CURRENT MISSION

spontaineous living

ABOUT ME

I am a good listener.
Like going for walks and having gentle conversations.

Love mountains.

And lakes.
And Oceans.

I really appreciate honest people, with good sense of humour, who have distance to themselves.

PHILOSOPHY

I’m a crazy man. I’m a nutjob. I’m a freakball. You know? I break through all boundaries. If I see a boundary, I eat a boundary. And wash it down with a cup of hot steaming rules.
my favourite Mighty Boosh

"The greatest gift you can give another is the purity of your attention"
Richard Moss

"The man who said "I'd rather be lucky than good" saw deeply into life" Woody Allen

Zawsze musi być ktoś najważniejszy,
jedyny, konieczny,
bez którego życie traci sens,
do którego powraca się ciągle
nawet z najdalszych zakątków świata,
...do którego wraca się jak do dzieciństwa,
żeby odzyskać nadzieję
i wierzyć nawet w niemożliwe...
Bez którego pogoda staje się niepogodą,
a radość umiera z czasem.
Musi być człowiek ważny jak alfabet,
bez którego wszystko staje się
niezrozumiałe i ponad siły.
Człowiek, który pomaga iść w nieznane,
który przynosi Szczęście.

"Through your embrace (Hugging) you speak a thousand words, without ever saying one."

"Don't be afraid that your life will end, be afraid that it will never begin..."

-Author Unknown

"It is not length of life, but depth of life."

I like architecture, but I love sleeping in the tent close to nature, cooking...

Tourists don’t know where they’ve been, travelers don’t know where they’re going – Paul Theroux

"I have learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did.
But people will never forget how you made them feel."
Maya Angelou

"There is no end
There is no beginning
There is only the passion for life"

"Life is available only in the present moment" - Thich Nhat Hanh.

"Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony" - Mahatma Gandhi

"It's no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society" - Jiddu Krishnamurti.

"A soul in tension that's learning to fly
Condition grounded but determined to try
Can't keep my eyes from the circling skies"
-Pink Floyd

"A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world." - Oscar Wilde

"Anthropocentrism describes the tendency for human beings to regard themselves as the central and most significant entities in the universe, or the assessment of reality through an exclusively human perspective." - Here lies the problem!

"Lead me not into temptation, I can find the way myself!" - Woohoo!

"A good traveller has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving"...Lao Tzu (570-490 BC)

To laugh is to risk appearing the fool,
To weep is to risk being called s...entimental.
To reach out to another is to risk involvement.
To expose feelings is to risk showing your true self.
To place your ideas and your dreams before the crowd
is to risk being called naive.
To love is to risk not being loved in return,
To live is to risk dying,
To hope is to risk despair,
To try is to risk failure

But risks must be taken, because the greatest risk in life is to risk nothing.
The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is nothing, and becomes nothing.

He may avoid suffering and sorrow, but he simply cannot learn, feel, change, grow or love.
Chained by his certitude, he is a slave; he has forfeited his freedom.

Only the person who risks is truly free.

~ Janet Rand

"Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?
The Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to
Alice: I don't much care where.
The Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.
Alice: …so long as I get somewhere.
The Cat: Oh, you're sure to do that, if only you walk long enough."

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindness.
Mark Twain

Loneliness is a negative state of mind. Aloneness is positive, notwithstanding w...hat the dictionaries say. In dictionaries, loneliness and aloneness are synonymous -- they are synonyms; in life they are not. Loneliness is a state of mind when you are constantly missing the other, aloneness is the state of mind when you are constantly delighted in yourself. Loneliness is miserable, aloneness is blis...sful. Loneliness is always worried, missing something, hankering for something, desiring for something; aloneness is a deep fulfillment, not going out, tremendously content, happy, celebrating. In loneliness you are off center, in aloneness you are centered and rooted. Aloneness is beautiful. It has an elegance around it, a grace, a climate of tremendous satisfaction. Loneliness is; beggarly; all around it there is begging and nothing else. It has no grace around it. In fact it is ugly. Loneliness is a dependence, aloneness is SHEER independence. One feels as if one is one's whole world, one's whole existence.

