I don't have a destination, just a neverending journey...

hello world. I'm back in the 'available internet' section of Thailand and even on my own laptop! it's pretty nice...actually my computer is overheating so I think I'm going to save this and swap out for 'available expensive internet' as opposed to ruining my laptop. sigh.

okay, so it's quite warm here. I'm guessing somewhere near a hundred. woohoo. I'm getting used to it, but it doesn't make me feel any less gross and sticky. especially with the humidity consistently around 90%.

update time.
so we left for our 'hilltribe trek' a few minutes after my last post. we hopped onto a truck, stopped in a small market along the way for water and snacks, took a quick dip in a beautiful 50m tall waterfall and eventually made it to our 'begin hiking here' destination. we had a nice 3 hour trek up and down some pretty good hills before we reached our first village. it was starting to get dark, but Marissa and I still decided to take a short walk and explore the primitive village/tribe. it was really nice and peaceful. we sat and watched some children playing and having fun [which is universal...you can go anywhere and watch children play and laugh. it makes me feel so connected to these people who I guess aren't really all that different from me.] we then had to fin our way back in the pitch black, finally managed to do so, and I was feeling very deep and decided that I needed to write a journal entry. all I could find was a crumpled yellow piece of paperish wrapper, so I just used that. I won't put the whole thing in here, but there are a few parts that I think might be nice to share:

"I know it sounds a bit silly, but I feel so in tune with the world right now. it's funny how sitting under the stars and breathing warm mountain air can clear someone's head. I feel like a completely new person. or maybe I just feel more like myself without all the pressure from the outside world leaning on me. whatever it is I feel more free than I've ever felt in my life. I love this beautiful world.
I'm so tempted to just go somewhere and move into a small village in the hills. I want to finally feel a real sense of community and unity. I want to hide away from modern life and take time to love the things that we overlook as a first world society. god...just thinking about it makes my heart flutter. I'm growing incresingly tired of 'social responsibilities' and trying to please other people. I just want to live by my heart and always do what makes me happy. just do what feels right. it seems a bit sad that someone might hear me say this and think that I'm just a silly young adult figuring out my bounderies. what if there are no boundaries? what if 'when I grow up' what I really want to do is something out of the ordinary? is that really so bad? I wish that at this moment I could share all the peace, love, understanding and hope that fills my heart with the rest of the world. I wish I could make people understand what it feels like to be where I am right now. and not physically...but mentally and emotionally. I feel so incredibly alive. I feel completely okay with who I am and where I am in life right now...and it's not just because I'm traveling or have this opportunity. it's because I'm opening my mind and my heart to all these beautiful things. I can guarantee that I could be just as happy and connected anywhere in New York as I am here and now. it just makes it so much more special to actually be here and to understand that this is now and it won't last forever. and thats what makes it so beautiful.

I feel so old and still...I feel so young.
I'm the oldest I've ever been before, and yet I'm as young as I'm ever going to be again.
I'm ever evolving, ever aging and ever learning...what a beautiful thing."

after I wrote that I wandered out and joined the group for dinner. I didn't finish my soup because the chicken was still bloody but I finished the rest of my food because I was starving. afterwards we all lit paper lanterns and let them flost up into the sky. it was really pretty. we all sat around for a bit and looked at the stars, made up new constalations, and eventually made our way into our primitive room and fell asleep under our bug nets and on our cotton mats on the floor.

