Friday, November 21, 2008

Finally Coming Up for Air

To begin with a very obvious statement: I have not updated since India, which is now very far behind in mind and proximity. For that, I apologize. However, I did predict this tardiness happening even before I was trampled by the rapid acceleration of time in the brief stops in several other countries, and even briefer stops back on the boat between these destinations during which hours were lost every night. Even I am surprised by how long it has taken me to find a free moment to write again. I must also confess that the earlier blogs were written at the expense school work, which was more or less neglected so I could continue to entertain you all out there in world wide web land. But something had to be done, as my time here is quickly vanishing and the list of work to be done is swelling. To your relief, I have very little work left to do now, which means more time devoted to you, dear readers, all of those outside of the hours spent sleeping (an unhealthy number) and eating (often sacrificed for more sleeping hours).

So where are we now. Today is Friday, November 21st. I have doubled my list of visited countries since I last spoke with you, and in half the time. That should give you a good idea of how the momentum has surged. Until now, I have had very little time to sleep—five days to try seeing everything there is to see in Malaysia, two days to catch up on work on the ship while battling unruly bowels, five days in Viet Nam for six-am wake up calls and twenty temple visits, then two days on the ship to relearn how to sit and type papers on a computer, five days in port dragging my sick, fatigued body around four Chinese airports and up and down the Great Wall, two days on the ship trying to recover from China's noxious air condition and a great loss incurred by everyone, five family-filled days in Japan to show everyone everything I used to love in every city I'd ever visited, all while translating in a language I hadn't spoken in months, which brings me here, to November 21st, the first time I have sat in bed with nothing to do, or at least nothing to be done immediately.

It may take me a while to provide you with sufficient entries of all five countries, but I will work as fast as I can, and as with the last India entry, I will probably be pulling some content from papers written from school. Yes, I have more time now, but I still think it unrealistic to carry myself back to where I left off. It's much too much.

So I will begin with Malaysia in the next entry, separating each country thereafter to give this blog a little structure—just to prevent you from feeling overwhelmed with everything at once.

1 comment:

Yoshi said...

good to hear from you again sis! looking forward to hanging on every word you type.