Month: May 2013

It is time for the weekly: shout-out #3

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So by now you get the idea right? I try and make a weekly shout out about one of the fellow bloggers whom I notice are passing through my pages. So here is a link to Adventures in Southeast Asia a blog by Rachel Wingo who relocated herself to Cambodia for work in Phnom Penh. I will enjoy taking an occasional look on her blog to see what she has discovered and how her writing develops. Her blog is quite new still as she only just relocated a few months ago. But I love to hear about and from other women who don’t let anything hold them back and try out another way of life. If you are reading this and are over 30 then I would be particularly delighted to hear about your ‘not-standard-normal’ life. I am currently in a state of flux and have been uncertain which way to move forward for some time. I think it really helps to hear about other adults out there, who live unconventionally but don’t consider themselves drifters …

the power of sleep #1

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The amazing power of sleeping enough hours and the right hours! I feel like a new human being! I didn’t even go to bed as early as perhaps I should, but the lights were out before midnight and I slept like a bear with many dreams flooding my night. The last dream was a bit stressful and the sound of my alarm clock became integrated into the dream, which is not the best thing really. But I got a full 9 hours of sleep, with a warm mostly asleep cuddle from the person I love at about 7.30 when we had both woken up from the natural light streaming into the bedroom. I fell asleep in his arms and that may have helped, too. When I did finally get up at 9.15am I felt like a whole new human being. Durianrider is definitely right when he says: “get off the internet and get to sleep & sleep as much as you need.” I know 9.15am is late to many, but sometimes you need to catch …

Cheating is not nice (hopeful but not blind)

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We went to explore a monthly antique market in the heart of Padova on Prato de la Valle on sunday. After an enjoyable hour of browsing books and Asian artifacts (many not antique but moldy) I decided to buy a lovely pair of silver earrings. I haven’t spent anything on myself aside from food purchases for such a long time and I had really wanted to find a nice set of earrings while in Italy. SO I didn’t think too much when I was offered the items for €18. A few hours later I had already concluded that in all likelihood the earrings were not silver, nor the stone real. But what really got to me was when some of the ‘silver’ paint chipped off and revealed a black base that looked like plastic. We investigated closer and the earrings are so exceptionally cheap that I feel at once idiotic for not having noticed it and in equal measures saddened by people being such liars. They don’t know that I usually turn every penny around …

Missing India

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India, a photo by Birgit Deubner on Flickr. I miss this crazy country. Whenever I think back to India I can’t arrive at one conclusion. Such a raw place. I think of it as honest in that all of life, its highs and lows, it’s hopes and despairs are out there to see. India doesn’t appear to hide much. Not a country now that I feel as safe in anymore (as a woman) as I would have done in years past, before the media finally paid attention to the plight of women. But I don’t think that India was safer then, but my own ignorance created illusions of safety. And we all know that illusion can create reality, too.

First Shout-out

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Shoutout: I think it would be nice to make a weekly shout-out to bloggers whom I notice wandering through my blog pages. I will try and take a look at their pages and if something catches my eye then I will post a shout-out to them here, with an occasional review and always a link. So the first shout-out is to Lakshmi Loves to Shop. I was attracted to the blog because of it’s title and because of my own occasional magpie qualities (loving shiny things that glitter and glimmer) and of course because I have been to India and India is often on my thoughts. Such a complex place, beauty and brutal honesty with regards to revealing so many harsh aspects of life, poverty, cast systems, gender inequality that can manifest in cruel ways. But  India is more than I could possibly attempt to capture with a few lines in this blog. Take a look around Lakshmi Loves to Shop perhaps you will be inspired.

Dreams for Change

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If you want it, then I really firmly believe you have to start to dream it and believe it. Whatever it is. Your personal future, the future of the earth we live on, our collective future. A lot of what we take for granted makes actually not all that much sense. Take the value of a piece of paper for example, depending on what you print on it, its value can be none or great, the value is assigned by an accepted agreement to assign it value, one distant century in the past people may have called this an unlikely dreamt up idea. So go ahead, dream the change you want to see and share the dream. Just remember how women’s right to vote was once a dream, not even so very long ago. Or how flying was a dream and now we all do it (or could do it if we saved up and chose to do so.). Dream, go, dream and let’s save our world with some inspiration. What do you think about this?

10 minutes Yoga

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I have been feeling a little low and sluggish in the past weeks. Things have been quite stressful and unsettling in life and it has distracted me from eating how I usually do and from moving my body enough. I have already gotten a grip again on my food and thought I share with you a regular yoga practice that you can follow along to as well. In case you are in a slump you probably already know that moving your body and eating vibrantly will help you get through this. And if you are feeling good: of course you can only gain and feel even better.. I found this video on Youtube and enjoyed the mini yoga stretching session. I feel much better and would like to really recommend that you give it a try. One word of caution is that the side position, where the yoga teacher rests on the side of her foot and on one palm: this is a bit much for a beginner. Play with it but be careful. The …

Journey Journals & Resolutions

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Indian Travel Journals, a photo by Birgit Deubner on Flickr. … when your mind wanders or your body travels then having a journal can be one easily accessible way of keeping yourself grounded. However I often don’t follow my own advice. So right now I am in Italy, staying near Venice, teaching English and feeling especially ungrounded. My yoga mat is rolled up in the other room and I haven’t put pen to paper in a very long time. ******************* Do you think it might be a good idea to make a new month resolution every month of the year and replace those with the annual ritual of making a New year resolution? What would your resolution be today? *******************

Escaping from oneself / Sharing viewpoints.

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Seeing life through the lens – sharing pictures – Cambodia, a photo by Birgit Deubner on Flickr. I haven’t heard back from you yet, about your thoughts regarding travel and traveling with baggage. So perhaps it is as good a time as any to share one my reflections with you. A friend of mine said that you can’t escape from your ‘self’, but that just perhaps sometimes running away buys you time before yourself catches up with you. And it might just be this time that you needed to get ready to face this self or it’s attached baggage weights. Another friend of mine would say “Just sit with it”. Such an opposite suggestion when my feet got itchy and my soul yearned for resolutions to issues I felt. One friend would say: go and move while another advocated utter stillness and an inward listening. With time I learnt to understand my second friend and stillness is the greater skill, but it did take me years of movement to understand this. Now I need to still …

Traveling with Baggage

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What do you think about travel and baggage? I speak here of both physical baggage and metaphysical baggage, and of course a journey can take place across continents or across the span of time.. What baggage do you take along and what baggage do you with you could leave behind from time to time or forever?