30. Pizza and San
.Toothless homeless is beyond joy. As I go down the stairs to reach the river and go to the Gaia I ran into him and Lina, the Chinese girl. He is carrying a pizza. Roxana, the English girl who works here (although she should be on TV doing stand up comedy), had explained to me earlier that now Toothless homeless was no longer homeless. He was living with Handless- The drug dealer.

Now that he had a house he could finally make the pizza he had promised us. He was starting a new business: pizza delivery. With unconstrained joy he carried his pizza on his hands, and like a 7 year old that has lost all of his front teeth he smiles from ear to ear. Lina, the Chinese little doll, is next to him.

She is so delicate. In her little dress, Fine hands that seemed to have been drawn by a painter, and that move almost as if she was a ballet dancer. Her smile always concealed by her hands while her shoulders move up. I can barely understand him.  But through gestures, unarticulated words, Lina’s translations of what she understood I get it. He wants me to go into the Gaia and pretend he had dropped the pizza on the Mekong. He is like a child in ecstasy.

I go into the bar and try to play my part on the game. I am awful at it. No one really understands what I am talking about. So I tell my friends. “Guys toothless homeless is here with the pizza, but he wants me to say that he has dropped the pizza on the Mekong. You have to act surprised when the pizza comes!”

Everybody does so. The pizza is brought. He unwrappes proudly and it does indeed look great. The pizza is devoured in a second and everybody is interested in supporting this new business. Even though we are all skeptical about the time it took him to produce one pizza. San, Toothless no longer homeless, tells me that next year he will put teeth back in. He thanks me for insisting on making Lina stay. “Thank you. Thank you! I will make vegetarian pizza for you next week.”

“Are you in love San?”

He opens his arms, lifts his shoulders and gives me a huge smile.

“I can pay for sex you know. But Lina is like an angel. I have not had a girlfriend since I a teenager”

I am not sure Lina knows she is in his mind his girlfriend. Maybe she does. She seems happy to have friends here. He pays her bill before she can see.  She is shocked and struggles to pay back. He does not let her. He wants to offer me drinks. I thank him but refrain. My Israeli new friend watches with me the scene. We are playing guitar in the Mekong. I play the Israeli song I learned. Preek, the Thai bartender, shows me the bossa nova song I taught him the day before. As the boat rocks as it has never done before, I imagine it as a living organism. I imagine it as big giant roaring with laughter up and down. A giant that is being tickled by all this joy

The sun is blasting in the blue sky. We carry with us no knowledge of the region, a map that features not much more than the departure and arrival point and lots of laughter. We ride bikes we rented from a Thai man we do not understand. The arrival was going to be the wetlands according to our drawn –by- someone- we- do- not- know map. The wetlands  stood 27 km away from where we were. Some of our friends predict it will take us 1,30 hours to bike that, some others predict our death out of exhaustion. We are so unprepared that we do not even really know what it means to bike 54km.  Together with me are a Brazilian couple who is traveling around the world, and a Norwegian boy. We don’t really mind. We go without anything in us that obliges us to finish or arrive anywhere. We go for the ride.

We ride first through the promenade that lies in front of the Mekong, then we exit the town, then we take roads, then we arrive in villages. We take detours and encounter protective dogs, and “waying” ( to way is the gesture of putting both hands in front of you in a prayer gesture.) people. “Ways” are accompanied of swadikas if the person who greets you is a woman, sawdikap if it is a man.

We are in Isaan the poorest and less touristy province of Thailand. It is by far my favorite place here. As we ride along little villages literally no one speaks any English. We “way” back, we respond to every single child who crosses our way. They wave. We knew we would never take one and half  hour to go. We are not people who really mind arriving, we mind encountering. We stop for fruits, for views, for detours. We stop for pictures.

The sun is so strong that even my fellow Brazilian friends who had come from Africa break slightly the vow of never complaining of heat. See they also lived in the UK and when they left to travel Africa they swore never to complain of the sun. That is precisely my own sentiment. So we complain of the heat but with enormous gratitude for it.

