On The Road To Find Out

E is for Eeyore, and Emily.

2009-12-18T11:41:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was my 23rd birthday, and I have to confess, I dislike my birthday; it is as Eeyore says, "the worst day of the year". Beyond being a young child (the days of troll-themed birthday parties, dollar-store gifts, ice-cream cakes and goody-bags to end the day) I have not enjoyed a single birthday. There will be moments during the day that are sweet, but the majority of the moments seem to be spent crying the remainder of the tear quota from the year of life past, or trying really hard not to cry until tears are just pouring down your face and people are looking at you oddly. It is fully the gloomiest day of the year, preceded only once so far in 2005 by the three days of my graduation. I don't know what it is. Maybe the pressure of other peoples expectations; expectations that it will be the best day of the year, expectations that you are super stoked that however many years ago you survived being born, really, it is my mom that should be getting the high fives and cakes and flowers every December 17th, not me.

I find that on my birthday I become overly introspective, and think about how much I didn't do in the past year of my life, and how many opportunities I let slip. It is kind of a day of mourning. Not that I am getting old, I don't mind that so much, but more just about the time that has passed and the fewness of things I have done- and then I feel guilty because, again, everyone else is so excited and expecting you to be so happy as well- and then, people are super disappointed when they find out that you are going home (after working on your birthday) to sit on your couch alone and watch Disney movies. Is it bad that that is what I want to do? My good friend at work cheered me up with a rendition of a gloomy day song that her stuffed Eeyore sings.

Being 23 now, I am ready to grow up and do my birthdays my way. I have a game plan for the years to come, and I am going to not expect every year to be different. It is hard to be a downer on the one day when everyone else around you is being so cheery for your sake, especially when your disposition on the other 364 days of the year generally leans towards extreme happiness.

Having now made all of the above statements let me back it up a little and clarify a few things. I appreciate everyones well wishes and thoughts, and I cherish the opportunity to reconnect with close friends from across the world. Also I love other peoples birthdays and making a big deal of them. Hypocritical? Peut-etre. I just don't like it when it's about me, I become an emotional wreck once a year. God knows I will never survive my own wedding.

This past week was focused on the virtue of purpose, and I had a lot of really insightful and poignant things to say about it, but I guess the purpose of this post changed when I began writing. Pat on the back for me tho because it was a good purposeful week, up until yesterday. This week is self-discipline. Start a new year on the right foot.

living life loyally

2009-12-10T15:38:00.000-08:00

So this last week has been super exciting and productive and revealing. Since I last wrote I have been attempting to focus on the virtue of loyalty, I have been to a wedding in Calgary, won grand prize at my work's casino night, got a job in China, mostly sorted out university for the fall, celebrated numerous birthdays, played musical bingo at a seniors home with junior youth, read the most recent NatGeo and made significant advances on Super Mario Bros Wii. What virtue?

Really tho, I definitely notice myself getting back into the mindset of virtues as the last few weeks have progressed; learning to really work with them and use them, that will come later. It all starts in the head right?

Loyalty is interesting. Makes you think of dogs? Yeah me too. Why? Because dogs are loyal. Why? Because they stick to, love, and sometimes protect (depending on their breed and disposition and size), the person that feeds them and takes care of them. Okay, if that is the basis of loyalty I am able to come up with then to be loyal I must stick to, love, and sometimes protect(?), both my parents and God. Because they have fed me and taken care of me collectively. Barring my logic making sense to anyone else my theory is (kind of) backed up in numerous quotes in Sacred Moments such as:

'The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,

his mercies never come to an end;

they are new every morning;

great is your faithfulness.'

Lamentations 3

There is another beautiful quote from the Bible, Proverbs 4, that resonated with me all week:

'More than all else, keep watch over your heart, since here are the wellsprings of life.'

The above quote reminded me of Baha'u'llah saying in Gleanings:

'Out of the whole world He hath chosen for Himself the hearts of men.'

The two quotes seem so intimately linked though they have come from religious teachings thousands of years separate; proof that there is one God with one unfolding religion for mankind? Loyalty seems to be more driven by the heart than by actions or the mind, and so it makes me think about what I really have my heart set on and therefore how that is influencing to what or who I feel most loyal.

If my heart is the well spring of life and I have my heart set on, an individual, an idea, a desire, how dangerous for my own well being could that be. And if my heart is the well spring of life and I allow God to have that one piece of me which He has chosen then what a content and harmonious existence I can begin to live. Deep.

On what will seem like a completely unrelated note to you, I have just recently downloaded Ocean into my computer which I haven't had for years. Ocean is a free software library of religious scripture and literature from around the world that you can download onto your computer. It is really a brilliant tool and has kept me completely occupied and engaged for hours now. I would like to blame that for the scattered nature of this post, I kept getting distracted by Ocean. Better than Nintendo I guess.

Next Thursday I will review my week of purposefulness which begins today.

orderly conduct

2009-12-05T00:50:00.000-08:00

Back in November- earlier this week- I was spending an unassuming evening- mostly by the fire stove- at my parents' house in Armstrong. As is not unusual in my character I was complaining. This nights complaint was about my wild and un-styled hair that seems to be becoming more uncooperative as the weather cools and the winter air dries out. My mom, who also suffers from wild hair (perhaps a case even more severe than mine) looked at me without missing a beat and stated with a smile, "Better to have the crazies on the outside of your head than the inside!" Then barely waiting for acknowledgement to her witty retort she turned and went downstairs, leaving me with her profound words of wisdom penetrating deep into my being.

As much as I am light-hearted and jesting about this story, the words really did stick with me all week and they came to be quite useful; like a mantra of sorts. Let me elaborate.

The virtue of this week was order. I have had strong organizational, logical, and systematic tendencies since I was young- I prefer not to use the term obsessive. I have expressed my penchant for order all throughout my life in my constant list-making, my use of daily organizers, the way I arrange my closet, the daily routines I create for myself, the way I show every step of my math homework no matter how easy it is and for how many years I have been doing it, the way I keep things that contain records but throw away everything else others may consider sentimental, clutter is destructive. I think that it is fair to say that I have a natural inclination towards order, and yet nowhere near being a, uh, a... 'master' of order even after almost 23 years of being good at it. Like other things if you don't practice, and reflect, you won't get better at it. So for this week I stayed focused on such things as: using simple methods to create order, subtracting things from my life in order to live soulfully, and enjoying the beauty and order of creation.

As the week went on I began to notice that despite my outward tendencies towards order my inner being, my mind and my emotions can easily become chaotic and woefully disorganized, but with the help of quotes from Sacred moments and my mother's words of wisdom ringing in my ears, I tried to pay attention to creating order within myself. In moments where my environment was uncontrollably disorderly, instead of giving in I tried to rise above, you know.

As one small example even when it was too late to clean my messy room, I prayed before I slept. This is hard for me, I like tidy rooms, and I especially like tidy spaces to pray in, but I let the crazies stay on the outside and kept the inside in order. Some nights I am too tired to clean and pray, so I let the prayers take the trump this week and I consistently slept better and felt better. Weird? Probably not.

