Jason::Adams

So ever since I was a little kid, I’ve always been scared of death.  I remember nightly before going to sleep, wishing individually for everyone i loved not to die.  I’m more scared of my loved ones dieing.  I realize now  while living by myself, that I’m still very much scared of death.  The more I think about it, the more scared I get,the more I read about it, the bleaker things seem to be…. I search online to see peoples thoughts on death, and the only way people are coping is by believing in some religion or by believing that their is life after death?  Am I supposed to trick myself into believing to calm my soul?  I seem to believe that at any moment, I or my loved ones could go. And after that, there is nothing.  Even stories fade, after 3 generations no one will be thinking of me after I’m gone.  This is all rather depressing to think about, but I feel like It’s something I need to think about, something I need to learn to deal with.  This feels like something that could cripple me emotionally and I need to be stronger, I need to have an understanding with my lovedones about that inevitable act.  Maybe I’ll have a talk with my Dad, Mom, Brother, Sister…. but have they ever thought about it?? Do they really want to hear it? Do I really want to hear what they have to say?

Death sucks man.

I’ve spent the last couple days what feels like just lounging around the hostel, when really I’ve tried to do alot.  Yesterday I tried to make it to Kontonburri and the Tiger Temple but ended up taking a 4 and a half hour bus the wrong direction in Thailand to Chontonburri (where the Thai dont pronounce the difference)  It was extremely frustrating and making the tiger temple would have been the perfect conclusion to my trip for me, but it didnt happen and I tried to make the best of it.  Hit the waterfall, the buddhist statue/temples, the secluded beach where I got drunk with some locals, the taxi drive around, and headed back home.   Today Joey and I made it out to the Grand Palace and the emerald buddah (because we got tricked the time before and never made it on time).  It was cool seeing the Palace and the temple, but really that kind of stuff doesnt make a trip for me.  Really its the stories I have, do I like to travel so that I have stories when I get home? So that I have stories for myself?  What really makes the trips for me are the amazing people you meet while out travelling.  On my last day today I met an italian named Rogero that made the taxi ride out to the night market with me to pick up Cecy’s painting.  Real cool guy who after high school just decided to start travelling around, told his parents he was going to work in australia for a year, but keeps calling switching where hes going to go.  His family is coming out to travel with him and see him on points of the trip, and in general hes a cool smart guy.  Knows like 5 languages.  On the way into the hostel I made a point of meeting a girl getting out in front of the hostel, she was looking for money for a tuk tuk, so I just paid for it and walked in side.  Invited her out to the big group of people I had arranged for dinner at Condoms and Cabbages and she agreed.  Later got to know her a little better and found out she was a 19 yr old young cutie from Camber Australia ( a government boring town) but she already managed a club called Toast out there in camber, and had bands such as sigur ros, jurassic 5, alot of music talent come out to her club.  Kind of hard to believe , but I have faith!  She’s a super cutie, and has an amazing smile, and after meeting all these cool people again seeing how long they had to travel I almost let my emotions get the best of me and extended my trip.  She was trying to convince me to extend my trip, and others where encouring it also, because all the europeans love to travel for extended periods of time, its a part of there culture.  We talked about this a bit at dinner and I think part of it has to do with the fact that the government pays for Uni so maybe they have alot more money to travel with right off the bat.  Not sure.  It was really tempting to extend my trip, but looking at the responsibilities I had at home, the opportunities I had at home, the finances in my account, its quite a bad move for only 5 more days of fun etc.  Yes those 5 days could have been excellent and could have made a great story, but I can’t always forget about the things at home.  Work hard play later right.  It stinks because I bet I could have a really great connection with this Australian girl Freya, but I guess we’ll have to leave it at that, we had a blast for one night, it was nice knowing you, goodbye, the usual traveller style.  Thats something I think Id have a problem with being a traveller, you get the excellent upside of meeting tons of new fascinating people all of the time, but you have the horrible downside of meeting this people, really enjoying their company, and then having to say goodbye over and over again.  not sure I could deal with this, considering how much I love people!

