morning has broken..

After a long night where the island tried not to hold its breath, nor think too much, where sandbags were piled against the worst, morning has broken. There was no tsunami last night. The sandbags and bags under the eyes of my fellow islanders remain the only evidence of a long, sleepless night spent in waiting.

the worst thing...

The very worst thing about living on a beautiful tropical island the size of a football field with no area higher than 1 meter above sea level, in the Indian Ocean is waiting to see if there is going to be another tsunami.

Today's earthquake has my entire island sleepless, as are people all over the coastal regions of southeast Asia.

It's 3.30 in the morning, and they expect that if something happens, it will begin about 5.00-6.00. So, we wait.

test your geography

This site has a variety of geography quizzes. Test your level of geography about continents, oceans, and more!
Simply click on the title of this entry, or cut and paste the following:

http://www.lizardpoint.com/fun/geoquiz/worldquiz.html

a dangerous business....

Bilbo Baggins once said, "It's a dangerous business going out of your door; you step into the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to."

I remember when I was 12 and my family left Northern California. I had been all over California, its coasts, mountains and valleys. California was my world, and a beautiful one. Then, as we drove across the border into Nevada, I saw the map in my head with all of its borders and dividing lines melting until lines didn't exist. Without lines my world was a much bigger place.

In my teenage years I traveled all over the US by car, by bus, by train, by plane, anything that could get me somewhere new. I've seen 45 of the 50 states, and most of those I've traveled fairly extensively, and often a few times over. At 20 I went on a 3000 mile road trip as a first date, and got my license the day before the trip. We drove 19 hours without stopping (except for petrol)straight from Texas to Virginia's coast, where I got out of the car and jumped into the ocean just for the joy of it.

By 21 I had swum in the Pacific, the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico. I had seen many wonders in the country of my birth, but I began to hunger for more. My best friend is English and we have always talked about so many ideas. One day we were talking and he said, "You know, when you say you're coming to visit me, and 'When would be a good time?' you seem to actually mean it." He was very confused. We'd been best friends with outrageous phone bills for almost 5 years and I'd never been to see him, although we had talked about it many times. "Yes. I am. When is your break?" I replied. He was shocked.

Once I decide on an action, I do it. As a by-the-by, I flew to Boston for a week, came back and was very sick when I did the passport application. I bought my ticket and was waiting for the passport to arrive. On the Saturday preceding my (Wednesday) trip, I got a letter stating that I needed to send another check as mine was post-dated and unacceptable. Panic. I called a friend and asked if he was up for a road trip to Houston to get my passport. Sunday night after work we drove half of the night, stayed in the creepiest hotel listening to fights and the occasional gunshots as we waited for morning (with furniture piled against the door just in case).

Monday morning, it took 10 minutes to get my passport (in my fever, I had written 1989 instead of 1998 on my check) and then we were free. Tuesday I had a meeting to make, and Wednesday I left for London. As long as I was in London, I thought, "Why not Paris?" I had a beautiful time. It was the warmest Valentines Day weekend in Paris in a century. Most of all, I had my passport and the world was my oyster.

What followed? A month in Italy, a week in the Netherlands, a five day weekend in Belgium, discovering the more hidden parts of the Riviera, trekking across France, Switzerland...it all blurs together. One day, returning to work, someone said to me, "Ah, now back to the real world." I smiled but thought with resentment, "THIS isn't the real world. THIS is just what pays for my trips to the real world."

Within a year, I had made the decision to move to Spain. In Barcelona I fell in love. Not with a person, but with a city, a life, a people. In the last few years it has been the place I return to whenever I want to go "home". Even so, it cannot hold me. There is always someplace more exotic to see, to live. Twice I have lived in Barcelona and twice I have received incredible job offers that I couldn't refuse.

At 29 I'll have lived on 5 continents and have traveled more than 25 countries. I've lived on the coasts of the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. In the last 3 years I have circled the globe 3-4 times. I'll be back round again in August as I return to Barcelona for a month of exams. I will have traveled for 15-38 hours at a go on planes, trains, buses, boats and in cars. My next dream? Cycling of course! As soon as I live in a country big enough for a bicycle, I hope to take it up. I've always thought I would start off easy by biking across the Netherlands (the flattest country I could think of).