We are tired. We see a little village. We see a lady that makes food. I know how to say Kao which is rice. We ask Kao with vegetables. I say “Jeh” to specify I wanted vegetarian. We decide to eat just to have the excuse to seat down. We are not hungry we think. The Thai lady prepares meticulously the fried rice we are going to have. The smells of  chilies and who knows what else starts to float in the air. We love being there. A little village on the backyard of some old Thai lady waiting for this food that we are now desperate for. The little Thai boy plays with his gigantic teddy bear. The king face hangs on the wall.

As we devour the delicious food that is served to us we feel there is no way on earth we could possibly bike more. We are lethargic. We want to sleep. We need coffee. We search for it and we are lucky enough to find a little market where the lady points us to ice coffee. I look around. We get little things. We find the shop the great excuse we need to just stop. As I am going through the items I see a little wallet. It is a perfect one. Perfect for coins! I want to buy it. It is colourful and perfect. I take and as it hangs in my hand I realized they come attached to keys. I am puzzled looking at it, when the sweet Thai lady comes. I suddenly understand that it belongs to her.

She takes it from my hand gently. I apologize. She removes the keys, opens it and removes the money from inside. She then holds it in front of her body, and makes the gesture of giving it to me. “From me to you” kind of thing. You all know how emotional I am. So yes. I get really emotional.. I tell her I can’t take her wallet. She holds her little bag in her chess, then points to the sky and gives it to me. I am speechless.  I had done nothing apart doing lots of “way” when I came in. My friend suggests I should give her money. I cant do it. It is a gift. I want to give her something as well. I have barely nothing with me. I do have my scarf. My favorite scarf I bought in the middle east. The one that traveled with me Palestine, Israel and India. That is it. I will give her my scarf. I walk towards her and repeat the same gesture. From me to you. She is happy. We do not exchange a single word. Just gifts carrying different stories. Just a respect and deference gestures and smiles.

Arriving at the wetlands seems even less important now. We mount our bikes taking every view we see with more joy. We pass rice fields, families, children, and when we arrive finally at the Wetlands I realized that it is really true.. to me what matter is not the end point, it is always the journey.

25. Ms. Lobinson

.I float on the Mekong. Tod, the Thai guitar player, sings Mrs (l)obinson. He asks me whether I want to play and sing. I do. I play Brazilian music, and the very few songs in English I know. But then a Thai boy comes he wants to play with me. I remember Dorjee the Tibetan in Exile traditional singer who so many times I jammed with. I like this practice now: learning to walk inside in another rhythm. I know most Thais who are there. We greet each other. There is so much joy in recognition.

As I am singing in Portuguese and older Danish guy comes to talk to me. He is heartbroken. A Brazilian Mulata has stolen his heart. “She is pregnant of me! 5 months and left me. She already has two children of two other gringos”. He looks at me, his hands moves in the air as if he is taking his heart out , he then throws it on the floor and steps over it. “That is what she did! She told me she was going back to Fortaleza! Do you know what it means???” I don’t, but he explains to me. She is looking for someone else. He is 56 she is 26. I am dazzled how is it that these older men suddenly act like little boys in love. The power of women just flabbergasts me.

I go back to the lady bar with my friends. The ladies now recognise me which means they smile more than often, and greet me back in a joyful way. The ladies who were in the boat with me before hug me. A Thai lady I do not know tells me I sing from inside. She hugs me and thanks me. She cant really put into words, so she breathes deeply and puts her hands in a prayer gesture and she ways at me (the thai greeting). Why is it again that we think we are that different? I can’t really figure it out right now.

I spend more and more time with the ladies who work in the kitchen of my guesthouse. Last night every single one gave me a little hug as they left. I am not sure this is practice. I still remember a shocked little 6 year old when I in my brazilianess just hugged her when I left the school I volunteered in. Not the ladies in the Kitchen. Wi, Joy, Noy, Tia are very affectionate.

Today after they told me swai ( beautiful ) to my red nails I grabbed my nail polish and painted Noy’s nails. I barely understand their jokes, or laughter, but it really does not matter. When I finished Wi made me seat, got her little bag, got a comb out and arranged my hair in two beautiful braids. I loved it. I loved seating in the sunny garden as she combed my hair. I loved not knowing what she was doing. I loved looking at it in the mirror once she was done. I loved our little exchanges that do not need that many words. What is it again that makes us soooo different? I just don’t now.

