Fairy Tale versus Very Real

Right. I have finally decided to breathe some life.

I had a million things to write about - but something akin to the mechanics of the fallacy of aggregation happens whenever I have too much to write about, I take too long to write it and thus I don't write it at all. (if you don't get the analogy, it's because it has happened all too quickly in my head in a flash of brilliance and I can't be bothered to go through it in words)

Have just finished filing a story at work and my eyes feel so tired it waters every time I close it. Took me the whole day to finish one story - I haven't been at a very productive level of late. I intend to kick myself when I go home in the privacy of my bedroom, just so hopefully, I can kick myself into some action in my life.

I have been feeling increasingly stupid about several things that have happened. And when I say stupid, I don't mean it literally of course. Just figuratively. Many things have been considered from a different perspective and I wouldn't say I'm wiser, but at least I have an idea of where I am headed now. Not that I could avoid any sort of disaster, should it place itself on my path anyway.

Phuket was crap and amazing in a lot of ways. Patong Beach was not the beach I imagined... but Maya Bay and the other islands were better than I dreamed. Seriously, I moved from the Very Real on Patong Beach... to the Fairy Tale on Phi phi islands and the like, in the middle of the ocean, snorkelling and diving off speedboats into crystal clear water and pretty fishes, basking in the sun and gazing at the blue horizon, spotting dolphins in the blue ocean and feeling the wind blowing through my hair on the bumpy ride on the deck of the speedboat.... to the Very Real on Patong Beach again where the water is dirty, and you get tut tut-ed every single second while you're walking, where the hagglers exhaust you and the shameless try and guilt you into giving you money by capitalising on their unfortunate circumstance... where your hotel room is a nice lovely luxurious room but you aint enjoying it and where reality enacts itself right in front of your eyes and you look, and you wonder, but you can't just do anything about it.

So when you think about the nastiness of the Very Real, it is equally astounding how we go to the Fairy Tale with such beautiful places and it is so peaceful and so beautiful and you wish you could just stay there forever and find some peace in your life - but when it comes down to reality, you don't actually really want to do that.

If there is one thing I have realised over the past two weeks, it is that fantasy and reality, is a fucking real distinction. Yeah, no shit. You may think. Stating the obvious? What if the obvious is even more obvious than the obvious you perceive in your head?

You may know what I'm referring to, you may not. But a smiliar analogy could be applied to this: I was working on a story featuring Asia's sex tourism... and you read about all the details and dynamics of what happens in the seedy trade... and you think you know what it's like. You think you know what it's about.

But it would never prepare you for the real experience, would it?

I walked down the infamous B street and I just grew increasingly sad as I ventured further and further, being acosted by some cabaret lady boys desperately trying to get us to watch their shows. Then, at the end of the street, almost reflecting the repulsing trade going on, there is the most pungent odour of (let's just put it nicely) sewage... that reeks the entire street of unfortunate girls meeting desperate guys.

A tarty looking prostitute in jeans, a tight top and heavy make-up gets off the taxi-bike she is sitting on as feminine as she possibly could.

She looks at me and my companion and shoots me a dark, dirty... and possibly jealous look.

Some are forced into it. Some embrace it shamelessly.

I can't get my head around alot of things I have been thinking about recently. It's all just made me really sad.
People search all their life for happiness, and calm, right? They certainly search for some kind of truth and certainty either. My struggle lies in the fact that I love that life is unpredictable, but I want that 100 per cent certainty about... something. which no one could take away. And how are you going to find that in a life where the only certainty is uncertainty?

And then I think about the maxim I often repeat to people around me: Nothing is ever absolute.

So I guess that search and process is one hell of a bitch ride.

....but the beauty of it is, I can just close my eyes and place it at His feet.

Some ask me if He's even there, or not.

I don't have the answers.

But there's nothing I can do. Some things you cannot control. Whatever happens there just has to be acceptance.

I hope I'm a lucky person.

And I do have to say this: Avoid B street if you look vaguely Asian/Oriental, have long hair and are tanned.

If one more person mistakes me for Thai, I'm personally going to box them.