus I was riding, having gotten the relative comfort of a seat even, got a flat tire a couple of kilometers from my stop, causing me to have to walk the dirty, garbage-strewn, dog/beggar-littered, still crowded streets even though most shops and businesses were closed.
Even now listening to the poignantly plaintive melodies of William Ackerman, which resonate for me such longing memories of upstate New York at this time of the fullest, deepest height of fall color, of those many years of jaunts up to Woodstock, or Greenville, or New London, or Lennox, or Williamsburg with Sara, doesn't disturb me. I am graced with complete acceptance of my life here now fully engaged in living an incredible adventure in Sri Lanka.
Earlier I spent a delightful dusk at the Galle Face Hotel, Colombo's oldest, built in 1864 as a posh testament to the glory of early Victorian Colonial British power, watching Japanese ceremonial drummers and young folk dong a dance combining traditional Japanese dance with hip-hop and the native Sri Lankan folk dancers as the sun splashed a full array of color across the cloud-splayed sky and the surging Indian Ocean.
For the past two days my spirits have been buoyed by the enthusiasm and the deep dedication to work for peace displayed by the large group of Japanese, Korean, Chinese activists who are participating in the activities and programs of the Peace Boat. Last night we had a delicious meal at the Carousel Restaurant where I spoke at length with Stacy, a California Surfer, most dedicated peace dude from Monterrey, who is a program coordinator for the Boat and several of the students as well as the head of NP Japan, who had come to visit the NP Project. Stacy has been to Vietnam several times, absolutely loving it, and asked me if I would be willing to come sometime as a lecturer -- ah doh !~!~! Like, I think I could dig it !~!~! That would be most super keen since I get plenty of leave time, and a flight wouldn't be that expensive, and I would share a bill with Lela Hayslip, author of the book, Heaven and Earth, which Oliver Stone made into another movie about our war.
In this afternoon's session, I got a lot of satisfaction making the statement that the Peace Boat was reversing the cycle of violence, saluting them for their efforts, wishing that my country could learn to do the same not only with Vietnam, but with their country for Nagasaki and Hiroshima instead of continuing to wage war to demonstrate our superiority in killing and destruction so as to assuage ourselves for having lost in the Vietnam War despite our vast material and technological superiority. And it seems we seemed doomed to repeat from our failure to remember in Iraq -- so sad to skim-read in the NYT email today that another two GIs were killed in one other ambush in the quagmire of Baghdad. This morning I also enjoyed and felt good about doing the meditation on the theme of Walela's "Amazing Grace."
Wednesday night I was very moved watching the PBS "A Force More Powerful" segment on Outpour's successful mobilization of the Serbian people to overthrow Milosevic. It was so reminiscent in style, in humor, in symbols, in outrageousness, so similar to the movement of my youth during the 60s, except they were successful, whereas ours failed due to our own limited objective of only being anti-war. They were totally committed to nonviolence and were grounded in a common vision of a just democratic society, whereas we weren't grounded in proactive principles, but were mostly guided by our self-seeking motives to avoid going to the dirty, little war of our generation in Vietnam and the general malaise of youth just to rebel for the sake of rebellion. So I watched it with sadness, wondering why we don't have poll watchers in Florida, wondering if it would do any good. And so it goes . . .
Tired. Will read for a bit and go to bed, to awaken whenever and go for a long, slow run. I'm not too bummed I'm choosing sensibly not to take a holiday to Galle, which would be pushing it and myself since I have to be back here Sunday at 2:30 p.m. for our meeting concerning preparations for our trip next week to Mutar, where I will begin to learn what the next phase of my life shall be like.
Ahhh, most sweet, to just be out here on the veranda, dancing while listening to Neil Young wail "Harvest Moon" as look up into this enchanting evening at a full October moon, a part of me wishing, fantasizing I could be dancing in the desert with sweet Bonnie, something we've never done . . .
7:53 a.m. Tuesday, October 7, 2002
NP Office, Columbo
Sitting here in the front foyer of the NP Colombo Office, where I spent the night last night, satiating my jonesing for connectivity, listening to Van de Man wail “Did Ye Get Healed”, which yes I am !~!~! Hopefully I was able to straighten out the DMFCU Visa ATM Card snafu, and will have a new card fedexed to me here.
Last night was a lovely evening with William, attending my first Sri Lankan AA meeting, a collection of men many of whom have long-term sobriety but with a healthy sprinkling of newcomers – no other ex-pats and no women. Then William and I had a delightful meal (me a tasty and healthy chicken salad) at The Cricket Club, where I began to get a rudimentary understanding of Cricket in our comparative discussion of it with baseball.
I also implemented a decision to go on and switch over to my ltbrin.mac.com email account, and was most gratified to see that somehow through the mysterious ethers of cyberspace my .mac address book has, likewise, healed itself, now synced from the Desktop address book.
So, shortly Jan and I go to Sarvodaya Center for another day of classes and then maybe off again tonight to hear Arthur C. Clarke give a lecture . . .
Life is sweet and most blessed – oh yes, Bonnie forwarded a wonderful missive on “sacred unions.”
