Crazy Bangkok

Here we are in the wonderfully crazy city of Bangkok!Almost had my wallet stolen out of my bag last night...we were walking back to our hotel and in a crowd when I felt one of the zips on my bag trying to be opened. I squeezed the bag in tighter and the grip released and I turned to find a young guy trying to look innocent...I told him that I knew what he was trying to do and he took off..minutes later we heard a woman screaming that her bag had been stolen.I was VERY LUCKY.
ALSO I FED MY FIRST ELEPHANT!!!!!
Just up from where we are staying we found our first elephant last night.
A litle baby girl called Bo Pong - she is 4 and was adorable!!!!We purchased sugar cane from her owner and fed her - that's how they look after them, they take them into the city to make money on the tourists buy letting them feed their elephants. The shopping here is crazy....huge departments stores all discounted...you could go mad!!!But the noise is overwhelming and the crowds even more so..

Extendo - stomach recovery

Good news - I am back in full force!
Had the hottest green curry last night ever - could not feel my lips.
I think that the lining of my stomach had to rebuild itself, but in the process it killed off any bugs. Nothing could survive in that environment!!!!
Today is our last full day in Phuket and it has been raining. We have not been able to do as much as we would have liked this week as the weather has not been kind.
But we did manage to have a swim in the Hotel Pool this morning even though it was raining - hey! we were wet anyway.
We are going to have a last swim in the Andaman sea this afternoon after another curry battle as the water is so warm it's crazy. I want to try it one more time and hold the memory with me.
Went for a walk along the beach last night and could feel the souls of those that were lost brushing past me.
I think that they are now on permanent patrol and they will be forever watchful.

Extendo - stomach Disaster

Yes....we all knew it would happen. The extendo - stomach has finally burst and sent a gurgling mess of destruction blocking many a Thai toilet in the process.The poor people of Phuket did not see this one coming...beware!!!!!It could be coming to a place near you!!!!
I have just about recovered from a bout of "whatever-the -hell-that-was" and am feeling that I can tackle my next plate of green curry at any moment.
We are not really doing much except for a horrendous amount of shopping for complete crap.It's so much fun!!
You can buy vodka cruisers here at the local 7/11 (every few metres)for two dollars. Each shop has a complete alchohol supply that would blow your mind....right next to the 50 cent chocolates and danish pastries that cost 50 cents each!!!!HEAVEN.
I am sure that we will do something cultural soon...maybe in Bangkok.
We are in an internet cafe where the lady who owns the place lost everything. Then she had to wait to have her little hole in the wall rebuilt by someone from overseas (lots of Indians and Pakistanis came in and brought out the places as the Thais could not afford to rebuild)and she moved back in, paying rent to her new landlords at a most exhorbitant fee not to mention the loan that she has to also pay off to afford two computers and an airconditioner to cool the place down.For this she must work 12 hour days and has had to put her 10 year old daughter into care as she has no time left to spend with her.
Next time you feel like complaining....don't!!!These people are doing it tough.
I could not work 12 days, seven days a week and not see my kids...and for what???They are not getting rich...they are just surviving.God bless them all.

Update from Phuket

Am now in Phuket - Patong beach.
All is well and yes....I survived the boat trips although I took so many tablets that all I could do for the next eight hours was sleep.
I cannot eat so much any more although my eyes say yes....my stomach is saying no!
The cakes and pastries here are to die for!!!
Our hotel is massive and is across the road from the main beach where the wave came in when it hit Phuket.
Everything is different.
Many shops have photos showing the devastation that the wave caused to them and stories abound.
It is very modern looking now down the main street - almost unrecognisable.
We did manage to eat at one of the restaurants we went to the last time we were here last night.The owner showed us photos of cars imbeded in the front of the shops next door and all the shit that got brought in by the waves just EVERYWHERE.How they cleaned this place up is a miracle.We went down to look at the beach this morning and I tried to picture the wave comming in.....needless to say I couldn't imagine it.
It is raining but humid...not that that will stop us shopping.

24th August 2006

I have developed the extend-o-stomach which can easily fit five times the normal amount of food and drink in it.
There are plenty of beautiful people around maling me feel quite inferior and lots of baking red raw flesh.
Food is excellent - we are eating down the road a bit where the food is 1/3 the price of the hotel stuff.
We have all learnt to snorkel and are going on a long boat trip tomorrow around to the island where they filmed "The Beach". Should be spectacular.
It is truely glorious, wish you were all here to see it for yourselves.

