Back in the U.S. of A.

We all knew the fairy tale had to come to an end at some point, but you can't say we didn't live it up the past 14 months. What a whirlwind of adventures we've had! Big thanks to all of you who've graciously followed us on this wacky experience of a lifetime. It surely has been one wild ride.

David and I flew "home" May 10 after five great weeks in New Zealand. Our consolidator wrangled us a free stopover in Fiji, which was great despite rain the bulk of the time. It didn't stop us from downing bottles of Fiji Bitter, playing cards on our balcony, and snorkeling when the sun did appear for brief stints. We had to fly to LAX next to catch an SF flight, but that was fine with us. For the first time ever, it was comforting to see the City of Angels, if only for a few hours.

We enjoyed eight nights in Fiji, branching out of our Western-catered resort to attend a Fijian Methodist church service in the village. We always make an effort to hang with the locals as much as possible, and Fiji was no exception. It reminded us a lot of Kenya, with its beautiful jungles, third-world villages, and wonderfully kind people. As luck would have it, one of the girls from church also works at our resort, and she later invited us to a kava ceremony at her father's house. Her sister and brothers were there, along with her dad (who lived in the Bay Area...go figure) and all of the subsequent kids/grandkids. Too cute! We brought gifts for the family, then got down to business. Kava tastes pretty nasty but it gives you a good, mellow buzz. It also, if you drink enough of it, forces you to visit the jungle outhouse, which--thanks to the resident stinkbug on the wall and toad on the floor--wasn't my favorite part of the night, but the warmth of these folks quickly overshadowed that dicey part.

New Zealand surpassed my expectations and then some. We scored a killer deal on a rental car and toodled around both the South and North Islands for 32 days. WOW! Highlights were swimming with dolphins (amazing!), hiking to the foot of Mt. Cook (the country's highest peak), strolling around the lake in Wanaka, cruising the Milford Sound, and soaking up Maori culture in Rotorua.

Sadly I fell off a horse in Glenorchy just as we were preparing to gallop up to the lookout where Aragorn and the gang hung out while filming a good chunk of Lord of the Rings. Oh well...at least nothing was broken (and the pics are beautiful). I suffered a nasty contusion on my left hip and thigh that still has me limping today. It put a damper on much of our adventure plans for NZ, but once I hit the sheep show in Rotorua while David did the more physically demanding morning of sledging, I was in hog heaven and forgot all about the injury...for a time. We all know how much I love animals!

Australia wasn't our favorite for reasons I won't ramble on about here, but the body surfing was killer (to coin a phrase from my UCLA days), and we spent most of our time at the beaches between Brisbane and Sydney. And yes, we held the requisite koala and even fed a few kangaroos (domesticated ones, that is). And I have to admit that seeing the Sydney opera house and harbor in person was pretty special.

Prior to arriving in Oz via Singapore on a raucous redeye to Brisbane that left us too drunk to rent a car (no joke), we spent 10 glorious days back in Bali, where we'd visited in 2005. Our attempts to get to Lombok failed as storms persisted and we opted to kick it in Ubud versus brave the rough seas for the chance at idyllic life on the Gili Islands. We were so glad we did, as many of the old memories came flooding back from our earlier days there. We even reconnected with a hotel staffer from our 2005 stay who made the effort to visit us at our current guesthouse. We were treated like family at our new pad, got $5 massages almost daily, ate great food, did a colonic, hiked around the villages and rice paddies, and soaked up some sun at our pool. We made many new friends this time around and hope to return in the future to further our explorations of this magical island and culture.

It's been wild to be back in the States, but at least the culture shock has been kept at a minimum due to our spending the last two months in Australia and New Zealand. The former has all of the things we dislike about America; the latter is a hidden treasure we don't want to share with anyone :-)
We enjoyed five short days in San Francisco (much to the chagrin of our good friends), taking in a Giants game (Americana at its best!) the morning after our U.S. return. We were still a bit jetlagged but cheered on our home team regardless. It was quite emotional to rise for the national anthem, something we hadn't done or heard in a really long time. It felt good that day to be an American, which wasn't always the case when we were traveling.

We moved on to visit our good friends Cathy and Hashem, also in the City, who graciously hosted us for four more nights. We spent long evenings eating good food, drinking yummy wine, and telling stories. Hashem graduates tomorrow from SF State with a broadcasting degree, and we wish him well on his quest for his first news reporting job. He and Cathy are very dear to us, and we just hope Hashem's new career doesn't send him to South Dakota for too long a stint. We envision great things for them both.

Seeing as David's 40th conveniently landed during our first week back, we made it to Vegas last Thursday in our car (fresh out of storage) to celebrate in grand style. What better way to reintroduce yourself to American culture than to hit the land of plenty where everything is bigger, better, and glitzier than the rest. Of course, I jest. But the contrast was an interesting one, and we had a blast! Didn't win back any trip expenses (I think we lost the equivalent of a small home in SE Asia), but we had a great time gambling, cruising the strip, and riding the NYNY roller coaster at midnight. Despite a couple of late-night three-card poker streaks, where I hit two big hands, we came out behind but had a fun time doing it. Isn't that always the main thing?

We then spent one night with my college roommate Devon and her family in Henderson, NV, and had fun catching up with them and their adorable girls in their new home. We're now here in Scottsdale, Arizona, visiting my mom, and reuniting with David's parents, who flew in yesterday from Connecticut. It's really great to be back with family, who, along with our friends, are the things we truly missed while traveling. Well, and good Mexican food, too. I can't lie.

We plan to spend June on the road in the Southwest to see if there are any other areas we could consider living in the future, as we've resigned ourselves to the fact that we'll probably never be able to buy in California (yes, even despite the failing housing market). But in all honesty, I think we're procrastinating coming back to the "real world" (and I'm not sure you could move me away from a coast). We do plan to return to San Francisco in July and then probably sublet for a bit until we figure out our next move. We're considering an apartment in either the Napa/Sonoma area or the Monterey Peninsula. We desperately need to get our stuff out of storage (it's been 2.5 years!), get rid of half of it, and start work on our book proposal and other creative adventures. And yes, some kind of jobs will have to be in our near future as well. We don't naively expect to become famous published authors right out the gate, but one has to keep the dream alive, right?

Of course, I'd be lying to you all if I didn't admit David and I have had plenty of conversations lately that center around when we'll be heading out into the great big world again. I think we're more acclimated now to living in Asia than we are to the modern conveniences and abundance that America provides. We're more comfortable with showers that get the entire bathroom wet, and spicy foods that make our stomachs sit upright and masochistically beg for more. I miss the cows walking down the street and the loud hum of foreign languages in my ear.

Stay tuned! Our next blog just might come to you from the mountains of Nepal or an English-language school in Indonesia. And you know I'm only half-joking.