10:21 p.m., October 10, 2003
Common Room, Sarvodaya
Whitney wails “I will always love you” in iTunes earphones, and I just let the bittersweet moments slide into the poignant hope of Bette’s “From a distance, knowing that I don’t have to be anything but what I am, content to be sitting here with Pepsi and fan blowing me cool, while just outside the bright full harvest moon shines such glory throughout this still dark night, back-lighting the full-puffed clouds in scattered rainbows of silver-grey-blacks as cicadae rub soft piercing harmonies of passion for each other. .
Just a little while ago I was filled with such utter contentment walking the dirty Moratowa streets, grooving on the silver dance of moonlight, listening to the plaintive sound of a monk chanting Buddhist rituals to a small gathering of devotees at one of the local shrines, eating with relish and a small spoon the Elephant House Vanilla Dream out of a sensibly small container. The hard edges of frustration about my technological challenges with connectivity to meMacMojo and the difficulty of wondering will I ever get the intricate mysteries of Tamil were melted, faded into the wind like the black splotches of diesel fumed smudge that burp and belch from the always-crowded Galle Road, teeming with a vibrant, Quuansequanaa(sp?)-like flow of humanity moving helter-skelter every which way to several Fridays through Sundays. I wasn’t even disturbed that the crowded bus I was riding, having gotten the relative comfort of a seat even, got a flat tire a couple of kilometers from my stop, causing me to have to walk the dirty, garbage-strewn, dog/beggar-littered, still crowded streets even though most shops and businesses were closed.
Even now listening to the poignantly plaintive melodies of William Ackerman, which resonate for me such longing memories of upstate New York at this time of the fullest, deepest height of fall color, of those many years of jaunts up to Woodstock, or Greenville, or New London, or Lennox, or Williamsburg with Sara, doesn’t disturb me. I am graced with complete acceptance of my life here now fully engaged in living an incredible adventure in Sri Lanka.
Earlier I spent a delightful dusk at the Galle Face Hotel, Colombo’s oldest, built in 1864 as a posh testament to the glory of early Victorian Colonial British power, watching Japanese ceremonial drummers and young folk dong a dance combining traditional Japanese dance with hip-hop and the native Sri Lankan folk dancers as the sun splashed a full array of color across the cloud-splayed sky and the surging Indian Ocean.
For the past two days my spirits have been buoyed by the enthusiasm and the deep dedication to work for peace displayed by the large group of Japanese, Korean, Chinese activists who are participating in the activities and programs of the . Last night we had a delicious meal at the Carousel Restaurant where I spoke at length with Stacy, a California Surfer, most dedicated peace dude from Monterrey, who is a program coordinator for the Boat and several of the students as well as the head of NP Japan, who had come to visit the NP Project. Stacy has been to Vietnam several times, absolutely loving it, and asked me if I would be willing to come sometime as a lecturer – ah doh !~!~! Like, I think I could dig it !~!~! That would be most super keen since I get plenty of leave time, and a flight wouldn’t be that expensive, and I would share a bill with Lela Hayslip, author of the book, Heaven and Earth, which Oliver Stone made into another movie about our war.
In this afternoon’s session, I got a lot of satisfaction making the statement that the Peace Boat was reversing the cycle of violence, saluting them for their efforts, wishing that my country could learn to do the same not only with Vietnam, but with their country for Nagasaki and Hiroshima instead of continuing to wage war to demonstrate our superiority in killing and destruction so as to assuage ourselves for having lost in the Vietnam War despite our vast material and technological superiority. And it seems we seemed doomed to repeat from our failure to remember in Iraq – so sad to skim-read in the NYT email today that another two GIs were killed in one other ambush in the quagmire of Baghdad. This morning I also enjoyed and felt good about doing the meditation on the theme of Walela’s “Amazing Grace.”
Wednesday night I was very moved watching the PBS “A Force More Powerful” segment on Outpour’s successful mobilization of the Serbian people to overthrow Milosevic. It was so reminiscent in style, in humor, in symbols, in outrageousness, so similar to the movement of my youth during the 60s, except they were successful, whereas ours failed due to our own limited objective of only being anti-war. They were totally committed to nonviolence and were grounded in a common vision of a just democratic society, whereas we weren’t grounded in proactive principles, but were mostly guided by our self-seeking motives to avoid going to the dirty, little war of our generation in Vietnam and the general malaise of youth just to rebel for the sake of rebellion. So I watched it with sadness, wondering why we don’t have poll watchers in Florida, wondering if it would do any good. And so it goes . . .
Tired. Will read for a bit and go to bed, to awaken whenever and go for a long, slow run. I’m not too bummed I’m choosing sensibly not to take a holiday to Galle, which would be pushing it and myself since I have to be back here Sunday at 2:30 p.m. for our meeting concerning preparations for our trip next week to Mutar, where I will begin to learn what the next phase of my life shall be like.
Ahhh, most sweet, to just be out here on the veranda, dancing while listening to Neil Young wail “Harvest Moon” as look up into this enchanting evening at a full October moon, a part of me wishing, fantasizing I could be dancing in the desert with sweet Bonnie, something we’ve never done . . .
NP Office, Columbo
Sitting here in the front foyer of the NP Colombo Office, where I spent the night last night, satiating my jonesing for connectivity, listening to Van de Man wail “Did Ye Get Healed”, which yes I am !~!~! Hopefully I was able to straighten out the DMFCU Visa ATM Card snafu, and will have a new card fedexed to me here.