Adventures in Paradise

23rd August 2006
Well what can I say...we are in paradise all right.
We have spent our first full day on Phi Phi island and I am truly at a loss for words when it comes to describing the beauty of this place. We awoke to the lapping of the waves about four metres from our front door. We scored the best bungalow in the whole complex. It was the last one in the row that fronts on to the beach. All the others are behind us or slightly up the hill.
Can you believe it??!! We can open our front door to see the ocean.
We have a hammock tied up to a tree and lounge chairs out the front.
We went for breakfast at he hotel restaurant – as usual too much to choose from including the usual eggs, bacon, toast, yoghurts, fruits and pancakes and waffles.
Then there was the thai food and the sweets – danishes, banana cake, chocolate donuts…
We then went for a swim, just outside our bungalow ( did I mention that?) in the warmest water I have ever swum in. Aleks and I both learnt how to snorkel and we spent hours in the water.
The trip was a long one and it was nice to have a rest today. We had a eleven hour flight to bank, then a three hour wait a the airport to board a domestic flight to Phuket. That was another hour. Then we got picked up at the airport by a local touring company that took us to the ferry. I swear that they had time to kill so they took us on the scenic route of the back streets of Phuket. I remember getting there somewhat quicker the last time we were here. Anyway, we made it in plenty of time to get the ferry which was my personal nightmare as I know I get very seasick.
But the water was as flat as a pancake and the gods were smiling on me as that’s how it stayed for the rest of the trip.
Thank goodness as it took us three hours to get from Phuket to Phi Pi as there were a number of drop offs along the way.
We were taken very close to the location and then the boat stopped…ok, what was going on here?
At low tide the boat cannot go in close so a long boat came to pick us up. We loaded on with all our gear and rode in the final 1/3 km where we stopped again just metres from the shore. Time to get off and walk through the water for the final few metres.
Never done that before…..
After 24 hours of traveling we were quite tired. I slept like a rock that night.
One thing I must say, Everyone should do this once in their life time.
This is what it’s all about. This place is so stunningly beautiful that you cannot take it all in. No matter how many photos you take it will not be enough.
I need to take hundreds to sustain me through the rest of the year, so I can sit down when things are not going too well and remember that I was there with the beach just outside my front door ( did I mention that?).

One day to go!!!!

This time tomorrow I will be on a plane having my first white wine on my way to Thailand..yippe!!!!
Sometimes I wonder if I could ever manage to go on a trip without needing to clean every visible surface in my house before I walk out the door.
I am always so tired by the time I leave that half the thrill of finally getting to the airport is gone.
Washing, ironing, cleaning, dusting, on and on...
This time we are having someone staying in our house while we are away specifically to look after our lazy dog.
I don't know how I feel about that.I am unsure whether I like the idea, but that's the way it has to be - we have no other alternative.
I just want to get my house back in the same condition that I left it.
Say a litle prayer for me on Tuesday at about 1 oclock. That's the time I will be on a ferry going to Phi Phi island and I DO NOT want to get sea sick. Anyone that knows me will know that I get violently ill just looking at a boat so heaven help me!

From another planet

Went to a friend's birthday party tonight.
It was in the back yard, as they always have them, but as it is still August it was freezing cold the moment the sun said goodbye for the day.
Two drums were lit for a bon fire to keep us warm and we all huddled around pushing each other for warm space.
An elderly lady wearing a delightful tracksuit told me off for hogging the space in front of the fire and told me to move as she was getting cold, all this while lighting her 16th cigarette in the past hour.
I asked a friend of a friend who she was to be told that she lived next door with her daughter, her husband, who spent the night downing beer and burping as loudly as he possibly could and her daughter's son who lived in the caravan at the back of the house.
They all kept on looking at me as if I had dropped from another planet - especially the son from the caravan.
A hangi had been made and every half hour we were told that it would be another half hour before the food was ready.
We were cold and starving.
When the cue came that the food was ready, we made our way round the back of the house to see the hangi pit.The guys started to dig the dirt off the top, then remove the tin that had been insulating the food. Unfortunately whoever had prepared this feast decided in their wisdom to then put a piece of rubber backed carpet over the wire rack that held the food ( all securely covered in foil) as extra insulation to keep he heat in.
So therefore, all this food, which included beef, pork, chicken, potatoes, pumpkin etc had an amazing aroma of rubber and synthetic carpet impregnated through it.
It was enough to make you gag.
But we were all starving and frozen, so what the hell! The food was layed out, carved up in 5cm slices and everyone pretended not to notice the slight waft of rubber that was comming from the tables.
Pity I don't drink, cause at that point I needed one.
I had one small piece of beef and it felt like I was eating a piece of tyre, so I headed for the potato salad - it was cold, yet had garlic in it?? Not good at 10 pm at night.
I gave up.
I asked my husband if we could politely and quietly leave, which we did and I came home to have a hot cup of peppermint tea.
Heaven help my husband's bowels tomorrow!!!!
It was not a good night.

