Australia

I apologize if I haven't been too entertaining with my blog lately. It just that it's a dying art, and I have to keep up my image by being as trendy as possible.

It get very confusing sometimes. Like when you look at the wheels of a moving car and, using a bit of pretendability, you can't tell if they are going forward or backward, or the water is so hot that, for that one instant, you think its freezing cold. And sometimes, when the weight is jsut too much to bear, you forget its even pressing down, and it might still be there, it might not, but would it really be beneficial to place all your bets on one horse ( if you catch my drift)?

I don't know, thats why I'm asking. I don't think it's worth getting all worked up about, we all know that never solves anything.

I suppose it's comparable to the above simile and metaphors, except they appear in the form of infinitely large jigsaw puzzles. The only thing that would make me want to tackle one of those any less is if it was in a state of constant motion, and man alIVE if that isn't the case as well. The answer, of course, is that it IS. Who would have thought?

And Who would have thought, in a world where we are bombarded with puzzles, all the hours spent, mind tangling and retangling (I'm getting a vivid image of the earbud headphones that you have to untangle every single time you put them in your backpack and take them back out), looking for that dang corner piece so we can at LEAST establish the frame. Who would have thought that all the practice and preparation would turn out to be faintly aplicable at best.

You can ignore everything I just said.

This will probably be my last entry, which is fine with me. Is it fine with you? Next time you hear from me it will most likely be in person, so that will be way cool compared to this.

(The following information, as of now, is simply the imagination at work. We can try to put ourselves in a position for the future to unfold as we wish, but that is the best we can do. No worries then right? I'll let you know how I went when I see you in the old Red White and Blue)

In a few days I am going to take a train to Brisbane and then to a place called Woodford in order to volunteer my time for free access to an Aboriginal music and arts festival called the Dreaming (We've heard amazing things). Immediately afterwards I will find an internet cafe where I will write and submit my last final. Following, I will continue a bit north in order to attend a Vipassana retreat which will consist of ten days of silent meditation (5*2hr sessions/day). Heavy right? Sounds easy, sounds hard, we'll see. A short distance south of the retreat is where I will spend about 12 days working on an organic farm in a Hare Krishna community. Being close to Brisbane, I will board another 14 hour train south to Newcastle in order to fly back to Brisbane and the a short 13 home. (Believe it or not I thought about flying straight from Brisbane while I'm up there, but when computers and profit run the world humans are no longer free to act logically and humanely)

Then I'll be seein ya, hey?

Friday
6:00 am- Wake up, finish essay on Taoism and Zen Buddhism. Far out.
1:30 pm- Catch train and school bus to Mangrove Mountain for Satyananda Yoga Center farm project retreat. You forget how hectic a bus stuffed full of middle school aged kids actually is.
5:15 pm-Yoga Class with instructor Shiva Mantra.
6:00 pm- Dinner
7:15 pm- Kirtan, the musical chanting of mantra for the purpose of tuning into the energy of those around and of the Universe
8:15 pm- Mauna, silence of body and mind, begins. Apparently, some people are afraid of silence and refuse to let go.

Saturday
5:30 pm- Wake up, shower, meditate under the sun-splashed leaves of a deciduous tree.
7:00 am- Breakfast
7:45 am- Mauna ends. Chanting begins.
8:00 am- Meet up and head to farm.
8:15 am- Ceremony to Shiva in order to cultivate positive energy, transformation, and change in regards to nature and to the self.
8:45 am- Pull weeds around young trees.
10:30 am- Morning tea. Resume pulling weeds.
12:00 pm- Yoga nidra, guided meditation into deep relaxation. Lunch. Admire the beautiful scene of the valley from high rocky outcrops.
1:30 pm- Visit the orchards.
3:00 pm- afternoon tea.
3:45 pm- Pull weeds.
4:30 pm- Back to ashram, shower, relax. Enter late into the group chanting of a healing mantra. Can't pick up on the Sanskrit, but feel the effects regardless.
6:00 pm- Dinner.
7:15 pm- Kirtan.
8:15 pm- Mauna begins.