Speaking of sleeping and praying and cleaning it is late and I am tired and I am flying to Calgary for a wedding in the morning so in honour of being somewhat orderly about my life I should wrap it up and go to sleep, after cleaning, and praying. Also as a somewhat ironic side note, it has taken me four sittings over two days to actually write this blog. That is how organized I am (NOT).

I particularly like the serenity of this quote from Jose Ortega Y Gasset, "Order is not pressure which is imposed on society from without, but an equilibrium which is set up from within."

This week coming up will focus on the virtue of loyalty.

a kind of kindness

2009-11-26T21:47:00.000-08:00

In the past week I have become acutely aware of two of my most extreme character flaws -- well three, if I count my tendency to use excessive amounts of dish soap to wash painfully few dishes; I always do have the cleanest dishes though. One of the flaws is really more of a bad habit, a minor flaw, and only aggravating to myself. The other one, needs seriously, for my peace of mind as well as for the comfort and well being of those who have to interact with me, to be addressed.

So I am going to refocus my mind on the daily virtues in the book by Linda Kavelin Popov 'Sacred Moments', which was previously the back bone of my blogs, as well as a renewing, and hopefully, productive way to live each day. (I have decided that focusing on the bad, will only glorify it and it seems pointless to be keeping who I don't want to be at the front of my mind. We will see how this goes.)

Diving right in, the virtue of this past week has been kindness. I don't know if it is that I am rarely kind, or if I was just having an overly morose and self-centered week, but focusing on being kind was an unexpected challenge. At least if I was not as kind as I should have been in all situations, I noticed and acknowledged how unkind I was. I noticed the kindness in people around me and that made me feel better. For instance, I saw an older man drop his bag of groceries on a busy street and a young guy with headphones in and neon hightops on chased an apple down the pavement and brought it back to the man. I know this is a brief and superficial look into kindness but I am in a limbo between exhaustion and needing to get this written so I can mentally move on to next(this) weeks virtue: order.

Also late last week Florence passed away. The funeral was a suitably peaceful event as she was 97 years old and had passed in her sleep, but it definitely made me stop and pause and re-examine a lot of what I am doing with my life. In my previous post about Florence, I ended by saying that I had her by my side and I knew there was nothing she couldn't teach me. I pray that she is still by my side.

happy happy hippy.

2009-11-09T23:18:00.000-08:00

It is interesting how much happens around and to us for no apparent reason. So I would like to take this moment to ponder the unapparent, because nothing happens for no actual reason does it?

I wrote the above lines about half an hour ago and have sat here staring at the computer and coming up with a million elusive thoughts on the idea- each of which mean nothing, and lead nowhere, and are simply evanescent musings that I already know will lead to no conclusion or greater understandings. So I pondered like I said I would, I hope you did the same.

The thought came to my mind because when I got home tonight I was so happy. Like almost painfully happy. Embarrassing happy, where you can't stop smiling and just want to laugh out loud. (On a side note, laughing is so weird. It is an odd stuttering staccato noise that we make in our throats to express joy... it is weird when you think about it.) It could have been all of the caffeine-heavy black tea and sugar I consumed in the last two hours, but I think it was also joy. And it was for no apparent reason. And I really mean that. There are many reasons that I can think of to be happy about life, but there was no visible reason for me to be so happy at that moment (except the caffeine). Life in general is just good, and full of goodness at the moment.

The junior youth girls are a large part of that goodness. I am so in awe. Last Thursday we got together and did a quick tour and meet and greet at Heritage Square, which is a seniors residence here in town where we are going to volunteer. The girls were so polite and comfortable and excited to be there. I got the chance to meet the moms tonight. I have known some of them for years and gotten to know a couple more over the last few weeks, but as of tonight I have met them all. And they are all great, and supportive, and awesome, and wonderful.

Friends are another part of the goodness. Friends that I have known since I didn't know myself, friends who have gone through the good and the bad, friends who I wont see for another ten years, friends who I haven't seen in five years, friends who I can call after a nightmare at 3am and will talk to me until I fall asleep again, friends who make me laugh, and friends who send you an email just when you need it. (So I started this whole friends paragraph not really knowing what I was writing and then I just realized that the song that had started playing on my iTunes DJ was See My Friends by the Kinks - this is why I shouldn't write with music on.)

The possibilities of the future contribute to my goodness.

The Starbucks girl that brought free samples into my work today huuugely contributed to my goodness.

The following week will be a good one.

I think the caffeine is worn off, because now I just feel regular happy.

back in the game?

2009-10-30T01:11:00.000-07:00

I feel like recently I have been doing so many things, and I write so much in my mind, but I have stopped taking the time to sit and actually put my mental blogs into type. Despite everything that I have been doing, I can not even claim that I have not had the time, I guess I have just not had the 'oomph'; then it gets to the point where I have so many things that I want to write about, and I don't know where to start, so it feels safer just not to write. Despite being such a spontaneous and capricious individual I have a few obsessive organizational tendencies that can be somewhat of a hindrance to just getting things done...

I want to write more frequently, not for you, the readers', sake, but rather for my own. I think better when I write.

Something that has been such an inspiration in my life recently is the junior youth group I have recently started 'animating'. On average there are six junior youth (aka juyu) who attend, and they are from an assortment of backgrounds and families, but they are all girls and they range from sixth to eighth grade. We get together once a week after school and are slowly working our way through a work book called 'Breezes of Confirmation' while doing yoga, arts, service projects, and of course having deep and meaningful conversations. Every week the girls leave me with so many things to think about and reflect upon in my own self, as well of course as society as a whole.

In last weeks lesson the final activity was to write a paragraph about what you wanted to be when you grew up and why. The girls were fandastik! We had a human rights lawyer, astronaut, astronomer, teacher, singers, and actresses. And then there was me. It struck me that it was so simple for these girls to write down their dreams and future careers and be so sure about them, while I sat with my work book in front of me thoroughly stumped and puzzled and chewing on the back of my pencil. What happens between being eleven and twenty-two. How do you become so much less sure of everything in your life the older you get? Does this happen to everyone or is it just me?

I am dead certain about many things that I want to do; I want to travel, I want to be of service to humanity, and I want to raise a family. So do I just pick a career that I am not passion about but would be good at just to do something? So much emphasis is put on loving what you do and therefore having a happy life, but I think I could love anything I do, so that does not narrow it down. I can be passionate and happy doing whatever needs to be done, so how do I make a choice?

So basically what I am trying to say is I don't know. I know that I am flying out of the country on January fourth, and I think that I will apply to some universities before I leave so that I can always come back to one in the fall. Or not.