Im sitting here writing in Bangkok, on what appears to be my last night.  I want to run upstairs and convince all of the people watching the movie to stop watching the movie and go out drinking with me on my last night, but I know my last night, doesnt mean much to them.  They are travellers, they go through many peoples last nights, everyone is always moving.  the friendships so brief, yet so true, so innocent, so lacking of the social conformities everyone is used too.  It’s friendship based on a universal understanding, of a common background of the type of personality it takes to travel the world.  I’m going to learn the lesson of letting go, I’m going to go upstairs, and say goodbye to everyone, hug some goodbye, and be content with the memory of the good fleeting moment, the strong bond between new friends, and the everlasting mark that the trip has left and will leave on my heart.  Man I’m going to miss it, thought it was only yesterday it started.  Good times. Good people. Connection.

Woke up to the guys watching Last Samurai and after many failed attempts at trying to get them off the tv, I packed my bags and told them I was just going to go.  This got them moving fast, and somehow we managed to make it on the bus last minute.  (Literally mike and joey were hopping on the bus as it was driving away)  We rode the packed bus all the way over to Patong beach.  This beach was definately better than Karon or Kata but nothing compared to Phi Phi Don.  Definately alot of older, grey hair, fat men.  We made do with what we had and sat in between a group of young people.  I made my way quickly over to the jet skis where I got 35 min of jet ski action for about 1000 baht or the equivalent of 30 bucks.  It was a good time, but definately needed some boats so i could jump the wake.  The view was still awesome jetskiing around the islands in thailand.  Great time.  Would be amazing to rent a jetski for an hour or two and just cruise around the coast of thailand.  Spent 30 minutes joshin around on the water, then headed back and met the canadians right near us.  Decided to meetup with the canadians for drinks later, fucked around a bit with the scottish guy right near, and headed off.  We grabbed some burgers at Rock City where they had the King Kong burger, which was a hamburger with fried egg, sausage, asparagus, cheese… definately weird but the best burger I had so far on the south east asia trip.  Just saw Dan one of brits I drank with on the top of th hostel roof the other night, great guys, could see myself having a lot of british friends they reccomendedt he movies layercake, chopper, id etc.
Walked around patong for a bit waisting time, then met the canadians and had some drinks.  Saw teh bunny on the stripper pole , realized how exhausted i was from the sun, and just headed home with the guys on a relatively scary tuk tuk. 

I just spent the last 2 hours on top of our hostel drinking and talking with two lone german travellers who met….  Heard lots of cool travelling stories, and got to meet some more really great people.  it’s always so awesome for me  meeting all of these people.  We flipped heads or tails whether the germans and I would go drink or if they would go to bed early considering they had a boat to take early in the morning.  Fate was with us that night and we ended up drinking late into the night.  Went to the 7-eleven right below our hostel ( preferred dining area of choice for our trip, dim sum yummm, fake chicken meatballs yummm) and grabbed a couple 32 oz of Tiger beer.  Tiger beer is excellente, too bad we have all these crap american beers, their crappiest beer is really good.  The two germans were real friendly and the usual conversations about the different countries where we were from started.  Also the usual George Bush , and american stereotypes, and borat conversations started as well.  I’m kindof bitter that the movie Borat was made now.  Everyone thinks americans are crazy bullriders who are racist as hell and ignorant as fuck.  Atleast I was helping break stereotypes I constantly heard “you are the coolest americans we have ever met, you seem like your from canada”

They ended up inviting me to stay with them in germany, (this is always offered as a sign of good faith between travellers, but Im wondering how rare it is for actual followthrough).  The girl has travelled all over the world, to many remote places.  She works in advertising agency for Mercedes Benz I believe it was, and the guy had met her at the hostel and was clearly trying to capitalize on the fact that he was the only german around. Whee. Definately intoxicated while writing this and my music is distracting me. Waves of m83 are taking over, dammit I never make time to write these blogs excuse after excuse. I’ll write later.                                                                                                                                         

So I’ve arrived in Phuket and found us a hostel somewhere in the boonies I hear about 15 minutes from Patong.  Last night we ate at a barbeque where you grab your own raw meat and own ingredients for soup, and cook everything over coals at your table, definately a very unique experience.  We had a ladyboy as our server, she/he was actually very nice to us, and helped us because we obviously had no idea what we were doing.  Ate some heart under Armando’s reccomendation, and it wasn’t bad except for the texture of the meat.

