As I was reading my last post this morning, I was inspired to look at my LIFE LIST in a new way, with a different time reference: a list of things that I want to do it at least once a year!
Sunday, May 21, 2023
Monday, October 24, 2022
HOW DID I GET HERE? MY LIFE LIST AT 75!
Monday, October 24, 2022
4:30 am ... I am nearly conscious but enough to be moved by stars twinkling brightly through our bedroom window. Not often do they shimmer so radiantly over our part of the Pacific. Is this a dream? I slip into my heaviest winter robe, step out onto the
deck and move a lounge chair to take advantage of this infrequent celestial experience.
Like a double exposure, memories of our recent middle~of~the~night Alaskan Aurora Borealis experience merge with these starry night sky thoughts. The Aurora is a luminescent early morning vision that is the flip side of a cloud time lapse at sunset.
Just
before reclining into my angle of repose, there streaks a singular shooting
star flashing to the southwest. So life affirming that bracing the twilight chill merits leaving the warmth and coziness of our bed. I go back inside, grab one of Patricia's ice hockey blankets, then settle in to watch the subtle shift from star glimmering night to astronomical twilight. An exquisite way to celebrate my 75th birthday. So memorable was this that I'm placing it on my life list do once a year. But, was I dreaming?
There are things we only do once in our lifetimes. Turning 75 is one of those never-to-be duplicated experiences.
Last night 14 of my friends and family gathered in celebration at Nobu, a fine Japanese restaurant looking down on Newport Harbor. Patricia called two of them "book ends". Chucky Thomas my first student genius from Foothill High School and Matthew Mori, from Montebello, my last. Georgia and Michael Litvak from my Garfield High days joined in with Jim Reed whom I've known since 1966, long before anyone else at the table. Sharon Thomas, Chuckies wife, and my family, Jason, Leandra, David, Cameron, and Samantha. Together they paint a bright canvas of my life span from my days as a young teacher to now.
Jason remembered my original Sony Reel to Reel tape recorder as I put it out into the hallway at the New Age School filling the corridors with Chariots of Fire.
More soon...
But how did I get here? What events that have shaped the arc of my life?
Quote from the movie Land: "You offered me a way do die in a state of grace."
We sat with Joyce when she took her last breaths. Her family found it impossible to visit her in the hospital, but I was there. She was a volunteer at Barbara Clark's Demonstration School during her last, preterminal year. We offered her a way do die in a state of grace.
This is a rare gift you can give to someone at exactly the proper moment. This should be on everyone's LifeList of experiences to have during the arc of a lifetime.
From the movie: Woman Walks Ahead -Sitting Bull Quotes
"Your society values people by how much you have...
ours by how much we give away." -
"The guards thought I was sleeping but I'd made myself into an eagle."
"Cantognake" Lakota meaning to place and hold in your heart, this moment.
chantoganake...
Saturday, October 8, 2022
#3. THE AURORA BOREALIS LEGEND
If you whistle under the Northern Lights,
they will shift and dance for you.
In the 7th grade I wrote the first entries to my Life List: places to explore, people to meet, and things to experience over the arc of my lifetime. Actually, this was a homework assignment given to us during an assembly and inspired by the famed explorer John Goddard, click HERE for more. I did that homework assignment life list using the Encyclopedia Britannia my mother had just bought for me and my beginners collection of National Geographics. Since those early years I have been moving down that list but cannot help adding more to do as I meet other travelers and read about far away places. I feel like the character depicted in the Flammarion engraving discovering the wonders beyond the heavens: click HERE.
MY LIFE LIST
#1 Walk Olduvai Gorge, into a steep-sided ravine where Mary Leakey discovered a skull fragment of Zinjanthropus Boisei, dubbed the "Nutcracker Man" because of his huge molars, who lived 1.75 million years ago.
#2 Walk the Inca Trail down into the ancient city of Machu Picchu to feel the echoes of its people.
#3. Experience the Aurora Borealis. 60 years it took from that day to this week at Borealis Basecamp, Latitude 60.10323 degrees North, 28 miles above Fairbanks Alaska. There's a legend: if you whistle under the borealis, it will shift and dance for you.
#4. Click HERE for the whole list.
