Happiness

If this picture doesn't make you smile I don't know what will.

Rememdios

Rememdios. Cures. To help you when you are sick, down and out, or angry.

Here I have been given much advice on what to do for various problems. Have a crik in your neck? Just have a prgenant woman bite you there. Hack yourself with a macehete? Stuff cobwebs in the wound. Have your period? Don't shower, and don't eat meat or avocados. Having a bad hairday? It's because you didn't cut your hair under a full moon. Have stomach issues? Fix some really bitter root tea. Have baka presion? Shoot yourself up with a Vitamin B cocktail.

How do I solve my bad hair day? With a straightner. How do I solve a bad day in the pueblo? Or when I get lost in the pueblo? A licuado. Or a Snickers bar. How do I solve digestive issues? Eat lots of oatmeal or a salad. How do I deal with back issues from riding in tuks and sitting on uncomfortable things almost always? Yoga. How do I cope with PMS? Again, a Snickers bar. Or cheeseburgers. How do I cope with boredeom. My site mate, and cheeseburgers.





But cross culturally, I feel like this is true in all cases.

Satisfying Things

• Acai Bowls for breakfast
• Slowly but surely appreciating island music, such as this song
• Getting enough vitamin D, and feeling the difference
• The sense of accomplishment after an incredibly tiring day of paddling
• Going to the library
• Nice motorists who wave at you when you let them merge
• Ms. Dragonwagon and her recipes (I just made her Thai Green Curry with Eggplant, Beans, and Garbanzo...mmm!!)
• Reading on the beach
• Whale watching and actually seeing a whale
• Meeting new people
• Singing. I just joined a community choir...what a fun bunch!
• Art
• Seeing the little boy and his pet goat at the river
• Visiting the buddhist shrines at the Lawai International Center
• Plantain Lumpia
• Watching my plants grow, and using my fresh herbs for the first time
• Finishing projects at work
• Australian singers
• The sound of chickens beating their wings and pecking around in the woods
• Driving with the windows down, all the time

Creative Buddha

Buddha has been my most recent muse. I started working on a buddha paper cut design and then, coincidentally, went to the Lawai International Center the next day. The Center is the oldest buddhist shrine in the US, with 88 miniature temples, representing the 88 temples in the Shikoku Pilgrimage in Japan. Now I can't stop drawing buddhas! Big buddhas, little buddhas, buddhas with halos, buddhas with robes...

A view from Thursday

cinco siete cinco

beans beans beans beans beans
beans beans beans beans beans beans beans
beans salt tortilla



misting from the peaks
rivers bulging at their banks
puddles in my bed



mud caked to my knees
dirt under my fingernails
happy harvester

Vistas

exploring the inner journey through the outer world