snowy days are meant for cutting wood

today was a day that a guy can really like. waking up to the mountains around covered in snow. a chill in the air but so much natural beauty surrounding us.  I didn't feel that i had been doing too much work here at the wwoof spot and my jewish guilt was getting to me a bit. but today more than made up for it. today we played with wood.

Mr Lee, the brother to the mother of the house i am at, and I got to cut some logs  with a chainsaw. i don't know any guy who doesn't love playing with saw and power tools. combine them together and you got yourself a chainsaw.  these things rock. and using them to cut into logs that are lying in stacks on the front law is down right AWESOME.  

once done cutting and moving them from one side of the lawn to the other with a wheel barrow came the next fun part of the day. we chopped wood. the tools of choice? these axe heads that had handles of either small trees or big branches.  this was old school, this was rugged. at one point one of the handles split so we had to take the wood left in the axehead out and put a new "pole" in. this was how it was done for years, it worked then and can work now. here's the process we used for chopping the wood.  we'd land the axe into the center of the log. next the axe swinger would hold the handle while the other person would take a sledgehammer like mallet and hit the axe head, delivering it deeper and deeper until the wood would split. next the axe swinger would take, usually, one chop down the halves to split them. then we'd move to the next log.

needless to say, it was very, very, VERY fun. Tiring, but fun.

After that we demolished a cement well in the yard, but that wasn't as fun as playing with wood.  

yoga as prayer

In the school of raja yoga there are 8 different limbs or subsets. the most commonly associated limb with yoga in the US is asana, the postures. I got into yoga as a way to stretch more to help my running out. pretty soon running became second to yoga. i was doing it 7 times or more a week. i couldn't get enough. but it was purely the asana i was doing, and it was purely physical. sure i got little touches of other things here and there, we all do when we do yoga it's one of the reasons we keep going back for more. but it's mainly about physicality not prayer for most. I went to yoga school for a few reasons. 1) a second skillset i could fall back on or use if needed/wanted to. 2) to "deepen my practice" and become more skilled at the postures. 3) to learn more about this things that i had been practicing for so long. what is yoga? what is the origins… etc.

Of course yoga is different for each person. but part of the school of yoga that isn't a limb is prayer. you have your mantras and your pujas and your kirtans. all forms of prayer to the higher gods and the gods within ourselves. but this is not asana. asana is not prayer. or is it?

Yesterday I had Zarina, my fellow WWOOF housemate here show me how to practice Salat, or the muslim prayer 5 times a day. though it didn't really click with me (don't worry mom, i'm not changing my Judaism to Islam) i did appreciate it what it meant. There was a lot of movement going on it. Bend over, stand up, kneel, sit down (in a position similar to virasana), stand again. repeat. almost like a vinyasa of sorts.

After learning Salat, i went to practice my yoga for the day. I kept thinking of the similarities of the asana practice with Salat. then i started to think of the asana as a purification of the body and a prayer to the god within myself. I went through my practice and kept thinking that this time it was a prayer, that asana can be seen as a prayer for ourselves and i felt that having this view also helped deepen my practice for the day. If you are an active practicer, maybe you would want to try this as well and see how it works for you.

namaste

brrrr

It's another cold day here. I wake up on my sleep mat under the cover, a completely different sleeping experience. no memory foam coil spring mattress with duvets and comforters to keep you nestled up in a warm cocoon of soft goodness. no, this is a mat and a cover. and you know what? it works just fine. I wake up on my side, another night dreaming that i was sleeping next to my girlfriend. but she isn't there and I am alone in this big cold room.

how many days has it been? 4, 5 maybe? feels like an eternity. I've traveled for longer than 5 days before and it never seemed like this before. time never moved so slow. i'm sure when it's all done and i'm back home, I'll have wished that i had more time, but now that i have the time i just wish i was back home. or that a part of home, jill, was with me. I guess when i traveled alone in europe for a month i had some friends and family along the way and i didn't have anything waiting for me back home. that was part of this trip and why i could go for so long, originally i had nothing at home. no house, no kids, no pets, no mortgage, no girlfriend. somewhere along the way home i rediscovered my amazing love with Jill. now i have a girlfriend (an amazing one at that), and i am not home with her. instead i am in the near siberian climate of eastern korea and wondering if maybe i should just come home early. I know it sounds silly, 4 days away from your girlfriend is nothing. and it really is nothing. but i think it's more of the adding up of 4 days here, 4 days there, 3 months here… etc… etc… I feel that in time this will get easier for both of us. as we settle into the facts and get familiar with the lack of touch from the other but constant email and phone call contact, things will get easier. we're just in a new uncharted territory at the moment. give it time to breathe, as my yoga guru's would say.

even as i write this, i know it's true. also, the sun starting to come out as i type these words also helps my disposition out. ahhh, sun. my old happy friend. you really do make things seem so much happier and brighter.