Since we're about to travel to Alaska...
Is it Denali or Mount McKinley?
Photo credit: NPS
It's worthy of mention to note that in took 100 years of debate to change the name of Mount Mckinley back to it's original name: Denali just in time ...
"On the eve of the National Park Service’s 100th anniversary in 2016, the name of the highest peak in North America changed from “Mount McKinley” to “Denali.” The timing of the change not only helped mark the agency’s centennial, it shines a light on the long human history of the park, and illuminates a naming debate that has lasted more than 100 years."
I've long thought that a similar initiative should be focused on Sagarmatha, Chomolungma (goddess mother of the world). Mount Everest is so... eurocentric.
Let's engineer a renaming campaign!!!
Sagarmatha
Now back to the Borealis..
It was a wait worthy of the years, but like most expeditions, there were the stops, both planned and unplanned, along the way that gave the journey an energy and life of its own.
Here be the journal of that journey between September 27, 2022 and October 10th.
The 10 DAY BOREALIS EXPEDITION on a single page.
Below photo credit: Jaeseop Song
I'd return in a New York heartbeat especially for a family ski trip.
Though our Borealis Expedition had many parts, they are placed solidly in context by the pristine clarity of the documentary below. It weaves many stories into our journey, the Anthabaskans, caribou, salmon, wood bison, black-taided deer, musk ox, grizzly bears, bull elk Klondike gold, all within the story of the Yukon River. Take a look.
Day 5: Walking along 2nd Street in downtown Fairbanks we meet an engaging native elder, Anne, a river of wisdom and experience and kindness tending to her store: Beads and Things.
She is a native Anthabaskan from Stevens Village less than a day away. She radiates a purity from living in the arctic according to its laws, steeped in her culture, a strong sense of honor, and strength of body and mind required for life under the Northern Lights. Later, we are standing outside, when another elder walks by, she greets him with a broad smile and tells him: "Will you dance with me?" His face radiates a shy happiness from her kind flirtation. Though I came to Alaska for the Northern Lights, I found the luminous treasure in Anne from Stevens. Click on the video link below and listen to her wisdom.
Holding her hands together Anne told us:
"Take care of each other.
Because we are all one family."
"When someone died Grandma would say Abah, she hurt." Anne has taught us the first word of our Anthabaskan vocabulary.
Her 47 year old son, Ron Gossal Junior, is the artist who designed this hoodie which Patricia quickly scoops up to show her design student in Santa Ana California.
Day 8: We meet the tall and lean Carl Ray Erhart up at Borealis Base camp who lives that same extraordinary and rich close-to-the-earth Koikan Anthabaskan way of living. He was born in Tanana Village 130 miles west of Fairbanks.
"My parents raised me on a totally subsistence life style... fishing in the summer, trapping in the winter. Dogs were our transportation. If you go to the Discovery Channel and look up Yukon Men, that's all about the people in my village.Mushing
He is a competitive musher with his own team of sled dogs which he races when the snow comes. We learn about him and his way of life as he tours us on his sled, his dogs pulling eagerly on there harnesses. He is very attentive to their needs, their health well cared for as their lives are interdependent.
It's about the adventure and living life. I try to live each day and not worry about... money and that 'kind of stuff'.
The
tour company Riverboat Discovery sponsors my kennel, they do a stern
wheeler tour to the Chena River Village. It's a real genuine experience
of what natives do to survive here with real Koikon Anthabaskans giving
the tour."
More about Carl coming soon.
To double our chances of experiencing the Aurora Borealis, we reserved two nights in a dome at BOREALIS BASECAMP. After dinner and a short walk we fell into a cozy sleep under a starry canopy: the Alaskan night sky... then awakened to a chime (a service to clients who which to be notified when the borealis appears). See the 3 photos below.
Dome photo courtesy Borealis Basecamp
** From https://www.saltwire.com/newfoundland-labrador/opinion/whistling-at-the-northern-lights-135097/
Click HERE: the Northern Lights in the voice of Dene Elder Jonas Antoine. The Dene people are a First Nations indigenous group inhabiting the northern boreal and Arctic regions of Canada and Alaska.
As in all my voyages of exploration and discovery, I returned with more questions than were answered on the journey.