Last night was a lovely evening with William, attending my first Sri Lankan AA meeting, a collection of men many of whom have long-term sobriety but with a healthy sprinkling of newcomers – no other ex-pats and no women. Then William and I had a delightful meal (me a tasty and healthy chicken salad) at The Cricket Club, where I began to get a rudimentary understanding of Cricket in our comparative discussion of it with baseball.
I also implemented a decision to go on and switch over to my ltbrin.mac.com email account, and was most gratified to see that somehow through the mysterious ethers of cyberspace my .mac address book has, likewise, healed itself, now synced from the Desktop address book.
So, shortly Jan and I go to Sarvodaya Center for another day of classes and then maybe off again tonight to hear Arthur C. Clarke give a lecture . . .
Life is sweet and most blessed – oh yes, Bonnie forwarded a wonderful missive on “sacred unions.”
10:21 p.m., October 10, 2003
Common Room, Sarvodaya
Whitney wails “I will always love you” in iTunes earphones, and I just let the bittersweet moments slide into the poignant hope of Bette’s “From a distance, knowing that I don’t have to be anything but what I am, content to be sitting here with Pepsi and fan blowing me cool, while just outside the bright full harvest moon shines such glory throughout this still dark night, back-lighting the full-puffed clouds in scattered rainbows of silver-grey-blacks as cicadae rub soft piercing harmonies of passion for each other. .
Just a little while ago I was filled with such utter contentment walking the dirty Moratowa streets, grooving on the silver dance of moonlight, listening to the plaintive sound of a monk chanting Buddhist rituals to a small gathering of devotees at one of the local shrines, eating with relish and a small spoon the Elephant House Vanilla Dream out of a sensibly small container. The hard edges of frustration about my technological challenges with connectivity to meMacMojo and the difficulty of wondering will I ever get the intricate mysteries of Tamil were melted, faded into the wind like the black splotches of diesel fumed smudge that burp and belch from the always-crowded Galle Road, teeming with a vibrant, Quuansequanaa(sp?)-like flow of humanity moving helter-skelter every which way to several Fridays through Sundays. I wasn’t even disturbed that the crowded bus I was riding, having gotten the relative comfort of a seat even, got a flat tire a couple of kilometers from my stop, causing me to have to walk the dirty, garbage-strewn, dog/beggar-littered, still crowded streets even though most shops and businesses were closed.
Even now listening to the poignantly plaintive melodies of William Ackerman, which resonate for me such longing memories of upstate New York at this time of the fullest, deepest height of fall color, of those many years of jaunts up to Woodstock, or Greenville, or New London, or Lennox, or Williamsburg with Sara, doesn’t disturb me. I am graced with complete acceptance of my life here now fully engaged in living an incredible adventure in Sri Lanka.
Earlier I spent a delightful dusk at the Galle Face Hotel, Colombo’s oldest, built in 1864 as a posh testament to the glory of early Victorian Colonial British power, watching Japanese ceremonial drummers and young folk dong a dance combining traditional Japanese dance with hip-hop and the native Sri Lankan folk dancers as the sun splashed a full array of color across the cloud-splayed sky and the surging Indian Ocean.
For the past two days my spirits have been buoyed by the enthusiasm and the deep dedication to work for peace displayed by the large group of Japanese, Korean, Chinese activists who are participating in the activities and programs of the . Last night we had a delicious meal at the Carousel Restaurant where I spoke at length with Stacy, a California Surfer, most dedicated peace dude from Monterrey, who is a program coordinator for the Boat and several of the students as well as the head of NP Japan, who had come to visit the NP Project. Stacy has been to Vietnam several times, absolutely loving it, and asked me if I would be willing to come sometime as a lecturer – ah doh !~!~! Like, I think I could dig it !~!~! That would be most super keen since I get plenty of leave time, and a flight wouldn’t be that expensive, and I would share a bill with Lela Hayslip, author of the book, Heaven and Earth, which Oliver Stone made into another movie about our war.
In this afternoon’s session, I got a lot of satisfaction making the statement that the Peace Boat was reversing the cycle of violence, saluting them for their efforts, wishing that my country could learn to do the same not only with Vietnam, but with their country for Nagasaki and Hiroshima instead of continuing to wage war to demonstrate our superiority in killing and destruction so as to assuage ourselves for having lost in the Vietnam War despite our vast material and technological superiority. And it seems we seemed doomed to repeat from our failure to remember in Iraq – so sad to skim-read in the NYT email today that another two GIs were killed in one other ambush in the quagmire of Baghdad. This morning I also enjoyed and felt good about doing the meditation on the theme of Walela’s “Amazing Grace.”
Wednesday night I was very moved watching the PBS “A Force More Powerful” segment on Outpour’s successful mobilization of the Serbian people to overthrow Milosevic. It was so reminiscent in style, in humor, in symbols, in outrageousness, so similar to the movement of my youth during the 60s, except they were successful, whereas ours failed due to our own limited objective of only being anti-war. They were totally committed to nonviolence and were grounded in a common vision of a just democratic society, whereas we weren’t grounded in proactive principles, but were mostly guided by our self-seeking motives to avoid going to the dirty, little war of our generation in Vietnam and the general malaise of youth just to rebel for the sake of rebellion. So I watched it with sadness, wondering why we don’t have poll watchers in Florida, wondering if it would do any good. And so it goes . . .
