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Published: April 30th 2009
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cappuccino anyone...
at the shop with the free wi-fi... great coffee... salutations sibling beings...
this is my seventh day on kho pha-ngan and i am content, at ease... i mentioned a brother from calgary coming here, brother paul... he spent three nights on the island and we just hung-out the whole time... very comforting to have a little piece of canada here... if nothing else, not to have to focus so intently all the time on language just to understand the most basic things, so much energy... i thouroughly enjoyed our time, our long, verbose discussions on life, the universe, and everything... i felt we actually had quite a bit in common which made for many laughs, like an old friend you've known for years...
so i met paul at his minibus drop-off around sunset... the next day we decided to rent scooters... about $6cdn/24hrs, quite the deal, i think we speant almost half that on petrol... so the first day we rode around the island to visit three waterfalls, beautiful although they were all seasonal and there was actually no water running or very little... we also visited a couple of wats (monasteries)... what a great experience, flying around the island, wind in my topknot, seeing things
brother paul...
at the same coffee shop... other than the tourist spots... so we get back to town and going about 5km/hr around a corner (slowly so i can see what might be comin) and doesn't the front tire fly out from under me and i dump the scooter... i'm fine, just some roadrash on my left arm, but after some negotiations regarding a bare fromt tire that was also partially respnsible, i had to pay about $50cdn for the damage to the scooter...
the island is not too busy right now but there are about three beach bars that go full out, all night long... the music comes on at a reasonable level but at about 2300hrs the battle of the volume controls begins... one increases their volume, then the next, until about 10 minutes later they have all had three turns at it and are now all at full volume which they will maintain until 0230hrs in the morning ;-) unfortunately i am at one end of a horseshoe shaped bay and the sound carries over the water right to my hut...
so we decided to head down to the beach that evening to enjoy the music and so i could
marble buddha...
at a quiet monastery on the island... 108 steps leading up to it... go spin firestaff... were walking along and paul says, 'oh, there's a garbage, i just have to throw out my cigarette but...', whoa brother, that's the firespinners gas can, not garbage... ;-) then i accidentally bowed a little low saying hello to one of the liqour vendors (who seemed drunk) and who seemed to be very agitated and offended that i did... you do not bow low to someone younger than you here and he was much younger... i could see the bottle in his hand switch to a 'weapon'... so it takes about two minutes of me telling him that he is an old soul, many past lives and that is why i bowed... by the time i walked away he was bowing to me and wishing me peace and happiness, very interesting encounter...
there are quite a few firespinners here, mostly locals that i've seen but they are pretty good... there were staffs, poi, a juggler on stilts, a huge fire skipping rope... i picked up a staff in town for about $10cdn so i spun for the eve and paul took some video (which i do not have the softwear to run on my laptop)...
elephant trekk anyone...
notice the handler in the hammock... there are a few of these elephant trekking places on the island... may the elephants be happy... it was a good evening... it also got me into doing more practice on the beach during the day and just in general... my styx are really hard to use here because of the sweat, they don't work well when wet...
so paul left yesterday on his way to sit a vipassana course, i am with you brother, be happy... i am know preparing to head out tommorow but i still really have no idea to where... we shall see...
until now...
peace and love...
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