#1 What is the Anthabaskan term for the aurora borealis.
#2 When the Yukon River freezes over hows does that warm the hearts of native people. I have a clue from two junior high kids while on a expedition to Utqiagvik, the northern most point in the United States.
A Photo credit: Al Grillo/AP Resident of the town formerly known as Barrow, Alaska,
rides her motorcycle along an Arctic Ocean beach in 2005. The town is
now officially called Utqiagvik, its Inupiaq name.
Utqiagvik"The town is now officially called Utqiagvik,
its Inupiaq name. The northernmost community in the United States has
officially restored its original name. In October, the people of the
Alaskan town formerly known as Barrow, on the edge of the Arctic Ocean,
voted to restore its indigenous name, Utqiagvik." October, 2016
Sunday, May 1, 2022
THE CONGO
Long on my list: photographing the gorillas of the Congo. I read Daniel Quinn's very moving novel: Instinct which was made into a stirring movie starring Anthony Hopkins as an anthropologist studying mountain gorillas in the Congo.
Photo credit: https://www.virungaparkcongo.com/information/gorilla-trekking-africa/
My wife Patricia had a Design student a few years ago that one day will be a renowned travel photographer: Elissa Title. She recently took a gorilla trek.
Click HERE for Elissa's safari to photograph Gorillas in the mist.
Wednesday, July 22, 2020
“The Most Beautiful Places On Earth”
PREFACE: July, 1988 We were on an Earth Watch Expedition watching a Fijian sunset on Malolo Lai lai. After a candle lit dinner someone asked the group to “name the most beautiful places you’ve ever seen.” This was the most well traveled group I’d ever come across so I immediately opened my journal and wrote their answers, adding to the life list I started as a seventh grader.
“Hong Kong Harbor at night, and Bora Bora, . . . “The most beautiful places on earth." -- said my well heeled dinner companions. It was July of 1988 and I was determined to experience the beauty of these new highly regarded destinations.
Soon I was on a freighter bound for Bora Bora when I first witnessed that: “it takes a village to raise a child.” I could have flown from Papaete to Bora Bora but I’d have missed spending the night with a ship load of dancers from the outer islands including Taha’a, Huahine and Raiatea. The annual Tahitian dance competition had just ended with large families, whole villages bound for home. Performers pulled out instruments as the sun set filling the deck with enchanting Tahitian ballads. The importance of family was writ large as I watched a small child crawl onto the laps of various adults. I wondered which ones were his parents. By the time I’d counted him with seven different grownups I realized this kid knew everyone in the village, and no one would refuse taking him on their lap. “It takes a village.” Villagers began unrolling grass mats onto the freighters deck. We’d all be sleeping on the deck under a sparkling canopy of southern constellations. It was time to sleep but no one on a PA system telling people what to do. Four thousand miles into the Pacific Ocean, I was spending my first night in a polychronic universe. Click HERE for more on Chronometrics
I’d start with...Make a list of all the wonderful, interesting, enjoyable, exciting things you want to do across the arc of your lifetime... then start doing them. For me it was to
1. Walk Mary Leakey’s steps along Olduvai Gorge where she found the remains of our earliest ancestors. Yes, it was Mary not Louis that picked up those first bone fragments. It would take me nearly five more decades to arrive in Nairobi, on my way to find Mary’s footprints on the history of Africa.
2. Jump out of an airplane, and fly like an eagle until my parachute carries me on a bold and uplifting wind to places where the signposts are unfamiliar.
3... see the rest of my list. --- > --- > --- > --- > --- >
Make your LIFE LIST. While you do, let me tell you a story.
As a 7th grader, after listening to renowned explorer John Goddard, I began to build my list not knowing the passing years to the day I’d begin actualizing those dreams. It would be a decade before I’d jump out of that plane.
It was 1960 that John Goddard presented his Amazon Adventure Film Documentary at an assembly at my school, Luther Burbank Junior High. Goddard, solo, had taken a long canoe down the length of the Amazon River. What a story teller! His documentary was a narrative of his journey. While sleeping one night in his long boat, while anchored in the river, he was attacked by a giant Amazon anaconda. Wrapped in the constricting death grip of this larger than a man predator, and with only one arm free, he grabbed a machete and hacked at his nemesis until he lost consciousness. Still wrapped in giant Anaconda coils, he awakened hours later to find dead his attacker.