"The wise are wise only because they love. The fool are fools only because they think they can understand love"
Paulo Coelho
....
found on Buddhist Monastery (Thailand) Wall:

Oh..Boundless Joy to find at last...
There is no happiness in this world

"Whereas the tourist generally hurries back home at the end of a few weeks or months, the traveler, belonging no more to one place than to the next, moves slowly, over periods of years, from one part of the earth to another. Indeed, he would have found it difficult to tell, among the many places he had lived, precisely where it was he had felt most at home."

Following taken from a CouchSurfer-Hitchiker:

"A journey is best measured in friends rather than miles"
"You don't need much to be happy"
"Happiness is a journey. Not a destination" - this one argues a bit with the Thai Monastery Wall

“I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately, I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to put to rout all that was not life and not when I had come to die discover that I had not lived.” --Henry David Thoreau

“Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Just walk beside me and be my friend.”

“Inside every sane person there’s a madman struggling to get out.” Terry Pratchett

A philosophy professor stood before his class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, he wordlessly picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with rocks, rocks about 2" in diameter.
He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.
The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles, of course, rolled into the open areas between the rocks.
He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was. The professor picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else.
He then asked once more if the jar was full. This time the students were sure and they responded with a unanimous "Yes!"
The professor then produced two cans of beer from under the table and proceeded to pour their entire contents into the jar -- effectively filling the empty spaces between the sand. The students laughed.

"Now," said the professor, as the laughter subsided, "I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The rocks are the important things - your family, your partner, your health, your children; things that, if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house, your car."
The sand represented everything else. The small stuff. "If you put the sand into the jar first," he continued "there is no room for the pebbles or the rocks. The same goes for your life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you."
"Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your partner out dancing. There will always be time to go to work, clean the house, give a dinner party and fix the disposal."
"Take care of the rocks first -the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand."

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the beer represented.
The professor smiled. "I'm glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of beers."

'i prefare to be a dreamer among the humblest ,with visions to be realised ,than a lord amoung those without dreams and desires' -kahlil gibran,

As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular.-Oscar Wilde

'all our words are but crumbs that fall down from the feast of the mind' -kahlil gibran,

People seldom do what they believe in. They do what is convenient, then repent- bob dylan

"Believe in the ball, and let the ball do the playing"

....section continuation is in Goofy folder in my photos

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

Organized a CS potluck party at my flat. Five participating members of CouchSurfing.org.

Organized a CS Cooking and Eating Event at my flat. Twenty One participating members of CouchSurfing.org

Organizing a total of seventeen Cafe get-togethers twice a week in Krakow.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I hosted people from Belgium, Italy, Canada, USA, Turkey, Brazil, Spain, Portugal, China, Taiwan, Australia, France, UK. I cannot imagine a better experience. Most are on the Friends list.

Interests

My traveling and staying in the pleasant places slowly was changing to a spiritual search, without me even realizing this. I was finding some places have strong energy. In India hanging out in Dharamsala, the main site of Dalai Lama monastic complex energy in my body was changing. I started feeling it more intensely. In addition to the energy in my body becoming gentler, there seemed to be more and more of it, energy having it's peaks in short lasting experiences. I craved high energy inside my body. Then a sudden large energy influx of energy happened during a party with fellow travelers in Rishikesh (India) following a strong shaktipat from Sri Sri Ravi Shankar.
This is called a back door to meditation approach via a kundalini awakening. The most known, already deceased guru, who has undergone the similar path is Osho. That was not a short experience like before, energy stayed and it was much more of it than before. I started watching this energy, actually this energy was so strong it was impossible not to watch it.

I looked and looked "inside" and what Buddhist teachings call awakening to the effortless awareness happened to my surprise.
That was not new to me.

As a 15 years old, I was sitting on a beach of a lake in southern Poland. I saw one woman drowning. In awareness I swam to her, grabbed her from behind and brought her to the shore. That was in 1971.
I did not refer to it as awareness when I was a teenager, the only descriptive words that came to my mind were "I lost control of the physical body", "My body went into the lake, started swimming...". I was concerned that the woman may drown me, but body skillfully in a second grabbed her from behind...what was happening next was easy. I regained control of my physical body, after it sat down in the same place from where it started the rescue.

Awakening to effortless awareness happened at the age of 43. I called it effortless awareness using Nisardagata Maharaj term.
That occurred in the Summer 2000 in a place that used to be an Ashram. The Guru died ten years prior.