Describe Dorm

My bed is on the bottom bunk, Armando is sleeping above me, the city has just started bustling at about 6am and the sound of motorcycles and dogs barking is keeping me up.  So I decided to wake up and check out my laundry. (Laundry machines are so FRIGGIN confusing here)  I throw on “The Appleseed Cast - Fight Song” and go onto the top of the hostel to look into the city.  From the top you can see what looks like some kind of high mountain surrounded by fog and/or smog…. looking down on the bustle of the city I can’t help but think about how small we really are in the world.  How can you have a huge ego when even if you had a massively sucessful band, or were a famous actor in the states, most of these people I’m looking at on top of this hostel in a random city in Bangkok, would not care, would not know, would not change if you died and left this planet forever.  So what then do you strive for? I definately have that strive for “fame”, for recognition, for a place in this world.  But maybe me trying to find a place in this world is really finding peace with the fact that I will only have a place in this world as one of a race, one of many surviving for thousands of years to come.  What could I do to be remembered a thousand years from now? I could try and make it into the history books, but is it really worth the effort, am I wasting time for myself, for what I truely want?  You could say that I want fame, that anyone wants fame, for survival reasons. With fame comes power, when you are recognized, when everyone knows you, it is instant status.  That kind of recognition thousands of years ago meant survival.  With fame comes power and responsibility, but I dont need fame now.  I don’t need to survive, I will live long.  I don’t need fame for finding that “perfect girl”, I need time, I need dedication, and maybe a little luck.  So what have I learned on this trip so far? I’ve learned that the mass amount of ”friends” or more likely defined acquantainces you can accrue while networking, can be extremely beneficial for your life, for getting jobs, for gettings things you want.  Knowing people gets you things you need, but I’m not sure it actually provides any real soul value.  I need to establish deeper connections with people.  It’s funny, in a way, you leave, hoping to reaffirm, that your reality, your life, knew you left.  Its a reaffirmation of your existence, of your “value”.  Travelers check their emails and myspaces everyday, hoping someone from their home has messaged them, has said how much they miss them, everyone hoping.  Is there anyone that is really going to think about me, more than a brief fleeting moment?  Why do I feel dissapointed when I see no comments on my Myspace? Does it mean that no one cares? Does it mean I haven’t put enough effort into my friends, into the connections into the people I know? Maybe that I havent put enough effort into leaving comments for them? Maybe this goes back to the networking values, that you can’t recieve value without first giving it.

I’ve been really noticing the nuances between people and cultures lately.  I could never see myself living in a place like Malaysia or possibly even Thailand, where the culture is full of value leechers.  People don’t smile randomly, no one appears to be happy.  Im grateful to live in a place where I can smile at someone and receive a smile back, Im grateful to live in a place where our trash and sewage is taken care of, Im grateful for the fresh air in San Diego, I’m grateful for the beautiful girls, Im grateful for the rules we have, Im grateful for the people that follow the rules, Im grateful for the opportunity we have in America, Im grateful for the many friends I have, Im grateful for having a car, Im grateful for our healthcare, IM grateful for the freedom, IM grateful for the comfort, of home.  Indonesia V Malaysia? Whats the difference? The welcome, the greeting, the sincere and honest appreciation of life and the people around you.  I need to strive to live my life appreciating those things around me, and expressing my appreciation for the things the people bring to me.  I need to practice appreciating and understanding people, like that day in English class, Mr Rowans class where he asked me to say the beautiful things about the people around me, and told me I had a gift.  I had a gift to see the good things in life.  Lost focus in whatever I was writing about so i’m going to end this blog, and leave it un organized, in its raw form.  I’ll start another blog trying to cover some of the stuff I’ve done on this trip.

the lone dogs working their way around solely focused on finding their meals of the day, the people

So Im way behind in all of the writing I want to do. I think its best if I go over the last things I did, and then attempt to go back in my memory so that atleast some of the memories are preserved vividly.

