Ciao, hola, hooooi!

So after 4 days of pasta, horse meat, artichoke hearts, Serrano ham, Lambrusco and an intense reunion in Italy with Stefano after two weeks of healthy living in Bali, we were on our way to Spain. A Japanese drumming course in the mountains near Valencia. Who ever invented this? Yes, I can see you smirking…

But let me tell you this: it was fantastic! A week’s workshop, hitting small, large, larger and huge drums, learning how to play a solo on an Odaiko drum and how to tirelessly play a regular rhythm on a Chichibu was, surprisingly, a very entertaining and fun activity. My brother and I turned out to have a bit more talent than average, Stefano learned the Dutch kid’s song “Paperhat”, mom was very proud of her litter and made 1700 pictures of the whole thing. If you are ever in need of a new hobby and you consider yourself rhythmic enough, I can highly recommend learning how to play the Taiko drums.

After a week of hammering on cow skins, we rented a car and drove to Valencia and Barcelona to enjoy the pleasures of España’s lifestyle. Tapas, siesta’s, Dali, Gaudi, Flamenco… And it’s true, the Spanish really say “Ole!”. I thought it was rather old fashioned and had become a caricature trait, but it’s not. As we were admiring a Flamenco performance in a local bar, people around us were actually clapping and shouting Ole’s of approval all the time. I felt like an extra in a movie of Almodovar.

End of July, I was back in Holland. I have devoted several blogs already to the description of my feelings when back in my homeland. So I won’t repeat myself, but it still exactly like that. I love being back in Amsterdam in summer and seeing all my dear friends. I did everything I wanted to do, saw pretty much everybody I wanted to catch up with and more (especially Prosecco).

And, I actually added a new element to my yearly visit. Now that I am about to write about it, I hesitate. It’s quite personal, intimate and, all things considered, pretty disgusting too. Malesh, I’m just going to say it, or better even, come clean.

I’ve decided to undergo hydrocolon therapy. You know, colonic irrigation, or, in plain words, a major ass washing. I shall spare you the descriptive details, in case you’ve just had breakfast. In heaven’s name, why, might be your question. Well, I’ve thought long and hard about it too, and here’s the explanatory metaphore I’ve come up with – some of you have already heard this story when I was trying to explain my motivation to you.

Imagine you have a dishwasher. For years, because nobody told you, you have been putting your dishes, pans, cutlery, etc.., full of food scraps, leftovers, paper napkins and all that in the machine. For a long time, the machine does its job, all your plates come out nice and shiny. But after a while, you’re dishwasher starts performing badly. Food remainders are still stuck on your forks, the burned rice grains on the bottom of your pans are not washed out… Of course you turn to your mom for advice and she tells you to wash off the food bits before you put your plates in the dishwasher and to throw away the salad remnants from the bowl before of plonking the whole thing in the apparatus. Aaaah, you think, see, my mom is not always wrong! So you start wiping off the food from your plates and think the whole thing is thereby solved. Wrong. The dishwasher is still not working properly. So you end up calling the maintenance guy, who you have to wait for at home the whole day because he can’t tell you exactly at what time he will be there and when he gets there, he puts on his latex glove, sticks his arm elbow deep in your machine and grabs out a whole lot of putrefied food remains from your dishwasher’s filter. There you go, he says, now your thing is nice and clean. From now on, listen to your mom, don’t put any rubbish in the machine and that way, you can enjoy the pleasure of your appliance for many years to come.

So there you go. I consider hydrocolon therapy a necessary (and sort of evil) step in order to get my “machine” working properly. It is all well to start eating less meat, less fat, less sugar, more fibers, more veggies and more fruit, but if the 1,5 meters of large intestine are blocked and stuffed with old shit (literally), it’s not really going to work is it!??

And how do I feel now? Well…, shitty. In the literal sense of the word, because other than that I feel great. Shitty because the therapist gave me pills to “soften” the hard plaques of poo that are apparently stuck to my intestinal walls, and let me tell you, these pills work. Again, I shall spare you the details, but for those of you with a good sense of humour and a strong stomach, read the blog that I found on the Internet while I was researching the effects of these capsules. It’s hilariously written by a down to earth guy (yes, not by one of those zen-detox-vegan-yoga chicks) and describes pretty much what I’ve been through, though perhaps with a little more moderation. Check it out if you want a good laugh: http://ow.ly/68BOr

Well, on that note, I shall leave you, perhaps slightly nauseous and giggly, to your business.

I’m going to enjoy my last days in Holland, trying to stay near a toilet for the time being and then I’m off to Egypt, to reunite with my lovely, sexy, hot, sweet, uber patient, loyal, funny, chilled, clever, cuddly, understanding, domesticated, disciplined, caring and fantastic boyfriend whom I miss very much when he’s not around.

Anyone who wants to come and visit in the next few weeks, please do so, because you never know where we’ll end up for the next winter season. Life is still one big, unknown yet exciting adventure.

Ci vediamo, hasta luego, tot ziens!

Xxx

Yaisa