Other traveling dreams? I've never crossed a desert by camel, nor crossed a country on horseback. Then maybe, just maybe it would be very interesting to cross England in a motorcycle with a side passenger car attached! The Pan-American highway is of great interest, the Orient Express and the Trans-Siberian Railway are in the near future, and I've already got my eye on a trip to Antarctica! So many things to see in this world. How to find time to see them all? I'll try.

Of course, if you have any ideas for adventures, feel free to send them to me. :-)

a bridesmaid at last...

Last week, or perhaps the week before (time on an island is difficult to measure), I had had a bad day and escaped to the bar for a drink with friends. Before long, we noticed a lovely young woman sitting by herself. I invited her to join us. She's Bulgarian, on holiday with her husband. They had been married for six years and he had proposed to her in the Maldives. As of yet, she hadn't gotten him a Valentines Day present, and so she wanted to plan a second wedding here. She joked that I could be her bridesmaid.

I didn't see her again for a couple of days, then we met again at the cocktail party. Such an enchanting young woman, large blue eyes that are both merry like a child and show an inner softness and vulnerability. Her hair is like sunlight framing her creamy fair complexion. Tall and slender, from without, she is a vision, but what captured me was the sweetness, the purity of her being in her eyes. It was at the cocktail party, on the silky white beach at sunset when I met her husband. I knew that he was significantly older, but when I saw them together I was struck by the love shining between them.

I joined them for dinner that night along with another couple, on honeymoon, from England. We said goodnight around midnight. That night I dreamt of love, a love pure, strong and beautiful.

The wedding was to be the following day, but after two months without rain, suddenly the fury of the heavens were unleashed. It was the Bulgarian couple's last night on my resort before moving to our sister resort. The wedding was canceled, and she was terribly disappointed. The following day I took the ferry to our sister resort, to the cocktail party because I had said I would see them there. The surprise was on me! They were waiting at the jetty for the ferry to go back to my resort, which they referred to as "home". We had dinner and drinks once more. I drank in their looks, their affectionate touches like nectar. Despite living in one of the most romantic honeymoon destinations in the world, I don't see much genuine affection. Couple these days are very practical minded. The relax, and enjoy, but the affection is much lower than I would have expected.

If I were here with someone I loved, I would want to hold hands, to gaze at them, steal kisses, or else plant kisses of affection on their temple or brush their cheek with my lips if I left even for a moment, or for no reason at all. These two were enchanting with their affection. It was subtle, to be easily missed, but I could see the joy and love in their eyes.

The morning of the wedding dawned bright and early. I am not used to seeing mornings. I had left my office at 4.30am and my eyes closed at 5am. I rose a mere three hours later to get ready to see them off. I arrived at reception in time to help with the necklace of frangipani flowers, and the separating of petals from other flowers to be thrown into the air around them as they were paraded around the island. The groom came first, then in a grand procession with drums, we went to the villa to pick up the bride. She wore a simple white satin dress made by our tailors, and she was glowing. When the procession was ready to enter the boat, it was thought there wasn't enough room for the extra people to come. The problem was solved by the drummers sitting on the hull of the speedboat.

On the desert island, I played the part of the bridesmaid.

In such a company it seemed fitting that the bridesmaid film the wedding with the couple's camera. It was a grand wedding, and my first in Maldives. The ceremony calls for quite a bit of drinking- an entire coconut, a glass of champagne, another glass of champagne...before long the groom was asking for a toilet, so halfway through the ceremony he ran off to the side of the island, lifted his sarong and relieved himself while the rest of us laughed.

Later, after all was said and done, he wanted to go for a swim. She had packed his swimsuit, so up came the sarong once more, on with the swimming trunks and then off with everything else as he dove into the lagoon. I sat in the relative shade of a palm frond with her in her dress, knees under her chin.
"I wish I could go swimming too," she said.
I jumped up, "Go!"
"No, I can't. I brought my costume, but there is no where to change."
Now I had the help of the one female receptionist (who loves swimming as much as I do). We exclaimed that we could use the table cloths and hold them up in front of her as she changed.
"No, I just wish to. I cannot."
"Go in your dress then!" I exclaimed. "Really, you're not going to wear it again, why not?"
Her protests were getting weaker and weaker as she looked longingly at the water.
"You must be joking. How many times in your life will you have the opportunity to go swimming in your wedding dress off of a desert island in the middle of the ocean?"
"Ok...Ok, I will." and with that, she got up and with great resolve made her way to the beach and then slowly melted into the water. It was beautiful. When she had finished I was waiting with a towel to wrap around her. She looked radiant.

