Don’t Worry, I’ll Tie It All Together Somehow

For nearly three days, I walked around Jakarta and Pangandaran with an odd sensation on the back of my left thigh. One way, unquestionably the best way, to imagine the sensation is to picture a midget following at your left heel so closely that you can feel their hot breath on your skin. Another way to imagine it: someone peeing on you. Regardless of how it’s described, generally speaking, it’s not normal.

So at the end of day three, I googled the seemingly hodgepodge phrase “hotness on back of thigh” expecting nothing, but straight away found a medical website explaining what the cause was and how to alleviate the symptom. I have a pinched nerve in my back.

I tweaked by back on Bubbles early on (diving off the boat, of all things), but now that I’ve returned to backpacking, I think carrying my pack has aggravated the injury. One might conclude that my pack is heavy because I’m hauling around all my cold weather clothing, hiking boots and climbing gear (of which may never find a purpose again on this trip). Ethan might tell you it’s because I’m carrying 3 iPods, though, in my pitiful defense, one is exclusively used for backing up photos. I also have some souvenirs to send home. And my pack didn’t get any lighter with the purchase of a laptop. But even then, my pack should only weigh about 15kg (30lbs), when right now it is probably more like 20-22kg (45lbs).

I think the culprit is that I’m walking around Southeast pretending I’m a walking library. Some of the books I have are reference book I’ve been carrying around for months, and thousands of miles, and multiple countries and haven’t looked at for an equally long period. I never got rid of them because I was so unsure of where I was going next.

Today I finally traded in my Lonely Planet China, a book probably only dwarfed by LP India, and a weighty reference book on sailing. Also, a phrasebook for Russia, because I thought for a long time I’d return there while in transit to Europe. Well, I’m not. China either, although I feel I’ve left a lot unseen there. As for sailing, did Captain Cook need a book? Me either. Not anymore. As long as it’s basic sailing. And the weather conditions are favorable.

In exchange for those reference books, I’ve added four books to my stack. 

1. The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens
2. Trout Fishing in America by Richard Brautigan
3. The Beautiful Room is Empty by Edmund White
4. Brave New World by Aldus Huxley (how I haven’t read this yet I don’t know) 

 A pretty fine catch, if you ask me, all of which got piled on top of the following collection:

1. The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien (how I passed this over is also a mystery)
2. The First Men in the Moon by H.G. Wells
3. The Time Machine and The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells
4. The Running Vixen by Elizabeth Chadwick. 

Before you start laughing out loud about bullet 4, let me remind you not to judge a book by its title. The Running Vixen is a historical fiction set in the time of King Henry I (12th century), and it’s a romance novel. (Okay, laugh now). Fortunately, the cover tells me that Chadwick is “The best writer of medieval fiction currently around” from the always trustworthy Historical Novels Review. Just how I wound up with this is a very, very long story that I won’t bother going into detail about.

Actually, I simply traded it with an Aussie traveler for “Farewell Hippie Heaven” by Jack Parkinson.  Before that I read “A Short History of Nearly Everything*” by Bill Bryson and in a similar vein, “A Brief History in Time*” by Stephen Hawking.

While I was on the boat I read, “Marine Diesel Engines” by Nigel Calder, because it seemed like an appropriate next read after the sailboat’s engine nearly exploded. Also on the boat was “Coming Through Slaughter” by Michael Ondaatje, the author of The English Patient.

Some other books I’ve read and discarded (going back as far as April, after which I’ve lost track):

1. The Wild Things by David Eggers
2. Pride and Prejudice* by Jane Austen (which I really enjoyed)
3. Cash: The Autobiography of Johnny Cash by Kurt Cobain
4. The English Patient* by Michael Ondaatje

And those asterisks next to the titles? Those are books I recommend if you find yourself in need of a read.

Yet, writing blog posts won't lighten my pack nor fix my back. So I’m going to stay a while longer than I expected in Pangandaran and try to finish a book or two on the beach before I leave. And if I start feeling nearer to 100%, I’ll give the surfing a go in nearby Batu Karas where the friendly beach break is a good place for wussies to learn.