promise yourself

I think this is very thought provoking just before the New Year. I shall go on my Christmas break without taking any link to cyberspace with me, I need me-time and man-time, so I'll leave you with these words by Rob Brezsny as food for though till I return in January. I'm not doing copy and paste, but typing it out, as to take in every part. It really appeals deeply to me because it is so close to my own philosophy of working to make yourself better and happier, so making the world better and happier.

Do you promise to push hard to get better and smarter,
grow your devotion to the truth,
fuel your commitment to beauty,
refine your emotions,
hone your dreams,
wrestle with your shadow,
purge your ignorance and
soften your heart-
even as you always accept yourself for exactly who you are, with all of your so-called foibles and wobbles?

Do you pledge to wake yourself up,
never hold back,
have nothing to lose,
go all the way,
kiss the stormy sky,
be the hero of your own story,
ask for everything you need and give everything you have,
take yourself to the river when it is time to go to the river,
and take yourself to the mountaintop when it is time to go to the mountaintop?

May your days over the Christmas season be pervaded by Love and Light.

Surprises in loony land

A wonderful gift might not be wrapped as you expected. JL Huie

I had a lucky day today, a good flowing one. I had to renew my car registration and have been putting it off for weeks. Procrastination on these issues happen for many reasons, but this time particularly because Ollie is 10 years old this year and cars of 10 years or more need to go through a check here.

Recently in a bit of an absent-minded moment on the road...one should really never have those moments on the road at the best of times, but especially here in loony land... I clipped his right side-mirror. Immediately alarm bells went off in my head, dollar signs flashing in my mind's eye. I took the car to my trusty Bangladeshi carfixer just around the corner who unscrewed the mirror and told me to come back in a couple of days. My new housemate commented later that evening, 'What happened to Ollie's ear?"
I answered that he was sympathising with the scraggely one-eared wonder kitten Rufus we acquired recently. Or should I say, he acquired us, but that is another blog. 

In any case, long story short, the trusty carman was not able to find a new side mirror and took it on himself to cut a piece of normal mirror and stick it quite roughly into the place of the old one. It has to be added that he did charge me next to nothing. The loved one advised me to clean the glue off the mirror with nail polish remover, which did not work. Very unusual for any advice coming from him.

 I was therefore apprehensive about the whole visit to the police this morning. What would happen if they didn't accept the mirror? I would have to get a new one, hassle.. time... money..., I don't need this just before my holiday blah blah blah. What's that thing about expecting the worst and then it will probably not be that bad. This does not apply to any kind of official process in Oman, expecting the worst is just being realistic. 

Well, I arrived there, didn't have to wait, everyone really friendly, paid immediately, got the new card, no one mentioned anything about checking the car and I left within 15 minutes. It was incredible!
This set me up for a smooth ride for the rest of the day. I just took one step at a time and went with the flow. It was a GOOD productive day.

I learnt that one should be weary of putting lables on things, constantly having negative expectations just because of negative experiences from the past. It is important to give life and processes and people a fresh chance every day to actually evolve, break out of patterns and surprise you.

I wish you all one unexpected brilliant moment that permeates and sets the tone for the rest of your day.

Good night!

Expectations and silence

“We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aid, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn.”

Thoreau

What a strange weekend. On Wednesday after work I had a really excellent pedicure(purple) and then a yoga class which really filled me with joy. My new housemate and I were invited over to the loved one's house for dinner and I was really full of expectations.

But,oh my goodness, things were just not in synch; we ordered food, he wanted something different from us.. we decided to watch a film, we wanted different things. He decided to do us a favour by making a dessert from scratch, but in the mean time my blood sugar was so low I was practically fainting.

This all was too weird, a strange surreal landscape over which I had no control, and I started reacting emotionally to myself and the situation. Then on top of it all, as soon as I started eating, I felt as sick as a dog and suffered from some kind of strange stomach bug for the rest of the weekend. Yuck. The loved one was somehow happily playing behind his own walls, while I wanted him to be reassuring and take care of me. Mmm, no, this was not happening. Not in the way that I wanted. He offered me pills and TV shows and let me be. Exactly how he would like to be treated when he is not in top form.

Ever had that? You set yourself up for one thing and something completely different happens? Why do we keep doing that? As soon as I decided to just let it be and relinquish control and all expectations, the time together seemed to flow better. I learnt a long time ago that to want nothing often attracts abundance. Wanting nothing meaning to be fully accepting of the moment as it is, even if it feels peculiar. 

So, after volcanic physical and emotional inner turmoil, the last part turned out quiet and peaceful. The trip to the animal market and souq in Nizwa did us good, I found the magic rose oil, and we sat with our feet in the Falaj Daris. Even then, contrary to our expectations, the fish would not come to play and  nibble our feet. We sat in silence in the sun, enjoying the running water; him letting me be where I am and me letting him be where he is. Does that make any sense? Not trying to pull the other person closer or trying to fluff them up, but just being in that space of personal freedom together.

I include this quote today, because I experienced my first sunrise in many months as I was driving out of town on Sunday morning. I had this realisation that love is not easy, but it is beautiful, and that the one expectation we may always have in this life, is that of dawn. I feel so happy to be on this road with a trustworthy companion.

Of sushi and sunset

"... have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."

-Rainer Maria Rilke, from "Letters to a Young Poet"

I just had to take this beautiful quote by Rilke today, so apt after my thoughts yesterday. It was posted on FB today by my friend and fellow traveller on the road, Junaline. Thanks girlfriend. It is incredible to me how one attracts the support, information and confirmation you need when you really truly want something and are willing to do the work. It sometimes gives me goosebumps.


After writing and contemplating yesterday, I took myself off on a hot date with myself to one of my favourite restaurants in Muscat overlooking the beach. I sat on the terrace drinking miso and eating sushi, watching the sunset's pinks and golds reflecting in the calm water of the bay, and truly just came home. I was thinking about the words yesterday about living the joy in the moment. I want to visit the desert again soon and as I sat there spoke to Rashid about coming on Saturday after work. Out of the blue in our quite mundane conversation, he said, 'Stefani, I learnt a long time ago not to hold on to anything in this life, even when I really really want to'. It was an uncanny connection to my exact thought just a few minutes earlier.


I had a peaceful walk on the beach, really feeling my toes in the sand and and the cold breeze on my upper arms. I observed the ebb and flow and and felt so grateful for feeling this connection.


I am looking forward to my weekend which will start in a couple of hours with a pedicure, a yoga class, movie night with the loved one and a Christmas shopping trip with him on Friday to Nizwa to buy the real magic rose oil of the Jebel Akhdar.


I wish for all of you to do something only for yourself today, something that brings you home and helps you realise that you are truly welcome in this world.

of dandelions and rocks

Where have I been, I ask myself? Why is it that when we are busy and wrapped up in the single complicated moments of life, do we first give up the things that truly keep us healthy on all levels? Why is it sometimes so difficult to do the grounding things that truly bring us joy? A colleague commented recently that men automatically go back to the well, recharge, do what they need to do. Women have to be more deliberate about it. That's where I am now. Love is good, very good, but I am not loving myself first. Reminding myself how important it is to do that one.

