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~ a pilgrimage of the heart

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A #covidbubble Christmas

December 31, 2020

Unknowingly we’d begun to lay the foundation in April. Don and I returned from Malaysia on March 21st, just squeaking …

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Travelling through the world, and through life, feeling our way by the tips of our fingers.

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Kitano Tenmangu flea market, known as Tenjin-san, has the feel of a small-time festival. Performing together at the flea market in Kyoto, I think this human has had his monkey from when it was a tiny baby. The love between the two is so palpable, and the monkey looks so healthy, that it makes me smile. It’s such a delightful performance. It doesn’t matter that I don’t understand a word of what the human is saying, the monkey says it all in his own clever way, and when it’s time to bow, he bends at the waist so low his head is on the ground. The whole audience laughs and claps. See my latest blog post: The Ultimate Treasure Hunt - a flea market and a food market in Kyoto. Link in bio.

Kitano Tenmangu flea market is known locally as Tenjin-san flea market. It's as if the attics and storage rooms of Japan have been emptied out and put on display. There are both special artefacts, and the detritus of life spread out on the street; picture frames and small furniture, vinyl records, toys, an old scale, stacks of new dishes, beautiful handmade pottery, and uniquely Japanese antiques and curios, and rack upon rack of gently-loved kimonos. It feels like a small-time festival, and we lucked into it. It only happens on the 25th of each month. See my latest blog post: The Ultimate Treasure Hunt - a flea market and a food market in Kyoto. Link in bio.

Nishiki Market, a narrow street of five covered blocks with a ceiling of rainbow windows, is known as the kitchen of Kyoto. The market began life in the 1300’s as a wholesale fish market. Over the years it morphed into a retail market selling primarily foods, but also various other goods. There are hundreds of shops and restaurants, many of which have been in the same family for generations, and the market is now a long-standing fixture of ordinary life in the city. These two ladies are selling tea, and they hand out tea samples in beautiful pottery cups. No one steals the cups, because Japan. See my latest blog post: The Ultimate Treasure Hunt - a flea market and a food market in Kyoto. Link in bio.

For over three weeks we were based in Cusco, the still-beating heart of the Inca Empire, as we explored the Urubamba Valley. It is known as the Sacred Valley because it was the property of the emperor, and it is littered with imposing Inca ruins and traditional villages. We visited such sites as Moras with its enormous circular crop terraces, the cascading salt evaporation ponds of Moray, the villages of Chinchero and Ollantaytambo, several of the more prominent Inca ruins, and of course Machu Picchu. And all along the way we encountered ordinary people living their lives pretty much in the same way as they have done for hundreds of years.

After a three day overland trip from San Pedro de Atacama, Chile across the Bolivian altiplano to the Uyuni salt flats we flew to La Paz, Bolivia’s capital. I don’t remember why we decided to not spend time in La Paz; instead we took a bus straight to Copacabana on the shores of Lake Titicaca. I took this photo from the bus while waiting to leave La Paz. Mi ciudad esta cambiando – My city is changing. Blog post: Salt Flats and Bowler Hats. Link in bio.

We did a road trip by bus in South America: Mendoza, Argentina to Santiago, Chile, two days later Santiago to La Serena, two days later La Serena to Antofagasta, two days later Antofagasta to San Pedro de Atacama. All the buses were double-decker, and all had seats the size airplane business-class, and on every leg we got the upstairs front seats giving us panoramic views of the landscape as we travelled. It was epic! Antofagastais a working class town with a rough edge to it, a regular downtown core, and a small beach; an unremarkable mining town in the far north of Chile. Still, there is this bright mosaic gecko bringing a little life to an otherwise dull building.

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