In Taoism, Lao Tsu, this religion founder describes it in an obscure statement "Tao does not do, but nothing is not done". The word Tao, could in the contemporary world be described as something deeper than a spontaneous person. Other spiritual teachers called it Effortless Awareness, one does not need to meditate for the awareness experiences to happen. One is constantly in this awareness. That was the biggest surprise, I have had in my life.
Experiences of awareness happen to many people. Wikipedia says it often happens to sportsmen, actors...it also happens often to young travelers, especially young women. It is difficult to describe it. It is a feeling of "distance" to what one does. Distance to what one says. Awareness has been also defined as of watching where your attention is pointing. Alertness is another word for Awareness. Being Alert, Being on Adrenaline. For instance, you think what to say, but something different is said by your vocal cords. You think what to do, you start doing it, but "by fate" something a bit different is done. Spontaneous action. Experiences of awareness are accompanied by the feelings of joy, peace, exaltation, magic. When the experience is over, mind tends to have a fit, trying to figure it out.

Children are born with the Magic, rational, unfriendly world around causes this magic to be lost for most people.
"Trying not to loose a child within", a profile statement of a twenty year old. Mind of a person who hasn't lost the magic yet is quite used to it.
Mind of one who has lost it in early childhood doesn't even remember the magic. Most unhappy people of the world.
Most people are in between.

Some of you are not familiar with Eastern spiritual teachings.
Symbolism of a spontaneous action, of an Awareness exists also in the Christian teachings. The most common: "In the name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit". Feeling energy in one's body is realizing the Holy Spirit.
Realizing Father is in experiences of Awareness.
Son or Daughter is me and you.
In Christianity Symbol has been taught openly, the meaning and methods of it's realization have been a closed secret kept in monasteries.
In Buddhism everything is in the open.
Words used are different, there seems to be a multitude of methods of reaching the realization, but the Truth is the same.
Modern mind uses phrases like a random set of circumstances, spontaneous events, a chain of events happening to me.
The word Spontaneous is used to describe some people. Who is the scriptwriter and producer for those spontaneous chains of events?
Those are beginnings of the realization of the Father. Awareness of the Father, the scriptwriter and producer, functioning thru us.
An example how a modern mind could describe a spiritual experience of a partial Father realization:
Let's call her Angelina. Angelina wrote:
"The way we met was totally magic!!! I was looking to find my way to a meeting in XXXXX and...there I was again...feeling lost in the middle of nowhere, asking for help...It was then that I saw her sweet, welcoming face, that sweet girl coming my way...and totally by fate I asked: "sorry, do you know where club XXXXX is?" She says:â

• cats
• writing
• books
• poetry
• singing
• architecture
• acting
• dancing
• tango
• waltz
• ballroom dancing
• causes
• education
• dining
• cooking
• beer
• coffee
• potluck
• running
• meditation
• partying
• drinking
• clubbing
• flying
• gardening
• boating
• shopping
• clothing
• reading
• tv
• traveling
• investing
• magic
• backpacking
• christian
• buddhist
• boxing
• swimming
• agriculture
• chemistry
• teaching
• emergency services
• law
• medicine
• psychology
• religion
• hitchhiking
• beaches
• lakes
• mountains

Music, Movies, and Books

Carlos Castaneda and Paulo Coelho books

some older films: The Razors Edge (and a book under the same title), My Dinner with Andre, Double life of Veronique.
some even older TV series: The Fugitive, Colombo - a generation and a half old stuff. Humbleness and intelligence of the main characters ...they don't make that any more.

A little popular psychology book "Children of Frankenstein" by Herbert Muller and "Walden" by Thoreau.

It does not belong in "movies, music, books", but still it is the best place for it: Satya Sai Baba Presence

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Those words "to be feminine"...(one woman has it in her profile, this first story was originally written to her).
I have experienced gentler than western cultures, including the tribal areas. People still exist without being bombarded by advertising creating desires in people.
There are still small villages where women are feminine.
Feminine is a natural state for a woman.
Advertising, billboards create desires for products and services which in turn generate a career oriented woman. This in addition to other factors..
Being equal to a man in his money earning capabilities. In Western society, regrettably, a career oriented woman gets higher respect.
The above may seem oversimplified...I know.