Many things going on, many thoughts, much bliss, many perfect moments, also confusion, fog and frustration, but that is life and I take it all on.

I recently had a dream of standing with a dandelion in my left hand and a small rugged rock in my right. This was so representative to me how I feel about life and love right now. I feel that it is all so fleeting and I want to grab hold, and it is also solid and dependable and with me on a deep level. Both are made of the same stuff. Both are truly beautiful. And they do balance.

It reminded me of Blake's poem:

"He who binds to himself a joy does the winged life destroy; But he who kisses the joy as it flies lives in eternity's sun rise."

I've been aspiring to live that since my teens, why does it get more difficult and not more easy?

The loved one bought me a pair of really nice hiking boots for Christmas, my first proper hiking boots ever, may I add. He is so thoughtful. They mean so much to me, as they are the representation for me of the dandelion and the rock, the wings and the roots, the wild flight and also treading the path with care.

I feel an adventure coming on.

Love to you all. Wishing you deep roots and strong wings as Christmas and the end of the year draws near.

And yes, there are many questions, but there are also answers.

Work and play

I can't believe it is a week since I landed back in Muscat after a mega-flight. It is always when one is in the biggest hurry to get home, that the journey seems to drag on for infinity!We circled  endlessly for 30 minutes above Dubai before a runway was free. Then after taking on the passengers for the last leg to Muscat and taxi-ing for 15 minutes ( I had joked to the students that we were being driven home), we were called back becuase of problems with a tyre. I was ready to go balmy.

In any case, safely back home, great to be in my purple palace with my kitties. Straight into the deep end of beginning of academic year chaos, too many students, not enough books, wrong levels, too much admin. But it is great to see my colleagues that I missed through the summer, and I will readily admit that I always miss being in front of a class once I have been away for a few weeks. I am very fortunate to say that I really enjoy what I do for a living.

It has been a frustrating and tiring week, but also a week of much hope and joy. I am deeply happy to spend time with my rosepetal man again. He is in a good space with himself and gave me the warmest homecoming. The space between us is playful and peaceful and I look forward to being in the magic dunes with him tomorrow. I am sure the dust will settle there and I will find rest.

I am trying a new yoga group. It is unlike anything I have done before. It is loud and a little chaotic and the teacher is a real livewire, joking with us, pushing us. She said something in the final meditation which really got me through this week- "words of fire" my mother would have called it. " As you breathe.... CHARGE YOUSELF WITH GOODNESS...

Those words have been the perfect fulcrum for my week, I play them in my mind and breathe and imagine myself becoming more grateful, more clean inside, more humble, yes, just better.. more good. My wish  for us: May goodness pervade our lives as we breathe, and may we always feel secure in that.

Henri-Chapelle

I am preparing to leave Aachen and resume my normal life in Muscat. It was odd to be taken out of my comfort zone and just placed here for three weeks. Not on holiday, but also not too much work. It took me ages to ground myself, and I'm so ready to leave now. But I have had many enrichening experiences, time to think and be with myself, and I have a feeling I'll be back.

Today I went out with my friend Simon and his parents; it was a kind of idyllic day and I'm so glad I spent my last Sunday with them. Simon is a good friend I got to know in Muscat and I met his parents in Rashid's desert camp. It was a night of so much laughter, an instant connection, even a kind of recognition, a good understanding. So, it was wonderful to see them again. The weather could not have been more perfect. They live in the countryside just outside Aachen, their house surrounded by fields, on the border with Belgium.

They took me to a monastry nearby where we went into the beautiful church, walked in the lovely park, saw the water mill and enjoyed a hearty vegetable broth with bread made there, and a dark beer brewed there too. The place had a certain tranquility and we were easy together, like old friends. I was happy, because my German flowed relatively well, I was worrying about that before. The church bells followed me today wherever I went, it was really special.

They took me to a viewpoint where one can look over the so- called 'Valley of God', it is green and picturesque and I could have sat in that place all afternoon. There on the hill was an old bunker from the war, a reminder that the place has not always been so quiet and pristine. Simon mentioned that there was a war cemetery nearby. I had never visited one before, and recently having scrutinised very closely the loved one's pictures of Normany, I really wanted to go.

It is called Henri-Chapelle and we got there in the late afternoon. The path leading to the entrance is flanked with pink and red roses in large beds. As one walks in, you have no idea of the sight that awaits- 7000 + white crosses and Stars of David laid with absolute military precision in the most immaculately manicured lawn. There had clearly been some gathering today, as there were wreathes and many of the graves had fresh flowers.

I have to say it was truly a noteworthy place, a dignified place. I felt honoured to visit there and pay homage to these soldiers. We walked quietly and admired everything, and as we walked out, the church bells were once again ringing across the green valley and the sun was dipping behind the wispy clouds, causing the whole sky to burst into a most deep pink. It was a moment of deep knowing that I am in the right place at the right time. 

My visit to Bonn last Friday is so fresh in my mind. We visited 'Haus der Geschichte'', the history museum there- it covers the post-war years up to the present. I kept finding myself with tears flowing uncontolled down my cheeks; it was not a conscious crying, it was some kind of deep reaction to the knowledge of fellow humans enduring so much pain. I have never really properly thought about how it must have been to come back after 6 years of excrutiating war, and find your whole life in ruin, your home in rubble. So many people lost their homes, lost touch with their families and it must have been truly devastating. The resilience and stamina of the human spirit is truly amazing.

In my opinion, sometimes death is not the worst option.

As most of you know, I have had my share of grief, and as I stood in the cemetery today, I remembered this poem by Henry van Dyke called "Ode to Immortality" that has brought me great comfort through the years. It is an image which I love.


I am standing by the seashore.
A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze
and starts for the blue ocean.
She is an object of beauty and strength,
and I stand and watch
until at last she hangs like a speck of white cloud
just where the sun and sky come down to mingle with each other.

Then someone at my side says, 'There she is gone!
Gone where? Gone from my sight - that is all.

She is just as large in mast and hull and spar
as she was when she left my side
and just as able to bear her load of living freight
to the place of destination.
Her diminished size is in me, not in her.

And just at the moment when someone at my side says,
'There! She is gone! ' ,
there are other eyes watching her coming,
and other voices ready to take up the glad shout :
'There! She comes!'

- and that is Dying.

The ties that bind

How the time is flying here in Aachen. Took me absolute ages to settle down and now I realise the days are running out at rather an alarming rate. We have had such stimulating and interesting days this week. Firstly in the physics institute where our heads were filled with crazy info on the building blocks of the universe, then the computer centre where we got to spend time in the virtual reality 'cave', and today the /architecture/urban planning department where we went out into the laboratory that is Aachen and looked at the process of historical development.

Aachen is a multi-faceted city. There is the university with 40 000 students- that lifestyle and attitude; then just a few streets away, the mega-rich neighbourhood- people with old and new money, that Simon showed me on his tour last week. Walk a few streets in another direction, and one immediately notices that the people are poor and struggling, and there are also many more people clearly living on the streets than I expected. I guess there are many towns in the world like this, but here I feel it is all in really close proximity.

