Our internet access has been lacking, so I apologize for the lack of blog posts. However, hopefully my double post will make up for it. I am at a school after a 70km day, so here goes!
Today is thanksgiving Monday, we FINALLY have a day off, its been a long time since our last one, so its nice to have time to chill and reflect, unfortunately its been crazy rainy all day. Actually all three of our days off have been rainy, its kinda disappointing, since we are currently on Hornby Island and its beautiful here, but we don’t really have a chance to explore it. I popped out for a short (1.5 hr) ride around the island though, so I got to check out a bit of it. I went down to an area called Ford's Cove, which was beautiful. It had all of this big leaf maple trees lining the road, and then there were pastures lined by a rocky seashore and the sea rolling away in the distance with the rainy-stormy day. It was so beautiful, and the rain almost added to it because of the fog in the air.
Yesterday was thanksgiving and now that I am reflecting on this (although I have been reflecting on this all weekend) I am aware of how lucky I am. There are so many things that I am thankful for in my life, so many things that i often forget about! First of all, its amazing that I am able to be here right now, on this trip! Its definitely challenging, I never knew how hard it is to make all decisions with consensus is, it makes me realize how impatient I am! Its amazing to be meeting all of these amazing other females, discovering passions in them, and discovering that I am not alone with my passions, and goals in life. Swimming against the norm, working towards creating a more enviro. Sustainable future, ignoring what mass media often insists we must buy and consume, tends to isolate me (and others) and cause doubts to arise. However this experience has helped me see that those doubts have no place in my life, everything will work out, all I have to do is trust myself. So I am also thankful for myself and ability to listen (sometimes) to myself.
Yesterday I also got to talk to my family on the phone, which was really special for me. It was great to chat to mom, dad, brother, and sister, and for some reason it felt really special. I really appreciate having a family that is so supportive of what I am doing, especially when my life choices tend to challenge my families norms. Its nice to know whatever happens, we are still a family that loves and values one another. Thanks family!
I could go on and on about what I am thankful for, but I will stop here because...I want to get back to reading my book ( the birth house) and play games with my tour mates! So I end here, we have an 80 km bike ride tomorrow, along with 2 ferry rides! Then we arrive in Naniamo on Wednesday (we also have 2 performances Wednesday). So stay tuned!
Thanks for listening to my ramble and I hope you all had a wonderful thanksgiving as well!
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Sick...
The intensity of this trip makes me feel like i am living a lifetime of emotions, experiences, aches, pains, laughs, joys, and sorrows all in two months. Meaning the experience is really intense!
I have recently been feeling really sick: achy limbs (not from biking), stuffy and runny nose, sore throat and congested head! Let alone that I have been hacking up a lung! But I am not complaining! I am observing how a situation (like biking in the rain all day, being wet and cold, and having to then set up tent and cook for 14 other bikers) that is challenging but do-able is intolerable and causes exhaustion and a need for me to retreat! Living in an intentional community has caused me to sacrifice a lot of personal comforts and things that I usually rely on to define me (regular running routine, cooking, etc.) which has opened me to see the potential I have beyond these “items of definition”. However, it has also caused me to sacrifice myself, to the extent that i feel guilty if I take time for myself away from the group(like what I am doing right now). It is always a struggle to find balance between nurturing our inner and outer world, and I find that I tend to neglect my inner world, as many activists do, in hopes to find belonging, happiness, and/or fulfilment in life through my outer world. However, as one of my tour mates constantly reminds us: taking care of yourself is the most important priority and everything else comes second. This is a “rule”that we have even stated as a group during the tour, yet it still makes me feel guilty to leave the group for a warm, dry place to reflect, why?
Perhaps I feel guilty (which I think is a useless feeling, along with worry) because of how lucky I am and yet how I am still not satisfied. I may have been sick, wet, cold, and tired earlier, yet I was also fed, had friends and shelter (of one form or another), which many people would consider luxuries. Yet my luxuries still did not satisfy me, I wanted to be dry, warm, and healthy, all valid desires, yet also most likely the source of my guilt. Knowing what my needs, as an individual, where, I took it upon myself to leave (with another teammate) and act on these needs. This was not a gesture of hate or disdain towards the group, but rather an act of love towards myself, because without me there is no we.