Also, back to the juyu girls... Every single one of them is great. They are so full of idea's and energy and really bright girls who look forward to getting together every week and spending time with each other. Many times when we are done everything we have planned for the afternoon we will all just sit downstairs together and talk and talk and talk and talk. As bright and caring as each of them is, I have noticed a tendency towards 'white lies' come up almost every week in one form or another. They are really not harmful things at all, and by 'white lies' I mean spotless white, white to the extent that they will openly talk about it to me or even the parents because that is how 'acceptable' these lies are. Maybe it is not a big deal and I should just let it pass, but it feels like something that should be addressed. Perhaps I am just too hard lined and don't really accept any bending of the truth at all, but I don't really know. I don't want to make the girls feel bad either, because they are not meaning any harm, and I don't think that anyone in their lives has ever broached this behavior as unacceptable, so I don't want to dwell on it or point any of them out specifically... What do I do?

It is now very late and I have not really written anything very interesting or cohesive, but bear with me if you like and maybe it will get better!

Does anyone want to take the world and act on it? Lao-tzu

2009-09-11T10:26:00.000-07:00

While I was baking some scrumptious boysenberry-whitechocolate-spelt scones this morning I had three things on my mind:

1. I need an apron.

2. How will I get my regular sized baking sheet to fit into my apartment sized oven.

3. September 11.

Accepting my seven-year old navy Maxwell sweatpants, with holes in at least three places, as an acceptable place to wipe my flour covered hands and finding a muffin tin that fits in the oven just fine, and not being picky about the shape of my scones, I moved the trivial items aside in my mind and have spent a lot of time contemplating the date today.

Eight-years and five hours ago I was a blonde, lipsmackers wearing, ninth-grader about two weeks into living at my new home; an international boarding school. My new best friend, a fellow blonde, lipsmackers wearer, was, along with probably one third of the school's population that year, American. I had never heard of the World Trade centers, and genuinely thought that The Pentagon was something from the movies. That morning was probably no more unique for myself than most other fourteen-year-old-Canadian girls, with one exception, having just moved into an international home on Vancouver Island, there was not a moment of finger pointing, or hatred, or judgements towards anyone middle-eastern or muslim. The year proceeded, as it always will, winter break came by and there were indeed airplanes flying and airports open so most kids could get home to see their families and in Social Studies we memorized maps of all the continents and the capitals of every African, European, South-American, and Middle-Eastern country.

Over the years nine/eleven has come to mean something different for everyone, but something I hope that the american-nationalist, the blonde-canadian, the african-american, the muslim-american, the iraqi mother-of-four, the conspiracy-theorist, and the skeptic can all agree on is that it was a tragedy. I have the utmost respect and gratitude and admiration for those who were first responders on that day, and those who lost family or friends, so this is in no way an attempt to deflect the much deserved gratitude towards those heroes, however, the tragedy that occurred on this day and the way it derailed the lives of so many here in North-America is but a small insight into the fear and confusion and uncertainty that so much of the world lives in on a daily basis.

Did you know that the coffee that we drink today comes, originally, from Ethiopia. Did you know that according to equatorcoffee.ca more than half of Canada's citizens consume one to four coffee beverages a day. In 1994, in the United States, there were approximately $7.5 billion dollars in coffee sales. Did you know that according to the UN Human Development Index of 2006 Ethiopia ranked 170 out 177 poorest countries in the world. The average Ethiopian lives on less than one dollar a day.

Did you know that despite the fact that according to UNICEF 26% of children in Niger will die before they turn five years old, it is considered a 'safe' african country because of its 'fledgling democracy' and relative political stability.

Did you know that Venezuela has more murders per year than any other country in the world. According to dailymail.co.uk there were 130 murders for every 100,000 residents. South Africa is next on the list with 62 murders for the same number of residents. That is less than half as many.

I am reading a great book right now called 'The Chinese Religion and the Baha'i Faith' and in it there is a quote by Baha'u'llah which says, 'Be ye the fingers of one hand, the members of one body.' The author of this book elaborates saying,

'It is obvious that there is a great diversity of form and function in a body as reflected in its various parts- hands, legs, ears, the backbone, and so on. Although one treasures one's sensory organs such as eyes and ears much more than one's legs and hands, yet all receive the full support of the body. If one of our toes is bruised accidentally while walking, the whole body feels the pain and may be immobilized for a while because all the organs and sensory perceptions rush to the aid of the toe. Similarly, if one applied this attitude to the people in the world, we would no longer live in a world where people ignore the sufferings of others but rather rush to one another's aid whenever one part of humankind was ailing.'

I guess that all I am hoping is that while we are thankful for those who gave their lives to save lives and we remember those who lost their lives in New York on September 11, 2001, we also begin to notice some of the pain that the rest of humanity lives with on a daily basis. Whether it is just by becoming more aware yourself, saying a prayer, taking a moment to meditate, or become involved with a charity... begin to notice the rest of our human family.

freecell frivolity and my father

2009-06-21T10:06:00.000-07:00

Man it feels good to get an early start every day and be awake for a few hours before I have to be at work. It feels like I have so much time to get everything done and be really productive. It is fantastic! I could do all my 'to-dos' before 11:00am, I could learn a new language, I could go to the Farmers Market, I could run- or maybe walk fast- up Turtle Mountain, I could pray and meditate, I could write in my blog everyday!

Instead, I drink coffee and play hours of Freecell. It is a sad reason to get up at 8:00 in the morning. I do, on the up side, have a very impressive win percentage these days.

So today, the first official day of summer, the longest day of the year, and father's day, will also be recorded as stop-playing-freecell-and-actually-do-things-that-matter-in-life day.

I was going to write a few things about my dad since it is father's day today. I admire so many qualities in my dad and he has been a role model to me in so many virtues: acceptance, patience, excellence, creativity, humility, wisdom, and tact, and many more. I could ramble on with stories from my childhood and try to give you an idea of who I see my dad to be, but as Howard Colby Ives has said, "Memory has pictures which words may never paint."

So I will leave it at that and if I will forever remember one thing that my father has taught me thru out my life it is that where ever you go there you are.

The virtue of this week is Faith.

sunshine smiles

2009-05-28T15:41:00.000-07:00

The internet isn't working right now. I am not upset since it really isn't my internet; I have just been picking up wireless from my neighbours since we moved into this apartment. It reminds me of living on the boat when I would write my ridiculously long emails in Microsoft Word and then when they were all ready I would hook up to the cellphone that we had as a modem and spend less than five minutes actually online sending emails and downloading new ones to read onto my desktop.

As relaxing as life at sea can be, I learned how to complete many every day tasks in unfathomably short periods of time. For example, showering became an art form which I was able to master; I could wash my hair, face, body, condition my hair, and shave in four minutes. The need for speed here was that on the boat we had limited water, and when we were at a marina the showers generally cost two dollars for two minutes. So two twoonies later I would be squeaky clean and ready for another week at sea. I also became adept at washing dishes and preparing meals at an amazingly efficient rate. Like I mentioned before we had limited fresh water on board so the quick dishwashing was to remedy the water situation, and the quick cooking was because the stove and oven only worked when the large generator- not something that happened frequently or lasted for any substantial duration. Oh the woes of a cook at sea.