Aachen was originally a Roman town, and it is famous for the hot springs. The Romans built Aachen in the classical chess-board "castrum'', very ordered and regulated. Charlemagne came and the magnificent cathedral became the main feature. The altar of the cathedral traditionally has to face east, towards the rising sun, and so the city is orientated around that. Where the Carolinian roads then intercept with the Roman streets, there are often unusual triangular shapes. In the Medieval times, a circular city wall was built and the roads were narrower and more windy. Come the 1800's, the town planners were more into the classical boulevard style, as can be seen in front of the city theatre. Aachen in a huge fusion of different styles and spaces, and it all works beautifully. It is complex and interesting and connects all these different historical ages.

I have been thinking about the people and events of our lives, the seeming randomness of it, but yet how one somehow senses the invisible ties that hold those events and people together. There are so many seemingly unrelated paths and choices, but somehow beneath that, the mystical fibres that bind, that order, and cause these
experiences and relationships with things, places and people to converge and present sudden and magical answers. Serendipity. Connectedness. Complexity, Beauty. Infinite possibilities.

I realised that my thoughts have been connected to all the experiences I have had this week. The amazing building blocks of the universe: that the huge expanse of space is mirrored in the internal workings of the atoms, in the neutrons and quarks and bosons. That science is about the very particles that make up our universe, the huge spaces between them and the forces and fields that glue it all together. Connectedness. Imagine I learnt this week about the Higgs boson called the "God Particle". For me the incredible fusion between science and the spiritual life.

In the virtual reality cave, we examined space, and looked at tangible concepts, that are yet completely intangible. We believe that they are there, so they are. The visible and the invisible connected.

In my walks and tours around Aachen, I am reflecting on my life and path, looking at how the place developed, the spaces connected, the seeming unrelated elements fused into one unusual and beautiful town. I am thinking how my life has evolved, the people and the spaces connected, and how all the seemingly unrelated elements reveal themselves to be perfectly aligned, again and again. I ask myself how I can possibly doubt this, as I am living in the middle of this miracle. I feel so inherently like a particle of God.

Is this what love does? Bring it on.

My wish tonight, may we all perceive the order, the serendipity, the blessed continuity of our lives, no matter our religion or creed, and have the humility to feel gratitude for it. Amen.

http://www.ted.com/talks/carter_emmart_demos_a_3d_atlas_of_the_universe.html

Follow this link to see a 6 minute mind-blowing demonstration of a 3-D map of the universe.

Where the wind always blows

I have so much noise in my head that I have really struggled to get my backside back into this chair to share my words with you. When my thoughts and emotions are such a dappled pallette of colors and shades and light, it is difficult to find a theme. Somehow I have a need to draw one or two strands out of the entangled spagetti mess at a time and examine them before I can articulate.

I have to wait for that process to happen, thank God I am not professional writer! In any case, it all came together today in the middle of an energetic cheering crowd of 15 000, a football match here in Aachen, and I felt I could pick up my flow again.

I have been happy to be in Germany and have been having an enjoyable time with the students; it has not been stressful as so many before me reported. I am experiencing a lot of new things, and each day is an unknown,a mini adventure, even more so that usual as my inner landscape is also in constant flux. 

There is a large part of me that does not want to be away from home and feels really ungrounded. I feel like a balloon bouncing up and down, finding my centre and losing it, finding my centre and losing it, on average 15 times a day.

Happy to be in a country where the church bells are ringing all around. That and the sound of the cartyres on the asphalt in the rain are soothing and so deeply familiar from my previous life, that ocassionally I can take a deep breath. I am dreaming of the loved one often and wake up before dawn full of his stories and the lines on his face, and sometimes with tears, and this also makes me miss home. I am actually so blessed to have this intimacy, but also I am having a hard time keeping myslef rooted and letting my eyes perceive the different hues of this very moment.

How can a love be so fundamentally grounding and excrutiatingly uprooting at the same time?

We visited Cologne yesterday. The cathedral is a magnificent structure out of limestone and sandstone, the second highest spires in the the world, after the single spire of the Minster in Ulm. Or as I fondly call it, the Monster. I had the privilege to experience it again just a couple of months ago, a place I have deeply enjoyed since I first visited in 1997. In 1880 this cathedral in Cologne was the tallest structure in the world, crystalline white and visible for many miles around; an important place of pilgrimage, holding relics of the holy three kings.

It was hit in the war, but unlike the rest of Cologne, it was not wiped out. The story goes that the bomber pilots used it as a navigational marker. The facade is now quite blackened, due to the bombing and the acid rain, and there is a constant process of restoration in process. The cathedral has had a master builder since around 1240 when construction began, and it was somehow comforting to know that the current chief engineer is a woman!

I only spent a few minutes inside; my geologist friends with firm faith only in rocks, were waiting patiently outside on the square where the wind always blows, eager to show me their favourite Vietanamese watering hole. In those few short minutes, I sensed the centuries of worship that went before me. I sensed the faithful and also the doubters laying their sorrows and difficulties before God, finding a voice for their pleas, as well as their gratitude.

As I lit a candle on that ground, I joined those legions finding expression to their humanity and found there a moment of peace.

Seeds on fallow ground and sleep

I have to tell the world that I had a brilliant nights' sleep. It is not often that I sleep for a solid 6 hours without waking up at all. I woke up in a state of peace. What a blessing.

My subconscious must be calming down. I haven't shared the continuation of my passport saga with you, but it has really been riding me mentally for months. I have had so much support with it from unexpected quarters. Now, an angel called David, friend of a friend, has appeared from nowhere, and is helping me make a case for my citizenship after the British authorities told me on my last holidays that they would not be renewing my passport past April. A mistake 16 years ago, so sorry.

I believe everything happens for a reason, and I have not been able to see any reason at all for this thing happening in my life. One reason I now very clearly perceive, is to believe emphatically in the kindness of strangers.

Let mystery have its place in you-

do not always be turning up your whole soul

with the ploughshare of self-examination,

but leave a little fallow corner of your heart ready

for any seed the wind may bring.

HENRY FREDERIC AMIEL

I love it that life is like this, just catching you with the small moments of magic. And those small moments of magic often opening some inner window shutter, sending one's life in a completely new direction. What is life if we don't believe in the mystery of it. There was a moment sitting with the loved one this weekend passed; my nose just brushed his hair ever so lightly. It was the most soothing moment of connection with another human being, felt like a seed fallling on a fallow corner. The depth of the experience so unexpected.

I wish you all good sleep, the kindness of strangers, magical moments and a special seed falling on that little fallow corner of your heart today.

Of kitchen scales and sharing my sanctuary

Today is Thursday and I am really happy. As most of you know, it is virtual  Saturday, and I have been doing absolutely nothing. Some days are just made for lying on the sofa watching detective series on television, and swtching off from the world. It has been one of those. I am also happy cause the Eid holidays have been declared and I have almost a whole week off from work. I show up on Saturday and Sunday, then our road trip starts on Monday. I am so excited. I spoke to Rashid of the desert camp and am determined to do the island, the turtle beach and the desert. As Joseph Campbell said, and as I have quoted here before, Follow your bliss!