I end with a reflection on the group and the time we have left. There is three weeks left and I am excited, I love everyone on the trip, however I am also scared that we will start to lose ourselves (due to lack of individual time) and begin to dispose the group. I am also worried that we will continue to be over stressed by the weather, biking, performing, nomadic living and group dynamics. We will see what happens, I hope for the best and will try my best to bring positive energy to the group!
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Tired legs make it to Campbell River
Today (September 28th) we biked from Powell River to Campbell River. A ride that was only suppose to be 55km, however my partner and I made a few detours so it was more like 65 km (I'm guessing). My legs are tired, and my butt hurts, but it was a glorious ride. The scenery was amazing! With hills unfolding in the distance, fluffy clouds encircling mountain tops, and the sea calling our name. Last night was the first frost too, so although the day started off pretty chilly (we had to catch a ferry at 7:45am to the island, so we were up at....5 AM!!), it was lovely weather to bike in, nice and crisp!
Along the way, my bike partner and I also made the decision to stop in at cool looking roadside things, because whats the point in making the journey if you don't take advantage of it, and all the perks of going slow (biking vs driving) holds! So we stopped in at a farm produce stand, a sculptor who showed us his working area (in BC there are road signs to indicate whenever an artists, its pretty sweet....Ontario learn from BC!), and a road sign with my last name on it! The sculptor did really cool stuff! He designed and made fountains out of copper and old instruments, it was really neat. I doubt we would have seen him/his work if we were driving.
Our lunch was on the water, soo beautiful! We walked along the water checking out jellyfish and a crazy orange coral. It was really relaxing to just sit and eat and chat about what we want to do with our lives, what we foresee for our futures and all that jazz.
We don't have much else tonight, we may practice the play, we are currently making changes to it, but thats it. I am guessing we are all going to be pretty tired, I know my legs sure are! We have a performance tomorrow, and then another long (60 km) bikeride, and then my cooking group is also cooking dinner! Yikes!
So I am sitting at the library with my biking buddy using the internet!! yippee!! Anyways, I will end here. Thanks for listening, and following my ventures through stiff hip flexures, many sleep days, school presentations, and beautiful scenery!
Along the way, my bike partner and I also made the decision to stop in at cool looking roadside things, because whats the point in making the journey if you don't take advantage of it, and all the perks of going slow (biking vs driving) holds! So we stopped in at a farm produce stand, a sculptor who showed us his working area (in BC there are road signs to indicate whenever an artists, its pretty sweet....Ontario learn from BC!), and a road sign with my last name on it! The sculptor did really cool stuff! He designed and made fountains out of copper and old instruments, it was really neat. I doubt we would have seen him/his work if we were driving.
Our lunch was on the water, soo beautiful! We walked along the water checking out jellyfish and a crazy orange coral. It was really relaxing to just sit and eat and chat about what we want to do with our lives, what we foresee for our futures and all that jazz.
We don't have much else tonight, we may practice the play, we are currently making changes to it, but thats it. I am guessing we are all going to be pretty tired, I know my legs sure are! We have a performance tomorrow, and then another long (60 km) bikeride, and then my cooking group is also cooking dinner! Yikes!
So I am sitting at the library with my biking buddy using the internet!! yippee!! Anyways, I will end here. Thanks for listening, and following my ventures through stiff hip flexures, many sleep days, school presentations, and beautiful scenery!
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Pictures on Facebook
Link: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.952987908657.2408966.122609925&l=8232856c36&type=1
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Beyond Training week!
Sept 9/11
I biked out to the north shore of vancouver this morning and its SOO BEAUTIFUL!! I don't know what it but its so calming to be by the water. The view is beautiful, but the juxtaposition of man-made with natural is interesting. A lot of the "man-made" is destructive to the natural surroundings, like the large cargo ships. This contrast is beautiful although also scary.
Today is our day off so I biked to a cafe and had a lovely time. It was super cute and had fair-trade coffee and vegan muffins! Yippee! I love Birtish Columbia!
Sept 10/11
Today is the day for our premiere performance so I will keep it short! There is a lot of rehersing going down, so its intense but also exciting. We are still doing training week, but its the last day of training week which is sad but also exciting too.
Potluck! Everyone that came to see the performance brought food and its all vegan!! SOO nice to not have to eat rice and beans for dinner. Don't get me wrong, I love them, but....I need aq change!
Sept 11/11
Today is our official first day of the tour. The other tour group left and we are about to leave for our first "real"performance at the Science Center. Its pretty amazing thinking about all of the experiences and accompilishments I have had in the past year, and here comes another!
