Huanchaco, Peru

ahhh, back at the beach. the beach towns have always got a good vibe. that is, una buena onda! unfortunately, the highway separates the beach from the town, and the zooming traffic and horn-enthusiastic taxidrivers sort of robs it from a potentially intimate feel, but i think this will be a good place for me to be the next few days to sort of get back in check. i´ve just been feeling so low on energy these past few days, and it´s as though my mind is on speed. in moments i realize it and i say to myself, shhhhh but my attempts to relax myself are met with resilience and difficulty. perhaps it is all these words in my head draining me of my energy.

i arrived yesterday. at the bus terminal in trujillo i had a good selection of taxi drivers to choose from, lingering around the entrance with hopeful eyes. i went with my drivers recommendation of hotel on the way here instead of diving into my backpack and frantically flipping through my book to find the page of hotels for huanchaco while in the back seat.
first thing i did after i unloaded my pack and filled out all the usual obligatory info at the desk, (i have my passport number memorized now) and recieved my key, i walked along the long curve of the beach stip. i noticed a small bohemian looking circle of people on the beach, (it´s kind of strange how even from such a distance my peripheral vision detects a silouette of cascading dreadlocks) a minute later one of the bodies rises and i recognize gasparin as he jogs toward me. i let out an excited laugh and threw my arms around his neck, mucking up the kiss he was trying to politely plant on my cheek. gasparin, a darkskinned native of bolivia whom i met in montanita, with a smattering of faded tattoes, and a beautiful head of long black dreads. his eyes are benevolent and inquisitive, but there were times i saw them glazed over and distant. the vacant look that tells when someone is no longer really there, lost to an excess of alcohol or drugs. and that is when, i learned, it is best to stay away from a man.

he invited me to join the circle of boys for a smoke, and i obliged, still sort of floating from the coincedence. i recognized another of the boys from montanita as well. the boy i was facing was beautiful. tall, lean, brown, long thick dreadlocks pulled back into a fountain on top of his head. he spoke with so much energy, rising onto his knees, his longsleeved woven shirt rippling against his body as gusts of wind ripped through the beach.
at the speed at which the people often speak at with each other, it´s rare that i really get anything unless being directly spoken to. when i had anticipated this fact back at home, my thoughts were that it would be a good opportunity for me to develop my less obvious senses, to become sensitive enough to understand someone not by their words but by how they feel to me. but, well, it hasn´t exactly been that way. so i laugh when i think someone is saying something humorous, but it is sincere! who says i need to understand the joke to laugh at it? but sometimes i think i get it wrong. and they probably wonder...i know i shouldn´t be but i feel embarassed that i dont understand so many things. and that i still can´t speak as intelligently as i wish. this makes me shy to speak and communicate, and i realize that i would get a lot more out of those oportunities, and have more fun with them, if i could be more bold..i´m working on it..

i don´t know how it is possible for them to smoke the amounts of pot that they do. it is unfathomable to me. hooting with hand banging at the bowl like an indian call, sucking it in short breaths, smoke puffing out the sides of the mouth, and the moment where the pipe leaves the mouth and they can´t speak, holding it all in. and then the lungs protest, you can hear them expanding, as the chest juts out and the throat lurches, and a little cough. smoke leaks out the nostrils. then the big one, followed by a few applauses of its own, and the smoke all tumbles away.
we watched the sun go down on the rocks overlooking the beach. every color was vivid as i tried to relax myself. the wind was strong. while birds floated past the sun, the clouds were completely illuminated, parting and shifting forever slowly, in hues of gold and pink and violet. the sun cast a stream of gold running all the way from the edge of the horizon to the edge of the sea, where waves were folding themselves over into fringes of foam, licking the beach, and coating the blinding gold light with soft shimmering glass. and the boys on the rocks joke and banter in strange language.
and i try to see god.

this has been taking up alot of space in my thoughts recently. mainly thinking of how i would respond to an email i got from my grandpa the other day.
based on what i share here, he wrote to me, ¨it seems to us you are searching for God. Or maybe you are running away from God. Paradoxically, the two attitudes seem to get mixed up with each other for a lot of people.¨
and i have been tossing and turning over this, because i do have a concept of god that i want to express. but in trying to articulate these things i seem to run into paradox after paradox, leaving me exhausted. i feel it is impossible in this form. and if i follow my intuition, i can feel that it is not necessary, and unimportant, to define my beliefs.
but i could respond with this: i am the expression of god. what i seek is awareness.

so if i say, ¨and i try to see god¨, does that mean i am looking for god? well i suppose it would have to, but not in the religous context i percieved coming from my grandfather. (and then i get confused thinking, but do we not speak of the same god? what difference does it make?). so for me to say ¨and i try to see god¨ it is the same as if i were to say, i try to become aware.
so is god awareness? i think maybe in a sense yes and in another no.

my dreams have been obscured, dark, and choppy. the symbols i sense do not seem to be of myself, images i cannot interpret. but usually there is at least one thing that is vivid to me when i wake up, like a color, or a shape, or a number. and in the past week or so i have had many death themed dreams. first i had a few dreams where there would be a woman who looked alive, was talking, moving around, whatever. but then they´d tell me that they were actually dead. then i dreamt the same thing happening to me. i realized that i was, somehow, at the same time, conscious, and dead at the same time. the other night, i dreamt that my parents told me that i was going to die of a brain hemorrage. they kept saying, the doctor said. you wont live past january. and i thought, but how could it be possible? i´m going to live for a long time! i´m travelling! but i believed my parents. and i began thinking about what it would feel like as i was slipping into death. last night i dreamt of walking skeletons. one had grass it´s mouth
and so i have, because of these dreams, brought my mortality to mind. someday...maybe even before february...i will die. we all learn that we are going to die someday at a young age. but i have never been able to think about it as more of an accepted fact. so maybe now, to contemlate this, is sort of a step forward in my path to awareness. because it forces a decision before me, to look at the way i want to experience life. why would i want to experience life preoccupied with what is temporary?
but these questions have only just arose.

i did go to that museum. i saw many things in class cases, and got a headache from translating all those big words into english. i saw the remains of the skeleton of the lord of sipan. and it was mildly interesting. but what i liked best, was the small mural representing the religion of that ancient civilation. there were three worlds. at the top, heaven was the stars, the cosmos, ruled by a giant serpent god. in the middle, life, with people carrying out their everyday tasks. weaving, carrying jugs of water, etc.. on the bottom was the underworld. not hell. but a place where the ancestors lived. portrayed as warped, almost animal looking humans.
there were many gods of their culture. these dieties were shaped into their pottery. there was a crabmangod, octopusmangod, iguanamangod, fishmangod and many more. each ruled a different part of the world.
these things are interesting to me.
if i were to paint a mural to portray the universe, how would i paint god, or the afterlife?
i wouldnt separate it from the earth.

now i must go in search of a meal, which shouldnt be difficult. there are about 40 seafood restaurants to choose from. sorry if i´m not responding to emails quickly, it takes me so long to write my entries, and then i get tired of the keyboard.