I then have to show up for a couple of hours next Monday before flying to Germany with the students in the late evening.

So, it is almost Eid and time to make little surprise packets for the children. The  Omanis call these "Eidia". Usually the children in the neighbourhood come ringing the doorbell on the morning of Eid, asking for 100 besa notes and sweets, but I prefer to make little packets for the children that I know. I persuaded the man to drive me to the famous Lulu this morning. This was a big favour, as every bedu and his wife from the interior is coming into town this weekend to do pre-Eid shopping. Luckily he needed some ingredients to make his yummy rusks, so was willing, although swearing most of the way. See "Driving out of the box" entry below!

I bought loads of sweeties and some packets of colored pencils and although we had to brave massive queues at the check-out tills, we escaped unscathed. 

I enjoyed mixing the sweets and then made up the packets in small zip lock bags. Just as I was finishing, the loved one came out of the kitchen with his electronic scale. He painstakingly weighed all the goody bags one by one to make sure that each kiddy got their fair share, sometimes taking and sometimes adding. I really liked this, as I really couldn't be bothered about the details. For him the fairness and equality of this process was very important.   

I have another little story to share today. I have been asking the universe for ages about ways to make a little extra cash. Up to very recently I would never have thought of sharing my house, it is my sanctuary and the centre of my universe and the energy in there is very important, like a sacred space.

I recently had Shefaa staying for a month which worked well, and I have been thinking about it seriously. I put the thought out there, deciding that if it was meant to be, it would come to me.

Recently I was catching up with a colleague of mine on the beach outside our university. We were sitting on the beach on some nets in one of the fishermen huts looking at the sea and watching the gulls play over the water. It was a little windy, the perfect temperature, and the waves were making tiny peaks, like mini meringues. It was a moment that felt frozen in time. She was telling me how her partner was looking to do some volunteer work, possibly leaving quite soon, and how she was looking for flat for the next academic year. It felt right and I asked her immediately if she would like to come live with me.

So, after some discussion and not too much thought, I will have a housemate from November to next June. I have liked her since the first time we met, a very gentle and sensible person with beautiful green eyes and a consistent integrity. She is coming over on Saturday to thrash out the details, but I think it will be GOOD.

Of rocks and vigilance

This was my father's favourite psalm. I feel that he is close at the moment, really watching over me and I have been reading this psalm every day. These are such beautiful words of connection to nature and of complete trust. It doesn't matter what creed you follow, these are comforting and strengthening words. I think of my father in the last months of his life, and how these words were a safe-haven for him.

I love the image of feet not slipping, as I have such bad balance, I can barely keep my balance on a bike... famously falling off my bike in front of the school inspector walking his dog in our neighborhood.

I love the imagine of looking to the hills, God as a rock, eternal and ever-present and I love that my name derives from Stephen, meaning rock.

The most meaningful actual rock in my life is Table Mountain. I had a wonderful realisation a few years ago about how much it meant to me growing up in its shadow. I have been through so much, and the mountain is a solid presence.

I am a lover of rocks and collect them, I don't know much about them, although I am attempting to be an amateur geologist. I love them for their aesthetic value, for their color, shape, feel and beauty. I often walk around with a dead normal stone in my pocket, to ground me and remind me that even those things that seem permanent also change, it is just a matter of time. I love the way geologists have the capacity to think in thousands and millions of years. It really makes us seem so trivial and truly puts things in perspective.

I love the image of God not resting, but constantly watching over us, like a mother sitting by the bed of a sick child, being ever vigilant and aware of the child's every move and breath.

The man has been ill recently and I spent a night wth him, lying awake and listening to his breathing, switching on my all senses and intuition to what I could do to support and comfort, praying for his peace in the night. Being so relieved when I could tell that he was sleeping deeply.  It is so incredible to know that God does that for us every minute of every day into eternity in his all-encompassing capacity.

Living in the desert, I also love the idea of being protected from the sun; God being the shade to rest in, an oasis, not letting any harm come to us.

It is called a psalm of ascents, as this are one of the songs that the people used to sing as they ascended to Jerusalem to praise and worship.

I wish that we may all rest assured that we are protected and watched over, and sleep in peace tonight in that knowledge. Amen.

I lift up my eyes to the hills-

Where does my help come from?

My help comes from the Lord,

the Maker of heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot slip-

He who watches over you will not slumber:

indeed, he who watches over Israel

Will neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord watches over you-

The Lord is your shade at your right hand;

the sun will not harm you by day,

nor the moon by night.

The Lord will keep you from all harm-

he will watch over your life;

the Lord will watch over your coming and going

both now and forever.

Psalm 121

 A song of ascents

Psyllium husks and cute ears

''If you were here, I'd kneel for you, a thousand kisses deep."  L.Cohen

I never thought I could get so excited about psyllium husks. I have never been a breakfast person and I am not a great eater of fruit, plus I have a famously runny stomach. The Chinese say that the stomach is the second brain, and I certainly find that to be true. My stomach and brain are often in disagreement.  My stomach generally doesn't like to leave the house. I always have a little chat with it. 'Listen tummy, we have to go to work and I know that it's going to be a challenging day, but really it will be fine', or 'Listen lovely tummy, we are going on holiday but I promise to give you nice food at regular times'. I am forever coaxing my stomach to go with me without protesting.

Before going out the door, I invariably have to make a last loo stop. It used to be really bad, but since I have been living in Oman feeling much less stressed, my stomach has also settled down a lot.

 A BIG part of this because of Opra Winfrey. My goodness, is there anybody's life she hasn't touched in one way or another. There she was one night with Dr Oz. Bless the man. I always want to call him Dr Spock, I sort of expect him to have pointy ears. I like his ears, they are a good size. I absolutely do not trust men with small ears. Can't explain this phenomenon, sorry. Men are so bad at listening in any case, can you imagine what terrible listeners men with small ears are. Not to be trusted, absolutely not.

Back to Dr Oz with the ears. He was saying this thing like, Are you always rushed at breakfast or just skip breakfast all together? Do you suffer from an irregular tummy? Why don't you make yourself a shake in the morning with a banana and some frozen berries and some psyllium husks? Perfect, get your portion of fruits, give your body some sugar first thing in th day, fantastic anti-oxidants in the berries, and colon cleansing husks.

This idea literally changed my life. No more runny stomach. No more mid-morning sugar slump and frantic scavaging for food. I literally became a more emotionally balanced person overnight.

But what the hell are psyllium husks? I had a bit of a mission to find them, and my friend Renate has been posting them to me from South Africa. Or any unsuspecting friend has been bringing them to me from there. But these things are not cheap and I became determined to find them here. It has taken me months, and I have asked loads of people, most who look at me strangely.Completely by chance, I mentioned it to Vishkir, a friend going to South Africa, hoping he could bring some along.

He told me immediately that his mom uses them regularly and that you can get them in the local Lulu supermarket next to the panadols and the Vicks.We love the place, it has everything. I always take all my visitors there as part of the standard tourist trail. The name means "Pearl".  I made a bee-line there, and lo and behold, there was the little green packet with the deer on the front just as he said. And really reasonable. Joy.