It was almost a year ago exactly that I was working on the boat and my memories, as they always seem to be, are quite joyful ones. Joyfulness can be easy to find in memories, and I also find it easy to become joyful when thinking of things to come in the future. Something for me to practice then is to be joyful in the present.

I am planning my move to China right now and I am having a hard time narrowing down where I should move. China is a relatively large country and I really am armed with no specific needs to send me to any one city. I know I am going to be quite lonely there at times, and as always being so far away from home and anything familiar I have no doubts that there will be times when I get homesick. Abdu'l-Baha has a quote that I came across this week that says joy gives us wings; and that in times of joy we are actually stronger than when we are sad. So, I like the sound of having wings, and I don't particularly like redbull, so I figured I could begin to narrow down my chinese hometown by making a list of things that bring me joy, which can then be transferred into what a certain chinese place has to offer.

So far my joy list is:

sunshine
fruit

ocean
young children
old people
smiles
coffee

What I have come to conclude as of recently is that I will most likely be living in the Guangdong Province, perhaps Fujian Province. And hopefully in a coastal city. I think my list needs to become more specific now tho.

I got to spend some time with a two year old earlier this week, and she really knew how to be joyful. The simplest things, like handing out cards, re-collecting the cards and then handing them out again made her gurgle with joy, or an elastic being spun between an older girls fingers that had her in fits of giggles. I have learned from the elderly and the toddler. Us neither elderly nor toddlers are useless except to learn I guess.

The virtue for this week now is courtesy.

PS I am now at my parents house where I have a valid internet connection and I wanted to add a joyful moment that I just had this evening. My mom and I had a few friends over and watched part one of a talk on the Baha'i Covenant by Dr. Ali Nakhjavani. We had some beautifully uplifting prayers and wonderfully spiritually conversation. All three parts of the talk can be found here.

http://video. google.com/ videosearch? q=nakhjavani&emb=0&aq=f#

integrity illumination

2009-05-23T10:33:00.000-07:00

I had a hard time this week trying to put integrity into practice in my life. I did some thinking, and I figured out that the majority of my difficulties stemmed from the fact that integrity is a noun. There is no use of the word integrity as a verb, and so it is therefore, difficult to put into action. It is in fact, quite difficult to use in a sentence because there are no other forms of the word...integritable, integritally... they just don't work.

As a side note: I became aware of how hard it is to put something into action when you are unable to really internalize, understand, or even have a replete vocabulary for it. This is something that a series of courses by a Baha'i foundation is hoping to combat as young people in our world are growing up not having a vocabulary for positive qualities, and therefore being unable to manifest them. I understood how it could be a problem before, but now I can relate to it.

So I tried to put integrity into broader context to gain a better idea. Most of the quotes in the book Sacred Moments, pertaining to this virtue, had to do with the idea of a strong foundation. There was a quote from Matthew 7 which talked about building your house on rock instead of sand. Those who build their homes on rock will withstand the rain and wind and storms.

I know the rock that I want to build my life on is Baha'u'llah's teachings, and so when I came across an address that Abdu'l-Baha gave to some american believers in December of 1912 I thought it was worth sharing. His words are powerful and straightforward, and He is calling all people to a higher level of integrity. It reminds me of the poem Desiderata, good words to live by.

"You must manifest complete love and affection towards all mankind. Do not exalt yourselves above others but consider all as your equals, recognizing them as the servants of one God. Know that God is compassionate towards all, therefore love all from the depths of your hearts, prefer all religionists to yourselves, be filled with love for every race and be kind towards the people of all nationalities. Never speak disparagingly of others but praise without distinction. Pollute not your tongues by speaking evil of another. Recognize your enemies as your friends and consider those who wish you evil as the wishers of good. You must not see evil as evil and then compromise with your opinion, for to treat in a smooth, kindly way one whom you consider evil or an enemy is hypocrisy and this is not worthy nor allowable. No! You must consider your enemies as your friends, look upon your evil-wishers as your well-wishers and treat them accordingly. Act in such a way that your heart may be free from hatred. Let not your heart be offended with any one. If some one commits an error and wrong towards you, you must instantly forgive him. Do not complain of others. Refrain from reprimanding them and if you wish to give admonition or advice let it be offered in such a way that it will not burden the heart of the hearer. Turn all your thoughts towards bringing joy to hearts.

Beware! Beware! Lest ye offend any heart. Assist the world of humanity as much as possible. Be the source of consolation to every sad one, assist every weak one, be helpful to every indigent one, be the cause of glorification to every lowly one and shelter those who are overshadowed with fear.

In brief, let each of you be as a lamp shining forth with the virtues of the world of humanity. Be trustworthy, sincere, affectionate, and replete with chastity. Be illumined, be spiritual, be divine, be glorious, be quickened of God. Be a Baha'i."

muddiness and the Master

2009-05-13T22:55:00.000-07:00

Over the past couple of weeks I have been falling and now find my face planted firmly in the wet mud of May. It doesn't feel like the worst place to be, although breathing can sometimes be difficult, but I think it is about time to get back up again and go have a shower- or perhaps a pressure wash would be more appropriate.

I am now refraining from a theatrical and over extended metaphor on the mud of life.

An early believer in the Faith of Baha'u'llah once went to Abdu'l-Baha distraught about how he as such a weak and selfish human could ever hope to attain to the standard of being which Baha'u'llah called all humanity. Abdu'l-Baha assured him that it can only be accomplished little by little; little by little. The believer was encouraged and thought to himself, 'I have all eternity for this journey from self to God. The thing to do is to get started.'

So here I am, little by little, trying to figure things out.

The virtue of this week is integrity.

The Truth of Twelve and Thirteen

2009-04-26T00:33:00.000-07:00

When I was eleven years old I was on my way home from Japan with nineteen other preteens and four chaperones. We were on the Armstrong-Hokkaido Salmonoid Exchange that my town offered to twenty students every other year. We had just spent nine days in Hokkaido learning about salmon and watching the same fish that had swam up our rivers in the spring make their journey to the opposite end of the world; we had a layover in the Tokyo-Narita airport before catching our plane back to Vancouver. We ate lunch as a group and then, after doing our number countoff to make sure no one had gone M.I.A., we were allowed to go with our buddies to do some last minute souvenier shopping- but told explicitly which floors to stay on and where and when to meet back as a group before catching our plane. My buddy and I ended up in the bowels of the airport exploring some fascinating Japanese shops full of Hello Kitty. By the time we realized that we had wandered far and had no idea where we were or where we were supposed to be, we had no time left to find our group. We spent some time trying to sort it out, but my buddy-no where near as cool headed in a panic as myself- was starting to freak out that we were going to be stranded in Japan. I was starting to get a bit worried myself as I pictured the countoff beginning and then coming to a halt at eleven... as twelve and thirteen were running frantically around the airport. Would they just eventually carry on without us, keeping a small silence until fourteen chimed up and the count continued seamlessly. Would twelve and thirteen grow old in the airport? Unless the plane wouldn't leave without us. Would they really wait? Could they stall a whole entire airplane just for us? Not likely. The problem was that no one spoke english. And we were eleven. Finally we honed in on the one white-guy, who was apparently from Winnepeg which made us feel good, and he looked at our bits of ticket and papers that we had. He found us a Japanese-man-in-a-suit to take us where we needed to go. As we headed back with our Japanese-man-in-a-suit to meet up with the group I realized we were no longer in danger of becoming airport orphans and we were probably going to get into a lot of trouble. As I looked down at my tourquoise-and-purple-velcro-band-digital Timex secured to my wrist, I came up with an idea. We could actually be on time, if we set our watches back about fifteen minutes. The only thing is that we both had to do it, and then just stroll up to everyone else as if it's no big deal. I mean if both of our watches said the same thing how could they blame us? So I conveyed my plan to my buddy and we frantically, yet subtly, set our watches back a matching quarter of an hour.

