Nabil Reminded me today that it has been 5 months that Leila has left us. He told me if I went to a temple Leila would be with me.
In my mind I decided to take a page of my red book and to write Leila a letter. 

In it I told her I had learned from Dra EUthymia that mourning had 4 steps. 

First is was denial, When we don’t want to believe that death has happened, 

Second  was anger which is when we get angry to someone, to even the person who departed, or even to ourselves for our mistakes. 

Third comes a moment of feeling life has no meaning anymore without the person who left. That part could last 6 months. If  we notice we are still there we should look for help. 

And finally, the fourth time would be happy nostalgic feelings. We would remember of the person with joy, with love, with laughter.
I wrote to Leila saying I was sure she was fine. I recognised my guilts and my love and my concern for Nabil, Christine, Mounia, Soulaimane and Yasmina. I told her about our secrets and put my letter next to the beautiful blue Buddha in the Pagoda of my beloved city Kalaw here in Burma.

What a beautiful pagoda I thought. There were four options of Buddhas and I chose this blue one. I wrote in the letter Fellipe would have thought of her in Africa. I told her she will always be my dear friend. And I will always think of her beloved ones. In my bare foot I departed the pagoda. I feel total gratitude and love. I hope you are all well.

Love Jules

I have now been in Burma or Myanmar for about 18 days. I love Burma. It is Not only because of the beauty of Bagan or Pagodas, forests, mountains

It is because of the people. It started with Mr. win 

Anyone who knows me, should know I speak a lot, I ask about a lot, I try to learn so much about the history of this country. By now I know a little of Burmese language and more importantly I know some wonderful people. Like Lone Lone in Mandalay.

I fell in love with Kalaw. Here I met Min Min who is 30 and after working many years as a guide he was able to open his trekking agency. It is called July 7 and it started in March.

Min Min speaks English very well and his grandfather was Gurka. I walked with Min Min and Thutu who in the beginning spoke little English. It was more like he was afraid to make a mistake.

Thanks to our attempts I learned a lot. Thutu graduated from Pali and Buddhism so he could teach so much about the pagoda and the cave. In fact he even told me about legends and stories.
I liked it so much here that we attempted exploratory walk. We saw many plantations, the jungle.

We met  “Palaoom” people. We spoke as we could. And of course we laughed going down and up mountains for more than 25 kms 🙂

Yesterday I suggested to go again to View Point. This time it was a different walk and I am so happy I decided to go back. The Indian restaurant is in fact Nepalese 🙂 the weather was great and I learned so much more because we went through a different path.

To add to this amazing day walking from 8:30 to almost 5. I was invited to have dinner in Min Min’ house. This time also came Krishna who is also from a Gurka family.

So suddenly we were in their house. Tara is Min Min’s beautiful wife, Nadja and Kaman , his 7 and 2 year old children. Thutu and Krishna also live there  and luckily Virginia, the American I met in Kalaw took my advice and also joined us. And Tara was so nice to have us. She even lent me a Tamei when I was cold.

We had wonderful Min Min’s food. We sat on the floor and we ate in Burmese style with our hands. We had so much good food. And that was not even the only thing we had fun with.

Thutu showed us what a person can do with a Long Ji. We laughed. They showed us their games. And though I tried to jump close to the floor I could not do it. 

I learned that women bathe using a Tamei. I learned so much. Every single day is special, but yesterday was even more special because I really learned a lot and could see how is life in Kalaw. How it is that they put Tanaka in their face.

They put it in me 🙂

I walked with Min Min ‘s agency 3 days. And I like so much this place that I stayed here. Everyday I am more convinced we are so similar, and the difference that exists can exist even in one family but they do not necessarily exist between cultures.
We make our lives from our actions and courage to live and respect and try to understand the other.

If you ever come to Burma come to Kalaw. Go to Min Min in July 7 and please respect them. All they do is to pay attention so that you can have a great time, and all that I wish is that they have a great life too. They live in a great place.
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