Ah, another nite in Bangkok!

Friday, June 26, 2009. 6:13pm. Bangkok.

Amazing, amazing Bangkok. The river culture is astounding and the Grand Palace far outshines Versailles (so sorry my Frenchie amis!). Visited the Reclining Buddha today too, and meditatively dropped coins into the long long long line of pots along one wall of the temple. Love the temples and altars everywhere. And the bowls of water with cut lotus blooms next-to for blessing yourself and each other.

So much fun taking the tuk tuks and river boats...

Last eve we spent wandering the locals’ flower market and river back alleys. Piles of veggies in baskets, both mysterious and intoxicating. Roses bound in newspapers, jasmine offering wreaths...huge cut bird of paradise...Stray cats and dogs, altars, Buddhas, scooters, rock music, tattoo stalls…..Stumbled upon a tiny bar of teens drinking some very strong rice-wine like concoction.

Amazing food. Amazing people. Spent the better half of the afternoon today with a lovely family and their passionate patriarch in his colossal antique shop.

HEAVEN!

Now to B-day dinner with D…

Bangkok!

Thursday, June 25, 2009. 5:03pm. Bangkok Thailand

ZANY boat ride through the canals on super crazy scary skinny boat! YIKES!

Flight

Stardate: Thursday, June 25, 2009. 1:06 pm - Leaving Brunei Darussalam

Now aboard the Royal Brunei Air 2.5 hour flight from Brunei’s capitol city, Bandar Seri Begawan, to Bangkok. Once onboard, before departure, a Muslim prayer was sung for safe travels. I totally loved that. 

Last nite we strolled around Bandar Seri Begawan in the evening...I’d never heard the Muslim Call to Prayer before, and was really, completely, transfixed...so very, very beautiful against the dark and quiet of the small city…

I will not miss the conservatism of my first visit to a (liberal!) Muslim country -- kinda made me want to run around like Joan of Arc…I am strangely relieved to soon disembark in a nice, old-fashioned, hedonistic culture, thankyouverymuch. And I’m looking forward to a deep glass of red wine upon arriving. Brunei is a “dry” country, and though the Empire Hotel was a lovely delight, a glass of wine would have been welcome in watching the crazy-spectacular sunsets. But, having finally discovered the array of available teas, I pretty much kept nice and caffeinated.

We hadn’t really expected to stop in Thailand (had been talking about it)-- we don’t really have an itinerary -- and I’m super exited to see the city.

Not sure if I will maintain my blogging. Before I left, I fancied flexing my travelogue muscles, but find too much pressure in the commitment to post! As we head into Thailand, our activities will surely escalate with the hustle and bustle, leaving less time for writing. However, dealing with photo organizing is a must, regardless of how tired I might be at the end of the day: I still have 10 (of 20) full discs that I have not gone through from our summer trip to France two years ago -- I don’t want to face that, so I’d rather cull and post as we go along.

Hallelujah High Tea!

Ah...Brunei's Colonial past reached forth and calmed us with most exquisite tea! Hurray!

Brunei

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

7:39am (slept til 6, instead of waking at my recent norm of 3am. And happily not obsessed with the itchy certainty of imaginary (I hope!) bugs in the bed, as I was nite before last!)

Morning in Brunei Darussalam. Brunei, Abode of Peace…

We left Labuan yesterday afternoon in a whirlwind, barely making the last ferry (“death machine” scary boat) of the day to Borneo’s Brunei, and with no hotel reservations, though we knew where we wanted to stay. We really did have every intention of calling the hotel before we left Labuan, but the 430 ferry was cancelled and the last ferry out was 330. We made the boat, had no problems getting in at the wildly opulent (in a bit of a Vegas kinda way) Empire Hotel, and witnessed the most amazing sunset I’ve ever seen, sinking over the South China Sea.

Brunei is a sleepy Sultanate on Borneo, somewhat full of expats (which I am beginning to feel a lot like, as nearly the only Anglo anywhere, in our travels so far). Peaceful, perhaps because His Highness has his pleasure with caning and zero tolerance drug death penalties, in a tiny country rich on oil sold to North Korea -- but nonetheless, (relatively) ecologically pristine, tax free, with (for native Bruneis) free education, health care, free land for homes, and interest-free loans. But I digress, I’m not here for the politics!:

The views of the ocean are glorious, the surroundings, tropical rainforest, the absurdly sumptuous buffet last nite saved me from my previous Labuan starvation, and yet, I subsist, in (marginally) The Orient no less, on Lipton tea. Help! Perhaps serious tea awaits at our next port of embarkation!