Follow this link to his website.
http://www.johngoddard.info/
Afterward, Mr. Goddard descended the stage for a Q & A. Standing just two rows before me, our eyes met, and in an almost whisper he spoke these words: “Make a list of all the things you want to do during your lifetime, then set about doing them.” It seemed he spoke those words directly to me. In that moment there began a change in my lifetime.
That night, inspired by Goddard’s philosophy and his sense of adventure, I pulled my National Geographic collection off the self and along with my Encyclopaedia Britannica, began work on my personal LIFE list. --- >
Years later I divided my life list into two catagories: 1. the things that require a measure of stamina like climbing Kilimanjaro, skiing the Alps, or mounting an expedition to Olduvai Gorge and 2. those less athletic activities for later in life like wandering the galleries of the Louvre or visiting Venus de Milo or wondering about the mind of Michaelangelo before his 17 foot tall marble masterpiece David at the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence, or walking Japanese village streets ‘neath cherry trees heavy and pregnant in full blossom.
An excellent plan had I. While I never reached the top of Mount Everest, I am looking forward to the Colosso di Rodi (the Colossus of Rhodes), in Greece and treasures closer to home like Off Broadway in New York City. I’ve always wanted a romantic trip to Trevi Fountain from the 1954 movie Three Coins in the Fountain. Now I have someone I treasure, to share the romance of Trevi, Cinque Terra, perhaps then, on to Paris, Papaeete, Kyoto, Florence ...
So many things to do in a lifetime, so many ways to find ourselves.
Though no one previously suggested placing: “have grandchildren” on my LIFE LIST, I certainly do now that I have two. It is a remarkable experience.
Family is good place to start.
My grown children Leandra, and Jason, have come to possess such remarkable qualities. I never imagined I'd admire them so.
Lea has also brought two breath taking treasures into my life: Samantha, first grandchild and Cameron, first grandson. Since I was a first grandchild I’ve come to understand why my grandparents were so loving, kind and tender with me. There was never a moment in my childhood that lacked for affection.
There was always a lap and a warm and comforting embrace waiting for me. I felt …
unconditional love and it has shaped the person I am today and the man I’ll come to be in the future.
Along the arc of my life, I've included stops along my LIFE'S LIST, and I encourage each of you to stop what you are doing by listing five things to start your LIFE LIST.
Here's one from mine . . .
Watching a gorgeous golden, glittering on South Pacific water-setting sun,
a group of extremely well traveled American’s were having dinner with me
on the little Fijian island: Malolo lai lai.
We were on an Earth Watch Expedition to study coral growth and recovery in the months following a hurricane. A year before, a hurricane
had scrubbed away the reef surrounding Malolo lai lai. Mornings and afternoons we mapped the reef and collected data, evenings we enjoyed sunset dinner by candle light.
One evening after dinner while watching sunlight play off the water (see photo) we settled into a discussion about the most beautiful places in the world. Being so young, I jotted down a few quick notes.
"Bora Bora is the most beautiful place on Earth." said one very well heeled traveler.
"Hong Kong harbor at night." added another,
and on into the twilight did they share their stories.
Bora Bora went to the top of my Lifetime List.
And I agree, when I finally arrived many years later, it was the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen, 17 shades of lagoon blue as our freighter threaded the fringing reefs, but what made it an extra ordinary experience . . .
Make your LIFE LIST. While you do, let me tell you a story.
As a 7th grader, after listening to renowned explorer John Goddard, I began to build my list not knowing the passing years to the day I’d begin actualizing those dreams. It would be a decade before I’d jump out of that plane.
It was 1960 that John Goddard presented his Amazon Adventure Film Documentary at an assembly at my school, Luther Burbank Junior High. Goddard, solo, had taken a long canoe down the length of the Amazon River. What a story teller! His documentary was a narrative of his journey. While sleeping one night in his long boat, while anchored in the river, he was attacked by a giant Amazon anaconda. Wrapped in the constricting death grip of this larger than a man predator, and with only one arm free, he grabbed a machete and hacked at his nemesis until he lost consciousness. Still wrapped in giant Anaconda coils, he awakened hours later to find dead his attacker.