Tired. Will read for a bit and go to bed, to awaken whenever and go for a long, slow run. I’m not too bummed I’m choosing sensibly not to take a holiday to Galle, which would be pushing it and myself since I have to be back here Sunday at 2:30 p.m. for our meeting concerning preparations for our trip next week to Mutar, where I will begin to learn what the next phase of my life shall be like.
Ahhh, most sweet, to just be out here on the veranda, dancing while listening to Neil Young wail “Harvest Moon” as look up into this enchanting evening at a full October moon, a part of me wishing, fantasizing I could be dancing in the desert with sweet Bonnie, something we’ve never done . . .
Monday, October 06, 2003
6:16 p.m., Saturday, October 4, 2003
Ocean View Inn
Welp, the first week in Sri Lanka is done. I decided to take an R&R day for myself and found the same Guest House that Soraia and Karen stayed in when they arrived, a nice room with a double bed, a ceiling fan and windows opening onto a balcony from which I can see and hear the ocean.
Yes, indeedy do da ru, have I found the ocean again, this time a tempest-like, swirling, maelstrom of an Indian Ocean. It is twilight and the sea crows are cawing, no sea gulls or other seabirds, only flocks of swirling, swooping crows avariciously everywhere. There is a cool breeze off the ocean; the light is perfectly calm and serene; the white-frothed, roiling waves are sunset-cast pink-tinged highlights of sea green. I am perfectly at one, content and most grateful at the bountiful blessings my life keeps revealing to me. It don’t get any better than this.
Ah, I just noticed a billowing pink-orange-tinged cloud backlit by the sunset, scurrying across the azure sky against which skeins of sea crows ride the thermals like gangbusters, scripting the sky with harmonic, though cacophonous-sounding, scribbles. This is just wonderful.
I would take a picture, several, in fact, but my camera batteries just died. No matter, I’ll take some pictures early in the morning after my run along the beach. Tonight I walk down to the Mount Lavinia Hotel for dinner, and maybe watch the movie with other ex-pats at 9:30 p.m., then wander along the beach back to my room, where I have been invited to join a birthday party with disco dancing for the owner by the lady manager, whose daughter is visiting in South Carolina. Does it get any grander?
Still hassling with the VISA DMFCU card snafu – will have to call them on Monday. Also adapting and just accepting that my cyber-addition will be very limited with the very slow connectivity options to include the reality that in Mutur, there may be no dial-up available at all, and we will be limited to trips to Trincomalee. No matter, I’m adapting well. I can read much, watch lots of DVD’s and maybe get serious about some writing, to include finishing the Vietnam Journal and the love story gone bad with Sara.
Gonna go now but will connect in later -- I am so blessed . . .
8:12 a.m., Sunday, October 5, 2003
Ocean Inn View Guest House
Indian Ocean breeze. Clouds swift-scuttling across light blue sky. Sea crows squawking and gliding along wind currents. Tea strong, hot and sweet. Somewhere near someone is hammering, a continual occurrence in this country gone so much to seed in the past two decades of too much war against itself.
Just back from an invigorating 45 minute run along the shore, a combination of fishing village and open garbage dump. The land is so beautiful, and we humans with our proliferation of stuff dirty it so readily and handily. Watched the industriousness of the men of a fishing village man-haul a couple of fishing boats with net loads of squirming fish out of the sea and up upon the sandy shore. The sand is a tan-brown grit, very dirty, garbage strewn, along which I was hassled by several dogs defending their turf of garbage range and eyed suspiciously by wary crows.
As is always the case, though often I am unawares, I am gifted with everything I need exactly when I need it – just a moment ago I went down to ask the proprietress for a plastic bag to wrap my wet bathing suit in and there one was fluttering in the breeze of the downstairs patio. I am always so blessed.
Last night I walked to the Mount Lavinia Hotel along the beach and the railroad tracks, feeling safe since the trains are on strike. The original Hotel was built on a point of land in the early 1900s in a grand British Colonial style, lots of exquisitely carved wood, enormously high ceilings, lush gardens with waterfalls, exotic flora and singing birds.
I had a delicious meal in the Seafood Cove, exceedingly fresh – I picked out a 135 mg piece of Black Promfret, a tuna-like fish, which was cut from a whole fish right before my eyes. With a bottle of water and a wonderful salad bar, the total cost with generous tip was 600 rupees, about $6.00. I sat on a table out under the stars, a still bright Mars and the rising half-full moon, dancing on rippling clouds about 100 meters from the swiftly rolling, white-capped surf of the Indian Ocean. There was a duo of a percussionist playing a large bongo-like drum and a guitar player singing Sri Lankan songs. They wore large sombrero-like straw hats and the total effect was very reminiscent of Mexican serenades in a Tucson restaurant. I wished that Bonnie were with me. It was way more intense than Jakes on Delmar Beach.