I have been pleased about this now for more than a week. Everytime I see the packet in the cupboard my face breaks into a huge smile. What I am trying to say is that sometimes one can derive enormous pleasure from the smallest of things. Plus, sometimes something really simple can make a really big difference to your quality of life, you just have to have your ears and eyes open and be willing to give it a go.

The man in my life thinks I am a weirdo, yes, his word. I once asked him why he likes me. I think most of you can anticipate the kind of answer I thought I would get. I didn't get any of that. He answered that he perceives me as part alien, part mermaid and part unicorn. This is about as romantic as I can expect to get, and a huge compliment coming from this man. The one thing I can say about him though, he has very decent ears.

Driving out of the box

I am really happy to have come back from a great European holiday and to be able to look forward to a short break in Oman almost immediately. We have booked for Masera and Ras al Hadd for the Eid break. I am a huge fan of the beautiful island of Masera, its wild emptiness and vast beaches and the two completely different personalities of its east and west coasts. I love camels on the beach!

I haven't visited the turtles in a long time, as I became annoyed with the behaviour of the tourists, but apparantly it is better organised now, and the man hasn't been, so it has to be checked out again. I hope we get to see the babies. The sheer strength it take for those little mites to wiggle and wriggle their way out the sand and make their way to the water is incredible. You hold one of them in your hand and are immediately in awe of the life force they radiate. And the turtle beach at sunrise is a truly magnificent experience. Yes, it will be good.

I count under the many that took my mother for granted when she was around. I always expected her to be around forever, and I remember when she died, I did not only grieve her loss, but had to actively and consciously grieve for the loss of the dreams we had together. I am so grateful that we had those dreams, that she taught me to dream, dream crazy and out of the box. That I am now able to harbour dreams for myself again.

Another lesson I am thankful for, is her teaching me how to separate my emotions and feelings from other peoples'. I used to come home from school with a grumpy look on my face, and she used to ask, "So,Stefs, ma se kind, aan wie behoort die kak? Is dit joune of het jy dit by een van daai kinners opgetel?" So, my child, who does this anger...frustration...crappiness belong to? Is it yours or did you pick it up from another child?

We deal with so many people every day, and they love to dump their stuff on us. As open and receptive and caring human beings, we take it on and make it our own without even realising. Whenever I am in a shitty mood, this is the first question I ask myself, do I own this or is just someone else's thing clinging to me. If it isn't mine, I can of course drop it immediately. if it is mine, I can look at it and deal with it appropriately.

One avenue of my life where I have great difficulty applying this principle is with bad driving. Oman is notorious for the really atrocious drivers, and has one of the highest death toles per capita on the road in the world. We have a saying here in Muscat that if you see someone using indicators, they are clearly new in town. On the airplane form Germany recently, we commented that we had not heard a hooter even once in 3 weeks.  I think one could drive for a year in Germany not even knowing if your hooter is in working order. Here people will hoot behind you 1 millisecond after the traffic light has turned green. A friend says they do it as a favour to one another as everyone is looking down while busy texting; we should not take it personally. I could go on and on.

When it comes to Ramadan, everything gets completely off the scale. I am driving 10 km over the speedlimit, people come zooming past me on the inside...people pass me on the speedbumps. .. incredible crazy weaving all over the road... And my blood pressure rises every time. I have tried my Mozart, Leonard Cohen and even super chilled chakra clearing CDs, but terrible profanities still cross my lips.

So, I just make peace with the fact that I am also not using my indicators, I am also passing on the inside, passing on speedbumps and using my hooter at a whim. At least by foot is not on the dashboard as I am driving, or dangling out the window.

When in the sandland, do as the camelriders do.

Love and the gunmetal sea

'There ain't no cure for love'    L.Cohen

So, I have been so busy being in love, that there has just been no time to write. That does not mean that I have not thought about my blog, or that I have not written, no, I have been writing in my head all the time. I have also been jotting a lot of things down in my journal; but that's not sharing, so I guess it doen't really count.

I have been wanting to tell you about it for ages, but what to say about love, it is such an incredible subject. It is so private, so precious, and so fragile, but still it keeps growing against all odds like those unbelievable tough and plucky plants one sees pushing their way out between rocks in the mountain. They grow into huge trees and flower and live a life on that precipice. Or like those little flowers one sees coming up between the cracks in the pavement. What is with that?

Forgive me if I have told this story before. I remember years ago being on a grief seminar, everyone so torn that they could hardly speak. The Fransiscan nun running the workshop was using pictures to help us come to terms with all the complex emotions inside. One of the images she showed was of a little purple flower growing through the cracks of a cement tile. I remember being able to cry for the first time in many years. I perceived that picture to be the perfect symbol of hope. Nature doesn't think of the future. Nature just does what come naturally.

Maybe that is really how I feel now. I am in awe, quite speechless, am just watching and partaking in the flow of the process. And I allow myself to have hope.

It is the first time I have loved and preceived that love to be completely mine, mine, mine. This belongs to me and it is my experience: the joy, the excitement, yes, the beating heart  and anticipation when I know that I'll see him, the contentment, the peace, the mundane moments, all these things belong to me. It is not his doing, he is not responsible for it; he is part of it and shares in it as much as he wants, but this is my love. I have owned it.

I am basking in it, surrounded by it, have surrendered to it,  have opened my heart to it. I am complete and whole and can enjoy it completely and wholely. He is whole and complete and how he perceives it, and lives it, is his experience.

I am not projecting my feelings, expectations, longings or even gratefulness onto him, and it feels good.

There is so much silence and so much space between us, and so much intimacy in that silence and space.Also there is laughter and play and much joy in the ordinary things.

I seek to change nothing.

It is also dififcult and painful and sometimes I struggle. I have fear because after all we live in the world, but still I seek to change nothing about this complex and wonderful thing. It is too late to run.

Today is everything. It is a love of drifting together in the quiet gunmetal sea after sunset with the lightest frostpink in the sky and a slight mist around the street lamps in the distance. Being held by the soft water and that simple cool moment being all encompassing.

As my dear friend in Oberschwaben , Brigitte, said last week on the phone, 'Only the wind knows what tomorrow brings.'

Crazy funky fusion and a bottle of wine

The days are flying by and I am not writing. I feel as though I am sliding down a rainbow in slow motion, everything is kind of whooshing past, yet I am very much in the moment. This is a very strange combination of emotions- exhilaration, fear, deep peace, awe, laughter. It all feels right. I am dreaming of skydiving, but I am not alone in the sky. All the particles of the universe hold me. It is the ultimate exercise of trusting the process.

I wonder if I will ever sky dive, I have always wanted to in this lifetime. But I am simply too shit scared. I am afraid of throwing up or passing out or worse! Breaking a leg. I adore watching basejumping clips on youtube. I always joke with my friends and say that I get quite enough adrenaline in my blood by just getting my feet on the ground in the morning. I would really love to paraglide off Table Mountain though, maybe that is more of a soft option. Any companions?

 Let me get onto something more tangible.

