My Wandering Days Are Over

Photo: Kamakura-Enoshima Furii Kippu, day pass for a trip to the region in Kanagawa-ken, with a background of commuters hurrying for the Shonan-Shinjuku line back to the city. I had visited Kamakura for the first time on my first trip to Japan, in July 2008. It was such a pleasure to return on my last full day in Japan, in Asia, to go back to see the Daibutsu (Great Buddha) and the Kannon Hasedera Temple, as well as new discoveries like Enoshima Island. Six months on, so much to revisit, so much new to find.

You know my wandering days are over
Doesn't mean that I'm getting boring
You tell me
I'm tired of listening to myself here

I'm back! Safely home! And although, like in the song by Belle & Sebastian, "six months on, the winter's gone", I'm not filled with melancholy like the lonely circus boy and disenchanted pony. Instead I'm full of energy to leap into my new life, to settle into Vancouver, and to sort through the detritus of what seems like several past lives currently tucked into myriad boxes.

But I'm not turning my back on the trip altogether. I've transferred all 7,389 photos to my computer, and eventually I'll start sorting through them and posting some more here. Although I never got around to writing most of my planned posts on my travel music, I might get around to it now...and there are always future trips to plan.

You know my bip-bopping days are over
I hung my boots up and then retired from the disco floor
Now the centre of my so called being is
The space between your bed and wardrobe with the louvre doors

Lyrics here.

Gamelan

Wayang kulit (shadow puppet) show in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.

More than that

Photo: Thatched bamboo house with rice straw roof in a Khmu village, Luang Prabang province, Laos.

I associate the song "Guess How Much I Love You" by the Lucksmiths with being twenty and being in love, and finding any separation at all an ominous, painful gulf. But when I was compiling my travel playlist it felt rather appropriate too.

I bought a postcard
I'm getting close but
I haven't got around to it yet
I know I said I'd write
And maybe I might

It's harႈd to pull together all the threads while travelling, hard to live in the moment and also get to all those things that need doing. Sometimes I feel like all I can think about are obstacles; and things to feel anxious about; and the moments spent waiting for something to happen, as if all the day is nothing but in-between time.

On the map the gap's three fingers
But it's more than that
More than that

Distances can seem so incalculably large when you look at two points, if all you think of is the gulf between them. But travelling this way, roaming over the surface of the earth and finding the familiar in so many previous unknowns, I find myself thinking of it the other way around. It's not gaps any more, but just so much more space to be filled, so much more possibility.

Lyrics.

The playlist: revisited

I've just passed the halfway point in my trip and in honour of this milestone I wanted to revisit my original idea for the blog focus - my travel playlist. To date, I've only written the initial post, but with a few months left I might still manage to get the better part of it in.

The night before I left I managed to put some of the songs up to be listened to, but to my frustration I could only get about half the playlist on there. More frustratingly, it's a skewed half that cuts out nearly everything that wasn't in English (half the list) and even some of the less popular anglo stuff. Furthermore, now that I'm in a different region, I can't actually see what's there and what isn't. So I thought I'd start by posting the entire list all together, then continue with individual posts on the songs as I go.

Without further ado:

