It´s like reading a classic CYOA book. You begin the novel with all the opportunities imaginable, right at your fingertips.
Do you go with instinct, safety, greed?
Each decision you make has a significant consequence, and all lead to a new direction in your travels (or life). Each opens up new opportunity and possibilities.
I have come to the end of the chapter where I now choose my own, and next, adventure.
Choice A: I could continue my original plans-- go to Utila, Honduras (the Bay Islands) and complete my dive-master course for the next 2 months. This is no specific plan or outcome upon finishing, and I don´t know where it will lead me next. Although, as part of all ¨choose your own adventure¨books, you never really know what´s ahead.
A majority of the time, playing it safe in Choose Your Own Adventure never brings you to the lions den, you never get robbed, thrown into the eye of a hurricane, or break your leg. However, you also never have much thrill. The kids who play the safe route in CYOA books always end up somewhat bored and unattached. Not that taking my divemaster is boring, but it is following the ordinary plan. The intended route. Not deviating from the schedule.
or I could go with Choice B: Take a leap of faith and chance it. Put a kebosh on my Honduras plans and go home early. Try something totally new and perhaps risky. Not dangerous, but certainly different. There is only one way to move on from the constant normalcy of life, you have to take chances. You take risks with hopes that they will pay off. The kids who enjoy CYOA books the most where the kids who were living in the now. They weren´t thinking the rationality of the future, they were taking each opportunity as it came.
Choice B is certaintly the bigger gamble. Higher risk. However, high risk pays off high reward, if you hit the pot. It could go sour and you can lose drastically as well. But isn´t it better to try and fail, than to fail to try?
Solution? In this case, take the risk. When normally siding with safety and taking a sure bet, the risk can often be worth it. Without taking a chance you never have the opportunity to win big. Who wants to sit around with mediocrity and no spark forever? Settling with average is no way to live.
We now choose choice B. Take the risky option that looks like fun and has potential for rewards.
It looks like I´m going to the land of Oz.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Our individuality is all, all that we have. There are those who barter it for security, those who repress it for what they believe is the betterment of the whole society, but blessed in the twinkle of the morning star is the one who nurtures it and rides it, in grace and love and wit, from peculiar station to peculiar station along life's bitersweet route --Jitterbug Perfume
Sunday, February 10, 2008
It´s always just one more day...
It´s never easy getting to a new destination. The constant desire to spend ¨just one more day¨ in your current location is overwhelming and always an obstacle. However, we all know that it´s never one more day and it´s easy to get stuck in a town that you never imagined you would spend more than 5 hours in.
It happens, and in reality, it happens all the time when you are traveling.
I had expectations of arriving to the Bay Islands in Honduras 2 weeks ago. I am still not there, but I am really close in location! Belize was a convenient stop on my route to Honduras after leaving Mexico. After all, I didn have to go THROUGH Belize to get to Honduras, so it only made sense to spend a few days. A few days turned into 8, but I am now close to my original destination.
But than you meet these great people on the boat ride, or the bus ride, and with a snap of the fingers, you have a new plan or destination. Everyone told me La Ceiba was a grungy, undesireable place in Honduras and I should only use it as the jump'off point to get to the Bay Islands. They were wrong.
La Ceiba has character and vibrance ringing from the center. We were lucky enough to meet a canadian fellow doing volunteer work on our bus here. He has become our unofficial tour guide.
Last evening we attended the soccer match with the local team, Victoria. Luckily for us, it wasn´t as insane as some of the games get here. However, I don´t know any sporting event in the USA where fireworks are lit within the fan section. We were standing in the heart of the crazies. Big drums surround us (which not only did I get to assist in holding, but I got to play them as well!!) as the locals chant and scream the songs that I couldn´t understand any words to. They run to the left, than push to the right. Keep a watchful eye at all times or else you may get caught offguard, and falling off these bleachers won´t be pleasant. When Victoria finally scored, the entire section runs down the bleachers to the bottom, and than back up. Imagine hundreds, thousands of rowdy fans in a giant mosh storming around the benches. Insanity I tell you.
The center of the stadium is the Revolutionary section, so I am told. Here, a group of truly insane fellows with no shirts sit. They are impartial to a team. They are fenced in. Their only purpose is to be loud and rowdy. They scream for both teams. They harass both teams. They are the Revolutionaries and I am in awe of them.