Sunday
5:00 am- Wake up, shower, attend morning yoga class.
7:00 am- Breakfast.
7:45 am- Mauna ends. Meet and head to farm.
8:15 am- Ceremony to Shiva.
8:45 am- Rake cut grass into piles, break rake, fix rake, rake more.
10:30 am- Morning tea.
11:00 am- Pick up grass piles, head back to ashram, put away supplies.
12:30 am- Lunch, relaxation.
2:00 pm- Nice lady Shirly gives a ride to the train station, talk to anonymous lady on the train about all the nice things in life.
4:00pm- Back home, play a little toy drum on the sidewalk with a crazy old guy who is playing a little toy guitar. Preaching about life while cursing people for not leaving change, kicks me out cause he was doing better without me. A few things at the grocery, dinner, carelessly snap a guitar string, dumpster dive a fridge full of food for the week.

Quiet contemplation, a few minutes to unwind. River's got me hypnotized and it slows my busy mind. I know what’s waiting for me up around the next bend; I'm up the canyon headed home again.

Precisely the situation we find ourselves in. How absurd it is to find me sitting here and you sitting there and me rambling on about this and that and stories that, for all you know never even happened. Don't get me wrong, I am SO happy to know that you are interested, and I think is InFiNiTeLy important that we share with one another the things we've seen and the experiences we've had.

So,

SPEAK!

What have YOU done, what have YOU seen? What are your plans, what are your DREAMs, where do you want to GO and what do you hope to FIND there??? Tell me of your struggles and of your gains. Of your failures and your VICTORIES and the experience and the wisdom that they have imparted on you. What is it that has been eluding you, the thing that you want SO BAD to know about, but just haven't found the source for the knowledge? And at the same time, the things you can't wait to share, that you know SOMEONE will love to hear about, but simply haven't found an avenue to spread the knowledge thus far.

Well, can you Find the words? Or do we find ourselves unFound?

Man alive, it's becoming more difficult all the time to try squeeze what I am seeing into words on a computer screen. However, in light of my essay due dates coming up soon (my gosh I still have uni going on, who knew?) I might as well get some more typing practice in.

So it's kind of a bummer when, after some far out guy (the one who sees ghosts and faeries) offers to let you borrow his yellow van when you go and visit him because he is going on long trip, you call up only to discover he's already left on his trip. But it's not a bummer for long because there are plenty of other interesting things happening all over the world. And especially because there so much to do, it is also very easy not to decide what until the last minute and with very little planning. So lets go to Barrington Tops! From what I hear and the pictures I see this national park is such a nice nice place. Very beautiful and plenty of sites to see. Rushing out the door and leaving several things behind, like every time you try to catch the train for a long weekend, we're off to Dungog. Although I suppose you don't REALLY need anything to survive for 3 days out other than water and enough clothes to stay warm, and even then, who knows. So Dungog is a very small town with one street of shops, an historically old movie theater, and a caravan park, the latter most of which will prove to be very useful. Upon inquiring at the information center I find out from very nice and kind of old Zoey that all I need to do to get to the tops is take my car and get on this road and oh wait I don't have a car. I have become very trusting in the Universe and decide not to get upset or to rush back to catch the last train home for the day. So after saying hmm a few times Zoe waltzes up and tells me that shes sorry she doesn't have her car tonight but she'll take me up first thing in the morning, meanwhile here's a discount rate for the caravan park down the road because you look like a trustworthy fellow. Wow thanks, that was easy. Very grateful indeed I set up camp and get talking to another fellow in the park who turns out to be a Buddhist Australian of quite a few years (much more Australian than Buddhist but apparently he USED to be much more Buddhist). Wander, grab a bite, and settle down for a quite, meditative evening. In the morning the fellow has decided to rearrange his tightly packed car and give me a ride to the tops, which is funny because when we stop by the info center, yet ANOTHER guy ends up actually giving me the ride to the tops. Such nice people, and all without me even asking!

