Volunteering... Finally, something resonates!

My goodness... i'm sitting here in tears right now.  I've found something that resonates with what i want to do SO much...

And i found it in a post by Earl.  It's GrassrootsVolunteering.com.  I've wanted to volunteer on my journeys around the world, but could only ever find places that expect you to pay BIG BUCKS (i'm talking thousands!) for you to 'volunteer'.  Sounds to me, more like a tourist scam (or 'experience', to be fair).  I simply do not have that kind of money!  I'll be travelling with a small daypack.. that's all!  It's hostels and street food for me!

But with Grassroots... you have choices!  FREE volunteering opportunities... Under $200 opportunities... and it goes up from there.  To see that list of free ones, started the tears flowing...

Thank you Earl (& Shannon of course, who has created the website)!  You've made my day!  :-)

My Life Philosophy

Yeah, i know... it's old and it's been around the block a few times. But.. it definitely says how i plan to live my life! I just have to change one word (i don't drink wine that much)... I wonder who wrote this...

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways - Mai Tai in one hand - chocolate in the other - body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WOO-HOO, what a ride!!"

:-)

Aaaaand.... About face! Now Japan is on my radar...

No sooner have i decided that Chiang Mai is where i'm going to be living
next year... everything turns on it's head and now Japan is where i'm wanting to at least TRY to figure out how/where to live in, if at all possible!

See my new Japan blog... Amber Loves Japan.  *sigh*  Yet ANOTHER blog...  hehe (lets face it.. i just enjoy creating blogs and making them pretty).  But seeing it's not a place i plan to be moving through quickly, in hopefully GypsyKat style, i figure Japan should get a blog of its own.  It's all about how much time is spent.

Here in Yellowknife.. the sub Arctic.. i've spent a year, so it got its own blog.  And Japan would be the same, if possible, so i can learn Japanese.  We shall see if they even LET me stay long enough to get relatively fluent!

Anyway... new plans.. new research.  And it will all be on 'Amber Loves Japan'.

UPDATE: July 23/12 --- Japan is on hold.  I can't get a Visa to stay anywhere NEAR the amount of time i wanted there!  *sigh*  I think that maybe i should just keep everything here.. lol.. instead of making new blogs for everything!  Man.. i'm such a Blog Whore!  Lol

My first year as a nomad

Well.. SORT of a nomad. The kind that stays in one place in their own country for an entire year kind of nomad.

I thought that would be a good way to eeeease my way gently into the whole situation, seeing i had never in my entire life been alone! From daddy’s house to hubby’s house to best friend’s house. Yup.. that’s me!

My entire life i’ve wanted to travel, and in fact have, a bit... leaving the older kids in school while taking the 2 year old for a 6 week Road Trip down to Las Vegas and Salt Lake City! So i’ve had my tavellin’ moments (actually quite a few).

But this year was different.

I finally answered the Siren Call of the North that had been screaming in my ear for a few years, and moved to Yellowknife, NWT, Canada, just 200 miles south of the Arctic Circle by myself! 

I was even in "The Yellowknifer"!  I have arrived!

And it’s been a wonderful year! I’ve made friends... become active in a
local drumming/singing group where we’ve performed publicly... learned how to make a drum, sacred rattle, medicine pouch, plus many other things like silversmithing, felting and beading and making Inuit-style mittens out of seal skin. I have a ‘Night Sky Photography’ workshop tonight!

Let’s just say i love, love, LOVE to learn new things!

And i’ve created a Life. In Yellowknife.

An Unexpected Turnabout...

A whirlwind of change had has been buffeting my brain lately.  My plan was to come back to Yellowknife next fall after a summer in Vancouver, and my son’s wedding in September.  That would be so easy!  I LOVE Yellowknife!  I’ve got some great friends here.  I belong to the Sister’s of the Sacred Circle, where we sing and drum and perform in public.  And where i volunteer my time to host a Sewing Circle every week.  I have a JOB.  And not ‘only’ a job, but a job in the sub Arctic, in an Inuit Art Gallery!  How close to perfection is that??  And i love that job and the people i work with (and couldn’t even DREAM of a better boss)!  

In Yellowknife, i have created a Life!