Follow this link to his website.
http://www.johngoddard.info/
Afterward, Mr. Goddard descended the stage for a Q & A. Standing just two rows before me, our eyes met, and in an almost whisper he spoke these words: “Make a list of all the things you want to do during your lifetime, then set about doing them.” It seemed he spoke those words directly to me. In that moment there began a change in my lifetime.
That night, inspired by Goddard’s philosophy and his sense of adventure, I pulled my National Geographic collection off the self and along with my Encyclopaedia Britannica, began work on my personal LIFE list. --- >
Years later I divided my life list into two catagories: 1. the things that require a measure of stamina like climbing Kilimanjaro, skiing the Alps, or mounting an expedition to Olduvai Gorge and 2. those less athletic activities for later in life like wandering the galleries of the Louvre or visiting Venus de Milo or wondering about the mind of Michaelangelo before his 17 foot tall marble masterpiece David at the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence, or walking Japanese village streets ‘neath cherry trees heavy and pregnant in full blossom.
An excellent plan had I. While I never reached the top of Mount Everest, I am looking forward to the Colosso di Rodi (the Colossus of Rhodes), in Greece and treasures closer to home like Off Broadway in New York City. I’ve always wanted a romantic trip to Trevi Fountain from the 1954 movie Three Coins in the Fountain. Now I have someone I treasure, to share the romance of Trevi, Cinque Terra, perhaps then, on to Paris, Papaeete, Kyoto, Florence ...
So many things to do in a lifetime, so many ways to find ourselves.
Though no one previously suggested placing: “have grandchildren” on my LIFE LIST, I certainly do now that I have two. It is a remarkable experience.
Family is good place to start.
My grown children Leandra, and Jason, have come to possess such remarkable qualities. I never imagined I'd admire them so.
Lea has also brought two breath taking treasures into my life: Samantha, first grandchild and Cameron, first grandson. Since I was a first grandchild I’ve come to understand why my grandparents were so loving, kind and tender with me. There was never a moment in my childhood that lacked for affection.
There was always a lap and a warm and comforting embrace waiting for me. I felt …
unconditional love and it has shaped the person I am today and the man I’ll come to be in the future.
Along the arc of my life, I've included stops along my LIFE'S LIST, and I encourage each of you to stop what you are doing by listing five things to start your LIFE LIST.
Here's one from mine . . .
Watching a gorgeous golden, glittering on South Pacific water-setting sun,
a group of extremely well traveled American’s were having dinner with me
on the little Fijian island: Malolo lai lai.
had scrubbed away the reef surrounding Malolo lai lai. Mornings and afternoons we mapped the reef and collected data, evenings we enjoyed sunset dinner by candle light.
One evening after dinner while watching sunlight play off the water (see photo) we settled into a discussion about the most beautiful places in the world. Being so young, I jotted down a few quick notes.
"Bora Bora is the most beautiful place on Earth." said one very well heeled traveler.
"Hong Kong harbor at night." added another,
and on into the twilight did they share their stories.
Bora Bora went to the top of my Lifetime List.
And I agree, when I finally arrived many years later, it was the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen, 17 shades of lagoon blue as our freighter threaded the fringing reefs, but what made it an extra ordinary experience . . .
the incomparably gentle people of the Tahitian archipelago.
From Papaete, most visitors take a small plane to Bora Bora,
Being that Tahiti is one of the most expensive places to visit
and that I had only a humble teacher's income,
I discovered a local freighter that cut a route between Papaete, Huahine, Taha'a, Raiatea, and Bora Bora. "Take a grass woven beach mat." I was advised, "You'll be sleeping under the stars on the steel deck of that freighter."
Of the three freighters, take the "Hawaiki Nui”, the best, by a long shot but not a honeymoon voyage.
That overnight freighter trip introduced me to the wonderful people of Bora Bora who were returning home after their all island dance competition in Papaete.
Watching the sun set,
and twilight paint the sky,
we prepared for the evening as the local people
sang softly in the evening breeze. . . . . .
It takes a Village.
