Be Here Now

This morning started early. I got up at 5:30 to give offers (sticky rice) to the over 200 monks that live and study in Luang Prabang. It was a pretty special experience. (but not a single one said thanks! monks today, geez!!) The monks come out of their various temples around the city and walk a circuit around town where towns people line up with food. I went with my hosts from my guesthouse - they go everyday. I am probably going to go to the afternoon/evening prayer session today too. Each evening, you can hear the Buddhist chanting in various parts of town and certainly only enhances the overall "cool" that the town already has.

Really trying to take it slow here with moderate success. This is a great place just to be, but there are also alot of tempting sites and activities in the area too. Yesterday I took a boat trip up the Mekong to a cave that has 700+ Buddha statues inside. The day before was mt. biking (pretty mellow...), waterfall and swimming (nice!), kayaking back to town (fun, but rained the whole way, which got old...). Today I really want to get some quality cafe-time in, but being tempted by the sunny day and a potential trip to another (supposedly better) waterfall. What to do, what to do...

Can't quite believe I'm coming home in a week! Does actually feel like I've been gone for a long time though. I certainly will need time to reflect (probably when I get back) but as far as I can tell right now, the trip has been exactly what I hoped it would be. I had fun adventures, I got lots of rest, I ate strange foods, I met nice people, I spend long periods not thinking about work. Right now, I think one of the biggest take-aways is that travel has a way of forcing you to become comfortable with being uncomfortable. I've definitely gotten there. This is something that I hope to bring back and transfer to my everyday life. Also, I do feel ready and excited to jump back into work in a way that I don't think I've really felt for years. I was really hoping that would happen and relieved that it did (it was either gonna be that or a realization that I never wanted to work again, so the "I'm ready to work again!" road should certainly be less disruptive...)

OK. Gonna run for now (partially because this is the 2nd worst keyboard of my trip....) but Ill touch base again soon. Just added some more pictures from Phnom Penh to the site, but seems like it didn't load them all...grrr. But that's OK, I'm comfortable with that....

-erik