A Birthday to Remember...Sulawesi Style

Things have been looking up since we fled India and hit the streets of Malaysia. A month later, after zipping through modern Kuala Lumpur, lovely beachside Langkawi, culturally awesome Penang, and the amazing landscapes of Borneo (both Sabah and Sarawak), we've now arrived in Indonesia. North Sulawesi, to be exact. Not a place where they see many Western tourists, but we like it that way. We get a lot of stares, which, when we throw back a smile and "hello," turn into more smiles and big "hellos." We like that, too.

I celebrated my birthday this year as an affair to truly remember. It arrived with much anticipation after a crazy two days of travel from Kuching, Malaysian Borneo, to Johar Bahru, Malaysia and on to Singapore, which is just across the causeway and supposedly a quick drive. Using public transportation, however, makes it a three+-hour ordeal. Luckily we were crashing in the spare room at David's second cousin once removed (or something like that), who lives in Singapore with his adorable family (which includes a brand-new baby). Nonetheless, the family charm was soon dispelled by our over-four hour delay to Jakarta, which was besieged by floods.

Thanks to a cool immigration control dude who let us use the Diplomats lane for passport control (thus shaving some 30 minutes off our wait), and some quick-thinking parking control guys at the Jakarta airport, who radioed for a patrol car to whisk us over to the domestic terminal when the shuttle bus didn't arrive, we arrived just in time to make our flight to Manado in North Sulawesi, although we did have to throw too many U.S. dollars for departure tax at the ticket agent (no time to argue a fair conversion price), not to mention perform the 1,000-meter dash through the airport with four backpacks on in sweltering humidity, while every Indonesian on Java appeared to be screaming "Manado, Manado" back at us when they saw us running pell-mell asking, "Manado? Manado?" We were the last people to board and caused quite a ruckus when the flight attendants couldn't figure out how to offload our large backpacks at the last minute to the cargo hold and ended up cramming them in with their own bags in the special wardrobe.

We arrived very late at 1:30am the next day, found a good guesthouse, and slept like babies. We wasted no time in leaving the city, heading up to a little hill village called Tomohon in the Minahasa Highlands, about one hour south of Manado. Tomohon is lush, green, known for flowers/nurseries, and sits in a valley beneath two stunning volcanoes, both of them recently active in the 20th century I believe. It's really lovely.

We found refuge at this great little home stay called "Happy Flower," run by a neat Indonesian family. There are only three bungalows, four mangy dogs, tons of flowers, and tons of frogs croaking at the tops of their lungs all night long. It was pretty clean and neat, despite mildewy pillows and a few bugs in the partially open-air bathroom. It did have hot water, which is a bonus here, and a great balcony where we read and just watched the rain fall while the butterflies flit by.

Yoce, who greeted us on arrival, does tours around town. A cool Canadian girl named Jolene was with us the last two days at the home stay; she also happened to be one of only two other Westerners on our flight that crazy night, and greeted us with a, "Oh, so you're the guys making all that commotion on the plane the other night." Luckily she said it with a smile. As we quickly bonded with a fellow North American, the three of us hired Yoce for a half-day tour of the market and then a hike up to the crater of Mt. Mahawu. The price (about $25 for the three of us) included transportation and fruit, in addition to guide services. Not shabby.

So the transportation: This area is filled with little turquoise minivans called "mikrolets" that take you everywhere. So we hop in one of those from the rice field we were strolling along, and arrive at the main market about seven minutes later. We toured around and they sell some really gruesome things: fried bats, rats on sticks, and the most disturbing of all: dogs! We saw complete whole dogs charred and sitting on tables, some cut open to show their guts, not to mention LIVE dogs crammed in cages waiting to be...um...fried. So that was funky, but the people and stuff were amazing to see...probably the weirdest market in all our travels. That says a lot, given where we've been.

So then the next challenge...local scooter riding up to the volcano trailhead (don't tell our insurance agent). We'd heard from two cool Aussies that stayed with us the first night that this is how you really get around to the cool places here. I really didn't want to get on the back of a motorbike with an Indonesian dude smoking and driving on village backroads, as our insurance doesn't cover us, and you always hear horror stories (and see banged up people) in Asia. But as they say, when in Rome...

So by the time I'm done snapping photos, David, Jolene, and Yoce are already on the backs of their scooters, so I hop on mine. My helmet doesn't snap in, but then again...when in Rome. As David put it later, it would suffice for the initial impact but probably flop off after that. Lovely thought. Despite my initial anxiety, we never went that fast and ended up having this really serene, beautiful ride up the volcano through amazing farms and fields.

The hike was pretty easy, the crater really cool. We hiked through a ton of long grasses above our heads along the rim for about 10 minutes and then Yoce cut fresh mangoes for us up there and we took in the sulfur smell. The views were out of this world, although much of the sea beyond was clouded over. Then we hiked down through the jungle, and it wasn't too buggy. We alit on a local road, hiked through the village for a bit, and then since it started sprinkling...back on another posse of motorbikes. The ride was fast, and we made it back to the home stay in one piece. It was just really fun, and a great way to spend my 39th birthday.

David gave me a cute little cotton pouch he'd bought in Malaysia, stuffed with hand-drawn coupons for massage, ice cream, and the like. It was really cute and thoughtful, especially given the resources of where we are (read: unless you want to buy a scooter or a charred dog, limited). We had a nice dinner with Jolene and the mangy dogs at the home stay, then chilled out afterwards. It poured all night and we had rats eating/nesting in our ceiling, but other than that, a peaceful sleep.

It's a birthday I'll never forget, and just another really amazing day on this wild adventure of ours. I feel really alive here and so relaxed, and it's great. People are SO friendly and the area is really beautiful. I wonder how I can top that for my 40th...any suggestions are welcome.

Happy-to-be-leaving-India New Year!

I can't believe that 2008 is just around the corner. Tonight we leave India (whew...finally!) on a red-eye to Kuala Lumpur. Hello Malyasia! I have to admit I'm barely able to contain my excitement to depart this crazy country. I never once thought for a second that India would be easy, but lately, I've found myself missing China. That says a lot! Of course, I haven't had a chance to share my thoughts on China here yet, but when I do, you'll understand why it's pretty nuts for me to make the statement I just did.

Bodh Gaya, as you know if you read my previous blog, was amazing, spiritual, insane, sad, dirty, noisy, and enlightening all at the same time. On the morning we left, we endured a 5:30am wild auto rickshaw ride in the dark at the hands of two young Indian punks who drove as if they were characters in a video game. I honestly wasn't sure if we'd arrive at the train station in one piece. Luckily we did, and were pleased to see our train pull into the station on time at 6:25am.

