From the plane our plan was to go have lunch at the Ramada Resort because he knew the head chef at the restaurant. We had lunch and he showed us around the hotel, its gorgeous. He comp’d us a delicious lunch and offered to give us a room for 100 USD when its normally 400 per night. We took him up on the offer because the place was just to gorgeous to pass up. I was also stoked that they had a gym, which I used at night and in the morning. The pool was also sick, it had a view of this gorgeous river/ocean type deal. Sampled some local India rum while Bala had a beer, it was delish.

I met a cool guy from Dubai who was on his honeymoon, we played a bit of volleyball and chatted for a bit. The next day he told me he had been on this river boat house thing the night before and that sounded awesome. I asked Bala about it and we decided to go for it today. I’m actually on the boat right now, it’s a freaking blast. I’ll probably post a video of it later edited to the song “I’m on a boat” that clouse sent over.

I really love this kind of thing. We stopped by a little shop while we were on the boat and bought some huge prawns for like 12 bucks that we’re having for dinner tonight. It’s going to be delish. We also stopped by a shack that sold this coconut fermented thing. I thought it was alcoholic because it tasted awful but Bala assured me that it wasn’t. I drank a couple cups of it because he said it would grow on me and then realized I had become drunk. I then told him that he lied to me but he continued suggesting that it wasn’t alcoholic and that it just helps you to sleep better and keeps you cooler in the hot weather.

In other news, I have never felt like I’m living the name of this website URL more than right now. I’ve got my laptop out cruising along on this boat in the middle of nowhere in India writing down my thoughts. E-mails are still coming to my blackberry and I’m answering them as they come in. That device is a god send, I don’t know what I would do without it (not work I guess).

I feel like the theme for the last few days has been simplicity. The first hotel room we stayed in was simple even by my standards but the food was awesome. The resort was way too fancy for me but it was a nice refresher. Tonight its going to be a pretty tiny cot on a houseboat but that’s more my style. Going down the river I was reminded of how simply people can get by. This entire area was up by the British and now the people live here and obviously lead a pretty simple life. There’s miles of rice paddies and just small huts up and down the river everywhere. You’ll see people riding by boat back and forth. There’s even a state run boat system for transport that runs just like busses.
But this, right now, is exactly what I want to be doing with my life. Not planning anything and ending up on a boat going up some Indian river eating food prepared by locals… and… out of necessity, answering some e-mails on my phone.

I don’t think anyone back home could even tell that I’m not sitting at an office working all day, and that makes it all the better to be here. I guess I owe a serious thanks to Bala for this because if it wasn’t for him there’s no way I’d be enjoying this right now. This won’t be my last trip.

After we docked the boat we took a walk on the land where we docked. There’s just small simple houses all up and down this dirt road. I asked a ton of questions about how these people live and learned a lot. While we were chatting on the boat a man came by in a canoe selling clay pots, there’s people doing this for everything these people would need, there’s no reason to venture outside of their local area for anything at all. He said that they’ll spend about 10 rupees for fish each day and about 20 rupees for curry and they will have food all day long, for about 50 cents.

He also said that typically these people will go to some of the gulf countries and work for 5 years and save money, then, with the money they’ve saved they will come back here, put the money in a bank and build a house and live on that money for the rest of their lives. You have to admire that kind of commitment to simplicity. They will essentially work hard for 5 years of their life so they can enjoy a simple care free life for the rest of their days. Compare that to the American life where we work from 18 to 65 and then spend 65 to ~80 living out our retirement, once we can’t even enjoy the true joys of life.

That’s my one goal in life is never to fall into that. I never want to have to work because I need the money. The only reason I do any of the work I do now is because I enjoy it and I feel like its’ appreciated. I hope more people have that attitude towards work and I hope that everyone I work with can have that attitude too. I feel bad for those people that have to work to “pay the bills”. Why do you even have bills? Why did you buy something that you couldn’t afford to buy? Do you really need that plasma TV or that BMW? I doubt it considering 80% of the planet has never even seen them and they get by just fine.

As you can see my new plan has become to make these posts so long that nobody will ever want to read them.