We left Kuta as a group from Hotel Wina, after booking a room there just so we could store the stuff we didnt want to take.  Took just a small backpack, and packed into a van/taxi with Amit, Joey, Mike, Armando, Woyyang (our friend the artist with a studio in indonesia, and a crazy tatoo on his face) and our driver Jimmy.  Went to pick up Narnia at her hotel (the model from calgary), and she had invited some random aussie she met the night before (later It was obvious this was all an attempt to make me jealous or pissed off, childish woman she was)which meant we had to get another car, so we did and started heading towards UBUD. We were going to Mount Batur, a huge active volcano in Bali.  We seperated in the cars somehow, and ended up losing the other car, so we pulled over at on some random street to wait.  It was hot, so we got out of the car and proceeded to play hackysack in front of what looked like a huge wherehouse of handcrafted furniture.  We played hackysack for a bit, which is always good fun, when it suddenly started pouring.  (the weather is crazy in indonesia) We ran for the car, but the driver had left somewhere and the doors were locked, so we ran towards the wherehouse. All the people in Bali are exteremely nice, and were more than happy to let us stay in their shop to stay dry.  They ended up being super cool, we checked out all fo the crazy handcarved furniture, and then said goodbye when the rain stopped and the other car found us.  We took off towards ubud! We hadn’t slept much the night before, so I fell asleep for most of the car ride there, but it takes about an hour to get there.  The first thing we did was go to the monkey forest which was friggin awesome! We walk into the monkey forest and buy these bananas from vendors, which we later find out the monkeys don’t like that much. The bananas we got were small, and the monkeys like the big ones. We went into the forest, and it was incredible.  One second we were in this dirty, sidewalk broken, people filled city, and 10 steps later, we were in a lush green almost rainforest type environment.  Their were vines entangling and hanging from trees that towered hundreds of feet into the air.  We had entered a jungle alright, with one distinction, there where hundreds of monkeys.  The monkeys were used to people in their little jungle, and were walking around, taking bannans from people, stealing things, it was quite the site.  There were huge monkeys, small monkeys, baby monkeys, mother monkeys, just monkeys everywhere.  Narnia had bought some red type of fruit that the monkeys went absolutely bonkers for and started running all over here.  They were pulling her pants down,and actually ripped off her bikini at one point! HAHHA!  I got some of the red spikey fruit (which I later ate, and it tasted like a big grape) and started playing with monkeys.  They climbed up my clothes and jumped on my shoulders, and it was obvious that these monkeys were not stupid.  If you tried to tease them they’d fake walk away then pounce on your fruit. Or theyd just launch straight at you.  You cant move too quickly or appear to threaten them at all or youll get a quick hiss and a display of teeth which is supposed to be scary.  There was a great moment where I was walking on a moss covered wall, and I slipped and fell perfectly on my ass right on another wall.  Everyone looked at me and started laughing, and all I did was put a banana up in behind me on a shoulder to give to the monkey who appeared to be laughing at my fall as well. It was perfect timing and everyone wondered hwo it worked out so well. (Later when we met Alpha Monkey on top of Mt Batur, it was scary).  We then walked around and checked out the different temples, we went north some and went on a path Im not sure many tourists go on. I think it was actually some peoples living areas and farming areas, but we found a house made completely out of bamboo. Bamboo tables, bamboo walls, bamboo stairs, bamboo chairs.  We spent some time relaxing there (felt like  might be invading someones place of business or home), and took alot of pictures.  We then headed back down, and saw the crematory, which was basically graves (wasnt sure if it was monkeys or people or what, probably monkeys).
Next we went down some stairs to go into a cavern waterfall type area.  Apparently we were in a holy cavern, where people were filling bags of water, or bottles to keep with them and cherish.  People were washing their faces with the water coming straight out of the rocks, which makes me think it was a natural spring.  I washed my face with the holy water, but wasnt about to go drinking out of it, even if it did look like a natural spring.  There were moss covered walls, and status everywhere, of big  fat monkeys in armour.  The walls were huge, and everything around you was completely green whethere it was the leaves from the trees, or the moss that covered the bark, the floor, everything!  It was very calming and cool down there (due to the spring), and was definitely a highlight. We then packed back into the cars and headed over to the Antonio Blanco museum. (A museum that Woyyang I believe had wanted to check out, becuase hes an artist, and there was great views there)  The museum was pretty expensive but we bought our tickets and went in.  In the museum everyone was really nice and they had pelican birds, and tropical birds on the walk to the museum.  Outside of the museum was a beautiful statue fountain, and a HUUUUUGE statue at the entrance to the museum.  We took pictures trying to capture the size of the statue, but I determined it was pretty impossible.  