Today In Chiang Mai

Waking Dream: I am seeing the luminous face of a woman I know very well. I know I've met her before but I can't remember where. Her face has the bright glow that I described when I first met Jude on the Kanchanaburi Trek. I try to write down the features of her face because I know I need to remember it. I wake up here and the face is still strong in my vision, like the Oriental Vision I described in another Blog post.

My sister asked me to show her what Chiang Mai is like. Do you see elephants in the city? What does your Hotel look like? Let's take a tour together...

That's the bathroom in my hotel room. What you see on the wall is an electric heater. It heats the water for my shower as it comes out of the hose; and it works very well. When I turn the bathroom light on it acts exactly like that scene in the movie 'Apollo 13'. Remember when NASA has the astronauts turn the lights on in the capsule after being off for 5 days. They sputter to life and make a ping sound. That's the lighting here. "okay, yes, Houston, the light is operating. Tooth Brushing is commencing..." I already solved the mystery of the toilet flush so let's move on...

this is my bed. It is hard and has just the one grey sheet. I have a fan in the room to keep me cool at night. Sometime early in the morning, Chiang Mai cools down enough that I need to turn off the fan and use one of the red blankets.

This is the door to my room. I knocked on 203 but then I remembered it was the wrong city. Sorry Judy. You notice the second, padlock. I bought it to give myself security in my room. No one ever comes by to clean the suite. The ants like it that way. I lock my door, forgetting my key. When I come back with one of the Hotel staff, I meet two woman just coming downstairs with their packs on ready to go on a trek. I'm in a hurry to get on with my day so just nod to them and head downstairs.

Then it's downstairs and a five second walk next door to my favorite breakfast place: 'Nice Kitchen' where I eat my usual; scrambled eggs on a croissant with a slice of ham and Thai coffee. I hear the sound of Sitar music in the background and smell sandalwood suddenly; and then it's gone. I look over and there are the two women I saw upstairs, sitting at the table next to me. I don't know why I seem to need to meet them but I say hello. I learned from reading 'The Celestine Prophecies' not to take such meetings for granted. Or maybe it's from seeing too many episodes of 'Joan of Arcadia'. Anyway, we talk for a moment and they tell me they are here from Bavaria. I don't know what it means. I'm just the reporter.

Then I head one door over to read my email and answer my fan letters; well at least read my email...

Then Dennis shows up and we head out to do some shopping. On the way we pass by 'Mikes' which is the local hangout for Americans and Canadians who get nostalgic for the greasy food back home and for the political satire that bashes the Bush administration.

I keep looking for the brand names and so I bought this shirt from a sweetie at one of the shops. 150 baht. She wanted 220. I told her she needed to sell to me because I was her first customer today. "Ist customer Lucky" I reminded her.

Chaotic shopping and in it's midst, beautiful Thai Temples, all swirling together as one community.

This face reminded me of the link you made on your site for me. Namaste'!

We were getting hungry so we headed down the street to 'The Salsa Kitchen' where I had a bowl of Cuban Black Bean Soup. As we sit eating, we listen to twangy country music droning in the background: "...that's all it took for me to yurn for your embrace..."

Dennis had the chicken but couldn't remember the words (which was a blessing).

In the afternoon, Dennis rode off to the Train station to take the train to Bangkok. We will meet up on the 23rd to head off to the Islands for some well deserved R and R after our gruelling time here In Chiang Mai.
I went for dinner at a smorg that serves 'steak' that you fry yourself and all you can eat for 95 baht (less than three dollars).

The interesting thing about my trip is that no matter where I go, I seem to have some Soul to watch out for me. In Bangkok it was Sanga. In Chaing Mai it has been Dennis. Now that I'm alone for a night I find that this little dog walked around the whole restaurant while I was eating and settled down right beside me for a sleep.
I meet John McCoy, who has a bookshop called Irish Rover, just down the street from my Hotel. just as I'm writing this entry. He's been here since July of 98' He says he moved here and met a woman who he had a beautiful boy with. Now she's gone and he's looking again. Please send your proposals to the Blog. I'll pass them on. John has invited me to go to a Jazz bar that starts at 10pm so off I go.

As a footnote: As I write this post, I met John, who I then added to the Blog right as we talked. Meanwhile, as I'm talking to John and uploading pictures and writing this Post, Melissa is back in Ontario, reformatting the pictures as I'm adding them. Meanwhile, Kathy from Calgary is chatting with me on Yahoo Messenger. Meanwhile I am already receiving comments on the Blog I'm working on, from people all over the world who are reading it. This is the Chaos that is my life. And I love it. Oh yes! I forgot to mention the elephants! Maybe next time Meliss...

My Oriental Vision

As I get ready to travel to Asia I think of a quest that started when I was 17 years old. I had a great English Teacher in High School by the name of Diane Brown. She taught a book in one of her classes called ‘Man And His Symbols’ which is a book dealing with the Teachings of Carl Jung. Jung taught the concept of the Anima and Animus. He believed that each of us carry our other half inside ourselves. A man has the Animus or feminine aspect within just as the woman carries the male aspect within her. For a man the Animus is often his muse, such as in the case of De Vinci’s Mona Lisa. As I understand it, De Vinci worked on that painting for many years and carried it around with him when he traveled. The Mona Lisa represents, in Jungian terms, the connection to the collective unconscious. If you look at this painting you will see that his muse stands in front of a wondrous world. Diane was a tremendous influence on me and was my guide to many books and concepts that started me on the path of esoteric studies. It was during this study that I had an extraordinary experience. I was just waking up one morning when I heard a voice inside say: “keep your eyes closed.” I followed this instruction and suddenly a picture of a beautiful Asian woman appeared on the screen of my mind. She was a painting and yet she appeared alive. She stood in the center of a stained glass window of brilliant white and yellow crystals with an intense light streaming through from behind it. I found the vision breath taking. I then came to consciousness and opened my eyes, to find that this picture remained even with my eyes open. (I have put two images together to try to show a crude version of what I saw. The woman in this painting is the closest I could find to the woman I saw in my vision.) She was very much my Anima; or guardian to the unconscious; beckoning me to enter a greater World. All day long I could see this beautiful Asian woman in my vision whether my eyes were open or closed. It was such a powerful image that I spent many years looking for it in Art books because I felt it must somehow exist in this physical world. Perhaps it does, but a part of me always understood that it was just for me alone. I have looked for this magical vision in the eyes of each woman who has been my lover. And as I travel now to mystical new lands of ancient cultures, I look for her still.