Today was a brilliant afternoon.
Tour Guide Dan took my friend and I on a hike. We went through the mountains 2 hours to a magnificient waterfall. It was a stunning site, and after a long and sweaty trip to arrive we were given the best refreshment by standing at the bottom and taking in the heavy water flowing on our head. The other amazement? When you stood halfway up the waterfall in the jungle, you could see the ocean in the distance.
Our walk back was a continuance of a terrific day. After hitching a ride we arrived at the school that TourGuide Dan volunteers for. The school is located 1 hour out of La Ceiba, in the middle of the mountains for the children that live in the forest area. The majority of these children have never attended any type of school before because the distance is too far. The newly designed one-room school is the first opportunity for these people to have an education. In the 3 months since its implementation, they have almost 30 kids attending, ranging in age from 5 to 15.
What an opportunity this has created for these children living in the mountains.
Dan showed us around the school, which isn´t much to see being its only one room. We also stopped by one of the houses of his student where we were greeted by 5 excited children, and 2 lovely parents.
The people in Honduras have been so kind and friendly which creates a positive vibe for traveling.
It always amazes me that the countries with the toughest reputation on crime and poverty tend to be the most welcoming and friendly.
It happens, and in reality, it happens all the time when you are traveling.
I had expectations of arriving to the Bay Islands in Honduras 2 weeks ago. I am still not there, but I am really close in location! Belize was a convenient stop on my route to Honduras after leaving Mexico. After all, I didn have to go THROUGH Belize to get to Honduras, so it only made sense to spend a few days. A few days turned into 8, but I am now close to my original destination.
But than you meet these great people on the boat ride, or the bus ride, and with a snap of the fingers, you have a new plan or destination. Everyone told me La Ceiba was a grungy, undesireable place in Honduras and I should only use it as the jump'off point to get to the Bay Islands. They were wrong.
La Ceiba has character and vibrance ringing from the center. We were lucky enough to meet a canadian fellow doing volunteer work on our bus here. He has become our unofficial tour guide.
Last evening we attended the soccer match with the local team, Victoria. Luckily for us, it wasn´t as insane as some of the games get here. However, I don´t know any sporting event in the USA where fireworks are lit within the fan section. We were standing in the heart of the crazies. Big drums surround us (which not only did I get to assist in holding, but I got to play them as well!!) as the locals chant and scream the songs that I couldn´t understand any words to. They run to the left, than push to the right. Keep a watchful eye at all times or else you may get caught offguard, and falling off these bleachers won´t be pleasant. When Victoria finally scored, the entire section runs down the bleachers to the bottom, and than back up. Imagine hundreds, thousands of rowdy fans in a giant mosh storming around the benches. Insanity I tell you.
The center of the stadium is the Revolutionary section, so I am told. Here, a group of truly insane fellows with no shirts sit. They are impartial to a team. They are fenced in. Their only purpose is to be loud and rowdy. They scream for both teams. They harass both teams. They are the Revolutionaries and I am in awe of them.
Today was a brilliant afternoon.
Tour Guide Dan took my friend and I on a hike. We went through the mountains 2 hours to a magnificient waterfall. It was a stunning site, and after a long and sweaty trip to arrive we were given the best refreshment by standing at the bottom and taking in the heavy water flowing on our head. The other amazement? When you stood halfway up the waterfall in the jungle, you could see the ocean in the distance.
Our walk back was a continuance of a terrific day. After hitching a ride we arrived at the school that TourGuide Dan volunteers for. The school is located 1 hour out of La Ceiba, in the middle of the mountains for the children that live in the forest area. The majority of these children have never attended any type of school before because the distance is too far. The newly designed one-room school is the first opportunity for these people to have an education. In the 3 months since its implementation, they have almost 30 kids attending, ranging in age from 5 to 15.
What an opportunity this has created for these children living in the mountains.
Dan showed us around the school, which isn´t much to see being its only one room. We also stopped by one of the houses of his student where we were greeted by 5 excited children, and 2 lovely parents.
The people in Honduras have been so kind and friendly which creates a positive vibe for traveling.
It always amazes me that the countries with the toughest reputation on crime and poverty tend to be the most welcoming and friendly.
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