In those simple cultures, gentle people view CHILDREN as the highest GOOD for them to have.
For the child to grow up, let's say, psychologically healthy, child needs feminine around him. Doesn't have to be necessarily a physical mother. People die, mothers die, too; leaving small children.
Only the feminine has intuition, is capable of understanding child's need without words. Child is more often not capable to state his/her needs in words. Masculine is not capable of an intuitive understanding. That does not mean man cannot understand, man who understands does it thru his “feminine” side. Man generally is much less feminine than woman.

Child needs feminine intuition, feminine touch to grow. In villages in gentle "old world" cultures, mothers carry a baby, at least up to one year old, all the time either close to their chest or on the back. Right next to their skin. An average westerner may say, but when it is hot outside, sweating occurs. Is Childs good less important than a bit of inconvenience?
Child is all the time exposed to mother's feminine, gentle energy. Human bodies, bodies of all being generate energy, feminine is a gentle, loving, caring one. Most western people don’t feel either own energy or the energy of other people. Most westerners are too tense.
Primitive people feel energy quite clearly.
In those villages are children older that one, who walk, run, play. I spent hours observing those small children. Never saw a child having a tantrum, screaming, yelling...never.
Sometimes, when a child fell, child cried for a short time.
Small children were being taking care of by eleven year old girls. Those eleven year olds, were not like eleven year olds in the western world. Those village eleven year olds were gentle, caring, devoted to those small children. Those girls were hugging small children, kissing them on the top of the head, gently stroking them on the head and back if a child was crying.
Those eleven year old girls looked and behaved much more mature that the average western girl of the same age. They were naturally caring, loving, gentle.

Your mind may be saying: That is a bunch of bull, what do you know about children, you are a man.
Humbly, may I say, I worked as a teacher.
And not that humbly: Experience, what I have experienced, then we will talk.

Mothers of those children were cooking in their homes or working in the fields.
While observing them, I was not sitting somewhere away from them. I was sitting on the ground among them. I don't like to stand around children, I always want to be at their eye level or below. I don't like towering over any being.
I have noticed, that when a grown up person lowers himself or herself to the eye level of a child, this child is more likely to come.
I never called any of those children, asking them to come.
I always sat peacefully, waiting for them to approach me.
I am quite easy to be overcome by feelings, and I often cry, tears of joy. Children seeing my tears were often coming and hugging me. Those gorgeous five year old arms wrapped around my neck.
Cultures I am talking about were gentle. Children must have not experienced aggression from grownups. Children were gentle, caring. I realize I am repeating myself with “gentle”.
For a child like that to exist, there must have been a lot of femininity around him or her from their birth.
Mothers after child birth were not running to their offices making money, making careers. Mothers were not far from children. Fields, where mothers worked were visible from the village, easy walk, max 5 minutes. There was always at least one mother in a village overseeing eleven year olds taking care of smaller children.
After I saw first village like one I am describing (it was in Turkey), I somehow got hold of a book "Coming of Age in Samoa" by M. Mead.
I read this book over and over again 15 years ago, and I still remember. Wherever I traveled after reading this book, I looked for those kind of people.

For an average western person, those people are poor, beyond comprehension. For me those people, their village is a paradise. True, they eat simple cheap food, have ugly clothing, live in mud huts...but they have something we don't. They have gentleness, tenderness, it is all natural to them. Children, next generation, is the highest GOOD for them. They know how to read and write, they don't know calculus, big bang theory doesn't enter their minds. Those people, instinctively invest in the future, children, next generation. Instinctively they know they will die. And the only, what survives their death, are children, who in turn have children.
One of the first scenes of a movie Dead Poets Society...poetry teacher shows entering high school students old pictures of students who were studying in this high school hundred years ago...and what does he say. They are all dead.
Teacher tries to put CARPE DIEM in the new flock's minds. Live in a moment. That film does not concern itself with children of those entering high school students. Doesn't reach that far.
Those simple people in villages, poor ugly, according to western standards cluster of huts, go further...carpe diem PLUS.