Sept 12/11
We are moving out of Southlands farm and going to sleep on a school gym floor.
Sept 13/11
Today was our first cloudy day. We had two performances and some workshops and they all went well. We are still in need of practicing because all of us forget our lines here and there, but we are also pretty good at improve, so most the time the audience can't tell that we are saying different lines. We do need to work on our transitions though.
Sept 14/11
Its our food day today! we have broken up our food chores into groups. so we have 5 different cooking groups and eat team does a whole day, starting with dinner (so dinner, breakfast, lunch), so we are today. We have a lot of left overs to use, we also got a lot of veggies for free by asking a few natural grocers, YES! We also are aware of the need for awesome food, people need food joy, so....lentil loaf with stir-fried veggies and I am going to make giant oatmeal choc. chip cookies for everyone and our long bike ride tomorrow. I LOVE COOKING FOR PEOPLE!!
P.s. Everyone LOVED the food!
Sept 15/11
Our first big bike ride. We are leaving vancouver (woohoo), we are biking to gibsons. Not very far, about 35 km, but it was still a challenge with all the hills and all our stuff to carry. We also had to take a ferry, which was really nice to ride at the end of our bike ride. AND the scenery is SOO BEAUTIFUL!!! We are staying at a camp. and we did a performance there, and they fed us!
Sept 16, 17, and 18 to come. I am tired of typing...sorry!!
I biked out to the north shore of vancouver this morning and its SOO BEAUTIFUL!! I don't know what it but its so calming to be by the water. The view is beautiful, but the juxtaposition of man-made with natural is interesting. A lot of the "man-made" is destructive to the natural surroundings, like the large cargo ships. This contrast is beautiful although also scary.
Today is our day off so I biked to a cafe and had a lovely time. It was super cute and had fair-trade coffee and vegan muffins! Yippee! I love Birtish Columbia!
Sept 10/11
Today is the day for our premiere performance so I will keep it short! There is a lot of rehersing going down, so its intense but also exciting. We are still doing training week, but its the last day of training week which is sad but also exciting too.
Potluck! Everyone that came to see the performance brought food and its all vegan!! SOO nice to not have to eat rice and beans for dinner. Don't get me wrong, I love them, but....I need aq change!
Sept 11/11
Today is our official first day of the tour. The other tour group left and we are about to leave for our first "real"performance at the Science Center. Its pretty amazing thinking about all of the experiences and accompilishments I have had in the past year, and here comes another!
Sept 12/11
We are moving out of Southlands farm and going to sleep on a school gym floor.
Sept 13/11
Today was our first cloudy day. We had two performances and some workshops and they all went well. We are still in need of practicing because all of us forget our lines here and there, but we are also pretty good at improve, so most the time the audience can't tell that we are saying different lines. We do need to work on our transitions though.
Sept 14/11
Its our food day today! we have broken up our food chores into groups. so we have 5 different cooking groups and eat team does a whole day, starting with dinner (so dinner, breakfast, lunch), so we are today. We have a lot of left overs to use, we also got a lot of veggies for free by asking a few natural grocers, YES! We also are aware of the need for awesome food, people need food joy, so....lentil loaf with stir-fried veggies and I am going to make giant oatmeal choc. chip cookies for everyone and our long bike ride tomorrow. I LOVE COOKING FOR PEOPLE!!
P.s. Everyone LOVED the food!
Sept 15/11
Our first big bike ride. We are leaving vancouver (woohoo), we are biking to gibsons. Not very far, about 35 km, but it was still a challenge with all the hills and all our stuff to carry. We also had to take a ferry, which was really nice to ride at the end of our bike ride. AND the scenery is SOO BEAUTIFUL!!! We are staying at a camp. and we did a performance there, and they fed us!
Sept 16, 17, and 18 to come. I am tired of typing...sorry!!
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Training Week in Full Swing!
First of all I would like to apologize for the lack of photos, I will try my best get one or two up on my next post! One more logistics note, I have taken notes in my journal every day about how the experience is going, so I will make updates from those notes and date them appropriately, now for the good stuff!!
Sept 3/11
Today is the 1st day of training week and I am super tired, although excited for it all to begin. I met everyone and we are all super interesting, although I can see where some friction may arise, hopefully it doesn't though. When there is friction I find the best solution is trying to see where the other person is coming from.