We were looking at a 13-hour ride to Agra in a 2nd-class sleeper car. Sounded doable, except we weren't expecting to sit on the track after lunch in the middle of nowhere for 2.5 hours (this part of India runs on a single track, so apparently you have to wait for passing trains a lot of the time); or have endless cockroaches crawling over our seats and up the walls for the bulk of the journey; or be visited several times by a mouse, let alone experience the nasty personal habits that most Indians exhibit in public without reservation (hacking, spitting, loud talking, vocal belching, slurpy eating). That aside, the mouse didn't bother me too much (remember I'm a former pet rat owner) but the roaches made my skin crawl. No, they gave me a full-blown panic attack. Add to that continued delays along the way, and needless to say, David and I pulled into Agra bleary-eyed and at our wits' ends at 12:15 the next morning. Ugh! Those are 18 hours that we won't forget too soon but surely were happy to put behind us.

Agra is a pit of a city, with dirty old streets and funky little hamlets surrounding one of the most famous, pristine sites in the world. Hard to believe this is home to the Taj Mahal. We enjoyed our visit to the architectural marvel, but to be honest, I thought the place was a bit overhyped, and the drizzling rain didn't help much either. The money shots with blue sky behind that pearly white just aren't there. We toured the cool fort the next day, checked out the view of the Taj from across the river (haze prevented us from seeing too clearly), and had a nice dinner and good chat with two Indian brothers at their local restaurant. Our hotel was run by a bunch of cheats and scammers, but at least our room was clean. (Sadly, that theme will repeat itself throughout the rest of our time in India.) Things were, dare I say it, looking up.

The next morning a driver picked us up at 7:00am, and we embarked on our two-week road tour of Rajasthan. In 14 days we visited Jaipur, Bikaner, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur, Rohet, Ranakhpur, Udaipur, Bundi, and Ranthambore National Park. Whew! We didn't see any tigers (for which the latter is famous...bummer!), but we did take in a heck of a lot of old forts, museums, city palaces, ancient towns, desert sand, crazy highways (if you can call them that), good food, and yummy masala chai. Hey, we even slurped opium (no joke!) with the local Rajasthani villagers and smoked a bidi (hand-rolled Indian tobacco). That was a fun day. (Don't worry, mom...the opium, when filtered down as a liquid and drunk, merely creates a stimulating sensation, unlike the smoked version, which can really mess with your head.)

We had mixed feelings about our tour. Our driver was lazy, uninspired, constantly lost, and pretty lame. Nevertheless, we made the best of it. A highlight of the journey was a camel ride on the dunes outside of Jaisalmer, just a stone's throw from Pakistan and really out in the middle of nowhere. We watched the sun set over the desert, got our camel driver to run Michael Jackson (our camel) a few times (which was really fun and bouncy), and spent the night at a "luxury" tent resort that was everything I'd hoped our African tent camp safari experience would be but wasn't. Apparently $132 a night buys a lot more in India. We enjoyed several hours of Rajasthani music and dancing; snacks and drinks around the campfire; a huge yummy vegetarian buffet; and a delightfully comfy night of rest in our cozy deluxe tent complete with stone-floored bathroom, Western toilet/shower, and tasteful furnishings in the bedroom. Too bad bliss only reigned for one night.

Cockroaches in our room in Jodhpur forced us to change hotels, only to endure an even dirtier experience at the next dump the local agent ushered us into. Given that it was 10:30pm by the time we'd unpacked, we really had no choice but to hunker down for the night, demand a sheet change, and try our best to ignore the last guest's cigarette butts and body hairs in our bathroom. Lovely. Luckily the next morning, we stood firm with the local agent and demanded to be moved to yet another hotel. After 10 minutes of arguing with him (these businessmen love to lie to you), he had our driver take us to a lovely heritage hotel with beautiful gardens, a great room, amazing dining, and the nicest hotel manager we've met since we arrived in India. We were furious to learn that this great place cost only 100 rupees more than either of the dumps we'd been booked into the night before. They say anything is possible in India, but you sure have to fight hard to get it.

We spent Christmas Eve in the lakeside town of Udaipur, where we met a great German couple named Joe and Sylvia, who were on a similar road trip of their own ripe with problems and hassles. We drank beer together on a rooftop guesthouse restaurant, admired the city palace aglow in evening lights, and shared war stories about our travels thus far. It was a nice way to spend a holiday evening away from home. Too bad our hotel was filled with Indian families who like to leave their room doors open, shout across the hallways to one another, and let their children run amok through the marble-tiled courtyards. That's something about this culture that I really won't miss nor ever really understand. We managed to eek out a decent night's sleep despite the ruckus.

Christmas Day was less eventful and pretty dreary in the small funky town of Bundi, but as fate would have it, we ran into Joe and Sylvia again and had the pleasure of their company at yet another rooftop guesthouse restaurant with an amazing view of the old palace just above us. Another German guy joined us, and our table of five made for a nice holiday celebration. We called our parents afterwards, which made us both insanely homesick but also super happy, then called it a night. No visit from Santa; just a spooky walk out of the old city in the pitch black with no auto rickshaws in sight. We finally found one and were amazed at how eerily quiet India can be when everyone goes home for the night. Just you and the homeless dogs and the endless cows patrolling the streets.

And as I mentioned at the beginning, no tigers! But we did see Asia's largest antelope (the blue bull), a ton of Indian deer, wild boar, a mongoose, monkeys, and lots of cool birds. Save for the drunken hotel managers (who again lied to us like most hotel staff here), we had a decent stay in Ranthambore for two nights before catching an express train back to Delhi. That experience in chair class was much better than our roach-ridden slow train to Agra. Too bad they only offer chair class on a handful of Indian trains. It's a much more civilized way to travel for sure.

Back in Delhi we met with our travel agent and spent several hours sharing our woes. He was pleasant enough, but again, this is India, and he's only so sympathetic to our cause. We had reserved a room last month at a great little hotel in Karol Bagh, the main shopping district, and were happy to see the friendly face of the front desk manager, who remembered us from our August visit. After a quick nap, we struck out for a beer at a local bar we'd seen last time we were in town but never visited, and discovered a hidden little gem. I realized how long it'd been since I'd eaten anything other than chapati and paneer butter masala, or heard Western music, or had readily accessible cold beer, or been greeted by a smiling face at the door. We grubbed on tasty Chinese food, laughed with the restaurant manager, and had a real hot fudge sundae of all things. Rock on, Jade Garden!

But wait! Did I mention the leering men? How could I forget? As a woman, I'm a huge target for ogling, despite wearing baggy blouses, scarves, and no makeup when I go out. But Rajasthan proved really disgusting on this front. I can understand in small villages that many of the people have seen few white folk, but honestly, could you be more obvious about staring at me all of the time, people? Or ignoring the concept of personal space? Or treating me like some animal at the zoo? Unfortunately my tactic of staring back just as blatantly fazed none of them. They just continued to gaze at me with these disturbed, odd, longing looks on their faces. David tried to block and cover but couldn't keep up the game all of the time. After a while, it wears you out to the point where the four walls of your hotel room become more pleasing than sightseeing for the day. Sad but true.