We all know how the story ends. The chaperones were worried and we wouldn't have really gotten in much trouble because they were just concerned. However, we proceeded to lie blatantly to them and that got us in the bad books. The lies that seem so well thought out as a child, but to adults are more obvious than Freddy Mercury's love for men.

I meant to recount this story briefly to begin to make my points about the merit of living a truthful life, however I have a hard time telling brief stories.

Truthfulness is a beauty. I consider myself a very truthful person these days. As the story was meant to illustrate, I have not always valued truthfulness as strongly as I do now. Since the age of eleven it has been a slow but fruitful journey towards living a more and more truthful life. I can remember the two times that I have consciously lied (I say consciously because sometimes when I get carried away talking faster than I think I will lie unconsciously, but I will always immediately go back and nullify the false statement) in the past couple of years. Both times it was to make it look like I had not made a mistake, and both times I felt physically sick afterwards and had to go and fess up within twenty-four hours.

Getting caught for lying is always worse than dealing with the truth, and if you are not caught in this world I am sure that God in all His justice will deal with you in the spiritual worlds to come.

I had a lot of other things that I wanted to say about a more deep and philosophical truthfulness but my story was so long that I am going to pass on any more ramblings right now. In conclusion focusing on being truthful to others was not a difficulty for myself this week because that is something that I have focused on so much in the past that it is now in my nature. However, something that I did find some need to work on was being truthful with myself at all times. I don't think that that is an issue in my life at all, but not something that comes to me as naturally as being truthful with others does. In the Sacred Moments book there is a great Shakespeare quote, "This above all- to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man."

Abd'u'l-Baha has also spoken strongly about truthfulness. He says, "Truthfulness is the foundation of all human virtues. Without thruthfulness progress and success, in all the worlds of God, are impossible for any soul. When this holy attribute is established in man, all the divine qualities will also be acquired."

This weeks virtue is generosity. It is a good time to focuse on that in my life.

Raw Soul, Dirty Soles

2009-04-18T16:53:00.000-07:00

Eight days- forty-three hours of work, six hours at the gym, four movies, eight showers, two hours of meetings, and countless cups of coffee- later, I haven't found many moments of 'reverence'. Reverence is something hard to find, especially when you are looking for it.

I focused on the time that I always seem to have uninterruptedly to myself and made sure that I said my daily prayers every single night before I went to bed regardless of how late/early the

time was or how exhausted I was. This isn't completely new for me, because since I turned fifteen (the age of spiritual maturity in the Baha'i Faith) I have been trying to say my obligatory prayers everyday; however there was something in making such a conscious effort this week, and not letting myself just slide into bed when it has become too late and I figure I'll just say it the next day anyways. This has become a dangerously easy habit to get into when I am coming home from work after one in the morning a few nights a week. So this week was really good, my daily obligatory prayer has become like... brushing my teeth. I can get into bed without doing it, but I will definitely get up five minutes later because I know I won't sleep anyways, or wake up feeling like I have little furries on my teeth- or perhaps my soul.

That was a great success. Reverence tho? I don't know. In the 'Sacred Moments' book, with the daily virtues in it, many of the quotes Linda Kavelin Popov has chosen had to do with connection to the earth when finding reverence.

I connected to the earth very tangibly on April 16th. Toms Shoes hosted a Day Without Shoes. It is an incredible company with an admirable vision that I mentioned in my last post. I decided to participate in the barefoot day even tho noone else in this area was. I didn't really make a big deal of it, I just didn't wear shoes. Thank goodness the weather was warm and sunny! I really only got into one conversation about why I didn't have shoes on. Everyone else just 'wooted' about summer and gave me thumbs up. The ladies that I did talk to were at an autobody shop here in town. While I was waiting for an estimate on a friend's car we started chatting in the office when one of them asked about why I wasn't wearing shoes.

I told them about kids in Ethiopia and other parts of the world that don't have shoes and get foot parasites and other 100% preventable debilitating diseases from the ground they walk on, and many of them aren't allowed to go to school barefoot. From there we talked about different places of the world and my travels and eventually the Baha'i Faith. One of the ladies of really interested and wrote down the spelling of the Faith and had a lot of questions. I love moments of spiritual connectedness with complete strangers!

It was fun to wear barefeet in a lot of ways, but at the end of the day my soles were beaten up from the cement and stones and fresh black pavement I had to navigate across outside another autobody shop. I can't imagine doing that day after day, regardless of the weather. Ouch. Buy Toms friends!

leaving the house with barefeeties

but with my Toms in my bag just in case

walking into town

driving

checking out the damage after running errands

putting on my Toms for work

relaxing after a long barefoot day

Mortenson, Mycoskie, and me?

2009-04-10T14:29:00.000-07:00

"In 1993 a mountaineer named Greg Mortenson drifted into an impoverished Pakistan village in the Karakoram mountains after a failed attempt to climb K2. Moved by the inhabitants' kindness, he promised to return and build a school. Three Cups of Tea is the story of that promise and its extraordinary outcome. Over the next decade Mortenson built not just one but fifty-five schools- especially for girls- in the forbidding terrain that gave birth to the Taliban. His story is at once a riveting adventure and a testament to the power of the humanitarian spirit."

I want to be a Greg Mortenson when I grow up. No, edit; I want to be a Greg Mortenson tomorrow, today, right now. There is too much suffering going on in our world to wait to become someone who has a positive impact, the time is now. However, no matter how hard my heart is tugged to go and help, the vision of making an impact on other peoples lives seems to grand for me.

I came across a copy of Three Cups of Tea rather flippantly at the new and used bookstore in town. I was in the store browsing to kill some time before my doctors appointment down the street. With no previous intentions of buying a book (especially one that cost $16.50) I picked up this soft covered book with a photo of three young Pakistani girls on the cover and took it to the till. I haven't been able to stop reading since then; even on the treadmill at the gym- which is actually a very difficult thing to do and resulted in two ripped pages. As melo-dramatic as it sounds, this book has changed my life.

