Post-cleansing in Samui

I’ve been in Thailand the last 7 days. I fasted, drank coconuts, had massages, and read Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami. Although it’s hard to say exactly how, it was a truly absorbing read, and kept me lost in its pages throughout my week of hunger.

Here in Ko Samui, it is a fairly human infested place, not too different from the tourist-packed towns of Phuket, not really suitable for my next beach chill-out destination.

I’m well impressed by how my body was able to survive so well without food for 7 days, and still feel alive and energetic, with the exception of a dizzy spell every time I got up after sitting or lying for awhile. It was a dizziness that rivaled the effects of a giant bong hit.

The week away gave me enough time to reflect over my life, pondering over the current state of my relationship, my career, family ties and purposefulness in the world. I found satisfaction in these avenues of life, even while I was dissatisfied with most of them in their status quo – it was still, strangely satisfying, as if I had a glimpse of the future where the mess would settle and fall neatly into place.

Here I sit in Samui Airport, waiting for my Bangkok Airways flight to take me home in a half hour. Over the last week I have been fantasizing of all sorts of food – chocolate, brownies, ice cream, katsudon and 2 hours of dinner at Brazil on 6^th Ave, the succulent cuts of beef and roasted pineapple. Yet, I have just broken fast with a single honey mango and I find myself full and content. Strange… as if the wildest brewing storm came to a halt with a single drop of rain.

The announcer just said that we’ll be boarding in 5 minutes. That’s great because the waiting area is full of people standing already. I see many people that look like their anxious to get home. They have the deflated end-of-holiday look and they seem tired to travel. It makes me wonder a while what home means to me these days. I guess I’ll know in a few hours… at the point where I’ll actually feel I’m there.