Each island carries to this annual competition it’s children’s dance groups, adult dancers, and musicians, and on that South Pacific dreamy night, a few musicians strummed their instruments while a soft chorus of voices floated across the deck.
Listening, relaxing with each resonant note, I watched a three year old boy climb into his mother’s, and later his father’s lap.
Such a charming and handsome lad, I noticed how he was warmly embraced as he continued to gather the affection of so many adults that I began to wonder, which one’s were his actual parents.
And there
was I struck by the epiphany:
Here, in Tahiti, in Bora Bora,
it takes a village to raise a child.
I see it now, that little boy felt that each of those adults loved him,
cared for him.
That each was a parent to him.
Therein lies the magic,
the beauty of Bora Bora.
Over the communications loud speaker, our Captain notified tourists:
“For those interested, we’ll be sailing into Bora Bora’s lagoon at sunrise:
an experience well worth the early hour."
Under a breathless canopy of a South Pacific Starry Starry Night,
songs and faint laughter floated on a cool breeze, families began unrolling grass mats onto the expansive steel deck. I unrolled my mat and gazed up at the Southern Cross. A family from Bora Bora quietly moved in next to me.
A southern sky shooting star, was the last thing I remember before falling asleep.
I awakened just after 5 am wanting to be on the bow when we sailed into Bora Bora.
From the grass mat of the family next to me, a four year old, in his sleep had drifted on to my mat and was warmly snuggled in by my side. I was forever charmed by the gentleness, authenticity and tenderness of these people.
I'd become part of the village it takes to raise a child.
Moving ever so quietly, and oh so slowly, I rose from the sleeping child on my mat and made way to the bow under early morning light.
Off to the distant eastern horizon lay Bora Bora emergent from the night, eager for the dawn.
The captain from his pilot house expertly piloted his lumbering freighter into Bora Bora's fringing barrier reef's winding channels, I watched from the bow. At his first slow turn starboard, a stunning American expatriate quietly joined me on the bow, her hair lifted softly by cool morning's breeze. She was beautiful but lost, at first she seemed like an actress who'd run away from Hollywood's madness. She invited us to join her for lunch at the Hotel Bora Bora.
But I could not take my eyes long from
the 17 shades of breathtaking lagoon blue as we plied reef's waters,
bow waves lapping below
while the captain made way for landing.
It's true,
the old sailor's myth
"the gates of heaven
'b hidden somewhere in the South Pacific."
Heavenly waters,
heavenly island,
and loving
gentle people.
Paradise found.
Below, is a video clip link that includes scenes from Tahiti and French Polynesia.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KxvaTIH064
No one ever complained from their death bed: "I wish I'd spent more time at the office."
Ah. Remembering my 2006 pilgrimage to meditate with the Great Buddha of Nara Japan . .
And for the future: Mosi-oa-Tunya (Victoria Falls)
From Papaete, most visitors take a small plane to Bora Bora,
Being that Tahiti is one of the most expensive places to visit
and that I had only a humble teacher's income,
I discovered a local freighter that cut a route between Papaete, Huahine, Taha'a, Raiatea, and Bora Bora. "Take a grass woven beach mat." I was advised, "You'll be sleeping under the stars on the steel deck of that freighter."
Of the three freighters, take the "Hawaiki Nui”, the best, by a long shot but not a honeymoon voyage.
That overnight freighter trip introduced me to the wonderful people of Bora Bora who were returning home after their all island dance competition in Papaete.
Watching the sun set,
and twilight paint the sky,
we prepared for the evening as the local people
sang softly in the evening breeze. . . . . .
It takes a Village.
Each island carries to this annual competition it’s children’s dance groups, adult dancers, and musicians, and on that South Pacific dreamy night, a few musicians strummed their instruments while a soft chorus of voices floated across the deck.
Listening, relaxing with each resonant note, I watched a three year old boy climb into his mother’s, and later his father’s lap.
Such a charming and handsome lad, I noticed how he was warmly embraced as he continued to gather the affection of so many adults that I began to wonder, which one’s were his actual parents.
And there
was I struck by the epiphany:
Here, in Tahiti, in Bora Bora,
it takes a village to raise a child.
I see it now, that little boy felt that each of those adults loved him,
cared for him.
That each was a parent to him.