Later, after interneting up on Galle Road, I watched a silly movie, Cats and Dogs, up on the Terrace with Rita, Karen, Soraia and Linda. Holla, another Sri Lanka first – I was able to get a non-alcoholic Beck’s Beer, which tasted utterly delicious. The Terrace had lovely and lush-views of ocean, moonlit and starlit night sky, and the strings of lights along the sweeping Indian Ocean shore of the Colombo cityscape. I walked “home” alone to the Ocean View Inn along railroad tracks and empty seashore with the sea shining in scattering sparkles of half-full-moon beams.
It’s now time to have my adventurous day in Colombo City; I’m going to walk up Galle Road, look at some motorcycles, buy a few things, stroll in the park, hopefully get a latte in the Deli Mart, see the downtown city sights and get back down to Sarvodaya around twilight for some internetting and reading before starting Week Two of Training . . .
11:22 a.m., Sunday, October 5, 2003
Colombo World Trade Center
Sitting in the Barista Coffee shop on the 3rd floor in the connecting wing between the East and West twin-towered Colombo World Trade Center. I’m looking out through an expanse of plate-glass window upon an old colonial building, which I just found out is the Parliament Building where the President has her Office. I have a large cup of latte, not Starbucks by any means, but it’s caffeine and it’s passable, though very expensive at Rs. 220 -- on second or third taste, I actually prefer the machine Nescafe coffee with milk and sugar for less than 10% of the cost of this Starbucks wannabe.
Walking into the polished chrome, marble and grey-smoke-colored glass entrance and riding up the smooth-escalated stairs, I was struck by a wave of grief that MY NYC World Trade Center, North and South Towers, are no more, only a wisp of memory – god/buddha/allah/ganesh does that ever suck, and I just let the tears gently stream down. Right now I also just simple honor the stark memory again of me sitting in a place very much like this onem except it was very rush-hour crowded that early morning – I guess it was that Monday I took the long cab/subway ride through Brooklyn during the LIRR strike -- in November, 1979, struggling with the decision that Sara-then-Cathy had made not to have the abortion of the now wonderful young man of a son we were gifted to raise together. I will probably call her later today or tomorrow, or maybe next ?Sunday from Galle, which will be the 24th anniversary of when we met – she was again so vivid in my dreams night before last.
So glad I was finally able to speak with Sweet Bonnie, and I do wish that she had been sitting with me in the cool ocean breeze under the half-full moon sky last night at the Seafood Cove in the Mt. Lavinia Hotel.
In a bit I will wander over to the Hilton to eat a mid-day meal and listen to cool jazz for awhile before I wander the Galle Face Green and visit Viharamahadevi Park.
8:55 p.m., Sunday, October 5, 2003
Sarvodaya Common Room
Listening to Michael Jones mellow piano harmonies with cello accompaniment, wired to my iTunes sound, while Linda and Karen study Sinhalese together. Just a bit ago, I heard Harry’s “A Better Place To Be” and was quite moved, as I always have been by it, but what was really wonderful is that at the end, despite being in a deep grief space, remembering the glory of what Cathy/Sara and I experienced so powerfully with Lee Silverstein up at the Institute of Man and Science almost 24 years ago, at the end of the song, when the little man smiled his crooked grin, I was filled with an image of me relating with Bonnie and on a deeper level within my heart I am, indeed, committed to evolving a love relationship with her – it certainly is “a better place to be” than the broken-hearted, psyche-tearing, bottomless pit of emptiness I have experienced the past couple of years since I left New York.
A long, tiring, mixed day. I had a wonderful, though expensive for Sri Lanka, buffet meal at the Hilton, very upscale with very upscale jet-setters from the international community, Malaysians, Brits, Germans, Chinese, Japanese, and since I was there, I guess that includes this American as well. It was poignant listening to the very accomplished saxophonist doing jazzy karaoke covers of American music standards such as “The Way We Were,” What a Wonderful World,” “Moon River,” “Killing Me Softly,” etc., especially being in a mellow mood after delving into the grief space again about the demise of the WTC on 9.11 with its resurgence of memories about Cathy/Sara.
Then I took a long walk by Galle Face Green, which as Lonely Planet depicts is as brown as it is green, taking pictures and enjoying the new scene. I got a kick out of seeing Sri Lankan young couples making out like crazy mad curled up tight together under umbrellas as a stiff wind came in off the Indian Ocean and the adorable little twin girls giggling in delight dressed in matching red skirts with yellow blouses, one wearing sandals, the other barefoot. as their proud Daddy, smiling at me for smiling so widely at them, hovered about. It was a long but interesting walk along Lake Beira, seeing the pelicans and the horses incongruous in the urban scene, to find the rundown and rather ratty Viharamahadevi Park.
Again the evidence is so painfully clear that the government expending so much of its resources for the past 20 years of war can’t provide the services needed for the people, while my mind reels at the exuberance of excess that is available for the upper echelon of commercial classes, and I was right there with them, enjoying the excess with my means to the max. Hopefully in Mutar I will be able to focus more on gaining more non-attachment and living a simpler, more subdued life, though I accept and don’t judge too harshly that I enjoy and deserve a taste of the finer things in the illusory earthly plane we exist upon.