Despite the endless hassles, lies, dirt, poverty, and constant noise, I have mixed emotions about leaving India. There are some truly beautiful, kind people here. There are some amazing historical sites. There are places of seriously holy worship. And dare I say there's almost a method to the madness that goes on here day after day. India really is like no other place on Earth, and I'm glad to have had the chance to experience it. But ironically, I've felt most at peace when surrounded by influences of another culture.

It's in India that I walked in the Buddha's footsteps, toured the hillside community of the Dalai Lama, and got a blessing from the second most powerful Tibetan in the world. Interestingly enough, I'm writing this post from an Internet cafe in Delhi's Tibetan Refugee Camp. In fact, I'm surrounded by Tibetans as I type this, and David is listening to a Tibetan CD we just bought here. We'd discovered this singer while in Lhasa but could never find his album in any of the shops there. It took 10 seconds for a Tibetan woman to locate it on the shelf of a music kiosk here, and five seconds for us to buy it.

And that woman...Yangchen...the reason we're here on our last day, and a really heartwarming story. A few hours after we'd boarded the train from hell in Gaya, I realized that I'd left behind at our guesthouse my new silk mala beads pouch (which I'd just bought the day before at a Tibetan meditation center in Bodh Gaya) and cherished bracelet from Swayambunath temple in Nepal. Doing my best to practice non-attachment as a good Buddhist would, I tried to talk through the missing of these items, the lack of importance they held in the grand scheme of my life, and remind myself that I was lucky and happy to be alive and in one piece, yada, yada, yada. It worked for a while, but then the basic sadness of loss returned.

Later the next day in Agra, I emailed the hotel in Bodh Gaya and asked if there was any way they'd be able to mail the items to my hotel in Delhi. I wasn't expecting much, and I didn't even know if they'd found them in our room, if they'd been stolen, etc. I didn't hear back from the hotel until a week later, and to my surprise, one of the front desk guys we'd befriended wrote back apologizing for his delay in responding. He said they'd been really busy lately but were sending my items back to Delhi on December 24 with a girl who lived at the Tibetan Refugee Camp there. I could pick them up when I arrived back in the city. I was ecstatic. Non-attachment flew out the window. I had a chance to get back some cherished little things that held good spiritual energy for me. I was thrilled!

And that's how we came to be where we are right now. Grateful to have seen a mere speck of this huge crazy nation but excited to move on. Inspired by many of the people we've met but worn out by the actions of others. Moved to tears by the poverty of many but enlightened by the compassion of a cherished few. As the new year approaches, I have much to be thankful for and many things to look forward to. I can only hope that 2008 brings a fraction of the many blessings and wild experiences to which we've been privy so far. This global journey may be more than half over for us, but I know there are many great things yet to come.

Wishing you a year filled with peace, happiness, and open-minded heartfelt bliss!

In the Footsteps of the Buddha

While I acknowledge that I'm terribly behind on this beloved blog 'o mine, I feel compelled to fast forward us all a few months to the present day and place. Bodh Gaya, Bihar, India. The poorest and most lawless state in the country. We are surrounded by dust-filled streets, extreme poverty, snotty-nosed dirty begging kids everywhere you look. Cows (and their endless piles of shit), goats, buffaloes, and wild pigs roam the streets. Packs of seriously mangy dogs howl throughout the night. Scantily-clad children cry and wail throughout the day. Ancient grandmothers squat in the streets and wave beggars' bowls in your face. Polio-ridden people with severe deformities crawl along the ground asking for help. It's not a pretty sight, so why, might you ask, have we braved a scummy three-hour train ride from the more tourist-friendly (yet still crazy) enclave of Varanasi to subject ourselves to this madness?

The answer is quite simple, but it's one that might amaze you. It's here that, 2,600 years ago, Siddhartha Gautama found enlightenment under the bodhi tree and became known from that point on as the Buddha. The Mahabodhi Temple where this all happened became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2002, and Bodh Gaya now yearly welcomes thousands of pilgrims (many of them Tibetan) who flock here from October to March to pay homage to this holy religion.

Monks of all ages, sexes, races, and colors abound. They sit snuggly in pairs atop bicycle rickshaws, pile out in masses from rusty auto rickshaws, share space with us at Internet cafes checking their email (so Western of them!), and a few even ride their own bikes, sporting hip sunglasses and talking on cell phones as they go. It's an odd sight to see, but a comforting one as well.

Amid all this "monk-y business," as we call it, shiny new tour buses (so out of place in India!) shuttle smartly dressed Thai, Japanese, Korean, and Chinese tourists to the endless plethora of temples. A few daring Westerners (including us) brave the noisy, dirty streets on foot. It's hard to believe such peace and spirituality exist amid such squalor. We're continually amazed by what our eyes take in and our minds find so difficult to process. The entire scene is a canvas of contrasts, and we are but a few of the subjects roaming among it struggling to find a glimmer of hope in a desperate spot on the map.

I knew India would be hard, but I don't think I expected what we've come to experience this past week. Varanasi was quite tame, despite its reputation. Perhaps that's because we'd spent all of November in Nepal, which I call "India light." Nepal seems a bit more civilized and certainly less crowded. We'd endured an afternoon in Kathmandu at Pashupati, the holiest Hindu temple in the country, and witnessed body upon body burning atop cremation pyres. You know that horrible smell when a few rogue hairs get caught in the blow dryer? Multiply that by about 1,000, and that's Pashupati. The Nepalese think nothing of it, but it's certainly a shock to the Westerner's mentality. Oddly serene despite the main event, that area prepared us well for Varanasi's burning ghats. We barely blinked an eye as we passed by a flaming mass one afternoon, and I clearly could make out the face and head of a charred human being. We didn't stay long.

Our three days in Varanasi were enjoyable, save for me getting sick on the second night, a massive sinus infection that I'm still battling. I can't seem to stay healthy on this leg of our journey, having just recovered in mid-November from a nasty cold in Nepal that even delayed our trek by a few days. After eight miserable days suffering here in India, I have succumbed to antibiotics and reluctantly am putting my faith in Western medicine. The salt water snorting and disgusting grapefruit seed extract just weren't able to complete the job.

Sometimes on this trip, we've been left with no other choice but to turn to the hard drugs, which is a serious challenge to our holistic views. We felt a low point the other day in Bodh Gaya when we purchased paper face masks, akin to the type surgeons wear on duty. The dust, dirt, and pollution here is overwhelming, and we're not alone when we wander the streets with masks on now. Just about every monk and tourist in the know sport them.