I had a blinding visit with Matthew. His timing was perfect and we had a lovely weekend of catching up and spending time with friends here. Joe helped and we cooked up a storm on Thursday night. Very traditionally South African. We ate off the plates my parents Bill and Hester bought before I was born, and used the silver cutlery I inherited from my grandmother. My artist friends came with their baby and a bottle of South African white wine.. They admired my newly decorated living room profusely which made my chest swell with pride. I also invited Joe's German teacher called Sabine. A very interesting woman who recently moved from Canada to Oman, can't think off more opposite countries! They do have excellent people in common though. 

There was an air of perfection to that evening, as though the forces were conspiring for us. I felt as though generations of my family were watching over me and approving of the crazy funky fusion I have going on in my home and in my psyche.

I had another story to tell which has completely slipped my mind. I will tell you tomorrow. In the mean time I will share my favourite 'bottle of wine' story. I'm sure most of you know it but it always makes me laugh.

A saleswoman is driving home through Arizona after a long stint on the road. She sees a Navajo woman hitchhiking and because the trip has been long and quiet, she decides to pick her up. During their small talk, she notices the woman glancing at the brown paper bag on the seat between them.
'If you're wondering what's in the bag', says the driver, 'It's a bottle of wine, I got it for my husband.'
The Navajo woman is silent for a while, nods several times and says, 'Good trade'.

I often wonder why I enjoy that story so much. I love of course any play on words, but maybe it is the fact that I can laugh at myself for not having the foresight to have traded my own husband in for a bottle of wine a long time ago (instead of going through the whole life-altering excrutiating process as it was). It certainly would have been much simpler, as well as a good trade.

Suzi Q, 3 gates and the perfect moment

Oh my goodness, I love being this happy. I was driving to work this morning listening to Suzi Quattro, I mean not really the kind of artist that you would associate with being the catalyst for blinding realisations, but as I parked my car and prepared myself for getting out into the sauna, I felt as if something just came together, slipped into place. I stood in front of the sea and felt as though I was living the past, present and future in one. There was no sense of time; I felt huge and tiny simultaneously. Is this what it is to be truly present in the moment?

Haha, I know there are several of you out there right now who are taking the mickey out of me! What mind-altering substances has the girl been enjoying? Mmmm, for me to know of course, but it could have something to do with several glasses of my favourite bubbly beverage last night... either way, it was a perfect moment, the second this week. The universe is spoiling me! The first was listening to Leonard Cohen sing "Halleluja" at the winding down of a beautiful evening.

So, Matthew has arrived safely in town and I am looking forward to the weekend very much. We are both making breakthroughs at the moment, and it is good to be able to share it with each other in person.

Talking of sharing, I am always honoured to have the students share with me, and this week I have felt particularly close to them. I have been thinking of how we should watch our words and treat our fellow humans with reverance.

I remembered this lovely piece of advice from the Sufis.

They say we should speak only once our words have managed to pass through 3 gates.
At the first gate we ask, "Are these words true?" If so, they pass on.
At the second gate we ask, " Are they necessary?" and if they make it through that, they are ready for the final gate,

"Are they kind?"

My sincere wish and prayer: May our words and thoughts bring kindness to the world.

What a wonderful word- Quench

THE MYSTERY OF YOUR THIRST

Imagine this scene. You're really thirsty -- so dehydrated that you're
feeling faint. Yet here's the weird thing: You're walking along the bank of
a wide river that's so clear you could see the bottom if you looked.

But you're not looking. In fact, you seem oblivious to the surging force of
nature just a few yards away.

Is it invisible to you? Are you so preoccupied with your suffering that
you're blind to the very source that would end your suffering?

Up ahead you see a man. As you approach, you realize he's holding a
bottle of water. You run to him and beg him to let you drink. He readily
agrees. Gratefully, you guzzle the precious liquid, then thank him
profusely.

As you walk away, he calls after you, "By the way, there's a lot more
water over there," and he points to the river.

Do you hear him? If you hear him, do you believe him? Or do you keep
walking, hoping to find another person with another bottle somewhere up
ahead?

Rob Brezsny

wild wonderful windy wanderings

I really like my time with the Al Hasani family, because they are super hospitable, but also have a really good sense about when to leave me alone. I sleep on comfy matresses in the seperate majilis, and feel really at home there. I woke up excited yesterday because I knew I was going to be shown a piece of Oman I hadn't seen before.

Ahmed informed me that he had roped in a friend, Rashid, to drive us in his sturdy but aging Nissan Patrol, and was it OK if the car had no AC? I had no objections and we set off after lunch. The air was scorching and the famous warm wind that ripens the dates so nicely was blowing. I love it when one drives along and sand blows in little rivulets across the road. There are some places where the dunes are creeping onto the road. I do love Mother Nature! She will assert herself in many ways.

We were heading for the coastal road between Al Ashghara and Ras Al Hadd. Ras Al Hadd is the  main beach here in Oman famous for seeing the turtles and Al Ashghara is a small fishing town with a unique and quirky character which I love. As we approached the coast, the air cooled down and the weather became increasingly blustery. We came across a shallow lagoon with flamingoes and a little further on 3 Westerners were kite surfing. It looked like fabulous fun and was a very unexpected sight in this out-of-the-way place.

We drove past long vast beaches, only a few fishing boats and fishing shelters to be seen. The waves were foamy and wild and the sand stung our legs as we walked at the water's edge.
They then took me to an amazing place on a high cliff, where we sat for ages watching the waves break on the rocks, with shoals of silver fish swimming by in the milky green water and birds playing in the winds.
 From there we went to a cove with a beautiful white beach which we had all to ourselves. I lay on the sand listening to the wind, the waves and the boys chatting away to themselves in Arabic. Every now and again I would be nudged by a little crap, the beach was full of them, and they were determined to explore me, especially when I lay still for too long.

I do want to share a funny little moment. We have two main mobile telephone service providers in Oman. The one is called 'Hayyak' which is a a kind of local greeting used for both Hallo and Goodbye. The other is 'Nawras', which means seagull. As we were sitting there, a seagull was edging itself closer to us, and Rashid interrupted his conversation with Ahmed to say, 'Shuf, Nawras Hayyak'. 'Look, the seagull is greeting us'. Even the Arabs enjoy a good pun.

I was also treated to a famous Jalani snack, which is "ghoebs, jibin, patata"- flatbread,  processed cheese, potato chips... with hot sauce. Needless to say I was quite dubious about this idea, but had to take a chance. All of the ingredients are squashed onto the flatbread and enjoyed with relish, and in this case, even by me! I had two in the end, washed down with 7-up.

This reminded me so much of road trips as a child; my mother's drink of choice on the long hot journey to Calvinia was always lemonade.
As the sun set and the moon rose, a strange kind of whimsy overcame me, and I was ready to be back in the arms of my Muscat.

A different desert

How relieved I am that my Thursdays are now free! The money is always nice when one does a bit of extra work, but now that I have stopped and have my entire weekend to myself, I feel like a different person. I also took a long weekend this week and so only have a 4-day working week ahead of me. This will be full-on, but 4 days are oh so do-able.