Therein lies the magic,
the beauty of Bora Bora.
Over the communications loud speaker, our Captain notified tourists:
“For those interested, we’ll be sailing into Bora Bora’s lagoon at sunrise:
an experience well worth the early hour."
Under a breathless canopy of a South Pacific Starry Starry Night,
songs and faint laughter floated on a cool breeze, families began unrolling grass mats onto the expansive steel deck. I unrolled my mat and gazed up at the Southern Cross. A family from Bora Bora quietly moved in next to me.
A southern sky shooting star, was the last thing I remember before falling asleep.
I awakened just after 5 am wanting to be on the bow when we sailed into Bora Bora.
From the grass mat of the family next to me, a four year old, in his sleep had drifted on to my mat and was warmly snuggled in by my side. I was forever charmed by the gentleness, authenticity and tenderness of these people.
I'd become part of the village it takes to raise a child.
Moving ever so quietly, and oh so slowly, I rose from the sleeping child on my mat and made way to the bow under early morning light.
Off to the distant eastern horizon lay Bora Bora emergent from the night, eager for the dawn.
The captain from his pilot house expertly piloted his lumbering freighter into Bora Bora's fringing barrier reef's winding channels, I watched from the bow. At his first slow turn starboard, a stunning American expatriate quietly joined me on the bow, her hair lifted softly by cool morning's breeze. She was beautiful but lost, at first she seemed like an actress who'd run away from Hollywood's madness. She invited us to join her for lunch at the Hotel Bora Bora.
But I could not take my eyes long from
the 17 shades of breathtaking lagoon blue as we plied reef's waters,
bow waves lapping below
while the captain made way for landing.
It's true,
the old sailor's myth
"the gates of heaven
'b hidden somewhere in the South Pacific."
Heavenly waters,
heavenly island,
and loving
gentle people.
Paradise found.
Below, is a video clip link that includes scenes from Tahiti and French Polynesia.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KxvaTIH064
No one ever complained from their death bed: "I wish I'd spent more time at the office."
Ah. Remembering my 2006 pilgrimage to meditate with the Great Buddha of Nara Japan . .
Walking With the Maasai
When I was 13 years old, the Olduvai Gorge and the Great Rift Valley was the first entry on Life List, a dream of walking in the footsteps of Mary Leakey, where she discovered the fossilized bone fragments of one of our most ancient human ancestors. Come back for that story. It would take over forty years to actualize that inspiration, to take it from my mind and make it happen in the real world.
I finally took that journey, but planning a trip to East Africa was very different than making my life list. First step, order adventure travel catalogs. Soon one arrived that described a “Walk With The Maasai” with Iain Allen of Tropical Ice Adventure Travel headquartered in Nairobi. What follows is that month long journey. A few months later I touch down in Nairobi, but my luggage was lost in Amsterdam. It will take three days to catch up with me. So I awaken to the unusual cawing of african birds and explore the city that started as a clonal railway settlement in the 1890's. Worried my luggage won't arrive by the time my safari departs, I buy a journalists jacket as cool nights are expected on the Maasai Mara.
When I remember Africa, the first images that fall from the cumulonimbus clouds of memory are the sparkling smiles of the Maasai.
We visit a menyatta, (village),
surrounded by a boma (a circular wall of heavily thorned bushes).
Photo credit: Toby Manzanares, (all photos except as noted otherwise.)
Celebrating a Maasai Wedding a days drive west of Nairobi.
We are granted permission to set up camp not far from their village, where we stay for three nights.
Two Maasai warriors jump as high as they can for the joy and pleasure rather than in competition.
Photo credit: Tropical Ice
Prior to our departure one of our Maasai hosts asked if I’d send back photos when I got home. Back at home, I wrote to Iian Allen, our Tropical Ice guide asking if he’d give my village friends the link to this web page.
Cows are brought into the boma each afternoon to protect them overnight from prowling lions.
Maasai wedding: the father of the bride is seated.
When a teenager when he survived a lion attack.
The boy that saved his life was my Maasai guide. That story coming soon.
Photo credit: Tropical Ice
Seated here is the father of the bride, childhood friends with one of our Maasai guides. When they were kids, their job was to graze and guard the village cows.
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