We walked up the grand steps where we were informed about the rules, no cameras, etc.  The paintings in side were awesome! Antonio Blanco was basically known for just being a lustful man. At one point I read a quote of his from one of the things he wrote about a painting.  A fan said “you are very philosophical Blanco, what would you consider the meaning of life…” to which Blanco responded ” the closest i have ever gotten to the meaning of life, would be holding a fresh delicious mango in my right hand and the firm ripe buttocks of an 18 yr old in my left.”  That just about sums up Antonio Blanco.  Most of his paintings are nude paintings, but without the cover up of sexuality like the united states has.  There was a painting with a balinese woman with a candle in her vagina , (right now is a chance for you to explore cultural differences, because over there, that type of sexual act I described, isnt thought of as bad or something to be hidden, they celebrate lust and life!) But I wasnt all too impressed with his paintings of nude women.  I did have one painting that was my favorite entitled “Macabre” which was a painting of a skull and one of the sand time things, I cant remember what its called at the moment, but you flip it over and sands falls to the bottom to keep time.  Anyways the painting had a poem on it, basically talking about how death is life, in the process, and in creation.  It was very cool, and I’ll try and find the painting/poem for this blog later.  We made it to the top of the museum, where there were some superb gold statues and we got out first view of mount Batur.  Once we all saw the volcano we were scared! Holy crap we had no idea how huge this volcano was, it towered well above anything in the city, and was even towering above the clouds. We took pictures, lounged for a bit, and then headed back to our cars to setup our hotels. (we had to get to bed early because we would be leaving at 1am for the volcano)
At this point Narnia got very frustrating trying to take over the hotel process, and  basically could not deal with me.  It was obvious she was putting alot of emotion behind stupid stuff, and I think it had to do with the fact that she may have never been “rejected” before. She is a top model in calgary, and when I told her that I didnt want anything to do with her in that way, things definately changed. She got very bitter, and was trying to use tactics such as jealousy to I guess win me over?  The whole thing was so typical, and it just appeared to be a girl who always had control over everything in her life, especially guys, feel like she was losing control because some guy whos not even good looking, didnt want to have sex with her.  What the hell ever, her problem not mine.  She got all crazy,and eventually we just asked them to drop us off so we could find our own hotel. At the hotel she gave me one of the “YOUR NOT LISTENTING”, subcommunicating Im not understanding, or that what she was saying was always right. I felt the emotions behind it and just walked off. She said she had found one, but we continued walking looking for our own anyways.  On the walk, Joey and I got separated from Amit, Mike, and Armando, and he proceeded to freak out thinking they had ditched us, and were going to get hotels without us.  How this came to his mind I’m not sure, but maybe its validated from people ditching him throughout his life.  Life is full of lots of Catch-22’s, tough stuff.  Eventually we found them, and Amit had found a really cheap air conditioned place. We booked there, and after Narnia found out her place was fan cooled, she booked in our place as well.  She proceeded to stay on her power freak trying to decide everything, saying if someone was slow she wasnt waiting so she was getting another tourguide. Its hard to describe how everything actually went down, but Narnia was being a retard.  Personally I didnt care, let things go with the flow, and went with the guys to get some grub.  Mike and Joey got into another tiff, and the tension everywhere in the group was real high besides Amit, Armando, and myself who stayed calm and collected.  (Life is always changing, there is no definite. The only definite is the perception of what is your reality.)
Indian food was dank, and I ate a ton in hopes that the full stomach would help me fall asleep easier. From there we got in our room, and noticed how shitty it really was.  There was no hot water, my bed was wet, with bugs in it… Amit had what appeared to be a yellow stain on it, and Cando had a huge spider in his bed. We had no time now, so we just doused ourself in OFF and tried to get those 3 hours of sleep, till wakeup time.

I’m going to end the blog here, and I’ll continue with when we woke up at 1am, to hop in the car, and head towards the climb up Mount Batur Volcano.

Remember narnia, slingshot, riding bikes, studio, food market, woyyangs friend, rita, massage, mohawk, market, saying goodbye to herman, pictures, drawing in notebook, kiss on cheek for hs jakkarta girl.

Sitting in the internet cafe, finally found a cafe that can handle my blog!  Most sites can’t even load the blog, I guess its somehow bandwidth intensive.  Anyways woke up this morning to head over to Narissa (Narnia)’s hotel to say goodbye to Herman my friends I met at Narissa’s hotel.  Herman is a mandarain teacher and he had his high school class with him travelling around bali, they are from java.  Spent the day getting a mohawk, a massage, and chilling with narissa.  Shes so like me that its almost creepy. Gotta head out. Later.