Don't we need more FEMININE in the world?
...
A person, a CouchSurfer, who spent all his childhood in a village in Himalayas, at an elevation over 3000 metres above sea level, commented on the above: "It's little pity that people like us from East are slowly after the running competition. More often I feel it but could not simply stop it because the influence is so strong, I mean the power of modernization and globalization. Hope I would realize it sooner or later."
He is studying for a Master degree of the appropriate kind for working in a government in Germany...Oh, God!

Hugging an Orangutan in Sumatra (Bukitt Lawang), I also tried to teach her to build sandcastles, but the "student" wasn't interested;

Being hugged by a gibbon hanging out in a backpacker cafe in Pai, Thailand.

Experiencing sunrises on Parenthian Islands (Malaysia) while boiling water on a wooden fire for the first cup of coffee. I was a manager of the Rock Garden Bungalow complex on Long Beach. From time to time other travelers-employees were joining me. Rock Garden, was just a "garden" with big rocks and bungalows. There was no electricity, the Sun regulated people's lives;

I was a receptionist in Cameronian Holiday Inn guesthouse in Cameron Highlands in Malaysia. An Australian mother and her 11 year old daughter came in. I gave them a room. Mother was tired, took a nap, daughter came to talk to me. Would you like to work here, too. Yeah. So I taught her. Proudly she stood at the reception desk, I sat down at a table. A couple come in. She is handling it well, assigned them a room. I am still sitting at the table. The couple joined me. Talking. The eleven year old girl went play outside. Her mother woke up, but not completely and joined us at the table. The couple have no idea that I am the receptionist. Start talking about their reception experience. Tell the Aussie mother, isn't it strange that in Malaysia an eleven year old western girl is handling reception. Mother agrees it's strange, but she is not completely awake yet to tell them that I am the receptionist. Conversation continues. The eleven year old runs in. Could we have a towel, a woman asks the eleven year old receptionist. Of course, madam - I taught the girl to use madam and sir, just as a joke. Mother wakes up completely. HEY, THIS IS MY DAUGHTER! This is the girl who works reception we told you about.

Watching Rainbows over Katmandu from the rooftop of Potala Hotel in Thamel. In addition to watching my clothes drip-dry (that was already my fifth year in Asia, I was too mellow not be excited by dropping drops).

Playing with children: In Thailand, a place rarely frequented by westerners, north-west Thailand, right next to the Myanmar's border. I went up the hill to the Thai Buddhist monastery. There was maybe 30 children there, ages below 11. I was amazed by the happiness of these children, unspoiled happiness, innocence...The happy, smiling maybe 50 year old monk in broken English asked me if I would oversee those children, he had to go to monastery office. With children, I never wanted to "tower" over them, be so tall, them being small, I sat down on the ground. Slowly children started coming up to me, closer and closer, closer and closer, little girl sat on my lap. The rest of the girls come up quite quickly and totally surrounded me. I started crying, the tears of joy...Tears were coming from my eyes, girls were hugging me...I was still sitting, so my head was at their chest level.
Thru the little hole between the girls I see two monks coming. They act agitated...children left without any adult supervision. Monks ask children in Thai...I understood it. Where is some adult. The girls surrounding me moved a little so the monks could see me. See me crying. older monk eyes were also covering with tears.

Story uses Buddhist terms Watcher on the Hill and Buddha to depict a spontaneous person, person thru whom a "God Within" functions, speaks (the New Testament mentions such spiritual state, too):

Buddha operated guesthouse Parenthian Island Malaysia:
Coming back to Parenthian Islands, Buddha was met by the owner of the guesthouse. Owner on the boat offered Buddha a job. There were two foreigners working in this guesthouse. They left. Buddha replaced leaving girls with two then total of four watchers on the hill. Owner once said, women I hired were often arguing, women you hire never argue. Buddha offered “a solution” to owner “feeling bad”. Ask women watchers on the hill to pretend that they are arguing. She, one of those women, viewed it so ridiculous…they did not do that. Once came a confused seventeen year old Australian girl. Watcher on the hill, lost, nervous…offered a job immediately. Other employees were 22-25 year olds, immediately made aussie girl feel at home. Owner did not object to an extra person hired, started acting fatherly towards her. She was not hired for what one could call a “customer contact position”, she was accompanying a local boat boy to go shopping to the nearby village. Owner was in the past a two term member of the state parliament. Watcher on the hill. There were also two “constant” Malaysian visitors, both watchers on the hill. Chief of village police and Immigration officer. The immigration officer asked Buddha to start hiring women travelers for two other guesthouses, which owners were to shy to approach foreigners. It was Buddha’s in the bodies of Immigration officer and chief of police policy to have at least one foreign traveler working in each questhouse.
There was a limited cleaning bungalows. Buddha took it on himself. Without asking a 15 year old watcher on the hill Malaysian girl started joining the Buddha. Buddha, future OCI obscure visitor, with a beautifull15 year old Muslim girl going from bungalow to bungalow sweeping floors. No other Muslim found it inappropriate.