So yes... it would be SO easy to come back here.  To my life, and my job..  It’s what i WANT to do.

But... i don’t believe that’s what i’m SUPPOSED to or NEED to do.  I’d tell you how i know this, but.. you’d just think i’m crazy.  So i think that bit of info will be just for my friends who also happen to talk to trees and Auroras and sing to rivers, like i do.  Ok.. ‘nuff said.. and now you think i’m nuts anyway.  

Suffice it to say... I have it on ‘good authority’ (in MY world) that i’m not meant to come back to Yellowknife in the fall.  I have other quests to follow, challenges at hand and fears to conquer.  My kids aren’t going to like hearing this, because they think it’s dangerous and i’m too ‘old’ to go to where i need to go.  They think i should go to Europe.  They think it’s safer there, and they may very well be right.

And sure.. i’d LOVE to go to Europe!  It’s a life-long dream!  To see the Louvre and other incredible ‘Europe-y’ places?  It would be the SAFE thing to do.  I do WANT to go there.. and i WILL go there.  But... it’s not where i NEED to go right now, to find what i’m looking for at this time.


The place i need to go to is Thailand.  I need to swallow my incredibly intense fear (literally.. i cry every time i think of doing this thing), and travel to Thailand and Southeastern Asia and Indonesia, alone.  Not that i WANT to go alone.. Hey.. if anyone wants a travel partner to Chiang Mai Thailand.. i’m your babe!  Save me from having to face this fear!  Or not.  I still have to go!

The newest plan of the hour is to live in Chiang Mai for about 3 months (Jan to March), and travel to close-by countries now and then during that time... Cambodia, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Philippines, Bali (just because it’s Bali).. and oh my.. India and Nepal?  And of course, REALLY experience Thailand.  I plan to learn how to speak at least a bit of Thai (or at least try my best).  

I’m not happy to just visit a place.  I need to LIVE there.  My thought is for at least a month... three is best.  Actually, starting in Chiang Mai IS my ‘safe’ route.  It’s the place that all nomads seem to congregate when they need to settle down for a while and relax.  So.. sounds like a good place to start a nomad’s life to me!  The other countries i’ll just be scouting for future living possibilities.

And Thailand is the ‘Land of Smiles’.. a place where people will bend over backwards to help a complete stranger! Considering my experience tonight with slipping on ice in the middle of the street, not being able to get up... and a car just driving around me... and a guy going back into his house... I need to see this Thai personality for myself.  Are they really like people say they are?

Anyway, where i go after the 3 months is up, is of course, in the air.  Maybe head down to Australia for their fall (and see my niece!).. then through some south pacific islands to Easter Island to Chili (to re-learn my Spanish and see penguins?).. and then...?

OR.. head north to Japan and stay there for a month or two.  I SO want to live in Japan.. it’s been 40 years since i’ve been in Japan (the first country i fell in love with, when i was a kid)... before heading back over the Pacific before it gets too hot.

OR.. head west and into Europe... or.. whatever, i don’t know.  WAY too much info for right now.  Aaaa!   

Or heck.. maybe none of this will happen the way i’m thinking it will!  Chaos does reign after all!  And honestly, if my body does something like become diabetic, then i’ll be effectively grounded permanently.  Well.. to Canada at least.

I only know that next January, i at least plan to be stepping off a plane and into a new, more tropical life.. like it or not.  Honestly, i don’t know if i can handle the humid heat.  If you know me, you know i do not ‘do’ heat.  I thought the same about Arctic cold (being a wimpy Vancouver girl), but.. if you dress properly, extreme dry cold is no problem at all!  But.. bring in humid heat, and there’s nothing on earth that will stop you from being a miserable cretin, barring air conditioning.  Oh geez.. HOW am i going to survive the heat?

Well anyway... that’s the story.  I’m still in the ‘denial’ stage though.  (ie: NO!.. i want to come back to Yellowknife!  That’s comfortable!  That’s easy!)  It may take a bit more time and a few more tears before i get past this stage and accept the path i’m meant to be on this coming year.

Doesn’t mean i can’t come back to the Arctic the following year if i’m still in one piece...!  ;-)