still in jetlag mode, i slept for 10 hours last night and could easily sleep more but i want to see what Nandida, my host mom here, would like me to do today. i'm hoping to either chop wood or stay inside, as it's cooooooold outside.

bus travels

on a bus traveling to Jinbu from Seoul. clearly a different geographical landscape on the eastern roads of Korea compared with Seoul. Mountains covered in traces of snow surround us as we pass through the valleys beneath. I'm never really sure where i am. I see signs and buildings decorated in characters and words that I don't recognize. But I recognize the nature, and i soak it in as much as i can from the bus. we make the first stop in some town I can't pronounce and will soon forget. I ask the bus driver what time we'll be leaving so that i know if i have time to hit the bathroom and/or get a beverage for the road. of course his lack of english and my lack of korean make this simple question extremely difficult. I chance it and do both with a little time to spare. the next stop is Jinbu, my stop. I arrive and go to the pay phone, what looks to be an old archaic thing. i put the change in, make the call and talk a little before being disconnected. hang up, repeat until i find out that the car is out at the place i'm staying so i am told to take a taxi. I walk to the taxi stand and attempt to tell the ppl there where i need to go which ends up with me pointing the phone # i have and having them call the place to find out where the heck i need to go. 17,000 won later and i'm at the "farm." this farm is actually a small hotel, however it's off season so no guests here. I'm a little confused on what work i'll need to do but am hoping small carpentry and help with cooking will be needed. hey, a guy can dream right? wood and food skills are two things i wish to learn more about.

after arriving i get a small tour, take a well needed jetlagged nap and then get woken up for dinner. a white bean broth soup and various panchan (small dishes). i make small talk with the host family, as small talk is all we both only know or are able to get by with with each of our litle knowledge of the others language.

now it's time to sleep for the night, and see what tomorrow brings.

Bon Voyage...finally

I'm somewhere over the Pacific and flying to my destination of Incheon Airport, Korea. Having just finished watching one of the inflight movies, 2010, I'm left feeling these emotions that I've been putting off for the last 6 weeks or so. Though 2010 was far from a good movie by any means, (actually quite predictable and unfathomable in almost every way) I found myself getting heavily worked up at some of the generic "tearjerker" scenes. Thoughts of family, my girlfriend, and other loved ones rush through my head. thoughts of people I won't see for quite a long time. I don't think I knew then, nor now, what I actually signed up for when I booked this journey. But now it is slowly, very slowly, sinking in. A flash of tears and pain rush through my body, salty water drips down my cheeks.

The last few weeks I was too wrapped up in tying up the loose ends to get to this spot. I missed seeing a lot of friends and saying good bye to them, and I am sorry for that. I didn't call a lot of people back or missed correspondence with others. where as previously I could just wait a week or more to return a call to anyone, now it will be a much longer delay. this is something that made sense logically to me, but being in the situation itself proves opposite. It's something I couldn't fathom until I got to this spot. and now i am here, and not sure where to go or what to do from it.

Yeah, I'm scared. I feel lonelier than i've ever felt before, and I've barely begun. But, as people keep telling me, I've got a great journey ahead of me.

Leaving Jill's apartment today just seemed like another day. Sure we kissed goodbye a lot longer but it felt like I'd be back later that night to swoop her up in my arms and sleep comfortably next to. I didn't cry as i left, and of course i didn't say goodbye. how could i? I'd be back quickly. It didn't feel like a goodbye, it didn't feel sad. it felt like every other day. I was in a denial of sorts. I'm now holding comfort in the words of my friend Jessalyn when she said, "goodbye is such a stupid word, nothing is ever goodbye". So it wasn't a goodbye, just an extended "see you later, lover." Yet, I'm left still wishing that i could have done more for her, for me, for us.

Before the boarding process I made my last calls to the family and my best friend tom as well as numerous texts back and forth with Jill. I'll call when i can from abroad, but hearing the voices and "see you laters" of my brother and parents really helped cement in the upcoming trip more and more, and I could feel the distance already creeping in up and over and all around me.

When I boarded the plane i broke down again for just a minute, the sunglasses hiding my saline filled eyes. I called Jill to tell her that i love her and i could feel the sadness i was holding in myself as well as causing upon her. what I wouldn't give to have her here holding my hand as we travel to uncharted territory. but that isn't the current plan, and at this moment this can not happen.

so now I sit in my seat, preparing to take a nap next to a pleasant japanese fellow instead of falling asleep in my beautiful girlfriends arms. Instead of falling asleep in the room I grew up in. Instead of falling asleep in my brothers guest room. Oh, I'll be ok, I know this. I'm just in a new territory both geographically and emotionally. It's something I guess i just need to work through and we'll see where i come out on the other side.