Here we go, the start of another journey, this time a literary one. I will keep this blog in English since it’s the most useful language to connect with people at the present (hey, times are changing, I’m trying to skill up on Spanish and Mandarin too, just to be on the safe side!). This blog started to take form as a podcast in my mind, but for some reason I’ve decided to turn to the written word instead. I guess it makes me less dependent on technology and recording possibilities as well as people to interview in a podcast; I’m lazy, that is. Anyway, by writing I can still share the same stories as would have been possible in a podcast, only now, you have to trust my word for it and I won’t have to adapt my rose coloured world view to some co-talker. Win – win!
What is this? When I first started travelling, right before the big FB hit the market, I used to keep my travel diaries in Swedish at a Swedish web page. There’s a few posts still there, but really, after FB, the page is lost and forgotten, off the tracks from world wide web. And since then I’ve managed to accumulate a few international friends who are interested in travels and travelling the same way I am, I’ve come to the conclusion to start over, with another approach. FB is a great way of connecting with people, but really, I can’t handle the size of it any more. I turn to blog! This blog is not primarily about me and my experiences, this blog is also about the people I meet, their stories and views of the world, and if possible even about people they’ve met in turn. This is about people visiting any place on earth, or being in a community where heritage and culture fluctuate, challenges conventional lifestyles and proving that possibilities are endless. It’s about motion. Being in motion. Not necessarily a physical motion, but utterly necessary an intellectual, emotional and psychological one. This can happen in any environment, but for me and this blog, it’s about this constant motion in connection with travelling. That’s how I, personally, grow.

To reach outside the mental and physical borders humans have created throughout thousands of years is for some self evident, for others completely uninteresting. Some people do it through work and family, some do it with difficulty, some with ease. Some people think you have to turn your back on everything common to get to another “place”, some stand calmly rooted. The millions of ways to live a life. I have chosen to belong to society at the present, but I cherish my freedom and fear the day I’ll have a full time job and keep on changing life plans from year to year. Some people get motion sickness, I only get stillness sickness. Motion is my medicine. I used to have a discussion with a vagabond friend of mine, whether it’s about chasing or running. Why keep on moving? There’s really no saying what is the sanest reason for travelling, at the start I was definitely running from conventions, pressure, growing up, stagnation. Today it’s the chase for kicks, tricks, views, experiences, people and above all an alternative reality. What used to be real in my life has never been real for any other person in the world, the concept of reality and authenticity is altering, thus gives you the freedom to live life according to your specific reality. You’re creating the world you’re living in. A person has not only perceptions but a will to perceive, not only a capacity to observe the world, but a capacity to alter his or her observation of it – which, in the end, is the capacity to alter the world itself. To me, everyone has a story to tell, and everyone has done what no one else ever did. Small or big. Look for that in the next person you meet, though you might not feel like talking to him. Value the little neuron signals (s)he sets off and let them spiral free for a while. You might learn something new. In best case scenario, you’ll learn something new about yourself.

Without being too horrifyingly philosophically similar to western based Coelho-sentimental sentiments there will be some more of this crap to be found in this blog. Just a warning for future readers, I try to approach the world with the Buddhist loving kindness, though there’s plenty of irony and humour to be found in the complexities and grey zones in every culture.
That’s it for introduction. Stick to it, and you might found out how much beer I drank in Edinburgh last week. Heads up, I even smoked half a cigarette – that’s how weird that week turned out.