past lives

as things happen in your life, as you meet people, as you experience new places or walk through a city you are constantly putting the people, places and events into context based on your past experiences. as i have been here in asia i have met people who believe in many things that i was told as a child do not exist. growing up irish catholic in the US, there were many things i was told that existed, but would never be able to see or touch, i just needed to believe. there were other things that i was told where simple figments of the imagination, which i should not be tricked by and that should never be trusted no matter how real they appeared.

i have come to see some of these things in a new light. both the things i was told to believe and those i was told not to have come into question. this is not uncommon as you experience a new culture, meet new people. what is new is the complete acceptance of these ideas. i have always been flexible and accepting of differing points of view. it may come from my pleasure at taking the counter point in any discussion where the other person is sure they are right. the pleasure is even more intense if the other person opens believing there is no validity in the opposite point of view.

it may also come from a movie shown in science class in 6th grade (is that standard 6 here?). the movie showed two people on a rotating disk, picture a merry-go-round without the horses, where one throws a ball to the other. from the viewpoint of someone standing on the side, the ball goes straight while the riders move around. when they placed the camera from the viewpoint of the rider throwing the ball, the ball appears to wildly curve to the side.

this simple experiment was meant to show the rotation of the earth and to explain a bit of physics to a group of irish catholic boys who may have otherwise believed an unmoving hand moved the ball to the side. for me it proved that point of view had much to do with the interpretation of the events.

when an old friend contacts you out of the blue, and the timing adds extra impact to over events that are happening in your life, do you believe it’s a coincidence or is somehow related? if you meet someone, and realize you have met them before, is the connection part of that chance set of events or something larger? when you are with someone you barely know, and you feel comfortable beyond all reasonable explanation, does it throw up a wall of doubt and guarded protection, or does it bring a sense of relaxation and warmth?

the point of view for the viewer of course is related to prior events of the viewer. more surprisingly, as i am exposed to asia and it’s people, i am coming to believe that the hindus had something in the belief in past lives. this teaching is not part of catholic doctrine, but i was told of past lives first my by devote grandmother. nana taught me that if you were not clearly good or bad in life, you would be sent back to “try again”. clearly, coming back would only be useful if some of the past were left as echoes you could hear when you listened to yourself. this, in the western context would be your conscience; your inner voice of past experience, reminding you why things are right or wrong.

if i believe nana, it is not just the past lives of this life, but those of other lives that are affecting us. it is not just the person who you loved a few years ago you are remembering and missing, but the one you loved in another time and another place. past lives from this life do impact you, they do come to mind, they do help us to remember what is important or right for us. but the echoes of the “past past” are there also. the feelings can be there if you are open to sensing the flows, listening to your voice and accepting the validity of what you sense is right. just like the ball thrower, sometimes the sense that something unseen is affecting events, is real. life is like physics, unknown energy is flowing through and around us. the gravity of time and space, the light of life, the heat of relationships are with us always.

we just need to accept and believe.

comfortable storm

for first time since coming here i realized i fell asleep to the sound of rain and woke up to it. it’s that hard tropical rain. a rain that sounds heavier than western rain. the sound wraps around you and feels like it envelops you from all sides. its rain that you know is warm, but that would soak you to the bone immediately if you were to step outside into it.

i am lying in bed and watching the streaks on the windows. the morning twilight of a rainy dawn struggles to fill the room. the steady beat of the millions of drops falling together just outside my window push me back to sleep, coaxing me back to my dreams, the comfort and warmth of sub conscience. i lay, stretching my body and pulling the blankets closer for warmth while the demands of the day force me to open my eyes and concentrate on reality.

thunder is in the distance. the violence of the storm is away from me. barely heard as an echo, the rumbles getting further apart as i feel the reverberations in my head. the distance is too far to sense the flashes of lightening. they must be there but can not be felt from the comfort of my lonely bed.

it's time to throw the covers off and put my feet down on the icy tile flooring. the sensation of energy draining from my body through my feet, pulling the accumulated warmth of the night out of me is a daily reminder of the harsh transition between worlds.