I woke up early the next morning to a feeling that wasn't so great. I spent most of my time in the bathroom throwing up, managed to rinse off in the 'shower' which was a bucket full of water that you dumped on yourself with a scoop to rinse off. the room was more of a cubby and everyone could look in and see you showering...which a few of the locals were doing. yay. I tried to lay down for a little while longer (we were leaving to do more trekking at 9) but couldn't fall back asleep. I tried to choke down breakfast, but it kept coming back up. I had the most incredible pain in my stomach...it felt like I was all torn up inside. I didn't know what to do. the pain got unbearable every 10-30 minutes and I couldn't even breathe then. it was the worst case of food poisoning I've ever had. I had three options...pay to go to the hospital MILES and MILES away, have a motorbike bring me to our next village or tough it out and hike the 5 hours to our next destination. I hiked. I can honestly say I think it was one of the worst experiences of my life. I shouldn't have been hiking, but by the last hour I started to feel a bit better. I ate a few crackers and enjoyed the scenery for our last few minutes. we got to a tiny village where we were to eat lunch, and I ate an entire bowl of the thai equivelent of ramen noodles. after that I started to feel better...which was fortuanate, because the next 22km of our trip was by elephant. I took the neck of the elephant and Marissa got the seat on the elephants back...she didn't seem too psyched to be on the neck...and we slowly bumped along through the jungles of Thailand. it was a really cool experience and it was beautiful, I'm sure that if I had been feeling better I would have enjoyed it much more...but that's life. we did a bit more hiking afterwards and eventually ended up at our next overnight hilltribe village. I took a bit of a nap, rinsed myself off in the river running through the village, went for a stroll through the village with the group and ate a little bit of dinner. after dinner we all sat in a circle and played word games, painted eachother with charcoal, everyone but me had a few drinks and we went to bed on cotton mats and wood floors again.
I felt quite a bit better the next morning, ate some breakfast and packed my bag for our all day bamboo river rafting trip. we all wandered down to the water, tested out the boats...had to add some more bamboo to one that was sinking...and eventually headed downriver with bamboo poles in hand to push. we all took turns rowing and enjoying the scenery, we went through some pretty fast rapids, our boat broke and needed to be repaired at one point and quite a few hours later we made it to our meetup spot. we had some late lunch and hopped in the vans for our 2 hour drive back to ChaingMai. the night was mellow and everyone did their own thing and went to bed (yes, real beds!) pretty early.
the next day a bunch of us woke up early and went to take a Thai cooking class. we made curries, soup, sticky rice with mango and padthai. it was all amazing and I have the recipies...so I'll make some for people when I get home! Marissa and I wandered off and got a pretty painful traditional Thai massage, wandered around the markets a bit and met back up with the group. our guide brought us to a seafood buffet, but since I'm allergic I was out of luck. another couple and an english guy (Rob) didn't feel like having seafood so we all wandered down the road a ways and found a thai resteraunt. we ate, got dessert in a market and took a tuktuk back to the hotel. Rob and I talked till pretty late into the night and then I went to bed.
we left early the next day by local bus for Tha Ton. we went to a local Long Neck Keren village (women have metal around their necks to make them longer...I have pictures) and to a few temples and got to see some very large buddahs. we had just enough time to eat dinner before the power went out, so we all sat around by candlelight talking and then went to bed at a reasonable hour.
left early again the next morning by long tail boat for our 96km journey into ChaingRai. we had two boats for 14 people, and the water was so shallow that we kept getting stuck in the sand and had to get out and push the boat to freedom. it was fun, but tiring. four and a half hours later we arrived in ChaingRai, got some lunch and took a bus to the Golden Triangle. we took a smaller boat across the river into Laos for the day, came back and went to the Opium museam in Thailand and took the bus back to ChaingRai for the Night Baazar and diner. we stayed at the market pretty late, got back and had some wine and eventually went to bed.
this morning we woke up very early to catch a bus back to ChaingMai. first we decided to have breakfast at the hotel restaurant. bad move. the staff had no clue what they were doing and another girl from the group and I ended up helping out in the kitchen to get things done in time to catch the bus. everyone said I was the best waitress that they've had all trip...sadly I didn't get any tips. haha. we barely made it to the bus in time but made it to ChaingMai nevertheless.
so...here I am. hot, tired and to be honest my stomach is still a bit messed up. we have one more full day of the tour and then Marissa and I head off on our own again to explore a bit. this time we head south and east towards Cambodia and eventually into Vietnam. I'm very excited. then it's goodbye to Marissa and hello to Hong Kong and China! I still have half my trip left! haha.
so...I'm going to get some food and take a shower. we're just killing time right now before we catch our overnight train to Bangkok later on tonight.
I miss everyone and I'll try to stay in touch!
<3

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