So back to Varanasi. We strolled along the famous Ganges, took in more crazy sights than we can process, and David even got his hand on a cricket bat, smacking his first pitch out of the "ballpark." The local kids cheered him on quite loudly, and we had a good laugh. We almost got run down by mad cows in the dark alleys; Molly got a tika from a funky sadhu at the Golden Temple; we watched a man grab a feather from a dirty street and jam it excitedly in his ear (Q-tips anyone?); we tried the local raw water chestnuts (and didn't get sick!) from the street market while rats roamed around the vendor's feet; and perhaps in our most daunting feat, survived the one-hour cab ride from the airport into town despite a non-working horn in the taxi and a seriously snarky young driver who tried to literally take us for a wild ride. David quickly told him he was messing with the wrong people. I chuckled. At first we enjoyed the serenity of no honking, but we quickly realized that despite being peaceful, it's downright dangerous in this country. I couldn't help but laugh, though, as we puttered along at a snail's pace behind bicycle rickshaws we couldn't pass because our driver couldn't hoot them out of his way. He would pound on the steering wheel in frustration while David and I just smiled slyly from the back seat of the cushy Ambassador.

We spent our last day there in Sarnath, where the Buddha gave his first sermon after attaining enlightenment. Who woulda thunk all this cool stuff happened here in this dust bowl of a region? You really do have to see it to believe it. We toured a few historic sites, wandered around the zoo (which sadly consists of a few scaly, near-death crocodiles and some small caged birds), strolled through a local village among plenty of staring faces, ate a decent late lunch at a local restaurant, prayed at the Tibetan temple, and yes, yet again, David managed to get in on a local cricket game, this one transpiring in the front yard of a Thai temple, much to the delight of a squealing gang of local boys. Baseball season might be over, but the spirit lives on in my dear husband.

Now on to Bodh Gaya. We braved our first Indian train ride and felt lucky that the Purattasham Express was only 35 minutes late that day. Other trains were three, four, or even seven hours delayed. Egads! And to think that only the day after we rode that slow boat to Gaya, masked bandits robbed that exact train on the exact leg we were on, and stabbed several people in the process of stealing their possessions. We've been told that our return trip from Gaya to Agra on Dec. 11 is on a safe section of railway, but I'll believe it when I'm happily sipping masala chai in front of the famed Taj Mahal. Please wish us luck.

We were crammed into 3AC, the cheapest class, with a seriously gross Russian couple who couldn't keep their hands off each other, and two Indian men who insisted on carrying on a cross-compartment conversation with another guy who perched on someone else's bunk across the aisle. The result was non-stop Hindi chatter for three hours and disgusting public displays of affection from a few skanky Slavs. Thank God we were only on board for a short while.

We quickly found an auto rickshaw to transport us the 30 minutes to Bodh Gaya but were dismayed when the driver took off with seven of his closest friends hanging all over the vehicle. We made three stops along the way to drop off and pick up more unannounced Indians. When we got to the guesthouse we'd requested, we found two local guys who spoke enough English to let our driver know in no uncertain terms that we weren't going to pay the agreed 100 rupees to play public taxi for the afternoon. He could either take our generous donation of 50 rupees, or call it a day: We weren't going along with the scam. After a few rounds of raised voices back and forth, he cracked a smile and accepted the grungy bill David handed him.

The guesthouse proved nightmarish, as the construction both inside and out that was promised to halt by 5:00pm was still going strong at 8:30 that night. As I was sick, I dearly needed my sleep, and David had to ask the manager three times to cut the band saws and hammering. Luckily we'd found a better guesthouse before dinner, and planned to move there the next morning. By some strange twist of fate, the manager of the offending place agreed with us the next morning that we shouldn't have to pay full price and that he wasn't honest when we checked in. To our surprise, he even gave us a conciliatory "sorry" on our way out. That's a first in India. People here rarely like to admit when they don't know something, or they've made a mistake, or both. We felt victorious in more ways than just our wallet.

We love, love, love the Mahayana Hotel where we're currently holed up for the week. Run by Tibetans, it's a pretty decent abode as far as Indian standards go, and has the added blessing of hosting many famous monks and lamas over the years. I believe it was even blessed by the Dalai Lama himself and is named after the sect of Tibetan Buddhism that His Holiness follows. We feel at home in this place and have befriended the kind front desk staff during our stay. There are usually a few monks hanging around the lobby when we retire for the evening, which is a nice way to retire each night.

We spend our days sleeping late, touring the endless temples (just about every country with a Buddhist culture has at least one temple here), sitting in meditation, sketching and writing in the shadow of the famed Bodhi tree, and even getting a blessing from one of the most revered Tibetan lamas, His Holiness the Seventeenth Gyalwa Karmapa, Ogyen Trinley Dorje, who happens to be here in Bodh Gaya for several months. We had planned to visit him in Dharamsala a few months ago but ran out of time, so we consider his presence here to be most auspicious. He's intensely connected to the Dalai Lama and bravely managed to escape in 2000 from Tibet to India when he was only 14 years old.

Despite being very interested in Buddhism, I had no idea what this lama looked like or how such a blessing by him would be bestowed, so when our turn came to offer our kata (white scarf) to the monks, I handed it over to the first monk in line, who placed it around my neck. I then bypassed the money-donation-receiving monk (no offense intended but we just weren't in a rupee-giving mood that day) and was then handed a red silk cord by another monk. Thinking these guys had to be the assistants and I still had more to go in the "ceremony," I trotted off in search of a more ancient-looking, austere holy man. To my dismay, I was ushered downstairs with the rest of the common folk, and I emerged dejected on the lawn to find David. Still wondering what had just transpired, I asked him, "Which one was the main guy? Did I miss something? What just happened in there?" David shrugged and figured we must have had an unknowing moment of sublime spiritual attention showered upon us. I was still confused, though. "Who was the holy man? Maybe he's not here today. Maybe those guys were just stand-ins?" Untrue to my Buddhist self, I figured there had to be more bells and whistles associated with this blessing thing.

We walked back to town, still perplexed but treasuring the holy red cord around my neck and my now-blessed kata. We stumbled upon the Burmese temple on our way back and decided to leave our katas there upon the Buddha in offering to a country that could use a few blessings these days. When we got back to the hotel, our beloved front desk friends asked for my help in editing an English announcement they were making about the Karmapa's public appearance the following day. Seeing this as a perfect entry into asking a most embarrassing question, I shyly said to one of the Tibetans, "You know, we got a blessing today from His Holiness, but I'm not sure which guy he was." The man just shook his head and laughed. "You don't know what the Karmapa looks like?" No, I replied sheepishly. I assumed he was rather old. "No, he's quite young, in fact, with glasses." Ah, so that was him, I mused.