This guy Dave, who's parents own the campground, draws me up a map to get me to some rad waterfall because there really isn't any trail and especially no trail markers. But the map looks good so TO THE FALLS. Through the river and over the paddock dodging the piles we go. Warm and cushiony to the bare feet, but more gross than pleasant if you can imagine. The first section of bush is extremely reminiscent of bushwalking in Athens, Ohio. It probably looks nothing like it to be honest, it was more the feeling and the fact that I can barely picture Ohio woods right now (an odd feeling, I will be ecstatic to wander once again in the forests of home). There is such serenity in the hills of Australia and the first clearing has me captivated for quite some time. Onward and upward I am moving through more paddock which is covered in ferns. A wild scene. The stillness seems to grow as you become more and more separated from the people who don't care to venture out (in this case everyone at the campground except me). Simultaneously the trees become louder and more alive than anywhere in the city. During the rest of the walk (through the bush) the scene slowly becomes more rain forest-like. Very far out since I've never seen rain forest before. In the furthest reaches of my adventure (where, unfortunately, none of the pictures seemed to turn out) the double-headed leech creatures constantly bombarded my feet and took to sucking the life right out of me, which turned out not to be that bad. Its funny how your mind works though. You can stop and say, ok they are not hurting me, they just flip around here and there latching to and fro. Except as soon as you look down and see one 5 times as big as the rest, the reflex part of your mind freaks out and says, THING ON LEG, SWIPE SWIPE. So we swipe. Except its even funnier because swiping doesn't work. They are just latched right on the little buggers! So in the end you have to slow down to grab them off anyway. Crazy as the world is, I never even found the waterfall, and was most certainly in fear of being lost at one point. I had enough with me to be comfortable for some time but MAN would It have been miserable to be stuck out there in the dark. As long as we keep our mind and eye open, we will always know where to go. No worries. Peaceful decent, sore feet, dinner with the owners (man these people are SO nice), and up the next morning asking around for a ride back into town. And HOW nice? The owner lady ended up giving me the ride, she wasn't even headed that way. Unfortunately the 3:00 train only runs on saturdays and Dungog does not offer much to do Sunday evenings until 8:00. Fortunately the world is wonderful and as long as everything is always happening, there is no problem with being alive here instead of there or wherever we think we are supposed to be going.

I can't quite put my finger on it, but I seemed to learn so much more from the natural world this particular weekend than, dare I say any other hike ever? Bold statement, we'll just go with It taught me heaps. But perhaps it is not just we who are learning. Perhaps the entire natural world is learning together, all going through the same unknown existence. And, like two mature human beings, or two components of a cell, it will only be a matter of time before we learn how to communicate properly and help each other through this thing, whatever it is, toward whichever unimaginable future we can strive to imagine.

If nothing else we can be rest assured that there is enough inspiration and energy to go around, keeping us all wondering and loving and digging it all. And instead of sitting around talking about it, we are given the freedom dive in head first, immersing ourselves in this glorious situation of life.

In the end who knows. I don't, but it sure is hectic, and I will always love to hear what you have to say about it all.

Much Love to everybody

I have just returned from ten days out on my autumn holiday and life is certainly inspirational. Just in case anyone is wondering, easter is not celebrated very extraordinarily here. I have seen very little indicating the season. However, that may be due to the fact that I spent Good Friday and Easter Sunday (Thursday to Monday) at the National Folk Festival in Canberra where people had, I would argue, much more interesting events to be concerned with than eating Peeps and coloring easter eggs. Although I did learn that after coloring easter eggs you are supposed to have a competition to see which egg is the strongest by holding them tip to tip and smashing them together. I would like to know why I missed out on this easter extravaganza during my childhood years. No worries though, the past is past. So back to the music festival. I don't think it beats the fun of Nelson's Ledges, but old bearded folkies certainly know how to have a good time. I have never been to a place with that big of a variety of people, attitudes and ages alike, where everybody got along so well, and for five days on end. As with every situation there were given number of people who were fooled by some devilish force into thinking that they had to be serious, but on the whole, the crowd was phenomenal. On top of a bunch of rockin Australian folk bands and heaps of Irish folk music there was a whole load of groovin styles of music from all over the world. SO all day for five days there was music playing and everybody was happy, as the story goes. In addition there were event after event of dancing lessons, music lessons and random whatever idea someone came up with lessons happening around every corner. Along the road were artisans selling their crafts, mostly hand made, that simply blew me away. I don't know how we got so wrapped up in buying products shipped from far off countries manufactured in sweatshops, but that craving can easily be satiated by exploring the wonderful world of local crafts and choosing to support our brothers and sisters of closer proximity than china in their creative endeavors. Under temptation to spend hundreds of dollars, I was able to escape with 5 dollars on clothes and 14 dollars on tea (very good tea). In the end festivals are festivals and the sun is the sun. We dance around and have some fun, then its time to move on. A little bit more free and definitely on a living spree.