As I listen to the old European who is heartbroken I recognise that Scandinavians just like South Americans feel sometimes their hearts have been taken out and stepped upon. As I sing with Tod I feel music has also no real boundaries. As I seat laughing with the Thai ladies in the kitchen I know laughter needs no language. As I am welcomed by prostitutes in a lady bar I know that respect needs not much cultural understanding. Even in the complicated conversations about the differences between Mayhayana and Hinnayana Buddhism with an American 70 year old monk and mystic and an older Thai lady who has done her PhD on Thai and Buddhist culture we seem to understand each other pretty well. The more I travel and meet people either exchanging thoughts, words, or simply acts of kindness I feel that yes that is a lot of things we do really differently, but overwhelmingly I still keep thinking we are so alike.   

Yesterday I met two incredibly interesting men. They were both Anglo-saxon and both between 70 and 80 years old. One was a true Scottish gentleman, and the other a true subversive north american. Apart from the kindness, and the interest in different cultures that was common to both that was nothing else that made them alike.

The Scottish man was gentle and spoke softly. Everything about him was soft. He dressed like what I imagine british civil servants doing safaris to dress like. He was a patient man. And did not mind waiting for my slowness, nor the fact that other people were taking all of my attention. As a true British gentleman he waited in total stillness. When i was finally able to help him I was mesmerised. Not so long ago I had helped here a very nice Canadian couple that had taught in Morocco and in the UAE for 10 years. they were now teaching in Thailand and they had nothing really of positive to say about the UAE. This Scottish gentleman, close to his 80 had taught English in Saudi Arabia decades ago. As I asked him about it his face lit up. ” It was wonderful. The hospitality! I was invited to houses, and when the women would hide away their fathers and husbands would tell them to not be silly because it was me.” I was moved, he did not feel entitled to be invited to houses, he did not feel people should be behaving in that or that way. He talked like someone who was thankful for having had the chance to be there. I asked a thousand questions and as he spoke I could see the excitement of a little boy. I kept wondering about what makes someone leave Scottish mountains to go to the desert of saudi arabia but I did not ask. Even at almost 80 years old keep going learning about different cultures.

The second man was completely different. All that the first one was slow the second was fast. Million thoughts and million words. He was a physicist and had worked in many different projects. As a child he had had a Buddhist vision but at that time Buddhism was not popular in the West as it is today so he did not know what it was. In fact, he used to think all children had these Buddhist visions but simply did not talk about. This man moved in fast speed, carried a Buddhist monk bag and knew all that I possibly could want to know about Buddhism. I was amazed. He could actually answer all of my doubts about the lines of Buddhism, about the separations, about the different Buddhist, mystic and Tantric practices practice… All that had never remained clear from my conversations with lamas and monks he could answer. As we talked and talked I discovered he had been studying with the Tibetans for the past 40 years. He had been a monk, and considers himself a mystic. He had met the holiest of the lamas and had no respect for tradition. ” because something is tradition it does not mean is right. It simply means it has been practiced for a long time.” although he identifies much closer to the Mahayana tradition of Buddhism ( of which Tibetan Buddhism is part), he had also lived with the Theravada monks in Thailand as a monk for a year. He has an absolutely brilliant mind. One of those that is hard to follow because can think in abstraction just as well as in concrete terms.

What makes people like these two men keep crossing borders? Is it the life that they lived that made them this way kind of accidentally? Or is something they could not escape? Have they chose this life or has this life chosen them? They seem happy, and have lived intense lives. Would they do it again? Are they happy? What is the price they have paid to see other words from within? Everyday I wonder more and more about these questions. Does happiness come from belonging or from detachment? Where does it come from? I look at these two older men healthy travelling and living abroad in fascination. I look at them half mesmerised, half terrified. I want to see all they have seen, I want to see it all in the hope to dissolve all boundaries that separate me from others, but while I am successful in daily braking a little bit more these arbitrary language and cultural separations, I simultaneously feel more alone.

24. Lisa
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Lisa is 49. She comes from Sacramento California. She always had a dream of going around the world. She teaches in school and for the past 30 year she has been dreaming of going around the world. Not in 80 days, but in 7 months. When you are traveling, hearing of someone who is going around the world starts to become common. I still remember the first time I heard of someone who had crossed Mongolia by horse. I was amazed. Now I have encountered so many people who have done it that it seems banal. But of course it is not banal! It is crazy and amazing.