I think now, in reviewing the website above, that the monk who placed the kata around my neck is indeed one of the most holy Buddhists alive today. Sadly, I wasn't very present during the entire five-second event, but today I'm much more at peace with the experience. Bodh Gaya has a way of doing that to a person: Putting you in a place of serious introspection, allowing divine wisdom and grace to take over when the most human of efforts fails. It's okay that I was blessed but didn't recognize the blessing. It's okay that I'm now wearing that shiny red cord as a bracelet because it's more at home there than dangling around my neck. It's okay that I haven't completely arrived on my path to enlightenment. In fact, I have a long, long way to go.

I still have much work to do on this planet, and Bodh Gaya is just one more stop along the journey. Albeit, it's probably the most amazing destination (save for Lhasa) in which I've ever plopped myself down. Perhaps I'll catch a glimpse of the Karmapa on the street today. It could happen; his sister walked out of our hotel lobby this morning in my presence, and now I at least have an idea of what he looks like. As the locals all like to remind us, "Anything is possible in India."

From Addis to Amritsar to Ayutthaya...

Well, at the risk of being even more behind in this neglected blog, I figured I owed everyone at least a recap of the last several months before bringing you up to current speed. As it stands, I'll still have a few more posts to add before I can join you in real time now, but I guess this is better than nothing. It's amazing how tough it is to find time or space to write in some of the places we've been lately.

Back in late July, we said a tearful goodbye to Kenya after a surprisingly wonderful month there, and headed a bit reluctantly to Ethiopia. We weren't expecting much, and that was a good thing. Despite reports that Addis Ababa was on the rise, it's still a depressingly dreary, backwards, dust- and poverty-ridden city. I sadly doubt that will change for many years to come.

We'd braved a trip to Ethiopia with the express purpose of doing the northern tourist circuit, which includes stops in Bahir Dar, Gonder, and Lalibela, the latter known for its famous 13-century rock-hewn churches. Sadly, after several frustrating visits to Ethiopian Airlines, the only carrier for these towns, we discovered it would take a total of seven flights on small planes to make this circuit doable. To get to Lalibela, the most desired on our list, we'd have to stop twice in the former two places. Didn't sound like a fun or safe way to travel, and taking a bus overland was even riskier: Unsafe and two days to reach a destination not so far away...ugh. So we made the tough decision to skip these destinations, save our sanity, try to make the best of Addis, and leave early for India. (The fact that we have no pictures to show from our week in Ethiopia says a lot: It honestly felt too risky to wander the streets with a camera around our necks.)

A few nice surprises cropped up in this strange city. We treated ourselves to an afternoon at a really nice day spa, of all things, getting our first massages in four months. David also got a much-needed haircut, and I got a much-needed pedicure. That was nice, albeit a big Western-style "splurge." Then we ate early dinner at a very Western cafe that rocked (our first real sandwich in four months, with chicken salad, ricotta, and caramelized onions...go figure). Of course, that delightful experience was quickly relegated to the past as we awoke the next day, braved the crowds at Ethiopian Airlines, re-ticketed to leave early, and then took our first minibus (where you ride for 15 cents with about 12-14 other Ethiopians) to the outdoor Merkato, supposedly the largest in Africa. Let me tell you, THAT is an experience like no other...makes Cairo look like NYC. We lasted about an hour before two attempted pickpocketings - including one guy who grabbed my arm 10x harder than any angry parent ever would - sent us in search of a minivan out of there. I screamed at the guy and he ran off, but it was wacky. Similar to Marrakech, when the dancing hawker whacked me on the arm with a big tin plate. That hurt, too.

But we survived to tell about it. I pet a goat, smiled at a few donkeys, made it through massive amounts of mud and rocks and water without slipping, and managed to find a minibus back to the general proximity of our hotel, where we proceeded to fight with the front desk about our checkout date. Sorted that out finally, but even so, the place is pretty dingy and you'd probably want plastic on the chairs in the room before you sit down, but hey...this is Ethiopia. About 10 years ago everyone here was either killing each other or starving or both, so you can't ask for much.

I am weary, though...weary of the looks, the lack of smiles, the poverty, the dirt, the funky food that makes my system upset, the misunderstandings, the lack of belief in the concept that the customer is always right...and somehow, I think things will get better in India. I fear I'm in for a big surprise.

But oh, how Delhi delighted us in so many ways! Despite being bleary eyed after another lovely red eye, we alit in Delhi around 8am and were kindly greeted by a driver from our hotel, who shuffled us into the cushy back seat of an old Ambassador, and off we went. WE LOVE IT HERE! It's a mix of the urban development of Bangkok (yes, you read that correctly) and the crazy, colonial character of Hanoi. Our hotel is great and in the heart of the Karol Bagh district, which is the main shopping area: Think street vendors and tons of little shops, and it's ALWAYS chaotic except in early morning when things are shut down. But it's HONK, HONK, HONK even if there's nothing to honk at.

That said, we really enjoyed it. A nice breath of fresh air (literally, if you can believe that) from East Africa. That shows you how backwards things were there (even in Kenya, despite our love of the country). We ended up (long story) meeting a tour agent, who booked us a driver and car for a 16-day tour of Himachal Pradesh and Punjab states. As an added bonus for our booking, he gave us a free day tour of Delhi by private car. We saw great sights and got a good introduction to this massive sprawling city. The next day we ventured out on our own via the subway to the old quarter, and what a change! This is the India I've read about...packed dusty streets full of rickshaws and vendors, people scrambling every which way, dark alleys beckoning you in. A visit to the Red Fort rounded out that experience.

On the way to a restaurant near our hotel one night (where we ate dinner like kings for a total of $3.50!), we found a homeless mama dog with about eight brand-new puppies curled up in a disgusting park. I got my rescue hat on, and we found a department store (yes!) and got them to give us a large box for the dog. We then figured she needed food and water, so we went to the nearby McDonald's (double yes) and ordered two chicken burgers (remember they don't serve beef here) for only $1 total, and got two free cups of water to go with it...score! We then took this all back to the mama dog, who was scared but thrilled. We got quite a few looks from the locals, but then it was almost dark so we left. But oddly, the box, the dog, and all the puppies were gone the next day, so we're a little worried that someone did something bad, but at least we did what we could.

Leaving Delhi was a serious trip in itself. In 16 days we explored the Himachal Pradesh hill towns of Shimla, Manali, McLeod Ganj (just outside Dharamsala and home to the Dalai Lama), and Dalhousie, and then ventured west to glorious Amritsar in Punjab, home to the famous Sikh Golden Temple. Too much transpired on that journey to include in this blog, so you'll just have to wait for the book. :-) We thoroughly enjoyed all of the locations and had a lot of great days just exploring and soaking up the local cultures. McLeod Ganj is a huge Tibetan refugee outpost, and our few hours spent at the Tibetan Children's Village there were a highlight of the entire journey. Sadly the Dalai Lama was teaching in Ladakh and not in residence, but I'm committed to getting an audience with him one of these days. Also sitting during prayer inside Amritsar's Golden Temple on the pond was extremely spiritual. So many beautiful colors and sounds whirling around in there.