So we can joke around that Big Joe will find somebody he knows anywhere he goes. It is something else though when he hooks you up with a guy who happens to be living in Australia in a city that you just happen to be traveling to. While in Canberra I met up with a guy named Rocky Padjen, and old Canadian and the national womens hockey coach, who took me into his house for a few days (fantastic after sleeping on the wet ground and eating pb&j for a week) and showed me around Canberra. Cities in themselves don't do much for me, and the people tend to be a little bit too busy on average to stop for too much of a chat. However I was able to appreciate Canberra as a beautiful city and enjoy some of the sites. The nicest part of my stay in Canberra was the hour and a half I spent sitting in silence next to an eccentric looking homeless man in the park gazing off into the sunny distance. I don't know if he was comfortable with me sitting with him, he wasn't too keen to talk, but I'll bet deep down he enjoyed the company as much as I did. I did find out the next day, as I was walking past what I am assuming is his daily spot, that he has Tourrette's. Either that or he occasionally gets extremely upset with the state of things and chooses to express his rage by throwing curses into the wind.

So we need to get out of the city because its just too dang big and full of things and especially since I just spend 5 days mingling with heaps of crazy old folk and loud young folk and tons of nice looking little tykes busking for a few bucks on the side of the foot paths while their parents were watching from afar or more likely off listening to an act at this or that stage. O yeah, and I met some super nice women at the morning yoga classes who made beautiful eye contact when you talk to them and the words you exchange have a distinct feeling beyond just empty syllables which were established by some people who thought they were very important in order to signifying certain objects and happenings and ideas. But out we go, on a bus next to a guy. This is the guy who doesn't feel like smiling, but instead grumbles sometimes because he's not getting what it is he's looking for except he doesn't realize that he isn't even sure what it is hes looking for so by Jove you bet hes never gonna find it. But since hes grumbling you figure theres no point in trying to make a connection because hes also the same guy whose subconscious programing is set up to resist such connections. But you never know until you try do you? Now which one of us is guy?

The coast is about 2 1/2 hours from Canberra by bus. A nice looking town but you need money and a car if you want to partake in the type of enjoyment the area was developed for. Yet sometimes simply wearing a backpack and rolling up your jeans gives you the edge you need. No one questions you as you wander around finishing the scraps of food people left on the tables in front of the cafe and you can certainly find some friends among the nice naturely ladies at the health food store and the smiling old men who love to spend their wonderful free time with their wonderful old wives and their vans and fishing rods that have gotten them here and there plenty of times. But even so, I need to find some free land in this town. I've never worn a cap in my life save during my embarrassing baseball years but I was really digging this Dan & Dan Landscaping hat that Rocky had given me, especially since the sun was doin its thing way up in the sky all day long. I don't remember much about my wandering other than the serenity it brought. I suppose you might say the beach was cove-like in this area, I don't know, but anyhow the waves were fairly small along this stretch and reminded me much of Lake Erie. I came to a nice climbing cliff on top of a which I found a police officer trying to escape the mundane idea of his duty. He quickly became embarrassed by the irrationality of our situation and wandered off, disguising his scenic searching as a routine hunt for mischief. We apparently weren't supposed to be on this or that side of some ridiculous fence according to some guy somewhere as I discovered after following my friend and inquiring about certain affairs. I know it sounds all too ridiculous to consider that some people who don't like climbing cliffs and looking at the ocean decided that other people couldn't do it either, so I pitched tent on the edge and the universe came to rest with me as we drifted off into the peaceful night of nothingness and everythingness.

In the morning I decided not to bother rushing back to catch the bus and ended up having a great conversation with a very interested and interesting man. He suggested I pay a dollar and a half to check out an opal and shell museum on the walk back to town, which was very cool. You can't even imagine the beauty and variety of shells in the world, all created from scratch by little sea creatures considered in ignorance to have no sense of creativity or artistic ability. After a long day of hitchhiking and training and busing I am back home in the luxury of my box, cooking warm meals in my tea kettle once again.

It isn't until we are able to slow down, reflect and consolidate our gains that we realize the enormous impact our every experience has on our very being. I find myself continuously filled with awe and wonder with respect to life and its enigmatic quality, inspiration erupting from the core are flowing into the very space that we occupy. The feeling can't possibly be described, but if you've felt it you know, if you haven't, be excited for it. Just remember.