Adventures today to be determined...

PS. I was previously remiss in telling the tale of the mall pharmacist in Labuan who, after I broke his door, happily sold me all sorts of bandages and meds for my little blistered feeties. Perhaps not much of a tale after all... 

PSS. And don’t even get me started on the delightful presence of the bidet! Oh! And the dragon fruit! More on that later!

Note from Labuan...

Labuan is a sleepy, relatively idyllic, industrial port with a tiny downtown replete with a KFC, merchant market, and a large dollar store-like mall, full of (mostly) junk from China, some traditional medicine folks, massage therapists, salons, travel agents, and a food court. The downtown shops are a ghost-town because all the successful merchants have moved into the mall. Interesting that it seems trade is what is doing in indigenous cultures, taking away their arts and crafts and replacing them with cheap consumer crap. D’s here consulting for a firm that owns a power barge right across the bay from the hotel (I can see it from the window). 

I’ve been, well, “challenged” the the food...I think I’ll write a book about weight loss and exposure to SE Asian cuisine!

Trekked through the small town's market in the hot, hot, hot. Skipped the fish-sellers, thankyouverymuch. Scored an awesome multi- string (mostly real!) fresh water pearl lariat necklace and a trad Malaysia outfit.

D’s wrapping up work obligations and thus, we’re moving on soon...

Malay Jet Lag, etc...

After 23 hours flying and layovers in Moscow, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, we are finally on the small island of Labuan, just off the northern coast of Borneo. Dave is here on business, I, however, am not! This is my first morning here and although sleep was iffy (melatonin is a jet lag life-saver), after a workout and copious amounts of tea, I am feeling pretty darn good. Much exploration to do, more travel plans to make, and pics later!

Phoenix!

In an attempt to re-create and re-define this blog, I'll be writing a bit about my current creative life as singer and Artistic Director of Divergence Vocal Theater, and the mayhem that ensues. I haven't posted an entry in ages! And of course, tons of cool things have transpired in the interim, including the founding of DVT (and its website) and my brand new, shiny website.

Here's the current dish on Divergence Vocal Theater's spring production, The 10th Muse:

"This past weekend was the second production from new indie performance company, Divergence Vocal Theater. The 10th Muse was a musical, theatrical, poetic meditation on love, heartbreak, and other such manipulations of Eros. Artistic director, Misha Penton, pulled from Berlioz, Gounod, and Boulanger (among others) for music. For text, she appropriated text from Sapho and also 4 poems from neoNuma poet, Jill Alexander Essbaum. Throw in some modern dance choreography by Toni Leago Valle, and you begin to get an idea of how fully packed a one-hour performance from DVT can be...So I can't really do a review of what I saw this past Saturday night. What I want to do instead is talk a bit about one artist's evolution into a force for re-imaging opera for the 21st Century...performance art as much as performing art. It's juxtaposition of ancient and modern art, it's a collection of thoughts on a theme, it is a collection of impressions intended to evoke feelings. An evening with DVT, then, is a feast for the eyes and ears, with video projection, dancers, and highly trained voices and musicians. Mixing in spoken word fragments and poetry ups the intellectual involvement. It seems unlikely that someone would leave a performance without having seen or heard something that stimulated them on some level. If this interdisciplinary approach to performance piques your interest in the least, I recommend you head over to DVT's website and subscribe to their email list. There are sure to be new and exciting things developing in the months to come and you won't want to miss out. Neil Ellis Orts. NeoNuma Arts. March 2009

"A lot of people are doing a lot of things to “save” opera these days – from staging brand-new world premieres the way Houston Grand Opera does almost every season to staging nothing but the oldest, most-proven seat-fillers like Carmen and La Boheme. This new Houston-based troupe led by singer-artistic director Misha Penton finds yet another way, mixing the musical form known as opera with modern dance, poetry and just about anything else that strikes their fancy". - John De Mers, ArtsHouston

"Misha Penton...has created something utterly new on the Houston music and arts scene: fearless, authentic, flawless fusion of old and new opera, dance, instrumental music, technology/multimedia, and literature." - MaryBeth Smith. SomaQuest. March 2009

"And- what a great show. You've created another powerful creative meditation- with music, voice, and dance and words. Really awesome. The poetry was blindingly beautiful...Thank you for being courageous enough to create these special experiences." -- Scott Sawyer. Praxis Collective

I'm Purple!

