noodle quest 2006

this entry is for my cousin joelle who is still routinely checking the noodlequest for updates… thanks jo.  still “adjusting” (will i ever stop?) to life back here in the USA.  i just don’t see how things could become less weird.  the more time goes by the less everything seems normal- or the more normal things get the weirder they seem… one of the two, anyway.  elyse’s shower in philly pics are up as are the pics from me dan’s trip to koh tao.  soon i will post more pics from elyse’s shower in nyc.  soon to come, pics from elyse’s shower in other major cities in the US.  next week, spokane.  stay tuned.  (link to the right of screen as always).

i just realized i have kept the pics from koh tao on my camera i think in an effort to make it seem like it just happened.  i guess it wasn’t so long ago.

dan sent me some beautiful hanging chimes for my birthday which i love.  he drew little pictures of us on two peices of the wood and it is super nice and makes a really lovely spring whistle in my room.

i started work at a yoga studio two weeks ago and it is going okay. free yoga classes in exchange for a little bit of money and two shifts a week.  tomorrow i am going to start volunteering at the open center which i am really pcyhed about.

 that’s all jo! (and others… maybe). 

so i am in new york and have been since wednesday afternoon. it is definitely culture shock- in some ways. i mean none of it is truly shocking- it just all feels so different. from the people, to the wealth to the energy, everything about new york feels more different than it ever has. everything just feels os specific. i feel much less attaced to this space and am taking the things that have always offended me about new york much less personally. everythign feels very interesting- i am in travel mode and this is definitely probably the strangest place i have been on the noodle quest.

i really haven’t had any time to just chill in my house. between seeing friends, eating, walking, doing, looking, sitting, thinking, traveling (philly briday shower), etc. i have just been so busy. i am really looking forward to nothingness in my house. strangely i can’t stop the urge to kind of look at craigslist for a job but really i want to give myself at least a few weeks of downtime to see friends and settle in to this space.

mmm cheese and coffe are really good. damn new york has really good food. also all of my friends are pretty nice to. and my family is so amazingly loving and crazy. new york is really very thought provoking for me right now. i am very pleased with my energy right now. i am really moving through teh craziness in very peaceful way and feeling very happy about it.

thoughtfully yours,

mali-marissa…

p.s. bridal shower pics to be posted soon and also the pics from dan and i’s trip to koh tao.

damn i am a sucker for all things japanese.  look: ﾝｹﾝﾇｴｳ ｳｴｳﾅ ｲｫllｯｧ hmmm wonder what that means… who cares, ｲｫｵｳﾞｪ i love   it!

free internet in the airport is so good. even better is the opportunity to make wonderful throatal sounds of aknowledgment that exist only here in japan. ahhhhhh so is only the beginning.  i just bought a japanese hair stylemagazine for about 9$ and i am about to eat mass amounts of sushi for breakfast. 

our flight from bangkok was good- it went fast as jess and i hadn;t seen each other in so long and had much to discuss.  after 5 hours, i now know about the first day of jess;s meditation.  we are in disbelief that we didn:t have to pay overcharge as we really can barely lift our bags.

really almost home now…

the idea of entitling this entry “last thoughts” or “final thoughts” or something of that nature feels wrong.  the reason for this is because i don’t want to think or actually do think of this journey as somehow seperate from the rest of my life.  it’s not like, as many may think, okay i’ve done this trip and now i will start my post-grad life.  this is my post-grad life.  i have learned so many things in this part of the world that are really shaping my thoughts and plans for the future.  some of these things are that i know i will always travel.  i don’t want to live a sedentary life where i occasionally get up and go places for a few weeks at a time.  not only is that “not enough” for me but it is not how i envision my future.  somethings that have been so amazing about this trip is the feeling that i am carrying everything i need.  i realized as i threw things away and gave thinsg away at every stop that i can survive happily with literally the clothes i am wearing.  another thing that was truly amazing about this trip was that i had the freedom and opportunity to go anywhere- the next move was never assumed or pre-destined.  sure we had ideas of things we would like to see but if one day we woke up in hoi an, vietnam and decided we had to go to siem reap, cambodia the next morning, it could be done.  the feeling of liberation and peace that this awarded me is something i will not let go of or sacrficie for other comforts like stability or permanace.  i know in my life i might like to have a family and a home and i am not trying to rule these things out, but i know now that what is truly important to me is to always enjoy and be at peace with the present. 