Goodbye Dear Friend

I visited a good friend of mine today to say goodbye, as she is leaving to return to her place of birth - Indonesia.
I met Dotty a few years ago when I was doing readings in a coffee shop in a local suburb and she hadi just brought the place from the current owner.
We hit it off straight away.She would always supply me with free coffees while ever I was at her shop and I would always supply her with free tarot readings.
I told her many things over the years which turned out to come true, like the break in she would have at the shop, her daughter getting married, her father becomming ill and finally the fact that she would sell up within a year and move back home even before she had even entertained the idea.
Dotty has always opened her heart and her friendship to me and I will miss her greatly.
I will hopefully keep in touch via the internet and she has already invited me to come and visit her in Jakarta next year.
Goodbye and good luck my friend!

Help needed!

A very good friend of my husband's needs help fast.
She has always been there for other people, giving her time, her money and her energy to help others.
Now her son has become very ill in just a matter of days and lies in a medically induced coma at "John Hunter" hospital with a potentially life threatening illness.
This is....as we can all imagine....heartbreaking.
I ask that all that read this blog please spend a few minutes sending MATT loving and healing energy and distance reiki healing.
I know that we can affect change for this young man. He has the rest of his life to live.
Please....just a few minutes.
Love and healing to you MATT - as we will so mote it be!

It's been one year...

This time last year my father was in hospital after breaking his hip.It was the beginning of the end. It has been a year since his passing. Dad died on the 21st August 2005.
I have been thinking about it this week, especially since his grave has just been finished and I have not been out to see it yet.
Do I feel my father around me? No. No signs, no messages.
I have dreamt about him, once or twice.
In the most recent dream he was very angry at me for not telling him that I knew that he was dying (cause I did'nt).I did't think that it was going to improve his last days if I told him that was going to cark it at any moment.
It has been a hard first year. My mother decided to stay in the family home - alone -something that she vowed that she would never do.
Life goes on.

Fear

The Bene-Gesserit Littainy against Fear.

"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain. "

Since I read this in a recent blog elsewhere I have seen it many times over.
It is from the book "Dune".
I really like it and thought I would share.
Makes sense when you think of it in a psychic attack perspective.

One week to Thailand!

This time next week I will be counting down the hours to take off - I am leaving on Monday night.
The biggest challenge I face is the ferry trip from Phuket to Phi Phi Island as I suffer from terrible sea sickness. But I am going to take all the pills that the doctor has supplied me with and hopefully I will be so out of it that I will not go into the horrible contorted mess that I become when I even look at a boat. Here's hoping!
I will be spending four nights on Phi Phi island, then seven nights at Phuket and four nights in Bangkok. I have been to Thailand before and am looking forward to going back. I love the mix of cultures and religion. The locals are all so generous and honest, it is lovely to spend time talking to them. They all work so hard that I feel positively lazy around them. It is always a wake up call about the issues that I complain about in my life when I see how these people work. The people of Bali are the same in this respect.For the vast majority, their lives are so hard and yet they are satisfied with their lot and just get on with it.
We have a lot to learn from their grace and dignity about life.

Where's my earing?

Spent the day in Sydney with my youngest daughter and her friend at an Animae (Japanese Cartoon Art) Convention.
I wore a pair of silver earings that I had brought the last time I was in Bali. It was the first time that I had put them on and between home and the Convention I had managed to lose one, only noticing it missing an hour into walking around the convention venue.
Well, I was pissed off and also resigned to the fact that it was lost forever.
So I took the other one off and put it in my pocket.
We decided to take a walk down to Darling Harbour for a break and to have lunch several hours later and as we walked down the steps of the hotel where the convention was being held, my daughter's friend bent down to pick up something lying on the pavement.
He turned to me and handed me my lost earing.....what are the chances of that!!!!!

In memory of....

The strangest site today....a car passed me on the road, it was a red commodore with red number plates. On the back of the car was a sign " In memory of Lyn born..... died .....R.I.P. the number plates were LYN 57P. That's how old she was when she died.
What a tribute...

A Freudian Relationship

Dear old Sigmund would have had a field day with me and my relationship with my mother.This woman must have damaged me in some strange way in my formative years as I bear the scars even today and when I see her, which is way too often as I am now her main carer, it takes me 24 hours to get over the encounter.
I know that I do not remember very much of my early childhood but I do remember suffering from high anxiety and stress ever since I can remember, even as a five year old.
Both my parents were prisoners of war and held on to their fair share of demons - unfortunately they passed many of them onto me and I have been coping with them ever since.
Another meeting with her today has left me reeling. No matter how hard I try to keep my cool, I always seem to lose it. Boy, can she press my buttons.
What a shame....
Does anyone else have such a relationship?