The entire party then made its way across the beach to the boat and returned to the resort, drumming and singing the whole way. The groom even got to drive the boat, happy as a little kid.

That was two days ago. They have returned to their two beautiful children and the cold winter air of Bulgaria.
My heart thanks them, for allowing me to be a part of, to see and experience the beauty of their love.

rain

What is it about rain? The way the air tastes, the coolness it brings, or perhaps the relief after being hot and dry for what seems like a small eternity? These tropical islands grew hotter with each passing rainless day. Two months had built their dry furnaces in our seemingly air-less rooms where sleep became harder to find with each passing day, and then this morning...the air was cool and the sky was grey as I listened to the first drip...drop and then the gentle music of the soft rainfall upon the tropical trees outside my window.

Today is the first day of classes being resumed after a long frustrating month of administrative work. I take it as good luck...

evgeny

do you read this

write

i don't know you
i wish to know you
for the first time

friends

do you wish it
are you curious

friend


remembering the sun like a half forgotten dream
there was wind
a boat
laughter
birds
a look
the golden light fades into the recesses of the mind
was it a dream
is the past anything but
a whisper to the subconcious
is a photograph more real than a painting
is it all an illusion

-willow march 2005

trans-siberian railway

I'm considering the possibility of going to Mongolia later this year. I am unsure of the route I would take. One possibility is doing the Trans-Siberian railway, and another is connecting out of Seoul. As I am looking into the possibility of this journey, I will be looking at different routes. Possible countries or places that I might hit along the way are:
1. Irkutsk, Lake Baikal, (Siberia) the deepest fresh water lake in the world
2. Moscow
3. Korea
4. China, Shanghai
5. Mongolia -this hinges on getting in contact with 2 teachers I met and enjoyed spending time with in Malaysia

It's a big "if" at this point. It WILL happen, but perhaps not this year, maybe next.

If you live in any of these places, and would like a visit from an old friend, please contact me. Especially in Russia. I hope to see some friends along the way. :-)

write me...

Life is art. There are many kinds of art- some like modern and chic, others prefer it to show the uglier side of things. Some feel that art is a sculpture, others a painting, still others a performance. Whatever way we mold, shape, or paint it, it's ours. A beautiful gift that is only ours. Others may influence, but ultimately we must be the ones to decide what our art is. We should celebrate what we make.

If life is art, what of time? When we are small, minutes seem like hours, and an hour to play seems like only 5 minutes. A year is an eternity, and yet even then we find that a year is over before we know it. After 18, time begins to speed up, and yet we hit so many speedbumps that we wonder if we'll ever get through it. After 23...24...25...suddenly a year is nothing much. We feel like it ought to be significant, but we know it won't be. It will sail past us like a tall ship in a good wind.

The best thing in my life is that I have loved. I love. If "to love another person is to see the face of God.." Then it's no wonder I see God everywhere. I have felt for a long time now that I'm lucky to know the best people on the planet. My family, the friends I've had, the friends I have...how blessed I am!

In the last few months, and especially since the Tsunami, old friends have found me and gotten in touch. Still others (I think) have checked up on my life from my webpage and not written.

If you're reading this, and it's been awhile since you've talked to me, write me. Take a few minutes of your time to let me know how you are, where you are, what you're doing now and what you've done in the time since we last talked. Never worry that your life isn't interesting enough to write about. I LOVE to hear about whatever it is that you are doing. I just got the most wonderful letter in the world recently from a friend I hadn't spoken to in years. She's chosen to make an art of being a mother. She wrote me about her children, her husband and her life...I've read the letter over and over again, it made me so happy. It's a different life, not as exciting or glamorous as some...but beautiful, so very beautiful.

Don't worry about how much time has passed. Time means nothing. I hadn't seen her for 13 years. Someone else wrote me recently that I hadn't seen in 8 years. I chatted with yet another a couple of nights ago that I hadn't seen in 3 years. Time changes nothing...unless of course it simply makes the heart grow more fond.

So...write me. :-)

If you prefer the old fashioned post,

Willow Vanderbosch
Banyan Tree
Vabbinfaru, North Male Atoll
Republic of Maldives

These days I am actually responding by post...hey, I live on an island the size of a football field! I like the personal contact.

All contact welcome. Tell me your story. :-)