so many of the people i have met, especially dan, have shown me that you can not take things for granted, even the future.  i want to be able to plan for my future by always having some spare money, somehwere i can live, people to take care of me if i am sick, but i never want to sacrficice the now for tomorrow.  it is not what i see for myself.  being with dan these past few months has been a really interesting manifestation of these things.  i always knew i would be leaving and knowing that i would like to come back but not knowing when.  this truly allowed me to release expectation and critiscm and just accept and enjoy.  i can not explain the peace and tranquility that this has brought to my life.  i never realized how much time i spent thinking about what i was going to do next or being so un-present.  another thing i have cemented on this trip is learning that i want to be a healer in some facet.  studying thai massage and working with the body in such a physical and spiritual way really feels like the perfect compliment to my being.  i know i want to help people in my life- clearly that is my “career” destiny.  however i have never thought of something, praticed something that feels so very supportive of my personality, mindset and desires.  additionally, this is a career path that can be translatable globally and will always allow me movement and freedom. i’m not sure what healing path specifically i am interested in following but i feel excited rather than overwhelmed about the prospects of finding out. i have met so many travelers in my time in south east asia that live there lives practicing a trade they feel compelled by as they travel and move and sometimes stay in one place. i know that it is possible and that i can have this life if i choose it.

in my desire to travel and move i don’t want to convey that i am in anyway rejecting my family, friends, or home.  i just don’t want to view new york in any manner as “my final resting place” or anything on that scale, not neccesraily that dramatic.  the reason is because i don’t want to feel that that is my destiny or that that space, even though that is where i was raised, somehow has more holding power than any other space i might feel compelled to live and work and enjoy.  i really want to live peacefully as i think that is the greatest gift i can give to myself and to the world.  to do that i believe that i need to be fully present at all times and honest and aware of how i am feeling.  when i am not feeling that way, i really want to honor myself by adjusting my actions or my space- this is my dream for my life right now.

it has truly been an amazing experience these past 6 months.  sometimes i tihnk about things tida and i did together and things i did alone, flying down pnom penh streets on a motorcycle, riding a boat in a thunderstorm, working at a small bar on a thai island, going to a lao wedding, walking the streets of small towns and taking photographs, waking up and letting the day unfold organically.  i also think about the amazing people i have met, the italians from koh mak, linh in vietnam, all of the mindblowing and psychotic cambodians, the french guys from sihanoukville, mey ling and her family, tia in luang prabang, the wonderful and amazing friends from my massage school and of course dan.  i feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to have had all these experiences and the peace of mind to be open to receiving them. 

my next new destination will surely be india as i have felt really compeled by the ideas of that space and people i have met from and that have traveled to this space.  i think india also has amazing pockets of healing communities where i could learn a lot.  but that may not be for a while.  of course there will always be the issue of money- sad but true. i very much hope that i can find a way to make money that honors myself and my values that brings me joy.  i think i would really like to work at a healthcenter or yoga studio where i could work and also study and learn about the things that are happening around me. 

