Habituation

1-21-2011 - [on the bus] Saigon ->Mekong Delta

Maybe it was the preamble to the major Vietnamese Megapolis vibe that I got from Hanoi that was the cause of me not being phased by the "chaos personified" of Saigon. There was a couple hours somewhere in there where I felt the audio-visual overload of the 5 million scooters pouring in rivers down the streets and amidst the scooter-infested sidewalks [here they are used for riding as well as parking! Pedestrians - better learn rock-climbing to utilize the adjacent wall-space], singer voices blaring from the loud-speakers and the street life happening in its loudly natural way. I took a 30 min breather in some quiet tea shop and regrouped myself. 

As I was walking to my hotel at night after a day of exploring the City, I remarked to myself just how quickly our brains habituate....I weaved through the traffic and the barricaded sidewalks, letting the scooters through before they let out a beep....the noises [some quite loud] turned into the auditory "wallpaper," and I was again a quiet observer drifting through the "chaos with a method" that is Saigon. It was strange - the crazier things got around me, the more centered and aware I got. Like an eye of a tornado. 

I can see how the people who live there can tolerate it, though, upon arrival, it was difficult to comprehend. Bless habituation!

--

www.OneTapMagic.com
Discover Your Power )*(
www.NikaOne.com
The Art of Transformation [TAO-T]--->

~~~~~~~~~~~
"Let the beauty you love be what you do. There are a thousand ways to kneel and kiss the earth."
~Jalāl ad-Dīn Rumi - a Persian poet and whirling dervish

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Image
05/24/2013 Tonsai Beach, Thailand Home, Sweet Home!  Photo credit:  www.lederhosening.com I come out onto my patio and see a root of a banyan tree wiggle. Wait. That's no root. That's an iguana camouflaging as one – humbly looking for breakfast. A big one. Craggy karst rocks pierce the horizon in Pandora-esque starkness. The sky is crochet with a white-to-lilac cumulus nimbus, the temperature gently hovering around the “just perfect” mark. A hammock rocks gently under a leafy tree in the winds of the Andaman, as the milky-turquoise steamy waves sing a hymn to this paradise. In that hammock no more than a few metres from the shore, lays a blond girl clad in diaphanous raw silk holding a furry black cat. She is me. Azure butterflies sprinkle themselves like oversized confetti throughout the jungle. The bull frogs vibrate the jungle with moans that would put most peacocks in heat to shame. The cicadas cast their hypnotic spell over the fecund forest on the s...
Read more

My Jjimjilbanging Seoul

Image
01.28.2013 Seoul, South Korea My Jjimjilbanging Seoul Korea is a busy place. The work hours are long and vacations are short for most locals. A 12 hour work day is customary. A five-day a year vacation – a norm. The kids are not exempt from this working frenzy – an average child attends 4 after-school academies, making “Johnny a dull boy.” Yet, no complaint is to be heard. Neither from an adult nor from a child. To a question “How do you do it?” a frequent response is “oh, it's just my job...” while the kids just shrug their shoulders as if it hasn't even occurred for them to question this state of affairs. Truly, a a curious way of acceptance. However, I believe, there is one “escape hatch” that helps Koreans brave the freezing winters and intense working conditions in this tiny, densely-populated country. The Jjimjilbangs, a Korean spin on the Roman Baths, and Oncheon – jjimjilbangs built on the natural hot springs, of which there are over 400 in Korea. If...
Read more

True Colours of Utah

Image
11.29.2012 Crystallizing Utah Utah is many things....and amazing fall colours are its hallmark. Bear Creek canyon near Mt. Nebo, UT, was my daily "stomping ground" for a few months. The trails there are steep, the air - fresh, and the colours - breathtaking. See for yourself! Ascending Mt. Nebo Our heroic Cat has multiplied yet again. Behold - left to right - Charcoal, Peach, Felty, Tigra. Our furry "Utah fruit" two months later.
Read more