I met an Israeli in India who told me he used to feel it was heroic when people told him once they returned to Israel that they had traveled in Asia for 7 months. Being in Asia himself he concluded “There is nothing heroic about it, it is actually pretty easy and pleasant.” He is right and wrong at the same time. It is easy and pleasant and at the same time heroic. It challenges it all, but the challenges of our notions eventually become normality to the point that cows and monkeys in the street don’t make you take out your cameras, and at some point not even notice them. And then it is mainly just pleasant.

For instance Roxanne who works here with me was reading the BBC news and she spotted an article where the man had been arrested. She asked me to go through the article with her to see if I could spot anything wrong. “Man riding a bike on the sidewalks” (standard practice in Thailand), “No helmet” ( standard), “ Carrying one baby in front of him” ( one baby??? We see whole families). It was a joke, we laughed about it, but yes it is actually true.

But back to Lisa, she had a dream. So after 30 years she organized herself to go. And on the first day of her vacation she found a lump in her breast. It turned out to be cancer. I look at her as we float on the Mekong. “How are you Lisa?”. Lisa is joyful, on my birthday she made me a balloon and a card with a poem. She gave me chocolate.  Lisa goes to the orphanage to play with children here in NK and is about to take a job teaching for 2 months in a little rural village. “I guess growing old is overrated. I was not going to let cancer get on the way of my dream.” And so she went through surgery, and radio and rented her house and left. In Bali she fell and hurt a leg but she would not let that stop her either. I watched her recover here. Listening to her made me remind me of my own determination to live well when I was in hospital. It is just amazing how much more resilient than we imagine we can be. “I could not do anything better right now. I am seeing the world.” As we both float on the Mekong I agree with her. Yes going around the world is both heroic and pleasant.

22- Lady Bar

A German physicist, a British scaffolder and I seat in an a lady bar. The physicist has just landed in Thailand. He wonders what a lady bar is. “a mix between a bar, a disco and brothel” answers my British friend. “So are all this girls “? ” Apart from that girl, and her mom who owns the bar yes”. That girl is Lolita. She is a girl, she wears a navy blue dress poked with white dots, it is tied on her waste. She smiles in that true discrete, and laughing Thai way. She looks like an Asian doll. She is the daughter of the owner of the bar. She is playing pool, she is amazing at it. Around the bar are mainly older Farang ( literally guava, but it is the word for white foreigner) men. “Are all these women prostitutes?” asks again the German physicist? We nod.

These Thai prostitutes are lovely. They are pure laughter and I just wished I could understand what goes inside their minds. Just as I could never really know what went behind Tibetan monks smily faces, I also do not know what goes behind these girls smiles. And probably to find out you have to ditch a whole bunch of preconceived ideas of what happiness entails.

Nong Khai lies on the border of the Mekong. It is the border town that leads to the “friendship bridge” into Laos. When I few years ago ( that now seem like in another life time) came to Thailand to volunteer I was asked to choose between a city, a town or a rural village. Seating on my very comfortable couch in London I decided for the rural village. I obviously had no idea what the ruralness of the village meant. I somehow thought in my mind that bc I was an anthropologist and came from south america I would cope just fine. As soon as I landed in Bangkok I realised I had been probably quite naive. It took me a while to accept that being in a less than 50 houses spread around village surrounded by rice fields where no farang went, with no running water, sauna like heat, not understanding language or culture was way more challenging that I had previously imagined. My catharsis happened then in a Buddhist funeral. Then things suddenly fell in place and I learned to love the simplicity of it.

It is strange how some knowledge is just embodied. Many times I was asked how was it that I got along in that little village without really knowing the language at all. Actually it took me weeks to find out they spoke Lao and not Thai. Yet all I remember is that we did communicate. Last night, as I sat in between two people on the back of a motorbike all these memories flooded me. I could really remember in my body taking these rides before. As I sat again in a lady bar puzzled by it I remembered the clandestine relationships I had seen taking place here when I first arrived.