i want to end this noodlequest entry by giving thanks to those that have been involved in this trip through reading my blog and sending me letters of support.  knowing that i had readers compelled me to write, record and reflect on my experiences.  so much has happened and i am so thankful to have photographs and a written account of many of my experiences.  in addition to everyone who has been reading the blog, i want to thank very much everyone who has posted on the blog.  it has been so funny and heart warming ot hear your resopnses to the sometimes silly and sometimes serious things that i have been experiencing.  i also very much want to thank all of the people who have written me personal e-mails.  my posting on the blog has allowed everyone to see my life but i did not have access to a written account of everyone elses.  thank you so much for keeping me updated- it really made me feel like i was still part of things that were happening at home which was priceless in making me feel comfortable continuing on my journey.  thank you so much gwen maffia and joe maffia for allowing jess to be my travel partner.  this amazingness of this trip had so much to do with sharing it with her.  jess i love you like a sister and want to thak you for your endless support, laughs, love, mind, etc.  this was an amazing adventure for us to have had together and i can’t wait for the next one. you were truly wonderful to be with for the past 6 months.  thank you laur for your silly posts and great e-mails. i know when i come home and move into your room it will be as if no time has passed. jo- you win the best correspondent award.　the consistency of your e-mail, posts and updates has been truly wonderful.  elyse, your love and support throughout the entirety of this trip has been immeasurable appreciated.  i always felt that you trusted i was doing the right thing by myself and were so excited for me to be doing what i was doing.  i am so thrilled to come home and support you in your next big adventure- your wedding. mom and dad thank you for actually taking me to the airport.  sometimes it really didn’t feel like you would un-barricade the door and alllow me to leave.  i know it must have been really hard never knowing exactly where i was, what i was doing and who i was with.  the respect that you showed me really allows me to know that you trust me and believe in me and my decision making.  your endless letters of love, concern and funny stories from home made me feel so cared for and missed. i thought of you all the time and sent you love and well wishes from this side of the globe all the time.

i can’t wait to see all of you tomorrow!  wow… tomorrow.

 love,

 mariss

i forgot to mention that n koh tao i ate a pretty authentic burrito which was unexpected.

yesterday i had my last massage at pimmalai with blah, my massage goddess.  how can a person’s touch feel so soothingly uh-human? this is my question.

after the massage, dan had a football game.  so i got on the sky train and just kind of rode it for a while until i decided to get off at siam center- i think i went there to get food, i’m not exactly sure of my motivation.  i checked out the utterly amazing gourmet market super store which blew my mind.  i bought some pre-made korean beef and japanese dumplings for dan and i made myself the super salad of my dreams.  wow i was in ecstacy creating that salad.  then i bought an avocado to accompany it and needless to say my joy could not reach greater heights.  i dare not mention the intracicies of the toasted pumpkin and black sesame seed dressing that blanketed my meal.  oh no, i wouldn’t dare.

 then i came home and watched a super  old black and white movie on the one english channel on dan’s t.v.  then dan came home and told me about his football game. 
on the way home from chumpon, all of my skin started to peel off and i seriously looked like i had a skin disease. i was in mourning for about 12 hours thinking about how my mom was going to slaughter me first thing in the airport and how much i was not looking forward to that.  i wept about my skin for a day and then decided to exfoliate and now my skin is doing much much better.  that koh tao sun did a NUMBER on me.  i really onyl laid out for a few hours on one day and hung out in the deep shade for the rest.  powerful sun.

today i am just spending hanging around the house and repositioning my clothese and gifts betwee my backpack and my new giant shopping bag that i could literally curl up and fit into.  unluckily, jess reminded me that i have yet another bag at ning’s house which she will bring to the airport… i really hope my bags are under the weight limit. 

every one is asking for some proper closure to the blog but i don’t think this one is it….

tonight danny and i are going to see the pink panther. tomorrow i am going home.  WEIRD! 

wow, koh tao was so nice.  we spent the first two days at a beach called aou leuk which was small small and had only two little bungalow places with about 5 bungalows each- 5 on the beach and 5 on the rocks overlooking the beach.  we ate all our meals at the rocky restaurant where our table with pillows on teh floor was right over the water.  wow.  so so nice.  the third day we went to an even smaller beach called lam thien.  the road there was unbelievable.  a flock of cattle could not be herded up this road- it was like all rocks and ditches and i was holding on tight in the back of the pick up.  lam thien was really nice.  we stayed in a bugalow iwth hammocks hiiiiiiiiigh up in the rocks above the water.  lam thien is also known as shark’s bay because of all the (supposedly non-vicious) baby sharks that swim aroud there.  dan did a lot of snorkeling but i stayed pretty close to the shore as there were some foot long leeches in the water that  did not feel so good about.  also the zillions of fish liked to nip at me.  at night i saw two big flippy feet coming out of a hole in the ceiling.  it was a giant gecko.  wow.  in aou leuk the gecko in our room was 2 feet long.  it was like a small small dinasour pet for us.  the last day we went to had sai ree which is one of the bigger beaches.  we ate some good italian food and sat at a bar on the beach.  today we are leaving to go back to bangkok.  we will catch a ferry in about 2 hours that takes us to chumpon, about 2 hours away.  then we will catch a bus to bangkok which takes about 7 hours. 