Additional “trouble tourist handling” program was instituted by the Immigration.
Buddha was asked to talk to tourists who cause scenes of anger. Several high anger travelers been asked to leave. Immigration objective was so police is not involved at all. There was a jail in the village. Empty. Sometimes there was too many travelers coming to the beach, there were no places left in guesthouses. Buddha was asked to talk to women travelers for whom there was no accommodations available. Jail was becoming an emergency guesthouse. Police chief, who according to some more goofy tourist women, looked like a yogi bear, often observed the Buddha talking girls into going to jail. Some of them wanted free food too. Hug the yogi bear…chief was increasing the distance between himself and the girls. A joke was, jail offers only free accommodation, if you want free food too…you would have to be formally “checked in”, hugging the chief would “stretching it” meet the formal procedure’s demands. When foreign travelers, women, were in jail, no local policeman could be inside working, using internet. That jail had it's last inmate eighteen years prior. A local boy got drunk, officially charged with disturbance of peace, for making too much singing noise. True reason for locking him up overnight was so his mother doesn't kill him. While tourist girls were inside the jail, there was not policeman in the vicinity, Policemen were afraid their wifes would kill them. Police boat was used to shuttle women travelers between jail and the beach, since the village where the jail was did not have a nice beach.

Back in 1991, I was about to validate my Eurail pass. Passes are valid from midnight of the first day. A thought that came to my mind, since I had absolutely no plan where to go, to take the first train to it's final destination departing after midnight from where I was, Bochum, Germany. I arrived at the train station on 23:30. Everything fine up to this point. I looked at the Train Departures. First train after midnight was going to Moscow. I have no visa to Russia. So I had to make a decision, not everything can be quite fully spontaneous. Real world. I saw on the schedule that the last train before midnight is going to Copenhagen. I went to the platform, saw this train's conductor. I explained to him that I am starting Eurail pass at midnight. I told him what my plan was and asked him if I can take his train instead. He was more than welcoming. This was the beginning of my first backpacking. Having a JOURNEY is the Key, destination will appear on the departure board. That was long before the www.couchsurfing.org where some pre-planning of a couch is advised.
------
Eight years of backpacking gone by ...back to the good old USofA, got a job as a substitute teacher. My mind, in the education field up top my profile I stated that I gotten reeducated in nine years of backpacking. So my mind, as a serious Substitute Teacher:
I have been told by couple of teacher that the class I will be having is quite mature, well behaved, diligent. So when I arrived in the classroom I greeted them kindly and ....wrote on the blackboard: Class work: roaming around in the hallways. Students looked at the board, looked at me...finally decided I was joking. One seventeen year old girl kindly started explaining to me that they are already grown up, they value education...and so on, very responsible stuff. I replied, thank you, I understand, but...I am not grown up.
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Another story. I was sent to the dance classroom. I come in, all girls, sixteen, seventeen year olds with tights on doing aerobic dancing. I looked for a while and said you need a woman substitute teacher. One girl says: Please stay, they would send us some here. More girls joined saying we already know you, and that they will be at their best behavior, please stay. Why do you like me? I asked. Tell us stories from Amsterdam (land of legal marihuana). Broad mind ness popped into my head: Be more worldly, In Indonesia there are magic mushrooms. There is more to the world than just Amsterdam.
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I walk into a chemistry classroom. Good morning Mr. Kuder...is it really good? I reply. I stand in front of a desk facing students. A girl, sixteen, moves papers on the desk and sits on it. Starts staring into my eyes. That surprised me, did not know what to do. She turns towards the class and pronounces: He is not on marihuana, and walks to her seat. How do you know? I ask. I just know. Is your mother a medical doctor with addictions specialization? No, when I am on marihuana, i sit in front of a mirror and stare into my eyes.
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While in Dali, Yunan Province, China I worked as a waiter in a tourist cafe.
One day two middle age Dutch men came in. I immediately liked them. One of them especially was a pleasant person to talk to.
I don't remember the subject of the conversation.
Guests left.
The next day they came back.
Ordered their sandwiches and brought alcohol with them, something good quality.
Conversation was more pleasant than the day before.
Finally this pleasant man asked me, what I think they do for living.
I knew they were very well rounded, educated, but
without much thinking I said insurance salesmen.
This more pleasant, open man started laughing. I knew, what I said was funny. But he was laughing and laughing. Finally I said that I was joking, I am glad it is funny, but I never expected that it was that funny.
We had one more shot of the fire water.
The man asked if I wanted to know what his job was.
Yes. I was really curious.
He introduced himself, name did not mean anything to me.
He added he was a member of the parliament of the Netherlands, the subcommittee on agriculture.
That was back in 1995. This other man was a cultural attaché in the Beijing embassy.
The member of the parliament gave me his home address and phone number and asked me to call when I came into the Netherlands.
He was a TV personality, almost every Dutch person I told this story, at that time, in the fall of 1995 guessed his name. I don't remember it well, but I think he was a chairperson of the committee on agriculture.