Sept 4/11
Day 2, I just snuck away for a little me and relaxation time. Its been a good day, although I underwent an emotional and energy roller-coaster. But all and all its been good. This was the first day that our tour group (sunshine coast) got to spend some time just with us (there are two tour groups training together this week). It was a really great bonding experience.
Sept 5/11
Today we start work on the food mandate. I am excited to see how it to goes, although nervous too. Its a great chance to experiment with our values, but I also don't want others to feel like I am imposing my values on them. Its sometimes hard to hold true to your own beliefs while also remaining open to others.
Sept 6/11
I am pretty tired, and I'll be honest, right now I don't really want to be here. I need some time for my batteries to recharge: to run, journal, and reflect on whats been going on so far. Surrendering control over your life is really hard, even if it for 4 days. We did do a hugging experience today though, which was amazing! Half of us closed our eyes while the other half went around and hugged the people with closed eyes and then we switched. It was fabulous, made me cry, all that love!
Sept 7/11
Biked to a coffee shop near the farm with a bunch of the girls that I am going on tour with before our day began. I had a really good conversation with one of the girls about food and making the choice to eat animal products or not to, it seems to be a topic that will forever be popping up. Its only the 5th day, but it feels like we have been here for forever already.
Sept 8/11
Day off (well, not full day, it starts at noon). We finally got through the full play this morning, I am a little concerned about it, since our first performance is on Saturday. Somehow we will make it work. I am so excited for free time too: I need to wash my clothes (and myself!), buy a few things and do a little interneting.
Well I hope you enjoyed those snap shots from my days, if you have suggestions or comments I would love to hear them!
Sept 3/11
Today is the 1st day of training week and I am super tired, although excited for it all to begin. I met everyone and we are all super interesting, although I can see where some friction may arise, hopefully it doesn't though. When there is friction I find the best solution is trying to see where the other person is coming from.
Sept 4/11
Day 2, I just snuck away for a little me and relaxation time. Its been a good day, although I underwent an emotional and energy roller-coaster. But all and all its been good. This was the first day that our tour group (sunshine coast) got to spend some time just with us (there are two tour groups training together this week). It was a really great bonding experience.
Sept 5/11
Today we start work on the food mandate. I am excited to see how it to goes, although nervous too. Its a great chance to experiment with our values, but I also don't want others to feel like I am imposing my values on them. Its sometimes hard to hold true to your own beliefs while also remaining open to others.
Sept 6/11
I am pretty tired, and I'll be honest, right now I don't really want to be here. I need some time for my batteries to recharge: to run, journal, and reflect on whats been going on so far. Surrendering control over your life is really hard, even if it for 4 days. We did do a hugging experience today though, which was amazing! Half of us closed our eyes while the other half went around and hugged the people with closed eyes and then we switched. It was fabulous, made me cry, all that love!
Sept 7/11
Biked to a coffee shop near the farm with a bunch of the girls that I am going on tour with before our day began. I had a really good conversation with one of the girls about food and making the choice to eat animal products or not to, it seems to be a topic that will forever be popping up. Its only the 5th day, but it feels like we have been here for forever already.
Sept 8/11
Day off (well, not full day, it starts at noon). We finally got through the full play this morning, I am a little concerned about it, since our first performance is on Saturday. Somehow we will make it work. I am so excited for free time too: I need to wash my clothes (and myself!), buy a few things and do a little interneting.
Well I hope you enjoyed those snap shots from my days, if you have suggestions or comments I would love to hear them!
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Otesha Tour Blog
If anyone is interested, there is going to be an Otesha blog for the tour I am going on, where the participants take turns posting updates about the experience/journey. If you want to be on the mailing list for these updates go to the link and subscribe!
Aside from that, my update today is that I leave for Vancouver tomorrow! The training week starts Saturday, but since we are meeting at 8am on Saturday I am spending friday night in Vancouver. I have my paneers mostly packed up, and every time I look at them I just can't believe that my whole life for the next 2 months can fit into these two small bags that STRAP ONTO MY BIKE!! I am sure I will get over this astonishment, but right now, ever time I look at those two little bags I am in awe.
My friend, who will also be on the tour (we only became friends after finding out we are going on this tour together!), and I went on a test run, fully loaded, 2 days ago and survived quite well. Although it lacked hills, we biked 60 km, and were barely phased, although somewhat tired at the end. So some of my faith in myself and my bike has been restored.
Well, I am off to bed, next time I write I will have started (and maybe finished) training week, so stay tuned!
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