2018 in Review

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Since my last post on Nei Jing Now!, I traveled to Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India to participate in the Public Health Theater workshop at Darpana Academy of Performing Arts. Then I sat a vipassana meditation course in Nanded, Maharashtra to start off the new Gregorian Calendar New Year. While I was in Nanded, I visited Huzur Sahib, the last abode of the tenth Guru of the Sikhs, and their second most important place of worship. There is a sweet palpable peace in Nanded. Several of the young boys in training there befriended me. I witnessed a devotee, who visits the gurudwara twice a day with a rose for each of these sweet children,  bend down, scoop up, and drink a handful of the water that every visitor walks through to clean their feet before entering the temple, in defiance of everything we know about germ theory. I learned of Mai Bhago, a fierce female Sikh warrior, who spent several years meditating in Nanded and serving Guru Gobind Singh-ji. I saw the weapons-she carried, astonishingly larger than the average human height!.

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I spent February in Kerala, where I took my second course in NonViolent Communication (NVC), followed by some days at Kovalam with its vast, sandy beach and the generous hospitality of a Tibetan friend I met in Pune who has set up his practice of Tibetan Medicine and Acupuncture there. I visited a dear friend from California who was staying at Amma’s seaside ashram, and then went deep into the interior of Kerala where a fellow dancer from Chicago had moved to marry and start a family. The traditional architecture and rural surroundings of her home are so far removed from Chicago, that at first I had to stretch myself to imagine how she was adjusting. After a few days of living among coconut and rubber palms, chickens, and peacocks, I wanted to shift to that village too.

In March, I pressed pause on my adventures in Pune, India and returned to Berkeley, USA for a few weeks to interview for jobs and take the Family Medicine board exam review course. I then hopped on a train to Wisconsin,

because nothing beats train travel, and because Wisconsin is home too. I will post photos from that journey in a few weeks. Stay tuned.) I sat another vipassana meditation course there because the first one of the year was so good, and I wanted and needed more of the same. It was so clear on this particular course how closely experience follows thought, and that thought and focus are completely directable. It is such a simple truth, almost pedantic, yet so profound in its implications.

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I lived in a Holiday Inn on the banks of the Milwaukee River for 7 weeks while serving in an Urgent Care Clinic at the Froedert Medical Center. It had snowed 33 inches in the last days of April, just as I was starting this temporary job. I watched the river blossom from a grey-white winter to a spring green, followed by the full lushness of summer in June. I’ll post the sequential photographs in a few weeks. Stay tuned. I spent precious days with my parents and sisters and met up with a few dear friends in between. Walking distance from the hotel was a sweet and simple yoga studio just above a crossfit gym. I signed myself up for package deals at both and resumed my preferred intensity of a fitness regimen.

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I was invited to speak at the International Society for Humor Studies Conference in Tallinn, Estonia on the topic of The Use of Humor in Public Health Activism. So, off to Europe I went in late June. My talk was well received, people laughed and engaged in a discussion afterwards, which the moderator ultimately had to cut short in the interest of time. One professor of journalism from New York University said my talk had opened her mind to a new way of thinking about humor, activism, and pranks. That feedback made me feel the trip was worth the effort. The conference was full of people from all over the world who value humor and fun, and the food was extravagant. I then spent an extra week in Tallinn after the conference making local friends.  

In general, I do my best to minimize my carbon footprint, whenever I fly I try to make it worth the carbon emissions. That means, as a flexible rule of thumb, I don’t fly for short trips. Which means I chose to spend the rest of the summer in Europe.

I took the ferry from Tallinn to Helsinki so I could attend another NVC intensive in Espoo. The retreat took place at a lovely resort on an idyllic lake replete with Finnish saunas. Again, more fabulous food, new friends, hot steam baths and refreshing swims. The course itself was deep and revealing. Whatever I learned will surely influence my interviews, so you will all share in the benefits by proxy. An extra week in Helsinki after the course included more fresh lake swimming, raspberry picking in a forest, joining the Make Science Great contingent at the TrumPutin protests, and more new friends.

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From Helsinki I went to Thessaloniki where I encountered two Syrian refugee brothers while each of us were photographing simple and funny things on an everyday residential street. One of them wanted to write, direct, and act in a short film of his own conception about religious tolerance and the kinship of all humanity. That’s a cause I support so I jumped in with my camera, penchant for performing, and a tiny capital investment. We shot the film in a matter of days and in the process I grew to adore the director’s lovely wife and cherubic children, who cried so much when we finally parted. The director is now looking for a few more dollars to finish editing and processing the story. If any of you are inclined to support his film, let me know. We can make your donation tax deductible.