I want to tell you about my trip down to Jalan, leaving last Thursday. The heat is kicking in very nicely now and I decided to have Ollie's AC checked before which was a very good thing. The sky is white and glaring and a warm wind blows. Why do I feel so happy? I always say that there is a part of me that never relaxes, a part of my belly that never totally unclenches in Europe, because I just love the heat.
I know the road really well, and the 270 km went really quickly. I love driving through the different regions, goats to be seen everywhere, then camels, bedu trucks, stark landscapes and the sands which are so soft and pleasing to the eye.

Jalan is about 100 km further on from my usual desert haunt, and it is the third time that I am on my way to visit the Al Hasani family. The desert is different, the sand is white and there is more vegetation. They have had a bit of rain in the last couple of weeks and I was really surprised by how green the place is. It is an area of Oman very famous for the dates, and they have been concerned this year, because the hot winds have been late in the coming. I came down here just after the storm called Phet hit Oman in June last year. Ahmed, my student, said it was heart breaking to see the old men sitting in their platations, weeping. Many of date palms were destroyed and the family told me with great sorrow yesterday that they had had to buy dates form the market to get themselves through the season.

Yet their mother is always sending me packets of dates, and I eat several every day, in the im-morning. I can't wait for the season of the fresh dates to begin, it will be soon! I learnt last night that the tradition is that one should always eat the dates in odd numbers, preferebly 3 or 5, or 7 if they are particularly yummy.

The main reason I decided to visit, is that Ahmed has been really excited in class these last 2 weeks, because his older brother is building an 'isbah' in the desert. An isbah is a place in the sands where one can relax, it usually has several elevated areas where one can sit or sleep out, a cooking or fire place, a couple of rooms made of palm leaves, sometimes open on one side. This one is going to be rather sophiticated with a simple shower and toilet; the water will be driven in of course. The sitting areas are elevated as scorpions apparantly cannot climb.... mmm, not so sure about that.

We went out just before sunset and did some serious reclining, resting and just chatting. I love the fact that I can be so relaxed with my students. The temperature was sublime and we sat on the dunes to have dinner and watch the moon till past midnight. We also went for a short adventure on 2 quad bikes. This is not usually my scene but I enjoyed it very much.

In that place, I can let go of everything that clutters me, and get back to my very essence, to my core, my inner quiet desert. We all need that from time to time!

Sexy palm trees on the scenic route

I have needed a break from cyberspace and I am happy to be back. Things are always moving and shifting in my life and I needed a little time to regroup. It really feels at the moment as though I have found a different internal scenic route to follow. I am  calmly checking out the views and enjoying the vistas and taking in the details of the landscape, and hopefully soon I will be able to put these things into words. What I love about this new road, is that I am not over-excited, I feel as though I have arrived. Arrived at a space in myself where I really want to be.

In the mean time, I had a really good day. I spent a calm couple of hours with my artist friends and their rose-petal baby. They have a super comfy carpet and I love to lie on there and just be. Great thoughts and deep realisations always arise in that space, and I came home feeling wonderful. Prior to the visit, I had a swim at the Chedi which was sublime as always. I lay on the wooden recliner wrapped in my white towel under the sexy palm trees, listening to the sea and the birds, and must have dozed off, because I woke up in a small puddle of drool, it was so relaxing.

We had our first meeting today to discuss the trip to Germany in September. We have 50+ applicants and only 15 spaces, so it will be an interesting process. I sat there checking all of them out, and already have a fair idea about who my money is on.
 My summer plans are slowly coming together. To the UK in mid-July to sort out the passort thing, and hopefully I'll have a bit of time to wander around before coming back to do 3 weeks of summer school in August. I like to be here in Ramadan and for the Eid at the end of August, then off to Aachen on 6 September. I decided not to cry that I can't go to South Africa, and that if I pace myself , this could work out fine.

 And as I know my life, there are bound to be some groovy surprises. Watch this space.

Sulaiman and the ant

Today I went to class completely unprepared. On Mondays I have a 4-hour session of Intensive English with a small class of students and yesterday was a really huge grammar session. So, as I was driving to work this morning, easing my way into the day, listening to some soothing Mozart Horn Concerts, I was wondering what I could do that they would really enjoy. I remembered the writing exercise about the Zamzam water... which I promised to tell you and haven't yet.. and thought that to choose some topic familiar and close to home is always the best.

So, I asked them all to start by telling me their favourite stories from the Holy Quran. There were not too many suprises in the stories that they told, however, I have never known that the Moslem faith had a holy man akin to Saint Francis of Assisi. The prophet Sulaiman was a man who loved and could talk to the animals. One day he came across a little ant hard at work collecting for the winter.

The prophet and the ant started a conversation and the the prophet asked the ant how much food he needed to survive the cold season. The ant answered that it was about a grain and a half of rice. Sulaiman then suggested to the ant that he put him in a comfortable little box with that amount of food and he would not have to work so hard. The ant declined, answering that he would not rely on a human with the potential to be unreliable, if his experience told him that if he worked hard, he could always rely on Allah to feed him.

I thought that was rather a good story.

The Spirit within

Many years ago I spent a few months in India, just wandering around. Sometimes I feel positively homesick for the place. This is one of the old friends I brought home with me.


There is a Spirit which is mind and life
light and truth and vast spaces
He contains all works and desires and all perfumes and all tastes.
He enfolds the whole universe
and in silence is loving to all.
This is the Spirit that is in my heart,
smaller than a grain of rice, or a grain of barley, or a mustard seed.
This is the Spirit that is in my heart.
greater than the sky, greater than heaven itself
greater than all these worlds.
This is the Spirit that is in my heart,
this is Brahman.

Chandogya Upanishad

Keys and comfort

To the desert, to the wadi, to the mountain, or to chill at home? I just love this question! My Thursday morning teen group has finally ended. I have just finished writing their reports, and emailed them off. Joe came around last night especially to show me how to make a tick using Microsoft Word. Bless him.Terrible, I haven't had to make ticks on the computer since I co-ordinated the childrens' courses at CfBT. I officially begged off the final day party. the theme is "The Circus", I am sure it would be the end of me. Each class reminds me a bit of a circus, and I am so done with that for now.

 I haven't been able to get away from the city for a while, and I am looking forward to some escapes again as the end of the semester draws near. Well, not that near, I'll still be pretty busy till mid July.
My student from Jalan whose family I love visiting, told me today that they are building an "isbah" in the desert and that I should come soon soon. This is a kind of a desert house made of palm fronds, usually open on one side.

Muscat is now approaching the 'sauna stage', but I am still one of the die-hards having lunch outside with the geologists. The sweat is almost dripping into our plates of food, but we are tough!
So, the desert, in contrast, is dry and really nice at night. The afternoons can be pretty windy, but the sunsets are beautiful and the place is quiet. No tourists dunebashing and destroying the peace.

I am happy, the week has flown, I only just realised that I never wrote much about this week. The dinner in the Chedi with the girls was really lovely last Wednesday. I am truly enjoying my membership there and going really regularly for a swim in the sea and the pool. Yesterday in my derailed state I went first to Claire who picked me up and brushed me off, and then straight to the Chedi where I was swimming in the sea at sunset and sucking down a tall mochito. Perfect.

