Travelling memories

Today when I was doing some shopping in my favorite Chinese store and not sure which mirror to take the smell of jasmine incense sticks overwhelmed me all of a sudden and for a few second I was back in India. I could picture myself getting off a plane into dust, heat, sweaty faces and people people people everywhere. Strange noises and smells, an overkill of impressions, surrounded by colour, laughter, shouting, kids running over the street.

Most people think Australia, New Zealand, the States, Canada is cool. Having visited Australia I can confirm, it is damn cool and damn easy, but Asia…is different. I can hardly describe what it is, maybe the feeling that everything is more real, the food, the people, the happiness. I have been and seen people who are so poor compared to Westerns when it comes to material stuff but yet so rich when it comes to family, loyalty, faithfulness, love, always with a smile in their face and the secureness that thing will not be alright, they are actually already fine.

I remember the peace above everything despite the ridiculous packed streets, sitting on the terrace at night, watching the moon through the palm leaves in Kerala, being on the roof of a fort in Rajasthan, looking at people going home in the evening, laughing and careless in the dusk. I remember the food, spicy, exciting, tastes I have never even dreamed of but still dream about now. I remember walking home over the dusty streets, surrounded by the smell of fresh jasmine flowers, colorful Saris in the dark, the horns of the little taxis, smiling faces.

The problem is, when you go back to where you have come from and you realize nothing will ever be the same again. You try to connect to the person you have been when you left, but after some time you realize it’s not possible anymore. Yes, you live your life like everybody else, but in the darkness of the night you remember how life has been in a different place, how easy and simple, how something unknown was rising in you to find the way to the surface to explode in laughter and pure pleasure of just being alive. When you had the best it is hard to adjust to the second best, less life, less taste, less colors, less happiness.

Well, there are a lot of flights going in the future to India, Thailand, Vietnam and for some reason I’m sure I will be in one of them.

Cheers!

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