I was able to sustain a brief shower under a thick-leafed Bodi tree to continue my walk to Liberty Plaza, which was closed, where I got a much needed Nescafe and bottle of water before catching the bus to Majestic Plaza. I walked into a Communications store to call Jan to see if he was available for me to do some internetting at the NP office, and there were Soraia and Karen. I called Jan and he was across the street at Unity Plaza. We had a nice impromptu gathering, then he went to visit a friend, and I stayed to internet, experiencing again the frustration of not being able to use the Ethernet connection.
Soraia, Karen and I had our first team misadventure together, when Soraia’s wallet was stolen on the bus as we were on our way for a Nescafe and pastry at the shop we went to the other night in Mount Lavinia. First we went to the local police station, and I had a fun trip, despite the annoyance of the crotch heat rash, getting us Nescafe coffees, carrying them back in individual plastic bags, successfully negotiating the crowed streets without spilling them. We then took a three-wheeler to make a report to the Tourist Police in the Fort, where I started my day first thing this morning. Then a long bus ride back to our temporary home at Sarvodaya.
It feels good, after a long shower and a beard trim, to sit here wrapped in the surround iTuned sounds of Harry and Van and Bill and Kris and Walela to be writing these words of present-day memory, while deluged with memories from other times, other places, other people – yes, I am, as I self-declared in a drunken stupor late one night in ’70 or ’71, a maker of memories. Perhaps, a lesson I shall need to manifest for myself to release myself from my so deep attachments, to include memories, as Gloria for herself negatively self-fulfilled a prophesy, is to develop Alzheimer’s Disease. What a silly ego-dominated thought to insist upon doing that just to insure that I make the error real. So blessed that I don’t have to take myself too seriously . . . ;)
Ah, gods & goddesses, sprites of every tradition, buoy me gently in your everlasting arms . . .
Ocean View Inn
Welp, the first week in Sri Lanka is done. I decided to take an R&R day for myself and found the same Guest House that Soraia and Karen stayed in when they arrived, a nice room with a double bed, a ceiling fan and windows opening onto a balcony from which I can see and hear the ocean.
Yes, indeedy do da ru, have I found the ocean again, this time a tempest-like, swirling, maelstrom of an Indian Ocean. It is twilight and the sea crows are cawing, no sea gulls or other seabirds, only flocks of swirling, swooping crows avariciously everywhere. There is a cool breeze off the ocean; the light is perfectly calm and serene; the white-frothed, roiling waves are sunset-cast pink-tinged highlights of sea green. I am perfectly at one, content and most grateful at the bountiful blessings my life keeps revealing to me. It don’t get any better than this.
Ah, I just noticed a billowing pink-orange-tinged cloud backlit by the sunset, scurrying across the azure sky against which skeins of sea crows ride the thermals like gangbusters, scripting the sky with harmonic, though cacophonous-sounding, scribbles. This is just wonderful.
I would take a picture, several, in fact, but my camera batteries just died. No matter, I’ll take some pictures early in the morning after my run along the beach. Tonight I walk down to the Mount Lavinia Hotel for dinner, and maybe watch the movie with other ex-pats at 9:30 p.m., then wander along the beach back to my room, where I have been invited to join a birthday party with disco dancing for the owner by the lady manager, whose daughter is visiting in South Carolina. Does it get any grander?
Still hassling with the VISA DMFCU card snafu – will have to call them on Monday. Also adapting and just accepting that my cyber-addition will be very limited with the very slow connectivity options to include the reality that in Mutur, there may be no dial-up available at all, and we will be limited to trips to Trincomalee. No matter, I’m adapting well. I can read much, watch lots of DVD’s and maybe get serious about some writing, to include finishing the Vietnam Journal and the love story gone bad with Sara.
Gonna go now but will connect in later -- I am so blessed . . .
8:12 a.m., Sunday, October 5, 2003
Ocean Inn View Guest House
Indian Ocean breeze. Clouds swift-scuttling across light blue sky. Sea crows squawking and gliding along wind currents. Tea strong, hot and sweet. Somewhere near someone is hammering, a continual occurrence in this country gone so much to seed in the past two decades of too much war against itself.
Just back from an invigorating 45 minute run along the shore, a combination of fishing village and open garbage dump. The land is so beautiful, and we humans with our proliferation of stuff dirty it so readily and handily. Watched the industriousness of the men of a fishing village man-haul a couple of fishing boats with net loads of squirming fish out of the sea and up upon the sandy shore. The sand is a tan-brown grit, very dirty, garbage strewn, along which I was hassled by several dogs defending their turf of garbage range and eyed suspiciously by wary crows.
As is always the case, though often I am unawares, I am gifted with everything I need exactly when I need it – just a moment ago I went down to ask the proprietress for a plastic bag to wrap my wet bathing suit in and there one was fluttering in the breeze of the downstairs patio. I am always so blessed.
Last night I walked to the Mount Lavinia Hotel along the beach and the railroad tracks, feeling safe since the trains are on strike. The original Hotel was built on a point of land in the early 1900s in a grand British Colonial style, lots of exquisitely carved wood, enormously high ceilings, lush gardens with waterfalls, exotic flora and singing birds.