In any case, back to last Wednesday.. I came out of that superb dinner to find that I had lost my keys! My lovely Omani neighbours are supposed to have a spare house key, but they couldn't find it. Oh my goodness, Joe to the rescue again. He left his party and came to save me, screwing off the burglar bars of my back window. Take it from me peops, have spare keys for your house and car hidden in useful places. It was a little test I didn't need.

Monica came from the UAE on Thursday and it was wonderful to catch up. We were neighbours for 5 years, close friends for the last two and I really miss her. This is all part of the expat lifestyle I guess, people coming and going, and it is difficult to know who the keepers are, but Monica is definitely one of them.
We were up most of the night and luckily I could rest on Friday.
I went to the 'Beatification Saloon' in the afternoon and decided to go to join the taco thing with a group of South Africans at Left Bank. I had many reservations about this, I was feeling a bit anti-social, Left Bank is far too trendy for me and I usually attempt to avoid my own kind when out of South Africa. They can be so scary. I changed my outfit about 17 times, even resorted to ironing for the first time in 5 years. As my mother used to say, "the 'casually flung together look', so difficult to achieve."

But all worked out well, the people were fine, I enjoyed speaking my language, the tacos turned out to be tappas, which reminded me of my awesome time in Spain last summer. I felt much better after a bloody Mary and had such a good laugh when the the hill on which the restaurant is situated was compared to a certain spot in Bloemfontein.

 It reminded me of the path I have come, the way I have walked, and how only a few years ago Muscat was just an exotic name on a map. Now it is home.

Autobiography in Five Chapters

I thought my inner GPS was sending me on my way to a roaring party, and in contrast I have found myself very busy avoiding all sorts of crazy potholes, unexpected obstacles, old patterns and thorns on my path, having to focus carefully on where I put my little feet. I suddenly landed in the wrong film, 'When Harry met Sally' turned into 'Apocalypse Now' and I had to regroup really quickly. Luckily this lady has a bit of a warrior spirit behind the pussycat facade and I am negotiating the way just fine. Don't know what happened to the GPS, alias my unfailing intuition, but clearly a little blip in the system. Will let you know once I hit the freeway again! As they say, 'all roads lead to the same party'. 

A friend sent me an email last night which reminded me so much of this mindblowing quote from The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying which I  immediately  would like to share. It will keep you going till I am back in full swing.

1) I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I fall in.
I am lost... I am hopeless.
It isn't my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

2) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don't see it.
I fall in again.
I can't believe I am in the same place.
But it isn't my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

3) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I still fall in...it is a habit.
My eyes are open
I know where I am.
It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

4) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

5) I walk down another street.

Wishing you all to leapfrog over the holes of your old habits and find a beautiful new road to explore.

My space

I am sitting in a room; the paint on the walls starts to peal, like flames are burning, melting it away.

Behind the transparent walls is the cosmos in all of its glory and infinity; the purples and blacks and oranges of the planets and the nebulae and the supernovas .  I am sitting in the centre of the universe, I am floating in space. I am in awe, I am filled with joy.

The vision lasts only a split second; I will remember it as long as I live.

burning

It is the burning of the heart that I want;
it is the burning that is everthing
more precious than the empire of the world
because it calls God secretly in the night.

RUMI

Say no more!

Encountering the sacred

This is a story of mine from a while back, some of you may know it already, but I thought it would be good to share it here: 

I experienced the sacred today in the form of a battered up cat that I found under a truck as I was driving out of the car park at work.

He was finished, lying in his own urine, emaciated, and covered with flies and ants, maggots on his face. But he was still breathing.

I knew that this was my task, to love him for the last hours of his life.

I don’t work Thursdays, woke up feeling very reclusive, and decided I had to go in to prepare for Saturday. The students arrive, and I feel like an actress a couple of nights before opening night. No matter how many times you have experienced the curtain going up, you always get the rush, and you need to stay calm and focused before. I am alone in the office, alone on the campus, I shuffle papers, and I feel better.

I always have a very clear sense of those specific souls being put in my care, that I have something specific to bring across to them and I am always in a state of prayerfulness before.

I see this cat soul and immediately begin to protest, ‘No God  no, I have just had this most exceedingly vulnerable week. All I want to do now is put my costume on and go into the sea and then soak up the sun and be alone and heal and heal.’

To be honest I almost drive away, but I know that this is my task.

I call my animal loving friend who is busy with her weekly shop. Great. She gives me a number of the nearest vet.. I call and she says I can bring him by at 5pm. Again the voice in my head says, ‘He is dying leave him, that’s 3 hours away’. But my heart is breaking and knows that there is no way I can let him die alone.

No one deserves to die alone. Suddenly my Arabic teacher is there at my elbow. We communicate in German. I tell him I don’t know what to do. He says we don’t respect the animals because they can’t express their feelings to us. He says that if I care for animals this is a sign I care for people too. I say we all have souls. What I  don’t say is that I also believe that the trees, rocks and water have souls. I tell him that in my experience, the humans that have suffered the most are silent too, because they are so tired of talking, no one hears them.

But my ears are open, my heart is open, I am awake, and I am so thankful for that.

I assure Herr Ahmed he can leave. The cat is still breathing and moving his head to get rid of the flies. I pray with my whole heart that he dies, but he is hanging on for dear life. He looks like he was a real ginger monster, and now he is a soul struggling to cross over, just like any soul who has finished their work on earth.

I think of the little bit of hospice help I did in Germany, and the old people I took care of in England. And I know we are all the same. The soul clings to this life like a bee to a sugary stamen. I admire this cat. I don’t admire myself, I am still shirking from the task. I look around.

 An angel has appeared from nowhere. His car has a UAE number plate, he is wearing jeans and is smoking a cigarette and staring at the sea. I see him immediately, I mean truly see, and engage with him.. He helps me to get the cat from under the truck. We put him in my car on the front seat and cover him with the towel, my swimming towel. The last music he hears in his life is Led Zeppelin. I hope he liked it!

He is cold and he smells, but he is breathing and I find this so sublimely beautiful. The angel says, ‘Be careful of diseases’, and I respond ‘I have no problem with that’. I touch him softly and tell him he will be mine and I will be his, till it's time to go.

He spends the last hours of his life on my kitchen table in an open box. I am pottering around and telling him what a ginga beauty he is and how smelly he is. My kitchen is green, quiet and cool and I hope he doesn’t mind me joking with him. I don’t joke with him about the maggots on his face, because I don’t want him to know how bad it really is.  I tell him how strong and courageous he is and how much I admire him. I tell him my mother, Hester, the Great Cat Mother of the Cape, will be there to meet him and that he should run toward the Light with all his might.

Later I drive him to the vet; I have never met her before.. She is so tender with him, shaves a little patch on his foreleg and as she injects the green liquid, she says, ‘I am so sorry, so sorry’.

I have my hand on his ribs and I push my love into him as he breathes his last breath. He lets out his last meow; I am astounded at his life force. My breath sticks in my throat.

I am privileged and in awe.

I cry. I am glad I did not run away. I helped a soul have a good death. Thank you thank you. The vet kisses me and we get on with our lives.

Yes, one of my encounters with the sacred today.