After two weeks in Thessaloniki, I hitched a ride with two Great Danes and a Syrian expatriate to Athens. There I visited Epidaurus and the Temple of Asclepius, the great grandfather of allopathic medicine, which includes a temple to Artemis, the goddess of wilderness. Standing at the site where the tradition of my profession took root filled me with a deep respect for how I serve in the world. It didn’t escape me that the approach taken at this ancient hospital, which included dream work, spiritual psychology, manual medicine, and herbal remedies, was “beyond holistic”. I couldn’t help wonder if more allopathic physicians and students pilgrimed to the roots of their practice, perhaps the currently reductionistic path of medicine might widen. It was also in Epidaurus that I saw my first Greek tragedy, Orestes by Euripides, in The Ancient Theater of Epidaurus, a great amphitheater with the impeccable acoustics that make rumors of murmurs.

I learned of the Antikythera Clock at the planetarium museum in Athens. It is a complex analogue computer with 39 gears capable of calculating the positions of the planets, the moon, our sun, eclipses, and the Olympic Games.

At the National Observatory of Athens, I saw Saturn and her rings through an historic telescope for the first time as an adult. I gasped at the first glance and needed to be pulled away from the lens so others could take a look too.

The monasteries of Meteora near Kalabakka, Greece were built in the 14th century on precipices of immense natural rock formations as high as 373 meters/1224 feet by way of ropes, pulleys, and baskets. I’m astonished by the devotion and dedication to build these places of worship, in the same way as I am dumbfounded by the feat of the temple at Ellora near Aurungabad, Maharashtra. To bear witness to the products of the intelligence and creativity of the human mind and spirit is inexplicably uplifting — there must be hope for our planet yet.

I shared a week on a Greek island, a journey on the Mediterranean sea, and a couple days in Venice with a dear friend I met up with after ten years. What a lovely feeling to travel and dream with someone I am deeply connected with. I then reconnected with a former Couchsurfing guest, and now friend, in Italy. His hospitality outdid mine by a mile. He made sure I saw the Scrovegni Chapel, and many other places of significance around Padua and Bologna. He so generously shared the wealth of his knowledge as a professor of sociology and the warmth of his home and family and friends.

All along the way I was reuniting with old friends and making new friends. I cannot speak highly enough of my Couchsurfing experience. The warmth and enthusiasm of perfect strangers, even those with whom the language barrier was significant, was inspirational and a blessing.

After an overnight train journey, I landed in Paris where a dear friend of my Couchsurfing host from Tallinn, and now friend, welcomed me into his flat. As my beautiful luck would have it, he is a tabla player and his flatmate is a tabla teacher! Straight off the bat we were playing together and practicing. Instant friendship. Another set of perfect strangers welcoming me into their home for 2 weeks! Their generosity was beyond expectations and when I finally left they were kind of enough to tell me my visit was far too short. Such sweetness abounds in the world, indeed.

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I held off on all the important tourist spots in Paris, until the very end of my 2 weeks there. I had seen them all before at age 11. Finally, I succumbed to some unspoken pressure and visited the Louvre, and couldn’t stop gawking at every piece of incredible art. The Nike of Samothrace thought to be built in the 2nd century CE and The Sleeping Hermaphrodite were by far my favorites. It seemed something radical was being liberated from the stones, and from within me.

I booked my ticket to the Eiffel Tower for the last elevator ride up on my last night in Paris. I did not expect that I would be as impressed with this cold, steel structure as I ultimately was. I didn’t want to leave. The guards had to basically kick me out along with the friend I made on the elevator ride to the top. It was a magical night to remember in so many regards. I stayed for the dancing lights finale at the Tower and missed the last metro ride. I ended up walking half the way back to my tabla playing friend’s flat in the middle of the night before catching a bus the rest of the way. The empty streets of Paris were the perfect icing on my stay in continental Europe. .

I now feel everyone should spend every summer in Europe.

Speaking of icing, Iceland is really cold, even in September!

My return to North America included getting acquainted with my two nieces in New York City, a clowning workshop and my first public performance as a clown in Brooklyn, the Clown Festival in Montreal and celebrating my birthday

with close friends from Havana who now live there, along with my Couchsurfing host and my fun-loving, genuine “wousin-in-law”. I met another gaggle of nieces and a nephew in Boston and then attended to my aunt in New Jersey as she had her second knee replaced. I took the train from Philadelphia to Chicago with a stop in Pittsburgh where I had the best tacos I have ever had in my life and saw some very interesting street art installations. I scooched up from Chicago back to Central Wisconsin just in time for the main annual fundraiser for SHAMA, Inc. and then settled in to buckle down and prepare for my board re-certification exam. I passed, which was a big relief.

I sat another vipassana meditation course, because vipassana is the best thing that has ever hit my planet. And since then I have been in service of my parents and sisters. I’m heading back to Berkeley in a couple weeks. Looking forward, staying present.  

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