karma

i took this photo on san blas island, central america.







i'm feeling much more positive today! its amazing what half a jar of nutella and a chat to your mum can do for your spirits!

instead of tormenting myself about my future, and wallowing in such first-world problems, i'm going to relax and enjoy this holiday and be thankful for living in such a beautiful place and having so much free time..... according to the laws of karma and reincarnation, such un-gratefullness on my behalf should probably mean that in my next life ill be born as a balinese peasant who has to wake at the crack of dawn to tend rice-paddies every day 'til i'm 60 and never learn to read or write or travel outside my own village.....

oh, touch wood!!! ....its time to start doing charitable acts so as to earn a decent re-birth.... i ask jerry what he thinks about saving up and going on a mission to nicaragua, to volunteer in an orphanage. it could be really fun actually. you know those projects where they clean the place up, do some renovations, help the kids to decorate with colourful wall murals and mosaics, plant a veggie garden etc...we could film the whole thing and make a documentary out of it....!

i have a friend (english joe) who lived in africa, doing volunteer teaching for several years and said it was the best experience of his life. his stories used to blow my mind. the people had absolutely nothing and death from HIV was a daily occurrence, but they were still SO happy! joe's students were so respectful and eager to learn that in his classrooms full of 80 kids, there would be complete silence- just a sea of big white smiles in black faces. (such a stark comparison to the hellish classes full of bratty russian mafia kids that i taught at summer school in croatia a few months ago)...

i'm impressed that jerry's actually into the orphanage idea and i officially add it to my list of 'things to do'.

;o)