Alleppey

So this morning we rode the boat back to Allepey and took an “auto” to a hotel. For a non-AC room its 18 dollars a night. Its clean and its not even hot so, it rocks. We spent like an hour and a half trying to find Bala a Moneygram outlet so he could get his bi-monthly paycheck. From there we walked around a bit, got some juice at a local stand (with no ice) and then went for lunch at this local hotel that was basically somebody’s house. They took great pride in showing me this European child that was sleeping there. I guess their son married a girl from Holland. Pretty much a miracle.

I’m struggling without Wifi, we’re going to a little internet café later on today to check e-mails and what not. I took a lesson from Four Hour Workweek and washed some of my clothes in the bathroom with some soap and hung them up to dry, I don’t have enough shorts so it will be nice to have some relatively clean ones to wear. I’m pretty sure I must have gotten sunburned today, I was in the blazing hot sun for like 2 hours without sunscreen. We’ll see. Glad I have clouse on AIM all day so I have someone to tell my stories to.

Pretty concerned about getting food poisoning right now especially after eating that food and probably drinking water that wasn’t purified. It’s not like I could really tell if my stomach is hurting since in general its in pain as a rule. It just varies in the level of how much pain my stomach is in, no biggie, I’m assuming I’ll get used to it eventually?

Going to the temple with Bala later to get blessed by an elephant and then go swimming at the beach. I hope.

Lately I can’t seem to avoid the feeling that I’ve wasted too much of my time working for something and trying to earn money or make something out of myself. I actually started thinking about it more upon the realization that I’m alreayd 24. I’ve only got about 6 more years before my youth is considered over and I haven’t gotten anywhere near accomplishing all of the things that I wanted to do while still single, healthy, and able to do ridiculous things.

I guess I should be thankful that right now I’m in India on a business trip and getting to experience an entirely new culture. But in reality I’m actually kind of dreading returning to the US and working on my gym and getting it going. Don’t get me wrong I enjoy my work but… Thailand is just a few hours flight from here and its been my dream for a few years now to go train there for a month. Part of me had the idea to just ask Lili to modify my ticket, and head to Thailand for a bit while I’m here… but… I know I shouldn’t.

Besides death I worry about love too, I mean, I’ve never really had the type of relationship with someone that most other people encounter in their life and decide “I definitely want to spend my entire life with this person”, nope, has not happened for me. I guess its just my view right now that I don’t think human love was meant to last a lifetime in reality and that I think marriage is just an ideal that we have been taught to accept and aspire to, although in reality its ridiculous. I’d like to believe that a life long commitment to someone is something that I will some day want to do, but at this point I’m not sure, and I think that’s a bit sad.

I mean what really is the point of life if you can’t create something and share it with a group of people you love? I mean sure I love my friends and my family, but I really want to create my own family one day. I guess I’ll mature into it, maybe I just have too much selfish living and exploring to do right now to be ok with it, 24 is a bit young after all right?

Anyways, I landed in India yesterday and met Bala for the first time. Oh I also got my first encounter by someone trying to rip me off. Bala made the mistake of thinking my plane arrived an hour later than it did (no big deal). He’s lucky I’m not an insane freak and didn’t panic I was just kinda chillin at the airport thinking to myself “what are the chances that I’ve been talking to someone on MSN for 4 months that isn’t… a real… person”. So anyways eventually he showed up, nice guy. We’re staying in this cute little apartment that was hotelized. Basically the living room is like the reception and we stay in one of the rooms. We’re sharing a bed right now, not bad at all. The food actually has been amazing so far, I got this spicy omelette and toast in the morning and this ridiculously good indian food at lunch. We met up with a guy Bala knows named Dinesh who is starting up an SEO company. He gave us a short proposal and took us to lunch, it was fantastic. We’re gonna go shop for some clothes and stuff this evening, I need to get some rupees.

I also need to take some photos since I’ve got nothing for this post, so uncharacteristic of me, time to get touristy on this place.

Ok here’s something to tide you over:

Me and Bala's Room In Bangalore

View From Our Hotel Room, It's Beautiful I Know