Wednesday 20 April 2016

Home in Canggu - 100 days away from Germany

...I don' think of all the misery but the beauty, that still remain....

After one week in Gilis and 3 weeks in Ubud I am finally back home in Canggu.This place is definitely what I am calling home here in Bali. I am back again at the same place and even at the same room. Back to my friends Owen, Andy, Agustin, Lisa, Kim, Dee and two new family members Niki and Yannick. Most of us living at the same guesthouse with a big lovely local family. Everybody has his own room but we share the kitchen. We spend a lot of time together, eating, going out, enjoying the sunsets, going for some trips, some of us surf every day (me still not, even I live in surfers paradise).



Canggu has several really good fancy places to eat very good and healthy food. The problem is, that I can't afford doing this every day as it is expensive (if you are not on holidays here :-). I buy my fruits at the market mostly and I really love the local warungs (small indonesian restaurant, whit simple typical cheap food). My favourite is still Nasi Campur (kind of buffet, which various food like tofu, tempe (pressed soy beans), curries, chicken, mie and nasi goreng. Sooo delicious.
But the best thing over everything is, that I am finally me again. It took me nearly two months now to just feel relaxed, my mind is relaxed, I am completely happy with myself again. I had to do this break from my previous life in Germany, otherwise I would gone crazy already. Stress, consume, work, people complaining about every little unimportant thing (me mostly), waiting the week to be weekend, waiting the months until going travelling again, waiting to the day to be happy again and when I look back...This was the best thing ever, and everybody who says to me, he/she can't! This is absolutely not true!!! People are just comfortable, to step out their comfort zone. I met so many people here who exactly did the same. Of course you can't just go without nothing. I saved many the whole last year, I sold everything I don't need and now I am here, with my two backpacks and more happy then ever. What do you really need to be happy? For me this is not a car anymore, this is not a well equipped apartment, a lot of expensive shoes or clothes. I wear my shirt 3 days in a row I owe only one pair of flipflops and nobody, me at least, don't care about it. My skin is taned, I can go swimming everyday in the ocean,  I still date the most beautiful guy in the world sometimes ;-), I got 3 new tattoos (and no I still will more) by my friend Noah, I sit on my scooter (and I loooove the traffic here :-), heat in my meanwhile pretty long hair, and just drive around, collecting smiles from all the people living here, exploring villages I probably would never find again. Of course maybe there's the day, when I wake up and say, I don't want this life anymore. I miss everything in Germany and I just want to go back. And if this day should come, I will come back, but at least I had a great time in life and I regret nothing!









So many good things happened already here, and at the end only two bad things...which turned back into positive again. My scooter, which got stollen came back and I got my whole money back from the rental. My creditcard got skimmed but at the end I was lucky, as they couldn't manage stealing my money as my bank already blocken the card. Maybe my karma is not that bad ;-). I am super calm (a feeling I usually didn't knew before) and this morning I found myself being angry, because one of those tourists ladies drow a car at the shortcut, which is not really open for the cars, but at the end the local drivers can handle it. European tourists can NOT!!!!!!! She nearly crashed me down to the rice paddies and this was the moment when my serbian temperament came back and I told her what I had on my mind.
I had to realize that teaching yoga, or even finding another kind of job here seems impossible, because of no work permit. The government is very strict here, which is at the end a big plus for the local people, as no foreigner can't take their jobs anymore that easy. This is what I call taking care of the own citizens, something which doesn't really work anymore in Germany. But this means for me that I already have some new plans, new country and the idea sounds meanwhile too good in my mind and in my heart. I am not going to tell which country as it's still in planning.
My heart brakes of just thinking of leaving Bali, as I love this place with all my heart, but changes are the best things in life, I realize now...









Sunday 10 April 2016

Bali Spirit Festival 2016

My friend Ruth and I already bought the tickets for the Bali Spirit Festival more than 6 months ago. We were so super exited to go there. Finally Ruth arrived some days before the festival and we both spent great time together already before the festival even started. Seeing each other one year later, we had so many things to speak about.
The festival was great, we tried some new yoga styles:
Laughing yoga: at the beginning we had no idea what is going to happen. But the more we got into it the more it got better and better. At the end we laughed like crazy, we hugged each other, people you never seen before, we looked into each others eyes and yeah....we felt love after 90 minutes. Simply great! Thank you lovely Kay Warurik.
I especially was super keen to finally join the class of Young Ho Kim, the german teacher. At the end the whole group followed his beautiful flow with Beyonces Song "Listen" but most he caught me at the end, as he told us his story, how he discovered yoga and got yoga teacher. Once again he remind me to ALWAYS listen and follow my heart and my dreams, and only then you are on the right path. Thank you, Young Ho Kim for your smiling face and the photo afterwards :-)
And as an ashtangi at heart I thought there's nothing which compares to it! Until we went to Jivamukti. OMG! 2 full hours and I was simply dead afterwards. Dead but super happy! Jivamukti, you got me :-)
I have to say that we both didn't like all this vinyasa classes with loud music and dancing, as we both prefer the traditional yoga, but this doesn't mean that it wasn't good, this is just our opinion. And I as well realized that theres is still a long way to be completely spiritual as sometimes I felt completely lost in some sessions.
At the end I had great times there and I really enjoyed, but I cannot say that this festival changed my life in any way, how many peoples did. I am ok with my life so far.  But I can highly recommend it to everybody who never was here before. I met lovely people from so many countries and had great raw vegan food, everything was colorful and the venue was simply paradise. Bali Spirit Festival, see you next time again!






















Friday 1 April 2016

It's not always sunshine in paradise...

it sometimes rains...Nearly everyday for a short time, because it's still the rainy saison. What's the difference to home? It's still hot here :-)
Some of you maybe think, and yes I have to admit that all my pictures just show happy times, that I am permanently happy. At the end the most time I am....but there are some days when I am not, which is completely normal. I already mentioned that I feel a kind of homesickness.... This is a feeling I didn't knew before. I was texting my friends back home and was super annoying :-( until I woke up 3 days before telling to myself, what a fool I am. Finally I am there, where I wanted to be, finally I have enough time to study Indonesian language, finally time to practice yoga the half day. And what am I doing? Crying high level....So this is the moment when I told to myself to stop it!
I am in Ubud now, the Bali Spirit Festival is ongoing. Jo and Grace, my friends I met at Krantis in India are here and yesterday finally my lovely friend Ruth arrived :-). Ruth and I attended the 200 hrs yoga teacher training at Krantis last year together.
If I should describe Ubud with one word it would be: GREEN! It's green where ever you look around. And all of these lovely smiling people. No matter where you are! And everybody is just helpful. I feel home here definitely.
Yesterday Ruth and I went to Seminyak. We rented a motorbike and trusted first to Google Maps. Of course we got completely lost somewhere in Denpasar. We drove streets I would never find again...but...you just have to ask the local people. The way back we just drove...And always asked. Man, I never trust Google Maps again. Only the local people. Don't really know how to express my love to them here.
How we spend our days? We do yoga, eat a lot and go to parties. We went out with a real Ubud Rockstar who showed us some really cool places in Ubud with good live music and nightlife. I hug a lot of street dogs every night, of course :-) and I go to the market every morning, meanwhile my Indonesian language is that good that I can order my food, buying stuff and have some small talks. Improving every day more and more...