Fantastic blog: Purple Women with honest, affirming, positive, and mature posts on the choice of Childfree-ness. Yay!

Quote

"When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross." - Sinclair Lewis

Two favorite passages...

"In my own life, I went to the water and was forever changed by the eye of the whale in which I saw and entire world. Peace is here, in accepting that smallness of our place in the world, in being as humble as the birds around us. This humble place is where we belong, according to the tribal view. Like the whales in the ocean gazing from the kelp beds and seeing the turning stars at night, when young people look at the clouds, the movement of an ant, the wings of a moth, or the leap of a fish---they are part of it.

But few people think of what is already missing, that there is a hole not only in the world, but also in the universe we used to call infinite, once believing it was without limit. This is true with the gray whales in the Atlantic. Do we now miss them? The Earth is yet an unknown mystery and we have barely begun to understand this." -- Linda Hogan

Brenda Peterson & Linda Hogan. "Sightings The Gray Whales' Mysterious Journey".


"Brother leviathan, sister whale, dwellers of the deep,
We greet you in the name of the human people
Who share this planet with you.
We stand in awe of your powerful beauty,
We take delight in your liquid dance,
We rejoice that another spring
has brought you to grace our coastal waters.

May the Creator, whose breath causes all things to be
Keep you on your journey home,
Sustain you through the summers and winters to come.
And make your very existence a song of praise and wonder..."

--Episcopal Priest, Jim Friederich's blessing during an at sea "interspecies ritual...improvisation...the blessing of the gray whales who pass every March on their way to Alaska". At the request of the Natural History Museum in Santa Barbara, California. Brenda Peterson & Linda Hogan. "Sightings The Gray Whales' Mysterious Journey".

Swallowtail in the garden today....

poem

cicadas sing even during these hot afternoons
before the rains rinse their songs
and shake them rattle-clean
i pretend
to want to catch one and cage him like i think the japanese do (ah, they've just now stopped)
that i'd make him happy (locked up)
and he would sing for me
instead
i will listen for evening
i will listen for their vespers

La Fontaine aux Visages...

I'm still wading thru yards of D's beautiful photos. This one is from Saint Aubin de Trêves, in Anjou, France. Still to come: Cinq Mars, Loches, and more. Never enough castles, I say!... all at at my flickr site...

Lotus bloom tadpole swim

Cool lotus plant that came home yesterday!

Fontevraud

Me at Fontevraud Abbey, Anjou, France- taken by my beloved.

Zen Toothbrush, Zen Toothpaste

Enroute from Paris to Houston. Am in Newark. Whew. Long flights. Ok, so my teeth were fuzzy and I forgot to brush them on the last plane when I had the toothbrush kit thingie, and so I went in search of one. I found one of those little jobbers where the tooth brush is in two parts, and the brush end fits into what we shall call a “handle”. So I go to the bathroom and put it together, and 15 seconds later the freakin’ thing comes in two (cuz it is in two parts, don’t ya know) and the brush falls on the floor. Ah, the Zen of travel.

Gaiman on a Rainy London Day

I haven’t had a head cold since 2003. No lie. I simply refuse to get them. So, I guess a nearly 5 year streak is pretty good. Dog gone it.

The cabs in London are my favorite. They are very cute and squat and fat, like British pub cat, I imagine, and they have all this great room inside for luggage instead of a trunk.

I spent the rainy, cold, July day nursing my runny nose and reading Neil Gaiman stories in London about London.

A Few Pics

Rainbow over the Loire

Chenonceaux

Chateau Saumur. Saumer, France

Me with the dolmen in the Grotto of the Fairies. Mettray, France

Roman Aqueduct, near Luynes, France

Road Weary

Still in London. Am really wiped as evidenced by my newly acquired sniffles and scratchy throat which I am managing to fend off nicely with beaucoup Vit C, zinc suckies, improvised neti, and the Brit government’s generous over-the-counter laws on pharmaceuticals. Great. We schlepped around London a bit yesterday- yes, yes, more old stuff. Far less impressive than Paris. Am I jaded or what? Much I’d like to see in England upon another return- sacred sites, standing stones, chalk drawings, etc….but I am ready to get on a plane- gotta get my head cleared for flight for sure. Dave has a meeting this afternoon and then we are training back to Paris tomorrow.