First time in my life I hitchhiked was in Turkey, Black sea coast. I was just standing there "hitchhiking"...I was actually praying that no car stops. I new there was a bus going ...
My prayer was discarded by God, a car stopped. A Turkish family on vacations, Ma, Pa, and two daughters eight and ten years old. Going with them was to last about two hours...it lasted over ten days. I became a babysitter for those girls...I love children. Ma and Pa were free to do what Mas and Pas do on vacation, being still quite young. And I had an all paid vacations. Girls were amazing, they spoke only a very childish English, but we well communicated using smiles and facial expressions. Arms were for hugging. I spoke no Turkish. This area in Turkey, few people spoke English. Girls were taking care of me more than I was taking care of them. Buying all the sweets and ice-cream.

Since some of the psychologists and psychology students are interested in what I have written in my profile, a story just for them:

twenty two year old woman
highly spontaineous behaviour
active, friendly, chatting, a lot of joking
no trace of stiff neurotic patterns, in 15 minute observation
scenario in a group of people
one asks this woman Where are you from?
From Germany -her reply
My raised voice comment: This is IMPOSSIBLE - (I said the F word).
I am from a village in the mountains near the border with Austria
My comment: How did you know how to reply to my comment
I am a student of psychology, fourth year
later she indicated she wants to learn a bit of Polish
I took her on the side, so nobody hears
I teach her "Kochana Istota" (loving being) and "Kochany mis" (loving teddy bear)
she practices, I explain to the subject the meaning of those phrases
back to the group...
several gentle Polish women in the group
I ask the German Psychology student if she still remembers what I taught her. YES
I ask: Could you pointing at yourself say those phrases.
She hesitated couple of seconds. Everybody heard what I said and is waiting for her.
She, pointing at herself, says Kochany Mis, Kochana Istota.
One Polish young woman drinking tea in this moment
chokes on the tea and expells it from her throat.
Later I talk to German Psychology student about Human Being/Human Doing, Neurotic Overachiever, people behaving more like humanoid robotic devices than human BEINGS - she gives knowledgeable comments "that is why I told you I am from a small village in the mountains"

Teach, Learn, Share

I could teach Haiku, a Japanese poetic style depicting a single moment, using contrast. An example from an ocean shore:

Gentle Clowds Wind Blows,
White Patches, Blue - Green Ocean,
Children Jumping Waves.

Another example from Kathmandu:

Gentle clowds wind blows,
Rooftops glitter - rising sun,
Rainbow spans the hills.

What can I say: I have seen a lot of gentle clowds.

I can teach basics of ballroom dancing. Basic steps of Jaif, Foxtrot, Tango, ChaCha, Waltz...

Countries I’ve Visited

Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Laos, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mexico, Monaco, Morocco, Myanmar, Nepal, Netherlands, Norway, Pakistan, Poland, Romania, Singapore, Slovakia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom, Vatican City State

Countries I’ve Lived In

China, Malaysia, Nepal, Poland, Thailand, United States

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