We bid India a short goodbye (knowing we'd return in late November for a month or so) and headed out on yet another red eye, this time to our favorite SE Asian city: Bangkok, baby! We arrived safely and were so happy to be back. It's very refreshing and a bit eerie to be transported to such an exotic, faraway place that feels like home. I guess we really are world travelers, especially when you consider that the hotel where we'd stayed in Jan. '06 had reserved the exact same room we had 1.5 years ago and even still had us in their system with our old address. Too funny! When we first came to Bangkok in Nov. '05, we hated it: The smells, the traffic, the pollution, the heat, the sounds. But after having been in places like Cairo and Addis, this wacky city now takes on an angelic sort of glow.

In our first seven hours back in the Land of Smiles, we lived a complete deja vu. We'd just walked a few blocks down Silom Rd. near our hotel, and I said, "Hey, there's where I got my pedicure last year, that's where you got your haircut, there's our 7/11, I remember that front desk guy, etc." Too funny! Little comforts like that go a long way after where we've been lately.

Having done the typical tourist circuit last time we visited, we opted to chill out a lot this time around, often frequenting the plethora of slick, modern, fabulously air-conditioned malls complete with their massively tasty food courts, killer gelato, and multiplex cinemas. We also got our share of Thai massage almost nightly.

We did take a great day trip out to the former capital of Ayutthaya, where we rented bikes and rode around ancient temples, eating pad Thai from a street vendor and riding the 3rd-class local train with the rest of Thailand. We also took a great walking tour of the less-visited Thonburi neighborhood on the other side of the Chao Praya River. We toured a great temple there where we fed fish and turtles hunks of funky sausage on sticks, then sat at another temple in front of the largest golden Buddha I've seen to date. I never tire of watching Thailand's saffron-clad monks wandering the streets or sharing a standing-room only space with me on the ferry boats that ply the river.

Next stop was China: Were we prepared for the Communist land of long-lost Mao? The endless coughing and street spitting? The throngs of people? The Szechwan food that burns your lips? The world's dirtiest public toilets? Only time would tell...

My True Calling

Back in Nairobi after safari, we contemplated our next move. We were feeling the draw toward the coast and longed to explore Kenya's beaches. We'd heard Lamu was nice but expensive; Malindi pretty but overrun with Westerners; and Mombasa more developed and touristy. After several trips to a travel agent we'd befriended downtown, we still weren't sure it was the "vacation" we wanted. (Is there such a thing as "vacation" when you're traveling for this long? I think not...but I digress.)

After several meetings in Henry's agency, we'd narrowed it down to several Mombasa beach resorts for an 11-day adventure due to cost and travel considerations. Lamu was proving to be expensive to fly, Zanzibar followed as a close second in this regard, and thus Mombasa became the buzz word. But something wasn't really jiving with me about it.

A few weeks earlier I'd caught wind, thanks to Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree forum, of a volunteer center named Takatifu Gardens operating in remote western Kenya. The place was run by Quakers who'd built a community center in a small village near Kakamega, and were looking for people to come help them teach English in primary schools. They also did work with a nearby orphanage. The opportunity sounded challenging, low-maintenance, and just what David and I had envisioned for part of our time in Africa. We'd left the States with a goal to put ourselves to good use in countries that needed it most. No one could argue that Kenya was one of those places.

I had emailed Fran, one of the leaders of the center, and started my inquiry before we'd even arrived in the country. Were there a lot of bugs? What was the toilet situation? How would we get there? How much did it cost? What exactly would we be doing with the kids? My questions were lengthy, but Fran proved diplomatic and even downright nice from the get go. I thought this might be the perfect opportunity for us to put ourselves to really good use in a country that desperately needed our help.

As the days wore on, and we grew weary of Nairobi, David could sense the debate running rampant in my head. We would leave Henry's office after another round of discussions on the best poolside offerings and resort packages in Mombasa, and try as I might, I couldn't really embrace the idea of luxuriating on a beach. "I can tell your heart isn't in it, honey," said my astute husband. "You want to go to Takatifu, right?" He'd nailed it on the head, known it all along, but he could see the fear in my eyes. "It's the bus ride that's holding you back, huh?" Yep, I nodded, a big lump in my throat.

Who wouldn't be a bit gun shy after enduring a week plus on Kenya's dusty, bumpy, mostly unpaved roads? We'd been back four days from safari, and my internal organs still hadn't shifted back to their original positions. We'd witnessed countless overloaded matatus (Kenya's decrepit, horribly unsafe version of the minibus) hurtling towards us in attempts to pass big rigs on crowded "highways." We'd swerved to avoid donkeys and any other creatures that wandered along the roadside. We'd been hassled several times by the ever-so-corrupt police at roadside "checkpoints." Driving in Kenya wasn't a fun or relaxing experience, and if it were that traumatic in a private safari minivan, I shuddered to envision what a public bus would be like.

Worry aside, we made the bold choice to ditch the sun and sand and instead brave the way to the countryside to put ourselves to good use for a week. I can tell you now it was the best decision I've ever made, not to mention the most rewarding experience of my life. The bus, despite being over an hour late and arriving nine hours later at our destination, wasn't so bad, but it was downright scary at times. Those crazy drivers can do unimaginable things with a rumbling large vehicle over a lot of red dirt. We were the only Westerners on board. Somehow this endeared us to our Kenyan neighbors; we got a lot of smiles and shared cookies with the kids. We befriended a local who kindly let us use his cell phone to alert Fran and his wife, Kim, of our delayed arrival.

When we arrived in Khayega near the only gas station in town (our pre-established meeting point), it had been raining for the last hour and the sun had sadly set. I can't describe what I felt as the driver pulled up to the side of the road and announced this was our drop-off point. David eeked out a small grin, I grabbed my pack and hoped for the best. We were the only white people amid a see of dark African faces along a remote rural road in even remoter western Kenya. It was pitch black outside. We felt vulnerable, and rightly so. But no sooner had we alit from the bus than Fran and Kim approached with a friendly, "Hello!" and we were whisked off to the safety of the Land Cruiser.

It's now the beginning of October while I write this entry (so far behind!), but the memory of our eight days there in July is so fresh in my mind. Our time in Shinyalu, Kenya, was awesome, life-changing, emotional, rewarding, and a thousand other adjectives I won't list here. Our Takatifu friends are Fran and Kim, a seriously nice and fun Australian couple who run the place; Ulrike, an inquisitive warm German woman; Casey, a funny outgoing dude from Texas; Karl and Rosie, a Kenyan brother and sister with the warmest smiles you've even seen; and Gidi, a Kenyan guy who never made us stop laughing.

