Lady, Tuk-Tuk
25 Jan
Exactly a year ago today, I was rather taken aback when a “lady”:http://popagandhi.com/57/four-women/ asked me: “How do I get to Bangkok from here without flying?”
“Why don’t you fly?” I replied. It had never occurred to me this was possible or even desirable. “And there’s that _problem_ in the South.”
She went ahead anyway, though not before asking if I wanted to go along. Without money but with plenty of school work, I had to refuse. A year later, after a few trips like that, here I am, still ignoring my school work, but now working myself into a sweat with this _lust_, this incurable fetish for trains and buses, trying to piece together the logistical puzzle of Nepali India, Nepal, and Bhutan (without flying).
It’s “people like that”:http://popagandhi.com/57/four-women/ who come into your life by chance, even if for a few days, and inspire you to change your world views, challenge your conception of _possibilities_. While I haven’t quite taken a year off to travel, unlike her, it’s people like that you return to meet in “Khao San”:http://www.khaosanroad.com/, “Psar Tuol Tom Pong”:http://www.phnompenhonline.com/Markets.asp, maybe San Francisco eventually, and speak of the good old days of alleyways behind multi-coloured buildings, magaritas and motodops.