1. KYOTO, Polémil Bazar
2. BARCELONE, Jean Leloup
3. GO PLACES, The New Pornographers
4. BRIDGES AND BALLOONS, Joanna Newsom
5. SHOULD I STAY OR SHOULD I GO?, The Clash
6. DESPIDIDA DE IMMIGRANTE, Cesaria Evora
7. SOMEWHERE OVER THE RAINBOW/WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD, Israel Kamakawiwo'ole
8. CITY OF THE DAMNED, The Gothic Archies
9. NICOTINE & GRAVY, Beck
10. MY WANDERING DAYS ARE OVER, Belle & Sebastian
11. NANTES, Beirut
12. PARADIS PERDU, Jean Leloup
13. THE LEGIONNAIRE'S LAMENT, The Decemberists
14. TIENS-TOÉ BIEN J'ARRIVE, Diane Dufresne
15. J'ERRE, Dumas
16. THE LADY IS A TRAMP, Ella Fitzgerald
17. READING IN BED, Emily Haines & the Soft Skeleton
18. ALL WE HAVE IS NOW, The Flaming Lips
19. JET SET...GO!, The Guild League
20. AMSTERDAM, Jacques Brel
21. JULY, JULY!, The Decemberists
22. VOYAGER, Jean Leloup
23. LA TRAVERSÉE, Les Colocs
24. COME BACK FROM SAN FRANCISCO, The Magnetic Fields
25. GREEN ROCKY ROAD, Kate & Anna McGarrigle
26. CLAM, CRAB, COCKLE, COWRIE, Joanna Newsom
27. PAPA WAS A RODEO, Kelly Hogan & the Pine Valley Cosmonauts
28. SHOREBIRD, Kim Barlow
29. THAT TEENAGE FEELING, Neko Case
30. J'Y SUIS JAMAIS ALLÉ, Yann Tiersen
31. VOILA L'ÉTÉ, Les négresses vertes
32. I'M SO FREE, Lou Reed
33. GUESS HOW MUCH I LOVE YOU, The Lucksmiths
34. CALIFORNIA (ALL THE WAY), Luna
35. ALL THE UMBRELLAS IN LONDON, The Magnetic Fields
36. WALKING SONG, Kate & Anna McGarrigle
37. JE SUIS PARTI, Jean Leloup
38. CARRY ME, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
39. DESAPARECIDO, Manu Chao
40. TODAY IS A GOOD DAY, MC Solaar
41. LAND DOWN UNDER, Men at Work
42. MUTINY, I PROMISE YOU, The New Pornographers
43. PAR REVE, Misia
44. RACING LIKE A PRO, The National
45. WORLD IS SPINNING AT 45 RPM, Pizzicato Five
46. THIS TORNADO LOVES YOU, Neko Case
47. MYRIAD HARBOUR, The New Pornographers
48. THE GET GO, New Young Pony Club
49. THERE SHE GOES, MY BEAUTIFUL WORLD, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
50. COLD COLD GROUND, Tom Waits
51. LE VENT NOUS PORTERA, Noir Désir
52. UN HOMME À LA MER, Stéfie Shock
53. FADO DO RETORNO I, Misia
54. VIA CON ME, Paolo Conte
55. CHICAGO, Sufjan Stevens
56. KIMBERLY, Patti Smith
57. ALL AROUND THE WORLD OR THE MYTH OF FINGERPRINTS, Paul Simon
58. WHERE IS MY MIND, The Pixies
59. I'M GONNA BE (500 MILES), The Proclaimers
60. WALK UNAFRAID, R.E.M.
61. LIFE ON MARS?, Seu Jorge
62. GENOVA PER NOI, Paolo Conte
63. WEIRD DIVIDE, The Shins
64. IS IT REALLY SO STRANGE?, The Smiths
65. TOXIC HOLIDAY, Stars
66. LE DÉCOR, Stéfie Shock
67. SEVEN SWANS, Sufjan Stevens
68. ISTANBUL, They Might Be Giants
69. SINGAPORE, Tom Waits
70. ASK, The Smiths,
71. EVOLVER, Veda Hille
72. MON AMOUR TOKYO, Pizzicato Five
73. ISLAND IN THE SUN, Weezer
74. SEVEN NATION ARMY, The White Stripes
75. THE STATE THAT I AM IN, Belle & Sebastian
76. ADVENTURES IN SOLITUDE, The New Pornographers
    

J'voudrais respirer l'air de Kyoto

J'aimerais bien savoir à quoi sers-je?
J'aimerais voir une forêt vierge
J’voudrais comprendre pourquoi Tout?
Et ne plus rien vouloir du tout

If there's anything more appropriate to kick off a transcontinental adventure than a Québec francophone klezmer song about the perils and joys of globalisation, I don't know what it is.

In any case, that's what I'm doing. In a few days I'm setting out for a six month tour of Japan and South-East Asia, and while I'm currently in that stage of preparation known as "denial" where everything feels quite unreal, it probably really is going to happen.

My plan is to blog about the trip here, and since my Brooklyn blog languished fairly quickly, I've decided to give myself a bit of a focus. Another thing I did to help prepare for my trip (=procrastinate) was to make a travel playlist - about five hours of music that in my mind at least was connected with travelling. I'm still hoping to find a way to put it all up here for you to listen to, but that may not happen.

So my focus is to use the songs to structure posts about travelling itself, as well as the details of the places I visit. This is a risky project that might degenerate rapidly into pretentious rambling, in which case I will cut it off.

Today's song, "Kyoto" by Polémil Bazar, is my response to everyone who asked me, "Why Asia?" or even better, "Why travel at all?" It's not so much that I have a good answer, more that I have a worse answer to the question "Why not?" So in this case I think I'll let the song answer for me.

The photos in this post are all from my trip to Kyoto in summer 2008. I hope to be posting new ones soon...

Oh and yes, the little wombat will be coming with me. She wants to see South-East Asia too!

The full lyrics to the song are here:
http://www.hugofleury.com/polo/texte_chants_mines.htm#KYOTO

J'aimerais voler, quitter ma tête
Aller semer partout la fête
Visiter Bagdad à vélo
J'voudrais respirer l'air de Kyoto

--Polémil Bazar