Ok, it’s really not that hard to grock.

back when i lived in san francisco, i had this tendency to go months without ever leaving the city. i seem to do the same thing living in bangkok, which is likely bad for my mental and physical health. so about a week ago, i went up to kao yai national park with sherry, her parents and two other friends. the park is somewhere between 1.5 and 4 hours from bangkok (depending on traffic) but manages to have unbelievably clean air, pretty mountains, cool weather and this rather unsettling quiet. we only went for two days which was probably too short, the first day up there i felt like i was wondering what i was missing back in the city. most of the time when i’m in bangkok, i just sit around naked in my apartment and read a book or play with my computer but somehow i had this fear of missing something. day two i started to settle into things and i’m sure that if i go back for a week or a month, that i’ll totally get into a routine of lounging, walking slowly and leaving my cell phone turned off.

these photographs were shot with my holga and that same agfa rsx ii film that i have been getting such great colors through cross-processing. i’ll post some digital and panoramic photographs soon.

i shot these photographs with pank at an abandoned building near nana bts … well it looked abandoned at first but when we started to explore we realized there were some security

guards who seemed much happier to let us in once i gave them 100B. the film is agfa rsx ii which i cross-processed and the camera is the holga of course. you can see the full set here on flickr.

anyone who has seen me in the last two years has probably heard me go on about the way yoga is taught in bangkok. after living and practicing yoga in california for 9 years, i was rather surprised at the corporate nature of yoga over here. back in the states, most studios are small operations which are run by people who are much more focused on yoga than on business. the studios often stay close to the teachings of a particular guru, and may or may do things like advertise properly and pay on time.

the place i work for now, had six locations in bangkok, two in the provinces and is building a multi-million dollar retreat center on an island down south. all of the yoga rooms are mirrored (so that hot yoga can be taught), marketing materials generally emphasize weight loss and they are kept in shape by a full staff of executives, administrators, front desk assistants and maids. there are huge shower rooms, towels and mats provided, etc. at the corporate-level there is no affiliation with any guru, really any form of yoga that is happening enough to make money will do.

that being said, i do get to teach ashtanga and don’t have to worry about paying my bills which in california is a very hard thing to do. i’m always paid on time and i’m pretty much left alone to teach what i want (i just have to put up with mirrors). i guess the fact that i’ve been here for two years is a testament to the fact that the pros outweigh the cons.

two weeks ago we celebrated the two year anniversary of one of our studios and in typical-bangkok-style did it up with a huge three day festival in the middle of the lat praw mall. loads of celebrities came and talked about how much they like practicing yoga, and i had to get up with three other teachers and do a synchronized performance of yoga poses done to music. i actually held off on posting about this for so long because i was (and still am) rather embarrassed about it, but i figure i’ll throw it up on the blog anyway. my practice has become this very personal thing and to get up and do a bunch of poses on a stage at a mall is nothing that i want to do. even more than that, i feel like it puts emphasis on the external aspects of the practice and away from the internal ones. i’ve written before that i don’t care about being a chinese contortionist anymore and that i’m much more interested in things like having proper breath and drishti in the asanas. i guess there is some aspect of a circus trick to it all, that we have to show off some fancy stuff to get people in the door and that if they turn into dedicated students then we can start teaching them deeper aspects of the practice. still tho, i’d rather not have to do it on a stage at a mall … photos are below.

ohh another good thing about work is that they are being supportive and flexible with me going back to college. i’m trying to get into ramkamheng to study a bachelor’s degree in thai and work is open to being flexible with my schedule around class times. ramkenheng has a lot of programs for people studying part time and hopefully i will get some transfer credit from drexel … i may very well be the only white person studying there and i’m sure i will be the only freshman who uses rogain already. more news to follow about this when i know it.

lately i haven’t felt too proud to be an american. mostly i feel embarrassed at all that our asshole in the white house has been up to. when russell called me yesterday morning to tell me that al gore won the nobel peace prize and that the new york times slapped george bush in the face over it, i realized that there are things that make me hopeful about changes to come.

There will also be those who complain that this prize — like the committee’s earlier awards to Jimmy Carter and the chief United Nations nuclear inspector, Mohamed ElBaradei — is an intentional slap at President Bush. It should be. We only wish that it would finally wake up the president.

the last four days before leaving mysore (which is actually over a month ago now), i skipped out on practice at the shala and went to ooty with the maharaja of media. ooty is a hill town about four hours from mysore in tamil nadu state. we drove up ourselves which was loads of fun as we were able to take our time, get lost and not worry what a chauffer would think when we constantly made comments about good looking men by the road-side.

the drive up passes first through an animal sanctuary where we saw wild elephants on both the drive up and down and then climbs up the mountains to ooty. ooty is famous for it’s pretty scenery, cool climate (cold) and tea plantations. apparently there are loads of other popular tourist things to do up there, but we mostly took long walks, checked out the local culture and checked out all the good-looking men. i’m not quite sure if they food was better than food in mysore or if i was just so sick of the food in mysore that anything new would taste good … however we did have a some great meals.

all of these photographs were shot with my holga on agfa rsx II film and cross-processed in bangkok at siam digital. one of the shots is of a christian church, of which there are many in ooty. plenty of evidence that missionaries cleaned up the heathen population, or whatever it is they do.