THE BEGINNING

Hi there world !

This is Alex from Denmark writing about his adventures in spiritual and mysterious South East Asia . . .

21/12/11 – 05/01/12

My journey started on December 21^st, when I took off to Vietnam to celebrate “merry X-mas” and to celebrate “happy New Year” as the locals say. I spent 2 fantastic weeks with my family and the most amazing New Year’s eve in Halong bay… Wow !

05/01/12 – 13/01/12

Now, I’m in Thailand with 25 other crazy Danes. We spent the first week on a resort in Khao Yai, close to Thailand’s greatest national park. Our encounter with the wildlife was rather special: we didn’t see much the first hour but then all of a sudden our guide finds something interesting. We stop and he sets up a station with some goggles with direct view of the fascinating object. The object was a “balloon”. “A balloon?”, I thought, “Hm… I have never heard of that bird before, and I had never seen such a bird before”; until I realized that we looking on an actual “balloon” caught in the top of the trees… We stayed there for 20 minutes and the balloon… We had a great laugh and what a nice memory we can now share ;)

13/01/12 –20/01/12

A lot of partying, drinking and social events later, we left Khao Yai and took off to Koh Samui, our new home for the next 4 months. The flight went smoothly and our new home, Smile House, blew our minds. It has all you can wish for! And a perfect breakfast/brunch (:

Then we had one week to settle down on the island and get to know it a little bit. We saw a mummified monk and some temples which are among the famous attractions on the island. The day we arrived, we also met Bob Color who sings on our Pub (The frog and Gecko) every Monday which became a weekly tradition from the first day on.

20/01/12 –03/02/12

The 2 following weeks were filled with activity thanks to our energetic and inspiring “health and nutrition” teacher Marie Mansachs. In this picture (I'll post it as soon as I find it..) we are fooling around in the pool, activating all muscles with different exercises before ending the sessions calmly with some “common floating” (you help the other to float in the water while walking around in the pool – extremely relaxing).

03/02/12 –10/02/12

Vacation. We needed that, right? 2 weeks of school 4 hours a day, 5 days a week, ugh!

Full Moon party. Not as in sane as the stories I had heard. I still keep my hopes high for the next one, though.

10/02/12 –04/03/12

Our next subject, “Personal development and communication”, took the group to a whole new level. The spirit was a high as ever! Now we had both our inner and outer health secured J.

Then, 10 people had to go back home to Denmark… Before parting, we held a goodbye party by the beach where we enjoyed great food and atmosphere accompanied with a beautiful song sung by Julie Mortensen. After the song we lit some wish lamps. The atmosphere was ceremonial and beautiful.

05/03/12

We flew to Bangkok, said goodbye to the others, and spent one eventful evening in Bangkok…

06/03/12 –12/03/12

The next day we went back to Bangkok airport to welcome the new group of people joining the second part of the programme. In spite of their long journey which still had one last stop, they seemed on top of it all and ready to be a wave of refreshment. A couple of hours later, we landed in Chiang Mai and checked in at Top North Hotel. We spent some days in cultural Chiang Mai, got to know the new fellows before spending three days in the most breathtaking surroundings in Chiang Dao.

12/03/12 –18/03/12

Everybody flies to Koh Samui but adventurous I stay! I have been allowed to volunteer at an organic farm called Panya. This was an eye opening experience as to how we can also live, alternatively to our present lifestyles.

Here, I'm doing everything from scratch. Rewarding !

Some of the other inspiring volunteers at Panya from all over the world (Australia, Canada, Brazil, Belgium, Italy, Denmark, Thailand, Israel, USA, Japan).

18/03/12 –29/03/12

2 weeks of philosophy.

29/03/12 –04/04/12

Bangkok

04/04/12 –08/04/12

Full Moon Party number 2

08/04/12 - 28/04/12

Project management and team building

29/04/12 –04/05/12

Shanghai

04/05/12 -12/06/12

Kyoto, Japan

12/06/12 –11/07/12

Bali, Indonesia

11/07/12 –01/08/12

Japan

01/08/12

COPENHAGEN !!!