the white waves crashing over the old pier of historic Dubrovnik were left behind, the scrubby clouds scudded through the sky and i followed the road to Montenegro, surprised to find out they used the euro there, and it soon felt like spain, with lots of restaurants and hotels and apartments-to-let strung out along the coast. i almost traversed the coast of the county in a day (thanks to a free ferry) but in the evening found myself in the pine woods next a beach nobody loved - on account of all the waste strewn everywhere - but still found myself feeling fresh from having bathed in the waves.
the next day, slowly progressing through the wind/rain, i crossed the little road to albania, and found myself transported very far away. waiting to cross the river, there was something about the ordered choas - people inhabiting the street space without any rules but with hand gestures and tooting of horns, where you are just likely to be on the wrong side of the road as the right, on account of all the potholes - that made me feel excited to be alive, made me feel suddenly closer to turkey than to europe (although never been to turkey) and made arise within me an incommensurable desire to be in India.
- couchsurfer mario in split had said (a little underimpressed) "all my friends are going to india.
i don't know what they are looking for - maybe to find a spiritual guru.
you have to find enlightenment within yourself".
yes, i agreed to myself afterwards, enlightenment is found inside oneself.
what is it about india, then, that pulls me?
place is important for experience-creation.
mario said many other things which i found interesting and insightful. he said that this world (this Universe) consists entirely of energy in motion. we behold it with our eyes and divide it into elements of different colours and forms but everything is essentially a flux of energy - a wave crashing or a bee buzzing or plants silently growing or a volcano exploding. we breathe in air and use it to fuel our own energy activities and then exhale, everything swirls, comes in, goes out, passes through, unity throughout, all is one.
All is One.
an interesting way of conceiving of time (for the linear conception progressing linearly into eternity can be rather baffling) is to say All is One Moment, and all experiences and happenings are happening now, and all that is now will always be so. - taken from a spiritual point of view because the physical side of things wants to divide up moments and live out its finite lifespan. and so do not lament passing moments - all moments are One and the same. Mario compared the mind to a field, and our thoughts and emotions to seeds. we choose to cultivate certain seeds at certain moments and pursue certain thought patterns and habitual emotions. all seeds (all possible thoughts, emotions) exist contemporaneously, and it is the task of the individual to cultivate his or her mind-garden in his or her chosen way.
Mario's philosophy on his couchsurfing profile was "liberate fully everyone, everywhere". he struck me as an unusually aware individual - aware of the substantive concerns that being alive entails.
i liked it when he quoted Teilhard de Chardin to me: "you are not a human beings in search of a spiritual experience, you are a spiritual being immersed in a human experience"
we spoke of the poverty of speaking, compared to the richness of communication between spirits. "take my dog, for example", he said. "he knows exactly when i want him to be still or come close, without speaking a word". also take sexual attraction between two individuals, for example - something that occurs viscerally, something akin to the way two magnets behave, and which leaves words as a little commentary on the side of the unmistakable message "i am attracted to you" imparted by the spirit, and confirmed by other little messages from body gestures. an hour or so after meeting, i asked him if we would have communicated as much, or the experience of being together would have essentially been the same, had we not spoken any words.
he replied with a smile: "surely".
i wasn't so sure though.
our spirits constitute the essence of our beings, but they are combined with our minds, and our desire to rationally comprehend things is also an essential part of human nature.
at the albanian border i stood by my bike waiting in the queue of cars to show my passport.
at one point i turned round and looked directly into the eyes of a man in a car, him unabashedly silently curious about me and me curious about his curiosity and wondering how long such eye contact could last. after a few seemingly long seconds it was broken and i had to look down at the pavement or up at the sky.
i hardly knew where i was - speaking a handful of little albanian words but knew that it was a friendly, human place on account of all the happy tooting and greetings, people on the street can have hardly seen cycle-tourers because they look at me and don't stop looking smiling greeting until i have passed. a man starts greeting/speaking to me from his motorcycle as i cycle by and soon we have stopped and he is communicating with me with his eyes and a smattering of italian that he has worked in italy for four years, and gradually his brown eyes say "i accept you" and he says, stuttering, "you my son". communication is not fluid, but i know that he wants to invite me back to his house not far away, and he feels that i am his son. he says, "mire, tears in my eyes", and shows me by wiping his eyes dry. i don't want to seem offhand in the face of his great show of affection, but i feel that i really want to continue along the road, and it is only when he gives me three big close-up kisses to say goodbye that i smell the alcohol and it is confirmed to me (what was hitherto suspected) that he is as drunk as a skunk...you never know when you arrive in a foreign country for the first time, who the people are.
yesterday was my first full day in albania and yielded more genuine exchanges, like going into the shop to buy a pen and receiving a lesson (actually at my request) on key albanian phrases from the girl who spoke italian - also ostensibly to see how well the pen worked. key albanian phrases like "kjo eshte rruga per shkoar ...?" (is this the road to...?), which has served me well today, bumping along country lanes trying to find a quiet road away from the lorries and construction vehicles and hanging dust on the main road.
images of albania for me are becoming: a haystack at the side of the road, piles and piles of litter everywhere, cockerels clucking, old men always wearing faded suits and open simple faces - not "simple" as it is sometimes used to mean "of low intelligence" but "good" and "honest", farming people, everyone in the fields hoeing or digging or wielding some agricultural implement, haystacks, cockerels.
the next day, slowly progressing through the wind/rain, i crossed the little road to albania, and found myself transported very far away. waiting to cross the river, there was something about the ordered choas - people inhabiting the street space without any rules but with hand gestures and tooting of horns, where you are just likely to be on the wrong side of the road as the right, on account of all the potholes - that made me feel excited to be alive, made me feel suddenly closer to turkey than to europe (although never been to turkey) and made arise within me an incommensurable desire to be in India.