I had a delicious meal in the Seafood Cove, exceedingly fresh – I picked out a 135 mg piece of Black Promfret, a tuna-like fish, which was cut from a whole fish right before my eyes. With a bottle of water and a wonderful salad bar, the total cost with generous tip was 600 rupees, about $6.00. I sat on a table out under the stars, a still bright Mars and the rising half-full moon, dancing on rippling clouds about 100 meters from the swiftly rolling, white-capped surf of the Indian Ocean. There was a duo of a percussionist playing a large bongo-like drum and a guitar player singing Sri Lankan songs. They wore large sombrero-like straw hats and the total effect was very reminiscent of Mexican serenades in a Tucson restaurant. I wished that Bonnie were with me. It was way more intense than Jakes on Delmar Beach.
Later, after interneting up on Galle Road, I watched a silly movie, Cats and Dogs, up on the Terrace with Rita, Karen, Soraia and Linda. Holla, another Sri Lanka first – I was able to get a non-alcoholic Beck’s Beer, which tasted utterly delicious. The Terrace had lovely and lush-views of ocean, moonlit and starlit night sky, and the strings of lights along the sweeping Indian Ocean shore of the Colombo cityscape. I walked “home” alone to the Ocean View Inn along railroad tracks and empty seashore with the sea shining in scattering sparkles of half-full-moon beams.
It’s now time to have my adventurous day in Colombo City; I’m going to walk up Galle Road, look at some motorcycles, buy a few things, stroll in the park, hopefully get a latte in the Deli Mart, see the downtown city sights and get back down to Sarvodaya around twilight for some internetting and reading before starting Week Two of Training . . .
11:22 a.m., Sunday, October 5, 2003
Colombo World Trade Center
Sitting in the Barista Coffee shop on the 3rd floor in the connecting wing between the East and West twin-towered Colombo World Trade Center. I’m looking out through an expanse of plate-glass window upon an old colonial building, which I just found out is the Parliament Building where the President has her Office. I have a large cup of latte, not Starbucks by any means, but it’s caffeine and it’s passable, though very expensive at Rs. 220 -- on second or third taste, I actually prefer the machine Nescafe coffee with milk and sugar for less than 10% of the cost of this Starbucks wannabe.
Walking into the polished chrome, marble and grey-smoke-colored glass entrance and riding up the smooth-escalated stairs, I was struck by a wave of grief that MY NYC World Trade Center, North and South Towers, are no more, only a wisp of memory – god/buddha/allah/ganesh does that ever suck, and I just let the tears gently stream down. Right now I also just simple honor the stark memory again of me sitting in a place very much like this onem except it was very rush-hour crowded that early morning – I guess it was that Monday I took the long cab/subway ride through Brooklyn during the LIRR strike -- in November, 1979, struggling with the decision that Sara-then-Cathy had made not to have the abortion of the now wonderful young man of a son we were gifted to raise together. I will probably call her later today or tomorrow, or maybe next ?Sunday from Galle, which will be the 24th anniversary of when we met – she was again so vivid in my dreams night before last.
So glad I was finally able to speak with Sweet Bonnie, and I do wish that she had been sitting with me in the cool ocean breeze under the half-full moon sky last night at the Seafood Cove in the Mt. Lavinia Hotel.
In a bit I will wander over to the Hilton to eat a mid-day meal and listen to cool jazz for awhile before I wander the Galle Face Green and visit Viharamahadevi Park.
8:55 p.m., Sunday, October 5, 2003
Sarvodaya Common Room
Listening to Michael Jones mellow piano harmonies with cello accompaniment, wired to my iTunes sound, while Linda and Karen study Sinhalese together. Just a bit ago, I heard Harry’s “A Better Place To Be” and was quite moved, as I always have been by it, but what was really wonderful is that at the end, despite being in a deep grief space, remembering the glory of what Cathy/Sara and I experienced so powerfully with Lee Silverstein up at the Institute of Man and Science almost 24 years ago, at the end of the song, when the little man smiled his crooked grin, I was filled with an image of me relating with Bonnie and on a deeper level within my heart I am, indeed, committed to evolving a love relationship with her – it certainly is “a better place to be” than the broken-hearted, psyche-tearing, bottomless pit of emptiness I have experienced the past couple of years since I left New York.
A long, tiring, mixed day. I had a wonderful, though expensive for Sri Lanka, buffet meal at the Hilton, very upscale with very upscale jet-setters from the international community, Malaysians, Brits, Germans, Chinese, Japanese, and since I was there, I guess that includes this American as well. It was poignant listening to the very accomplished saxophonist doing jazzy karaoke covers of American music standards such as “The Way We Were,” What a Wonderful World,” “Moon River,” “Killing Me Softly,” etc., especially being in a mellow mood after delving into the grief space again about the demise of the WTC on 9.11 with its resurgence of memories about Cathy/Sara.
Then I took a long walk by Galle Face Green, which as Lonely Planet depicts is as brown as it is green, taking pictures and enjoying the new scene. I got a kick out of seeing Sri Lankan young couples making out like crazy mad curled up tight together under umbrellas as a stiff wind came in off the Indian Ocean and the adorable little twin girls giggling in delight dressed in matching red skirts with yellow blouses, one wearing sandals, the other barefoot. as their proud Daddy, smiling at me for smiling so widely at them, hovered about. It was a long but interesting walk along Lake Beira, seeing the pelicans and the horses incongruous in the urban scene, to find the rundown and rather ratty Viharamahadevi Park.