These people are awesome, and we truly felt part of a community while we lived there. We shared meals, stories, and games together, and respected each other's quiet times. When we weren't working with the kids, we put ourselves to good use bettering the community center. I started in on weeding, which I loved despite the bugs, while David employed his art school talent to paint both door signs for our rooms and the larger project of the handicapped bathroom. I helped him out with the bathroom when I'd finished my gardening projects, and together, we put on a pretty mean three coats of what we dubbed "African cream" over the course of a few days.

On our second-to-last day there, 21 kids from an orphanage in Kakamega came to Takatifu Gardens for a day of fun. One of the little girls, Lilian, is only four but HIV positive--not uncommon in Africa but tough to swallow. You hear about these kids on Oprah or in the American news, but you don't really grasp the concept of their pain until you look at their faces and see it first-hand. This little angel has suffered so much in such a short time, and I could see it in her eyes as she sat in a chair next to me.

I watched her for a long while, a blank look on her face, until she caught sight of a group of ladies walking down the dirt road near the soccer field where we'd gone to play games (and of course, soccer!). Once the women caught sight of her, you knew something was up. They came running over smiling from ear to ear; one of the women scooped Lilian up in her arms. I asked Elizabeth, the social worker with us, what was going on. She responded that these ladies were all close friends of Lilian's mother before she died of AIDS. They recognized Lilian because she used to live in this village near the soccer field. The tears welled up in my eyes in an instant. You could feel the love pouring out from these women into this little child, and you could feel this little child light up from their hugs and kisses. Familiar faces meant so much.

It wasn't long before I witnessed another moving moment. Lilian's grandmother--poor, uneducated, and unable to care for Lilian--arrived at the soccer field. Lilian's face lit up once again as she was showered by love from a familiar person. I felt my tears coming yet again. To see this woman embrace her grandchild, knowing that she, too, had lost her own child--this child's mother--was heartbreaking and almost more than I could take. How to get through this supposedly happy day without feeling completely miserable and bogged down by the sadness of it all? It's one of the intense challenges Africa posed, and a dilemma I'll never quite understand.

Elizabeth told me that one of the orphanage's goals is to teach existing family members how to care for these children so they can stay with them for several weeks during the year. It's the orphanage's goal to keep these kids connected to whatever family remains whenever possible. For Lilian, it's a difficult task, as caring for an HIV-positive child in rural Africa presents a host of challenges. The grandmother has to be taught to give Lilian her daily meds, and to cook her meals that keep her healthy and won't upset her immune system. Tough to do when you're uneducated and live in a mud hut with no electricity and scant money.

David and I were particularly moved by the story of another boy, 10-year-old Eugene, a street kid who showed up at Takatifu one night homeless and hungry. His father had been arrested for murder, although we hear it was a fight where he hit another man, who fell and hit his head and then died as a result of his injuries. Now Eugene's village and relatives have disowned him; in western Kenya, it's customary to banish from the village the remaining relatives of a murderer. It doesn't matter that you're only 10 with nowhere to go and no one to care for you. Eugene miraculously found Takatifu, who in turn searched out this orphanage where he now lives. That's how Takatifu made the connection to Carmel, the orphanage director, who's really more of an angel than an administrative person. An aboriginal woman in her 70s from Australia, she's a true "everywoman" who's given these kids a new lease.

At the soccer field it was mostly the boys who played ball (David was in heaven, having been away from sports for so long) while the girls jumped rope. I talked forever with Carmel, and boy, did she have stories to tell. We walked back to Takatifu along the village road and got quite a few stares. But after being there all week in rural western Kenya, it didn't bother me anymore. In fact, it felt like we lived and belonged there...so cool!

We fed the kids a huge rice-and-beans-and-greens lunch, which they gobbled down, then most of them watched a movie on Fran's laptop. I went outside after a bit, and most of the girls (ages 4-12) were sitting outside bored in the sun. I went back inside to check with Casey to see if we had any art supplies. When he nodded "yes," I returned to ask the girls if they'd like to draw. The answer was a resounding YES! So I gathered up the scraps of paper I could find and the half-sharpened pencils and dying pens, and they were happy as clams. A few of the boys even joined in.

It was a sight to see, these poor kids sitting on the edge of the planter boxes in the hot African sun, using their knees and hands as bases for holding their paper, barely able to squeak ink out of the pen or pencil but creating images nonetheless. It made me think of all the excess toys and "things" most kids in the U.S. have, and I just got really emotional seeing these poor kids so appreciative of the barest of art supplies. They could teach all of us a lesson about gratitude, believe me.

I became enamored with two sisters, Rosy (7) and Stella (10), whom I was considering adopting were it not for the fact that (a) Adopting kids in Kenya is really tough, as the government is rife with corruption, extorts money from Westerners (it's supposed to cost $6,000 per child but can go as high as $50,000!), and it can take two years to sort out; (b) David would like to start with younger kids and raise them earlier, which I can understand; and (c) We are still traveling for a while, and I'm not sure where I'd stow two small Kenyan children in our backpacks. Ah, such obstacles!

I can't even begin to describe how those eight days has changed me (and us). I was so at peace in that jungle village, even despite having to shower from boiled water in a bucket; dealing with the horrible smell and dirt of pit toilets; and fighting off some bugs at times (although not many). Not to mention that life in rural Africa is, well, downright DIFFERENT!!! In hindsight, these things pale in comparison to what we received in the way of an amazing life-altering experience.

The Kenyan government only recently made primary education free. Prior to that action, most children in rural areas couldn't afford to attend school. Now with it being more accessible, schools are teeming with smiling, inquisitive kids who, for the most part, really want to learn. Sadly you also witness things such as a 15-year-old tall, skinny boy crammed into a class of little eight-year-olds, because he was never able to attend school before then and can't place into a higher class with kids his age.

It's not unusual for schools to have 750-1,200 students, with classes averaging 70 students per teacher. Top that off with the rustic conditions of the classrooms--thatched roofs, rats running around, primitive desks, and limited supplies, and you've got quite a challenge before you. In just three days we helped over 2,500 kids with their English reading...quite an accomplishment! I never tired of hearing little Kenyans read aloud, "A fat man stands to rrrub his rrribs," and smiled every time at the way they rolled their Rs with an African lilt. It was truly music to my ears.

So today, as I sit in an air-conditioned Internet cafe in Bangkok, amid the comforts of a Westernized, southeast Asian society (believe me, after where we've been these last six+ months, Bangkok is a breath of civilized fresh air), I'm reminded of our dear friends in little Shinyalu, who are with me in my heart more often than they probably know.

I miss them, I miss the friendships we made, I miss the kids, I miss being of service, and more than anything, I miss the feeling of pure bliss I experienced in finding my true calling. Save for the six-day silent meditation retreat I did several months after David and I were married, I've never felt more alive and free and in touch with my true self than when I spent those eight great days in western Kenya. Someday I will go back. And maybe we'll even adopt a child...or two...or three...