Equipped with a promise to a small village, extreme patience, perserverence, sacrifice and selflessness Greg Mortenson has offered countless villages in Northern Pakistan what their government was unable, education. It is an inspiring saga that started out so humbly, that it really proves how much can be done with such little material means. I doubt I will ever be awarded the Sitara-e-Pakistan, or build schools in such a remote and war torn area of the world, but there is something that I can do. I just don't know what yet.

This week I have also learned a lot more about a shoe company that I have come to adore. Toms Shoes.

I don't need to iterate here what the website adequately explains, but I do want to give my praise and respect to the founder of this company Blake Mycoskie. His is another story about the change one person can make. Both Greg and Blake began their journey of service with such humility about their own abilities, and respect for the people who they wanted to help. I want to learn from them, and perhaps when I am able to humbly accept how little I have to offer, I will find the avenue that needs what little I have.

This weeks virtue was respect- and from two strangers who I will never meet I have learned how respect for everyone that you meet, regardless of their condition and circumstances in life, leads to opportunities for service. I respect what they have done, but also the simple path that they followed to get there. With a strong rededication I am looking for that path of service in my life.

white hair, wrinkles, and wisdom

2009-04-02T22:29:00.000-07:00

I have finally met my teacher. She isn't who I expected -well in, fact I didn't even know that I was looking for a teacher. I see her only a few times a week, unfortunately, due to my busy schedule. We don't speak much and, when we do, we usually have the same conversation that lasts for about forty-five seconds. She has no idea who I am. I have to sit on her right side so I can yell into her good ear, and she has no idea who I am. Or that she is my teacher. Or who I am.

I have started telling the other captives of the home that she is my grandma, and they smile and reckon that everyone needs a grand-daughter. They have no idea how badly some girls need a grandma.

Florence Eleanor Strom is ninety-six years old. I promised her daughter that I would go and visit her as much as I could while she is on holidays in Ireland. Florence is hardly mobile, and only has a little bit of hearing left in her right ear. I said that I would and visit her, and I wanted to mean it, but I have never liked spending time around old people. Especially ones I don't know. Especially ones that I don't know all corralled together into one home, being held captive by their grand children's generation- but not cared for by their own grand children. But I wanted to keep my word so I decided that I would go and spend a couple of minutes with her whenever I had the chance; I wanted to be responsible, the virtue of the week drove me to do it!

The first time I went, I found her in the dining room. She was at a table with another gentleman who looks like he belongs in NewFoundland and has a penchant for whistling repetitive tunes. They were ignoring each other. We went back to her room and had a nice visit. I felt really awkward for a lot of the time, but I realized near the end that after living for almost a century awkward doesn't exist anymore. Every visit now seems to follow the pattern of me finding her in the dining room and then we will go back to her room and sit on the couch. We will have some disjointed conversation and then I will say some prayers, she will say they are nice, and then I'll kiss her on the cheek. Then I ask her what her plans for the week are and she will say not much and I will ask her pencil me in. Then I will spend the time until I see her again looking forward our next visit.

I don't know if it is all old people, or Florence in particular, who have the ability, without knowing, to teach some of life's greatest lessons. She has taught me what compassion in action really is. She has enabled my compassion to come to fruition. For the half an hour a day I can spend with Florence I am compassionate without distraction. It is impossible to enter a seniors home and not be overwhelmed with complete acceptance for the limitations on our physical existence. Florence may not be living a glamorous life but she can still crack a smile when telling me about her nickname (Flopsie) or express great shock and fascination and interest in my recent visit to India. Florence lives with a serenity of acceptance.

Abdu'l-Baha said

Let each one of God's loved ones centre his attention on this: to be the Lord's mercy to man; to be the Lord's grace. Let him do some good to every person whose path he crosseth and be of some benefit to him... In this way the light of divine guidance will shine forth, and the blessings of God will cradle all mankind...

In this way I have also learned about grace. And of course this week responsibility. The best thing about practicing and being so focused on being responsible is that I find that I am driven to action. If I am trying to be more responsible, it isn't a conscience thing for me, it is an action thing. Ever since I was young I have had a reasonably responsible conscience, but it is acting on everything that I know is right or I know that I should do that I need to get better at. I am solely responsible for the choices that I make in my life so I best make the right ones. That is something I have done a lot better this week than I usually do I think.

The virtue this week is going to be respect *cue Aretha Franklin* and I am fully re-dedicated to my journey through the virtues because I know that I have Florence by my side and I know there is nothing she can't teach me.

Grace-

2009-03-27T15:19:00.000-07:00

A name present in at least three generations on the maternal side of my family.
A period of time to pay late bills before being penalized.

A short prayer many offer before eating.

A way of moving, or being, with seamless elegance.

The 'no strings attached' love and favor that God has for each one of us.

I don't know.

This last week of integrating 'gracefullness' into my life has been a challenge. By character I am not an overly graceful individual; and on Friday of last week I was, along with the rest of the world-wide Baha'i community, thrown back into a hectic and consuming post-Fast life. Since I have started this intense weekly focus on virtues it has been a challenge and a learning experience yes, but while fasting I also had a certain focus and commitment. Whenever my stomach would knot up in hunger pains, or I would go to grab a drink without thinking, I would remember that I am not eating or drinking, and then I would remember why, and then I would think of God, and then- just to have something a little more tangible and concrete to focus on- I would call to mind compassion, or acceptance. I found that I thought of grace only a few times this week, usually in the morning when I would read the page in my 'Sacred Moments' book, or sometimes when lying in bed at night, but rarely when I was in a situation where acting, thinking, or just being, with grace would have been appropriate.

So what I am trying to get at in typically lengthy and evasive way is that I had little success with scratching the surface of what it really means to live with grace, and that I need to come up with tricks that will help me remember that I am first and foremost a spiritual being who needs desperately to focus more on the attributes of the soul so that I can be of some small benefit to humanity while in this world, and be a little more prepared for the next world.

This virtue I moved on to yesterday is responsibility. Uh - oh. Maybe by figuring out how to really learn from these virtues and not just think about them I can claim that I am taking responsibility for my own spiritual self? We'll see.

The Graceful Ones.

foot acceptance

2009-03-19T07:57:00.000-07:00

So, after a week of feeling like the most difficult thing in my life to accept was the recent, yet noticeably permanent, residence of a big beach ball in my bathroom, God was able to hit me with at least one or two that really forced me to learn to accept with humour and grace- and just get over it.

For the first three quarters of this week I actually felt like there was nothing that I had to accept that I couldn't. Not that I am the most accepting person out there, but just I guess, that I have a pretty easy and normal life. I have also never had any big problems with accepting myself. Sometimes I am not the most proud of myself etc., however accepting who I am has never been an issue for me. So, since I was finding that acceptance (on whatever level) was not a virtue that I really was having any growth with I actually had thoughts along the lines of 'One day my acceptance will really be tested because it has not yet. Perhaps God, you should begin to test my acceptance because I want to work on it, and I can't if I don't even have anything come up that it is a test for me to accept...'

