Author: lucyhannahbarritt

Diary Extracts from a Tropical Nomad – VI

Almost passing out on a stone tile floor had left me a little shaken and I was considering asking to go to hospital but I couldn’t face getting on a small speedboat and crossing the sea to a tiny clinic where nobody spoke English and I would have to do the whole thing again coming back. Instead, I ate some medicine, tried to get some sleep and the next day, I felt a little better. This was perhaps ‘The Dark Night of the Soul’. My body and my mind were frail, in danger of collapse and suffering greatly. There may be nothing worse than being ill and feeling like you have nobody to care for you. I buried myself in my room for a few days and tried to keep my spirits up.

Diary Extracts from a Tropical Nomad – V

A big lesson I needed to learn/am still learning, is that when you turn 30 you start to notice subtle changes in the way your body looks. In other words, a battle with gravity is stirring in no mans land. Political dissent is brewing in your thighs and there’s an bingo wing armada on the horizon.

Diary Extracts from a Tropical Nomad – IV

The drop in temperature as I climbed towards the national park in which the volcano lived was astonishing. I shivered as icy winds licked my fingers. You are never prepared for the cold when you are in South East Asia, you almost forget what it feels like and because your body is so used to being at a balmy 30 C, even the slightest drop renders you a shivering mess.