writer. traveller. life unraveller.
As I drove a friend to the airport a few days ago, I realized that one indicator that you live in a good place is the length of time it takes to drive to the airport. And I write that with all seriousness and anyone who lives in a big city will understand why. Hours... Continue Reading →
On the final day of Thai massage school, four of us listened as our teacher talked about herbal medicine for treating common ailments. “How do you treat heartache?” One woman asked. She’d recently broken up with her partner over the course of our ten-week training. His name was still scrawled in ink on the top of her... Continue Reading →
Travelling alone might be one of the best things you can do for yourself. Yes, it gets lonely, especially when you’re at an age seriously underrepresented in the travel world, and yes, it is sometimes scary. But loneliness and fear are a bit like mosquito bites, they affect everybody at some point but they only... Continue Reading →
Where am I? I asked myself this a few hundred times a day as I pondered all the things I would have been doing had I not rolled up on this remote tropical island. I had fallen off the map, or it felt that way. I was in a place were clocks don’t matter because... Continue Reading →
Photo credit: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UolOn_ZO-KY/UMuR9fNCKJI/AAAAAAAAACU/TqfPWbfWfp... Are Western women easy? The answer depends on who you ask. I am a single white female (SWF) travelling in Indonesia, a country that has conservative values regarding women, so my Western perspective is biased. This musing may provoke a bit of controversy but isn’t that the best kind of reading? It’s... Continue Reading →
I’ve avoided writing about this for some time because I fear it exposes my ineptness as a world traveller and an aspiring good person who is clouded by materialism. I am clumsy-minded, prone to inner torment and attached insensibly to things that have very little value in my goal towards being a more spiritual person.... Continue Reading →
Out there in the world, Canada is like the forgotten kid on the playground, but it doesn’t care. It’s the underdog to the United States, what a friend of mine calls “America’s attic” (and can you guess where he is from?) When I lived in Indonesia, nobody ever guessed that I’m from Canada. They would... Continue Reading →
I’m leaving Surabaya at long last. Of course I’ve left a dozen times over the course of two years to go on holiday but I always came back to my job and my apartment. Real Life was always there waiting for me to resume it. There were a handful of get-out-of-jail-free passes but I resigned... Continue Reading →
The first time I drove a motorbike in South East Asia I was robbed. I had just learned to drive a scooter during a holiday on the island of Lombok, next to Bali and one day I was scooting along one of the main roads, in the middle of a beautiful day, and boom–two local... Continue Reading →
This past weekend I went to Taman Dayu with a friend, a large park about an hour and a half drive from Surabaya. We had registered to participate in a 12 km run/hike race at my friend’s suggestion. Funny actually, because he hates running and hiking and getting up early. The race started at 6:30... Continue Reading →
colleen thornton 