Goodbye Gunter!

Boo Hoo!I enjoyed the last episode of live anatomy on t.v. last Monday night. What a shame.The topic was genitalia. Gunter had a decent poke around the testicles and penis of a poor deceased man and to cap off the evening we had a quick look at the female ovaries and uterus.The worst moment of the night was when he was examining the uterus and said that he thought that because of it's unusually large size that it may contain a small embryo - to which I prayed with all my might PLEASE NOT!!!!
Thank God it didn't - that was one creepy step too far, I don't care how informative he thought it might be.But wait - if you missed out you can always buy the dvd available on ebay!!!

Creating abundance

Once upon a time in a far away land a young man went to the forest and said to his spiritual master, "I want to have unlimited wealth, and with that unlimited wealth, I want to help and heal the world. Will you please tell me the secret to creating affluence?"
And the master said, "There are two Godesses that reside in your heart and everyone is deeply in love with these two supreme beings. But there is a certain secret that you need to know, and I will tell you what it is".
"Although you love two Goddesses, you must pay more attention to one of them. She is the Goddess of Knowledge, and her name is Sarasvati. Pursue her,love her and give her sttention. The other Goddess, whose name is Lakshmi, is the Goddess of Wealth.When you pay more attention to Sarasvati, Lakshmi wil become jealous and pay more attention to you. The more you seek the Goddess of Knowledge, the more the Goddess of Wealth will seek you. She will follow you wherever you go and never leave. And the wealth you desire will be yours forever"

Deepak Chopra from his book "Creating Affluence"
P.S. Buy an occassional lottery ticket too!

Census night!

It's census night this Tuesday- where the government gets to take stock of it's citizens,that's if we don't all lie!
This time around I am putting "pagan" under 'person's religion' section for the whole family - it's probably the closest to what we are.There should be a church of universal spiritualism where all gods are one-that's the one I would belong to.

A bit of trivia about Starbucks

I have been having some discussion lately about the virtues of Gloria Jeans coffee as apposed to Starbucks. I found an interesting article on Wikepedia about the name and logo.
According to Howard Schultz's book Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built a Company One Cup at a Time, the name of the company was derived from Moby-Dick, although not in as direct a fashion as many assume. Gordon Bowker liked the name "Pequod" (the ship in the novel), but his creative partner Terry Heckler objected: "No one's going to drink a cup of Pee-quod!" Heckler suggested "Starbo," the name of a mining camp on Mount Rainier. Combining the Moby-Dick idea with "Starbo" resulted in the the company being named for the Pequod's first mate, Starbuck.

The company logo is a siren (sometimes called a mermaid, but more properly known as a melusine since she has two tails). The logo has been streamlined over the years. In the first version, the Starbucks siren had bare breasts and a fully-visible double fish tail. In the second version, her breasts were covered by hair, but her navel was still visible, and the fish tail was cropped slightly. In the current version, her navel and breasts are not visible at all, and only vestiges remain of the fish tails. The original logo can still be seen on the Starbucks store in Seattle's Pike Place Market.

Celebrating St.Brigid's Day

I celebrated with a close group of friends St.Brigid's Day last night (Imbolc - Aug 1st in the Southern Hemisphere).Imbolc is a festival that heralds in Spring and the growing sun shine. We made St.Brigid's Crosses out of raffia to be hung at home for safety and protection. Mine is now proudly hanging on my front door and will remain there till next year. As I am going away soon for a two week holiday, I will be glad of the extra protection that St. Brigid will be affording my home.
Although it looks very pagan, it is also in the shape of a cross, so my mother in law, who is devoutly catholic, will not be questioning me when she comes to visit.
St.Brigid was another pagan Goddess that the Catholics claimed as their own when Christianity came to Ireland.As the then pagan Irish would not give up honoring Brigid the Catholics thought it better to make her their own rather than banning her altogether.

Another lesson in anatomy!

My hero, Gunter, was on tv last night cutting up another dead body on the screen for all of us to see. This time it was not a "freshie" as I call them, but this one had been stored in some sort of mixture that wizzened this body up into a horrible looking manequin.We were looking at digestion and dear old Gunter started by dissecting the tongue right down to the anus.M m m m!
At one point the assisting doctor had a freudian slip moment when, I am sure he said 'tequila' instead of 'two kilos' while examining the deceased woman's liver. I am sure that he was thinking that he could probably do with one at that point and that's why it slipped out - or maybe I just did not hear it right?
Also the drama was heightened by a naked model (male) who was being used as a human canvas - an artist was drawing the digestive tract onto this young man's body.Pity he had an erection when he first stood up - poor lad. He kept his hands firmly hiding his willy for the rest of the show.
This is must see tv.
Highly recommended - can't wait till next week.