koh tao was so fun and i am so glad that we came here.  i talked to jess and she absolutely loved her retreat.  she said it was totally amazing and powerful and transformative and i have not yet gotten all the details but we have a 24 hour trip home to catch up.  we are going to be in tokyo for 6 hours… where should we go? 

coming home on the morning of the 29th into jfk.  maybe a few more posts before that…

hello.  just got down to the beach after a 13 hour trip from bangkok including bus, waiting around and ferry.  pooped! unfortunately it is cloudy please pray for sun for me!  i am in koh tao and will be here until the 26th when we go back to bangkok then i fly home 2 days later on teh night of the 28th.  is that raelly true?

anyway might be difficult to e-mail fromt hese parts so check yall laterz. 

yesterday’s weekend market utterly blew my mind into tiny tiny shardy fragments. we woke up pretty early and then took a bus to the subway where we got off at the second to last stop to go to the weekend market. we stepped into it and i was just like oh my god i am so overwhelmed i don’t even know if this is appealing. i also wasn’t sure what i wanted which is a deinite no no in this market situation. i stopped another stunned farang (foreigner) and we looked at his map. HEAVENS TO BETSY i was only looking at one super small square in one very tiny section of just the section of the market that was devoted to clothes! there was also the door and window accesory section (mom try not to statr drooling), the home accesories market, the animal market, the used clothing market, the pots, pans and dishware market, the misc. market and probably a few more all in the same half circle grid that is known as the weekend market. oh yeah- of course there is also the food market.
wow. i decided to buy some fisherman panst to try and sell in nyc so i bargained around and got a good deal. then we walked around a bit, and ate some noodles.
after this it was getting unbelievably hot. dan bought us some ice pops. his tasted like extreme green apple and mine tasted like salt. ew it was gross.
then we decided to go to a movie because the heat was unbearable. we went to the movie theatre by his house and saw a thai movie called “nam phrik long rue” which was really silly. it was about this misfit team of ex navy men who were all crazy and one was a transvestitie an dthey had to go undercover into this transvestite party but then the transvestitite navy man got killed. it was really weird how normalized transvestitism was compared with some of the straight male characters reactions to homosexuality (i.e. vomitting when they by accident touched something that had touched another man’s genitals). it’s like this tolerance has to be paired with something like “it’s fine, but it’s not me.”
then we came back home and hung out for a while until i went to dinner with the chinese grandpas and danny went to his football game. oops, i mean soccer.
dinner was utterly fantastic. they were so excited to have me there we had a big round table in a priavte room. the gues list included the owner of teh restaurant (chinese grandpa #1), dr. rey (chinese grandpa #2) and a new friend mr. tao who works for the housing ministry in the thai government.
we started with a delicios soup with squid, shimps, mushrooms and fishballs. fishballs are really to my thing but teh soup was excellent. next came fried shrimp in a delicios tamarind dipping sauce. then a giant steamed fish with green vegetables and gingers was brought out which was also extremely delicios. we were also served thin noodles with shrimp and chinese kale in a delicious brown gravy, fried rice with pork, roast pork with preserved vegetables, kale with garlic and ginger and chicken, and mabe some other things i am forgetting. for desert they had probably the most delicious frit i ever had which they called star fruit but is different from what we call star fruit in the states. wow, what a great time. all of the men were so doting it was rediculous,. very literally one put ice in my drink, one poured and one stirred then one woul dstir again because it needed mroe stirring. so funny. they were such kind and generous hosts and begged me to come back and let them throw me an even bigger mroe delicious goodbye dinner celebration. i’m not sure if there will be time but it is so kind that they wanted to. they also forced me to accept money for the taxi ride there and had a driver drive me back to dan’s after dinner. thanks chinese grandpas and friends. chinese grandpa #, dr. rey is buying one of the biggest hotels in bangkok. i think he may be able to offer me some really fun and fantastic job where i get to travel a lot. too bad that doesn’t sound cool.
dan got to eat delish leftovers for post football dinner. luck him. now breakfast and then a different market before i com eback, pack and go to koh tao!