So la-di-da I carry on with my days. And then I decided to, finally, call my doctor and make an appointment to get my foot looked at- refer back to my post on december fifteenth, that broken toe- the toe has continued to ache since I originally hurt it in India. My doctor is out of town (are they allowed to go away?) so I went to the walk-in. All that I wanted was an x-ray requisition (most difficult thing to say out loud. Try it. x-ray requisition) so I could go and find out what was up with the achey foot. But instead, this balls-y walk-in doctor takes a look at both of my feet, pokes at them for a bit, asks me to stand and look down at my toes, and then asked me if my big toe has always looked like that, and I say, no, and then he starts throwing out all kinds of medical terms, and states that I have early hallux valgas, a.k.a. bunions. So yeah, bunions, that word just makes you cringe right? Well you should try walking with bunion-y toes. Oi. Something new I learned, bunions are just an inflamation or excessive growth of the bone and joint between your big toe and foot, and it is caused by everyday wear and tear. There is, apparently, nothing you can do about it, nothing that will make it better aside from surgery that will be needed within the next ten years once the pain is so bearable that I just can hardly walk. Yeah.

So no kidding, I swear, I only had a gimpy foot from India, and then I was walking to the clinic thinking about how my acceptance has never been tested, and God was all, 'Okay then, let me give you something that I know will be hard for you to accept. I know, because I am the All-Knowing, that you walk everywhere, that you love running and dancing and hiking and wearing cute shoes and sandals, and I know that you stand all day for work so, let me give you bunions. Because you want to learn acceptance.' And poof he messed up my feet. No joke.

On a less bitter note, my favorite quote this week from the book is about accepting others: 'In Buddhism, the word "suchness" is used to mean "the essence or particular characteristics of a thing or person, its true nature." Each person has his or her suchness. If we want to live in peace and happiness with a person, we have to see the suchness of that person. Once we see it, we understand him or her, and there will be no trouble. We can live peacefully and happily together."

I have found this week, that I have a much easier time accepting other people with all their strengths and weaknesses, than I have accepting things being 'wrong' with myself- as Linda Kaveling Popov says in her book 'Sacred Moments'- with humour and grace. The humour part is easy, but I think using humour is my way of not really accepting it. Evidently I need to find the balance of grace for a more complete acceptance; a great segue into this weeks virtue, grace.

compassion and conundrum

2009-03-12T12:14:00.000-07:00

My week of compassion is over.

Thank goodness! Do you have any idea how hard it is to be nice during the fast? I mean yeah, sure, there are moments of profound spiritual insight, but I get cranky when I am hungry AND tired! Moments of profound irritability. Actually I am mostly joking. I quite enjoy fasting; I think that I jinxed myself the other day, I said that to a few people who I was talking to, and by about three o'clock I had the worst hunger cramps that I have ever gotten during the fast. It was like God had commissioned some one to curl up in my stomach and punch repeatedly just below my ribs for a couple of hours- just to say, 'Oh yeah, how much do you REALLY enjoy it?'. Don't worry, I survived, and continued to smile (grimace perhaps) at the world around me as I hunched over the counter at work.

And that was also the day that my little virtues book was talking about having compassion for oneself. Compassion is such a complex thing. It is a word that people throw around quite freely, but the more that I have tried to focus all my actions and thoughts into a compassionate nature, I have only become more aware of how unaware I am about the true meaning of this virtue. There have been a few instances in the last week where it has come to my attention that someone around me is crying quietly in need of some compassion- and no one seems to be noticing. But even tho I notice, I find myself unable to find the appropriate response.
One of the 'mantras' in the book this week was 'I take time to reach out to those who need help.' And my virtue building self is so young and immature that I am only able to recognize those who need help but reaching out to them to be there when they need to get over a wall in life is... hard! For me.

Something that I have done well tho is that I have not watched a single episode of the Real World since my last blog, but that is partly because it doesn't seem to be on when I am eating in the morning anymore. But also, let us say, that it is some self restraint. I have spent a lot more time reading, and I am almost done 'The World Order of Baha'u'llah' which is a fantastic book, but it has been making me realize how much I don't know- and how important- the recent histories of Islam and Christianity are. Perhaps until I am really studying something in school again, I will do some of my own studies on those topics. Perhaps.

Recently the thought of going back to school in the fall has been causing a lot of confusion in my life. I know that, God willing, I will be at UBC Vancouver in the fall, but I don't know what I will be studying. For the past couple of years I had been planning on doing a degree in Applied Mathematics and then become a highschool teacher. But then recently - for a few reasons - I have been pulled or encouraged into other departments. I have been contemplating doing a degree in Anthropology with a minor in Asian Language and Culture, primarily to learn some mandarin. But how do I decide? I can think of a huge list of pro's and con's for each side. This is exactly why I have applied to so many uni's over the past five years and gone to none. It is not that I can't think of anything to study, it's that I want to study everything and the pressure to choose and commit to that one topic for so many years is too much because I start thinking about all the other things that I won't be studying!

Conundrum.

Well the virtue of this week is acceptance. And I leave you with this thought (compliments of Linda Kavelin Popov) 'What test in my life have I accepted with grace and humour?'

disclosure and discovery

2009-03-08T08:49:00.000-07:00

Since the Fast has begun I am finding myself awake- before the sun has made its way to my side of the world- and watching much too much television while I wait for the rest of the town to drink their first cup of coffee and catch up on the morning.
It is a little bit disconcerting that during this month of spiritual renewal, with the physical sacrifices of food and sleep that I am happily making, I find myself filling such a large part of my time with bad MTV reality television.
The time of fasting is a time to refocus our spiritual selves, and reconsecrate our physical and spiritual beings. So here I am writing, in an effort to harness my focus and draw myself away from the frighteningly addicting world of tasteless television- and because of a convincing post my friend recently made in his inspiring blog.
I have chosen two tools to help me thwart MTV and make my life my own again.
Tool one is blogging; tool two is a book called Sacred Moments by Linda Kavelin Popov.
This book has faithfully followed me-or been dragged along- to various countries and cities throughout the world; but in half the places I hardly open it. It is a book of virtues. It contains fifty-two virtues, one for each week of the year, so each day has a couple of inspiring quotes or insightful thoughts on a specific virtue.
So I am going to use the book to focus on a virtue and then blog about the way that it has affected me and then because I will feel obligated to blog about it I will actually do it and not just sit on this ridiculously soft and kooshy and comfortable sofa and watch channel 100 (yeah thats MTVcanada).
Todays virtue is compassion. And um, I guess that I don't really have anything to say about that yet because, all I have done today is eaten some food, done the dishes and watched a few episodes of the Real World- busted. Although I could without a doubt comment on the lack of compassion that the individuals in the Real World house have for each other. Is that backbiting?
Hm.
Well so instead of that, in striving to live my day with more compassion I will keep the following quote in mind:

"To "listen" another's soul into a condition of disclosure and discovery may be almost the greatest service that any human being performs for another." - Douglas V. Steere

saris, sweet coffee, and broken toes

2008-12-15T01:59:00.000-08:00

So haven't left the house in a day or two, but I put the time to good use overcoming a fever, harbouring a hideous chest cold, getting over the worst bout of premenstrual pain ever and then of course what follows? Oh and tripping over my sleeping feet and pretty much breaking my right big toe and skinning my left knee in the process.

