Tainted Love

As the longtail pulled up to the rocky beach and the calls of 'take!' and 'slack!!' filled the air, it felt as though I had never left.

Tonsai beach loomed up in front of me, it's limestone cliffs and jungle growth glowing in the sunlight just as they had that first week in Thailand, so many weeks ago.



Within a few hours of my arrival I had secured a home and was sitting around a plate of chicken and rice with a group of 'old' friends. By the day's end I had climbed a few routes and found a means of employment.

Everything is the same as the first time.



And yet everything has changed.



I am not the same person I was when I first left home almost a full 365 days ago. I am not the girl who landed at an airport in Thailand and decided "maybe I'll try rock climbing for a few days. That could be fun."

I have changed in ways that only the open road can change a person. I have grown in ways that only a backpack home and a 'plan-not-to-plan' can let you grow.
I. Am. Different.



That's why we travel, I suppose. So that we will push our limits, so that we will know a side of ourselves we could never see from the comfort of our couch. So that we become something new; dare I say it something better?



Or maybe ignorance really is bliss.

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Today I got an email from Bex, a beautiful and inspiring woman whose passion and dedication have continually astounded me. She's in Kolkata right now working with Deepa.

As I sit in my tropical paradise, alternating between drinking ice coffees and climbing rock ladders to heaven, she is elbow deep in the chaos of the City of Joy.

As I lay back on a cushion and watch the sun setting out over the turquoise blue waters, she makes the daily trudge past naked children and bleating cows, through crowded streets and up a stuffy cement staircase to the cries of 35 children in an enclosed space.

My greatest frustration in a day is not sending a route. Hers is trying to help a little girl learn to speak while surrounded by noise, filth and apathy.

Last time I was here, I didn't know. I didn't know that in some places in the world half a city sleeps in the streets each night. I hadn't stood at the foothills of the Himalayas and had my breath taken away. I hadn't ridden a wave or felt the power of sending a route. I didn't know what a family of five living on $10 a month looks like. I had never been dirty before. I had never been hungry before. I hadn't witnessed outright bigotry, I hadn't rocked a baby to sleep in the back of a rickshaw as her 17 year old mother sat smiling beside me.

I hadn't met Deepa.

Do all of these experiences mean that it should be harder for me to enjoy the beauty of now? Should I feel more guilty smiling in my little corner of the universe?
Because I don't.

I just feel luckier.

Which is why I'm going to check out until the end folks. This will be my last post from paradise. I'm about to dive in headfirst and enjoy these last moments of the journey without outside contact.

See you when I get home.