I enter the kitchen and the Thai ladies who work here offer me some food. it is Jeh (vegetarian) they say. It is Coconut milk, bananas, sugar and salt. I don’t really want it but how can I refuse such an offering. I seat and we eat. We attempt conversation. they laugh the whole time. Suddenly I remember how it is that you start to understand things. You just have to ditch all that you know, all your preconceptions. Then you can have whole conversations even when you don’t know which language you are speaking.

21. Nong Khai, Incoherence

. I seat at the the communal table that lies under the straw like roof in the middle of the Garden of Mut Mee Guesthouse. When I look up I see the white light bathing the Mekong. On the other side of the river I see Laos. Behind me are lush green vegetation, trees, and some of the houses that host our guests. I look up again, turn around and I see the people. Some Nong Khai victims, some tourists.

Most people here have been here before. Nong Khai victims are those who have just stayed. Some have been here now for years. This place is crazy I think. In front of me I see some of those who just stayed. Computer geniuses, university professors, yogis. I see the Dutch sadu looking like painter who has been living in India for the past 25 years. There are also the temporary victims those who come to stay for one day and are now for over a week. What is it about Nong Khai?

Nothing really I think. There is a really interesting sculpture park. The promenade along the river is nice. In some places you see low tables on the pavement, some people who seat on the ground. Mainly thais having Thai food. You also see the older Europeans with young Thai girls. Lady Boys who you cant ( at least not at first) tell are boys. Prostitute bars that are really friendly like. There is the people who come to volunteer, the people who are crossing to Laos. There are the massage parlours offering more often than not happy endings. There is a total difference view on sexuality. There is nothing really that is that special about Nong Khai and yet it holds many here.

It must be Mut Mee I think. The communal tables, the craziness of the stories that go around, the fact that people suddenly connect and stay. It must be Julian and his story telling. I really don’t know what it is. The surrealness of all that could go on and just be normal here. This morning for instance we all watched a snake snatch a HUGE gecko from the wall. We watched the snake constrict it. It was like national geographic live. Ambivalent feelings from all. “It is nature” said someone so children, young, old people all looked and observed for hours the slow process of the fight between the gecko and the snake. The snake constricted, the gecko made noises, we looked anxiously, shocked, curiously, marvelled. The fight for life in both sides. I don’t know how many hours it took for the snake to manage to swallow the whole gecko. And as it finally did, this Thai man who no one knew grabbed a broom, and got the snake, took it on his hands, open its mouth, removed the gecko. It couldn’t be alive we all thought. He threw the snake away in the jungle and released the gecko who petrified at first barely moved. Then after the Thai man encouraged the gecko to recover from the whole shock somehow it did. The crowd was divided. Some were happy for the Gecko some felt pity for the snake that worked for hours for nothing. He was a monk. Barely spoke english had once been bit by a tiger in Kanchanaburi. We all wondered whether he had then removed food from its mouth as well.

It is strange Nong Khai. Watching that battle for life was strange. It felt like it was arbitrary my decision. Why was I supporting silently the Gecko, why did I also think it was wrong for the monk to intervene in the natural process of that snake finding food to survive? I wanted both things to happen simultaneously. I wanted both the snake and the gecko to win. That is it I know what is it about Nong Khai: it is ok to be completely incoherent here. It is ok for you to want completely contradictory things at the same time. Everybody does it everywhere but here they just don’t hide it.

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You know when you grow up and people teach you to be weary of strangers? Your first hear that from parents, then you learn in political discourses, then scientist give you the evolutionary reasons that would have selected for us to have an in-group bias…I have been living fighting these generalisations and trying to be more empirical about people and things.  I try as much I can to go to the houses of those of groups we hear are so different than us. Every single time I go I feel over and over again that if you are respectful, if you try your hardest to be respectable… People know. You obviously always screw up, and break rules that are invisible to you because you have not been socialised in that system but I feel that people always know when you are trying and they are always more generous in forgiving strangers for these transgressions than they are to their own. Of course, we are in these situations like children who do not know.  I have never felt so strongly than now that strangers are the kindest people ever. I feel it is not simply a matter of attributing responsibility. What I mean is this: in many places people feel that people cant be responsible for things they do not know. This is surely true but somehow I feel that we are kinder to strangers because it is so easy to be. It is easier to not attribute to them a secret meaning or motivation for a given action or word. In fact, I think it is the people who are close, those we let in our deepest and darker places who are the most dangerous of all. Those can hurt you like nothing else. But yet we must always open ourselves otherwise what kind of life would we live?