Well I have not become ill from the food yet- in fact I am dangerously addicted to the oranges here! They are the most refreshing juicy scrumptious balls of delightfulness I have eaten. I think being ill helped me to get over my jetlag tho. I can now sleep through the night and well into the morning like a good Indian should; nothing happens until the afternoon and then everything stays open and bustling until late into the night... well by my standards.

We spent hours watching one of the only guranteed english channels while we were house bound and I am now much more knowledgeable on: Sea Animals Built For the Kill, Giant Prehistoric Alligators, and Linguistic Capacities of Apes. Thank you National Geographic, I no longer need to pay for a university education. It was quite nice we had a tea party with yummy temi tea and some butter biscuits and strawberry ones too, and then we were able to ORDER chips and pop up to our flat. Like roomservice. Like we did not have to leave! How genius is that!

So not much other excitement than that. Today is the first day that I woke up feeling, well, awake. Perhaps my soul has finally caught up with my body.

Before I got really ill we went out to the super Indian street and did some real Sari and Salwar Kameez shopping for me and Kelly to wear to the wedding. The shop was one of those spectacularily stereotypical shops that has fabric folded from floor to ceiling on every wall and you take your shoes off and then sit on a comfy mat. You tell them your fabric and colour preference and price range and they make a semi decent effort to find what you would want.

Of course I immediately fell in love with the MOST expensive ones in the store. They pegged me for expensive tastes after that and I had a hard time convincing them to show me cheaper stuff. Where is my rich husband?
I settled on a nice mono wine coloured one, and a pink and gold Kameez that I think I will wear for both New Years and the Sangeet (which is the dancey festive part of Nicoles wedding). Today we are out to find matching jewellery sets and shoes. I have to hobble tho because I have a purple toe. I should have brought arnica. However, according to Dr Vikram, Disspirin is a miracle medecine that cures everything so I am putting it to the test. So far it has worked on head aches and back cramps but now the test is on stuffy nose and bruised toes.

Well before we all faint from low blood sugar we are going to go for some amazing spinach soup :)

missing you.
loving you.
xoxoxox
em

oh and no buses yet chandra! i think we are taking one to the beach in a few days tho! woohoo

auto-rickshaws, paratha, and threading

2008-12-12T06:58:00.000-08:00

In Canada, steel toed boots are a necessary requirment for construction sites.
In India, flimsy leather sandals- completely optional. Barefoot acceptable.

3 days of being in India and I have forgotten how the rest of the world runs. How does anyone survive except to fend for themselves?
I don't remember what life could be like anywhere else. It is fascinating, but not as traumatizing as many people promised me that it would be.
After arriving in Mumbai myself, Nicole, Vikram (her fiancee), and Durga (his sister) spent the day touring the city until Kelly flew in twelve hours later. I got to see the Taj and took photos of the burnage. It was very blocked off though so we couldn't get too near. I want to put up photos but the internet here is slow and it is not worth but- but don't worry I am taking lots.
Anything you here about crazy Indian driving, don't believe it, because it is worse than ANYONE could ever describe. You have no idea, rickshaws and cars and vans and trucks and scooters and bicycles and dirtbikes and animals all flying down the road, no one knows how many lanes and there are no lights. No rules. Insanity. But fun.

We spent much of the day looking for Nicoles final set of jewellery for the wedding. She wanted Kundan style which is very fancy and opulent and traditionally has raw diamonds but we just got what they call art jewellery with no real stones in it. We looked in so many places and finally found it late at night at the last place we looked.

Mumbai is an unimaginably large and dirty city. It was very intimidating but I think because I was so in shock from all the lack of sleep and food that perhaps I was not really as phased as I should have been.

After picking Kelly up we did not arrive home in Pune until after 5am, and then slept in the next day. That was yesterday, we just hung out and then took an autorickshaw (so fun) into the town and shopped around a bit until we met up with Vik and his friends and went for an all you can eat dinner (less than $3) and so much food here is veg. yum. Then we went to a shisha bar that was really funky and jungly and had like semi open walls and trees and it was really neat. We got home late and I crashed.

Then I woke up at like 7 and thought because I cannot tell time I thought it was almost 2 and could not figure out why I am so tired. Life in India is so hectic and so relaxed at the same time. It is odd. We hang out at the apartment all morning and just chill and there is no rush and we all lie around, and then after we leave the house and his the town everything is so crazy and bustling- when the sun goes down it feels like a carnival. We walk fast and weave through traffic, except apparently we wont get hit because it causes too much commotion when foreigners are run over.

Today we all wore Indian clothes out, they are so comfy but I can't decide if I fit in or stand out more when I am dressed like this. I would wear this at home if I had it. I am in pink and purple with a purple jewel bindhi (on my forehead) and nicole is all black and and kelly is pretty olive greens with embroidery, again I will try and put pictures up soon!

We just came from the salon and I got my eyebrows threaded! It was so interesting, but fast and not too painful. I wish I could get it at home. Then I got my legs waxed too and altogether it came to 110 rupees which is equivalent to about $2.50! I think that we are going to get food and then head home. It is funny because the food has not really affected me at all, I am not getting sick and I can eat very spicy food, all with my right hand! (what they don't know is that is the hand that I wipe with ;) haha) However the pollution is really affecting me and I have a horrible throat ache and croaky voice and wheezy throat. But nothing major. Infact Vik just came in with some cough drops for me!

Anyways I am running out of time, I don't know how often I will have internet but I will try as soon as I can. I am having an awesome time and it is not a dangerous country and I am with good people, so please don't worry. I know many people are worried but it is not a scary place.

I think we are going to Delhi in a couple of days and will go to the temple and then we are going on a trip to a beach resort!

Gotta go. Miss you all loads. (well not all of you, I dont know who is reading this, but you know who you are)
xoxox
gossip girl.
i mean em.
ha.
oh.
bye

Hi Ma.

2008-12-04T01:26:00.000-08:00

Instead of writing a horribly long community email that only a few people with ever read- and yet I feel compelled to put something at least semi personal in for each person receiving it- I am just going to keep updates of my India trip on here.
What do you think?
You can send the link to whoever you want and that way I am not responsible for making sure that all of your (my?) friends get it!
We'll see. I'll try to update it as often as possible, but since I will be out exploring, eating amazing food, and hopefully soaking up some sun, the posts may not be too frequent!
Okay, I love you.