hey friends.  i am in bangkok now.  i flew in yesterday on orient thai airways which was okay but not as great as bangkok airways which i flew from samui to chiang mai.  that airline knows how to serve! free popcorn,, iced coffe, internet and lounge chairs!  but usually much mroe expensive than other domestic thailand airlines.

dan is in the kitchen right now cooking up my fantasy meal that i chose from some beautiful photos in a thai cook book he has.  i am very excited to eat!  last night i showed of fall of recent purchases.  we went for a swim in the pool where i got to float and look at the stars and then we ordered some pizza.  a great time.

today i have just been doing the crossword puzzle and drinking iced tea and lazing around.  we might go see a movie tonight although we both wanted to see Munich which is no longer in theatres.  they have a type of movie seat ticket, i think it is called “emperor seats,” you can buy at maybe 2 theatres where you sit in this giant lounge chair and the ticket includes a 15 minute head and neck massage probably among other things like food and drinks? i really don’t know.  i think it is 20$.  isn;t that nuts?

tomorrow we are going to wake up super early (yeah right- but i really would like to) and go to the weekend market.  then dan has a soccer game in the evening and i am going to meet the chinese grandpas for some kind of seafood extravaganza they are insisting on putting on for me.  i wouldn’t be so rude as to refuse.  they had organized an equally outstanding vegetarian counterpart but my vegetarian counterpart is unavailable to be in attendance.  you can check out her meditation retreat at wat kow tahm online.  she is on day 6 now.  i think it ends on the 22nd so 3 or 4 more days.  i wonder what is going on!

on monday we will go to koh tao to relax in the beginning of the EXTREME summer heat.  it is really so hot it is kind of rediculous but everyone says april is the hottest month.  i can not imagine. 

well, that’s all for now. 

last night i had a nice dinner with ro and laurie at the wok restaurant which is a really nice restaurant and famous cooking school. i had some massaman curry, the king’s favorite!
then i got home and packed until about 12. today i woke up, checked in on my dress and had a satin sash made for e’s dress. then i went back to julie’s, moved out of my room and went to the chinese market called warorot market. WOW! it was so freakign huge! at some points there were four levels and outside vendors and multiple buildigns- i am sure i saw 1/8th of it. good thing too because they had soo many cool things to buy. i settled on a weird tank top for lauren and a new hat for me. i never replaced the one that i lost in vientienne, laos.
so then i picked up my dress and sash and now i am at the niternet place. i said goodbye to bank, my friend who owns teh shop and left a good luck bracelet with him for his wife tum who is having her first ultrasound tomorrow and is going to find out if she is havign a girl or boy! everynoe thinks boy but her and bank think it will be a girl. everytime i am in chiang mai they are so kind to me and feed me all of the time in their room behind the internet. very very nice people.
i also took some impotrant photos today of my room at julie’s, my kao soi restaurant and kao soi chef, gotam the nepalese dude at the tailor and other important shots. it is a little after 2pm and i will go to the airport at 3:30 so i think i have just enough time for an hour foot massage for 3.5$! chiang mai is a spa lovers paradise.
anyway my flight is at 5 and i will get into chiang mai at around 6:30. dan’s going to meet me at the airport.
i just checked weather.com and it is 30 degrees in nyc! not okay! the 10 day forcast predicts 50 at the end. i conceptually can NOT grasp what thsi will feel like. ouch i am cold!
jess is on day 5 of ehr meditation retreat, the middle day of her journey. i am so curious what kinds of things are happening inside her skull. hopefully she will not be totally insane when we next see her. this feels pretty unlikely as 10 days seems adequate time to break down, go insane, stay insane for a while then peice yourself back together then fidn peace with your new brain, don’t you think?