- couchsurfer mario in split had said (a little underimpressed) "all my friends are going to india.
i don't know what they are looking for - maybe to find a spiritual guru.
you have to find enlightenment within yourself".
yes, i agreed to myself afterwards, enlightenment is found inside oneself.
what is it about india, then, that pulls me?
place is important for experience-creation.
mario said many other things which i found interesting and insightful. he said that this world (this Universe) consists entirely of energy in motion. we behold it with our eyes and divide it into elements of different colours and forms but everything is essentially a flux of energy - a wave crashing or a bee buzzing or plants silently growing or a volcano exploding. we breathe in air and use it to fuel our own energy activities and then exhale, everything swirls, comes in, goes out, passes through, unity throughout, all is one.
All is One.
an interesting way of conceiving of time (for the linear conception progressing linearly into eternity can be rather baffling) is to say All is One Moment, and all experiences and happenings are happening now, and all that is now will always be so. - taken from a spiritual point of view because the physical side of things wants to divide up moments and live out its finite lifespan. and so do not lament passing moments - all moments are One and the same. Mario compared the mind to a field, and our thoughts and emotions to seeds. we choose to cultivate certain seeds at certain moments and pursue certain thought patterns and habitual emotions. all seeds (all possible thoughts, emotions) exist contemporaneously, and it is the task of the individual to cultivate his or her mind-garden in his or her chosen way.
Mario's philosophy on his couchsurfing profile was "liberate fully everyone, everywhere". he struck me as an unusually aware individual - aware of the substantive concerns that being alive entails.
i liked it when he quoted Teilhard de Chardin to me: "you are not a human beings in search of a spiritual experience, you are a spiritual being immersed in a human experience"
we spoke of the poverty of speaking, compared to the richness of communication between spirits. "take my dog, for example", he said. "he knows exactly when i want him to be still or come close, without speaking a word". also take sexual attraction between two individuals, for example - something that occurs viscerally, something akin to the way two magnets behave, and which leaves words as a little commentary on the side of the unmistakable message "i am attracted to you" imparted by the spirit, and confirmed by other little messages from body gestures. an hour or so after meeting, i asked him if we would have communicated as much, or the experience of being together would have essentially been the same, had we not spoken any words.
he replied with a smile: "surely".
i wasn't so sure though.
our spirits constitute the essence of our beings, but they are combined with our minds, and our desire to rationally comprehend things is also an essential part of human nature.
at the albanian border i stood by my bike waiting in the queue of cars to show my passport.
at one point i turned round and looked directly into the eyes of a man in a car, him unabashedly silently curious about me and me curious about his curiosity and wondering how long such eye contact could last. after a few seemingly long seconds it was broken and i had to look down at the pavement or up at the sky.
i hardly knew where i was - speaking a handful of little albanian words but knew that it was a friendly, human place on account of all the happy tooting and greetings, people on the street can have hardly seen cycle-tourers because they look at me and don't stop looking smiling greeting until i have passed. a man starts greeting/speaking to me from his motorcycle as i cycle by and soon we have stopped and he is communicating with me with his eyes and a smattering of italian that he has worked in italy for four years, and gradually his brown eyes say "i accept you" and he says, stuttering, "you my son". communication is not fluid, but i know that he wants to invite me back to his house not far away, and he feels that i am his son. he says, "mire, tears in my eyes", and shows me by wiping his eyes dry. i don't want to seem offhand in the face of his great show of affection, but i feel that i really want to continue along the road, and it is only when he gives me three big close-up kisses to say goodbye that i smell the alcohol and it is confirmed to me (what was hitherto suspected) that he is as drunk as a skunk...you never know when you arrive in a foreign country for the first time, who the people are.
yesterday was my first full day in albania and yielded more genuine exchanges, like going into the shop to buy a pen and receiving a lesson (actually at my request) on key albanian phrases from the girl who spoke italian - also ostensibly to see how well the pen worked. key albanian phrases like "kjo eshte rruga per shkoar ...?" (is this the road to...?), which has served me well today, bumping along country lanes trying to find a quiet road away from the lorries and construction vehicles and hanging dust on the main road.
images of albania for me are becoming: a haystack at the side of the road, piles and piles of litter everywhere, cockerels clucking, old men always wearing faded suits and open simple faces - not "simple" as it is sometimes used to mean "of low intelligence" but "good" and "honest", farming people, everyone in the fields hoeing or digging or wielding some agricultural implement, haystacks, cockerels.
Un fuerte abrazo!... Estoy fuera en Portugal y mi aceso a internet es reducido. Y como mi inglés esta un poquito olvidado me es difícil entrar al detalle hasta que regrese.
RispondiEliminaCada vez que veo los contrastes de las montanhas en el horizonte en una puesta de sol, me acuerdo de ti (por aquel dibujo tan hermoso que enviaste a "ilnata". Ya veo que estás bien (para eso si me da el ingles).
Ah Carson,
RispondiEliminaReading your words makes you feel more like a whisp of air than a memory of something physical.