Again the evidence is so painfully clear that the government expending so much of its resources for the past 20 years of war can’t provide the services needed for the people, while my mind reels at the exuberance of excess that is available for the upper echelon of commercial classes, and I was right there with them, enjoying the excess with my means to the max. Hopefully in Mutar I will be able to focus more on gaining more non-attachment and living a simpler, more subdued life, though I accept and don’t judge too harshly that I enjoy and deserve a taste of the finer things in the illusory earthly plane we exist upon.
I was able to sustain a brief shower under a thick-leafed Bodi tree to continue my walk to Liberty Plaza, which was closed, where I got a much needed Nescafe and bottle of water before catching the bus to Majestic Plaza. I walked into a Communications store to call Jan to see if he was available for me to do some internetting at the NP office, and there were Soraia and Karen. I called Jan and he was across the street at Unity Plaza. We had a nice impromptu gathering, then he went to visit a friend, and I stayed to internet, experiencing again the frustration of not being able to use the Ethernet connection.
Soraia, Karen and I had our first team misadventure together, when Soraia’s wallet was stolen on the bus as we were on our way for a Nescafe and pastry at the shop we went to the other night in Mount Lavinia. First we went to the local police station, and I had a fun trip, despite the annoyance of the crotch heat rash, getting us Nescafe coffees, carrying them back in individual plastic bags, successfully negotiating the crowed streets without spilling them. We then took a three-wheeler to make a report to the Tourist Police in the Fort, where I started my day first thing this morning. Then a long bus ride back to our temporary home at Sarvodaya.
It feels good, after a long shower and a beard trim, to sit here wrapped in the surround iTuned sounds of Harry and Van and Bill and Kris and Walela to be writing these words of present-day memory, while deluged with memories from other times, other places, other people – yes, I am, as I self-declared in a drunken stupor late one night in ’70 or ’71, a maker of memories. Perhaps, a lesson I shall need to manifest for myself to release myself from my so deep attachments, to include memories, as Gloria for herself negatively self-fulfilled a prophesy, is to develop Alzheimer’s Disease. What a silly ego-dominated thought to insist upon doing that just to insure that I make the error real. So blessed that I don’t have to take myself too seriously . . . ;)
Ah, gods & goddesses, sprites of every tradition, buoy me gently in your everlasting arms . . .
Thursday, October 02, 2003
And a hearty hallo to all from Columbo . . .
At a bit of a faster internet connection, but I can't configure meMacMojo to their dsl so no pics again today. Don't really have many anyway except for the opening ceremony last Monday when we lit the ceremonial stand and re-ignited our lights from the Thailand training.
Today was spent getting our one-year Visas and registering at our embassies. The American Embassey is a fortress by the sea, all spit and polished wood exemplar of the 21st Century American Empire. I was good and just went with the program, even wishing the spit and polished Marine "Semper Fi" and didn't make a smart-ass remark about the 2,000 or so illegal detainees on Guantanomo, which gives a very different reality to the photo-opped display they had on Muslim life in America in the lobby.
I'll be serving in the East, in a Muslim town of Mutur. I with Soraia from Brazil and Karen from Germany will be the only ex-pat workers in the area. We are a 1-hour ferry ride from the nearest large town, Trincomalee, north of which are the best beaches in Sri Lanka -- Y E A H !~!~! It is an area where there has been considerable conflict of late, and I am very excited about the challenge of doing our peacework there -- it's what I came for. I've had one day of Tamil language training and it's not too bad. I'm very privileged to be able to learn more not only about the Tamil/Hindu culture, but about the Muslim culture as well.
One thing I've been thinking about is to buy a small motocycle or Vespa for transportation -- I can get a new Honda for about $800 U.S. and a used one for considerably less.
Life is good and I am most bounteously blessed . . .
Later, when I can . . .
At a bit of a faster internet connection, but I can't configure meMacMojo to their dsl so no pics again today. Don't really have many anyway except for the opening ceremony last Monday when we lit the ceremonial stand and re-ignited our lights from the Thailand training.
Today was spent getting our one-year Visas and registering at our embassies. The American Embassey is a fortress by the sea, all spit and polished wood exemplar of the 21st Century American Empire. I was good and just went with the program, even wishing the spit and polished Marine "Semper Fi" and didn't make a smart-ass remark about the 2,000 or so illegal detainees on Guantanomo, which gives a very different reality to the photo-opped display they had on Muslim life in America in the lobby.
I'll be serving in the East, in a Muslim town of Mutur. I with Soraia from Brazil and Karen from Germany will be the only ex-pat workers in the area. We are a 1-hour ferry ride from the nearest large town, Trincomalee, north of which are the best beaches in Sri Lanka -- Y E A H !~!~! It is an area where there has been considerable conflict of late, and I am very excited about the challenge of doing our peacework there -- it's what I came for. I've had one day of Tamil language training and it's not too bad. I'm very privileged to be able to learn more not only about the Tamil/Hindu culture, but about the Muslim culture as well.
One thing I've been thinking about is to buy a small motocycle or Vespa for transportation -- I can get a new Honda for about $800 U.S. and a used one for considerably less.
Life is good and I am most bounteously blessed . . .
Later, when I can . . .