i need to rush to the shower. if i can get my body under the temporary heat of the spray, feel the deep soothing warmth of the water spread through my skin, i can reclaim the energy sapped by the cold floor and start my day recharged, ready to take on the storm raging outside my window. ready to walk though the rain, feeling the drops beat their random symphony of white noise on the world around me. feeling the smallest percentage of drops touch my skin, while others come close but fall just short.

the shower water will be dried off, but the drops of rain will merge together, left to pool on the skin, tropical rain drops leaving streaks on my skin like the ones on the window. both barriers meant to protect the warm and dry insides from the wetness from outside. leaving trails of their passing, but not penetrating beyond the barrier.

it's time to get up.

simple life

(this post was written while sitting on a bus, i am just getting around to posting now, sorry for the strange order of the past few posts)


i am on a bus driving from hanoi to halong bay, i am sitting among expat travelers from all over the world. all of us hoping to have good weather for the overnight boat trip that may be the visual high point of our respective vacations in vietnam.

as i watch the country side of vietnam unfold along the road, i am shaken by the simplicity of life so many people here live with. hanoi is a model of simplicity. nothing appears difficult to find. interactions are direct and easy, even when there is little shared language. although there is open poverty, people appear to be if not happy, than content.

this has helped to make my vacation a relaxing and easy going time. a direct contrast with a US vacation like going to LA and attempting to capture the west coast vibe, enjoy the sun, see a star, eat at a restaurant with a celebrity chef, and go to a sterilized theme park. none of those things, other than the sun possibly, would play in vietnam.

the road to the coast is a long stretch of shops, houses and rice paddies that show just how simple life can be if you could accept it. selling noodles in front of your house as an endless stream of bicycles with locals, motos with people moving from one city to the next and buses filled with tourists go by.

if that life is too stressful for you, you can work in the rice paddy. feet in water all day, crouched over tending to next months dinner. enjoying the placid pools of water and fields of spiky green plants sticking up like the hair of a punk rocker whose songs you would never hear. the required world view being the distance you can see; and the stone walls of your family house, that is half the size of an american child’s cramped bedroom.

the tourists chat about their travels, discuss visas, restaurants and flight plans as they pass by you. as you spend your day in the sun or hidden under a battered blue tarp that shelters you from the heat, the tourists complain they are getting too old to take a 3 hour bus trip to the boat that promises to allow them to rest and relax on their vacation. when they stop for gas there are groans of delay and demands for air conditioning; clearly focused inwardly rather than considering the life you are living just outside their window.

life can be simple, if you can allow it to be.

we are who we meet

traveling, meeting people, having conversations, exchanging ideas these are the things that make a trip, or any day in your life, what it is. i have met and talked to more interesting people in the past week than i have on any trip of my life. i am not sure what makes this trip different, but it is and i like it.

i woke up this morning thinking about the past few days and how much i enjoyed them. the halong bay trip was great, and to a very large extent that was due to the other people on the trip. there was english, chinese, italian and french being spoken around the table. communication was not an issue

the places we live, work, study or visit are not places to themselves, they are collections of people. all people are both different and the same as those in other places. this has struck me repeatedly since leaving the US, no matter what, people really are the same.

any place, any event is really was result of the people you bump into. the chance conversation, the smile you see when you look up, the distant stare that makes you wonder what is behind it. the look someone gives you when they realize you are taking their picture. the conversation that seems to flow, or is quiet without concern. they add up to the experience.

the interesting thing is that these people have lived lives that have by design or chance brought them to the same place as you, at the same moment. how many times in your life will you bump into this person? where will you each be in your lives the next time come within reach?

as you meet people you like, as you finish conversations you enjoy, when and how do you tell them that you would like to talk again. continuing to talk means opening yourself to this person and possibly sharing parts of your life far away from the chance encounter.

not saying anything, simply walking away and beginning the random drift of life away from them is easiest. but it would also mean you may never speak to them again. it is emotionally safe, it is socially acceptable, it is what most people expect. there is an issue though, for some of the people you meet in your life this would be a sad way to end a wonderful day.