I have been in silence for a while. i always am when the stories that are surrounding me are more mine than others. I always feel they are too boring. Too secret.
But when you end up living a public life like I am doing now I get messages who come from all corners of the world when I disappear for too long.  I feel thankful for each one. and i apologise for having been gone for so long.

I am on my way back. After an open hand and knee, a bus accident, hearing a man die, saying many painful goodbyes, hearing many difficult stories, after breaking lots of things inside, after many dangerous roads, many bus rides, rickshaws, bikes, planes, trains, steps, taxis, cars…Through the hands of a total stranger who took care of me when I most needed help I am making my way back. Strangers always surprise me, and even when i loose this enormous faith in the path, through the help and love of once strangers who are now friends I know I have to keep going. People ask me why ? What am I searching for?  And I have no clear answer. I guess I am here to hear and tell stories. The stories of these strangers.

I was rescued by a sweet stranger these days one that has done more than I could have ever asked for. This stranger took me to a doctor, helped me with bureaucratic situations, gave me food and shelter when I most needed. This stranger gave me a feeling of home with mother and brother and sister, and dog and cat. And when finally this stranger dropped me to fly away as if all of that had not been enough he gave me a little gift.

” It is nothing much. But it has a meaning.”

I open my hands and I see a little anchor. I smile.

” You can keep going and when you need you can use an anchor. You will find many anchors on your path. I am one for you.”

And like that with my wounds licked by dogs and cats. Like that with messages of support and love coming from all continents I hoped in the plane to make my way back to the land of smiles. Just like that I flew to the land who is supposedly under water to float again in the Mekong. From the world of Tibetans, Indians, Kashmeres, and Israelis back now to the world of Palestinians and Thais. And I who felt so lonely in the past days feel a glimpse of joy in the Horizon. I was going home. My home in Asia. I was after years coming back to the border of Thailand and Laos.

I look at the stranger who now is a friend. And I say thank you. He tells me I should not thank him. I insist. ” Does it give you a good feeling to say it?” I explain that it does as gratitude is something so beautiful. He smiles and thanks me for giving him the opportunity to be kind, to be better, the opportunity to feel good.

And like this we agreed that whatever it is that it happens people like us will always encounter each other.

As I walk away I remember my yogi friend who dresses up like an angel in a certain week of the year and gives messages and flowers to strangers. Once in the tube in England he gave a flower to an old lady who broke out in tears and told him her son had just died and that she had not left home since then. That morning she asked for a sign to keep going, she asked God for one sign that life was worth living. My friend dressed in angthat day that sign.

Is there any metaphysical reality to that? Who knows? Does it even matter? As I am pondering about it as I walk the airport I remember another thing. When I had just left hospital I joined a yoga camp.  The first thing we did in that camp was to write our names in a piece of paper and pile them in the middle of the room. Then each one of us took a name. It was decided this way that for that week we would be the secret guardian angel of that person. always paying attention whether he/she was ok. In that playful and lyrical way everybody was being taken care of.

While I walk the airport I realise it is not important whether there is any metaphysical reality to it. We just have to keep going and helping strangers along the way. Maybe eventually this way we might even become malleable, compassionate and flexible enough to also be gentle, and kind to those who are so close.

I land in Udon Thani and as I get out of the gate I see an old friend. he screams ” Welcome Back”.  I feel enormous joy. Yes I am back. I drive with his sons, and friend back to Nong Khai. I am coming home. There is a room being set up for me. I realise that I do not even remember how good it is to have one stable place for you. I recognise some Thai old familiar faces. At night I make finally my way back to the Gaia the boat that floats in the Mekong. I see the river pass. How many years had I dreamed of being back? And now I am here. ” julieta, how long are you going stay for? We ask people to stay for at least 3 months when they coming to work. is that ok?”. And inside of me I can say without hesitation that it is ok. That it is great. I finally do not want to run away. I want to learn the inner secrets of a guesthouse that lies in front of the Mekong. I want to learn the stories that are behind Thai and tourist smiles. I want to see the strangers pass in this border town, be their anchors when they need one.  As my new sweet English friend who also works here and I are organising our little house I feel this enormous joy. I know in my whole body that yes I am back.