Summer has set in. ♥

Sunshine, freedom and a little flower.

Right in the eye of summer (: June came and went, then came July; and now it's almost on it's way out! Time has this tendency to fly right by you just when you're trying to savour the best of it huh? It's now just slightly over 50 days to England and I, am fucking psyched. (: I can't wait to get started on assignments and term papers, getting involved in the Innocence project, studying in the library, getting pumped up on caffeine, the cold frost in the early mornings and everything that has to do with being a law student in England. Haha... my tone might change a few weeks into school as I start to grumble about having to wake up at the ass crack of dawn and having to make the long trudge to class, but I'm fairly certain the thrill of reading law will last for a long time to come. ;)

That aside, summer thus far has been pretty awesome (: Our trip to Bangkok and Koh Tao was a blast and we met some cool people too (and lots of crazy english lads :D). Managed to get my Deep Dive and Night Dive certification this time round and clocked another 9 dives in my log book so I must say that I felt pretty damn accomplished. Haha.. It's a pity though that I did not get to see any sharks this time round. Though I did see a couple of huge rays. OH! We saw a ginormous school of barracudas! It was awesome! I managed to spot my favourite yellow box-fish a couple of times too (: With that, I don't know when I'd be able to dive again but I hope I'll be able to make it to PNG in the near future because Paul's pictures look fuckin amazing. Anyway, a few captured moments of our summer trip:

Of fire stunts and pretty sunsets (:

♥

Koh Tao was amaaaazing. For 5 days, we did pretty much nothing but dive, hang out, read, eat, sleep, rinse and repeat. (: Waking up at 630am for the morning dives was an awesome way to start the days and I miss it soooooo damn much already.

The topic of life as a dive instructor came up on a few occasions as we lamented about how awesome it must be, to wake up every morning knowing that you will be doing a job that you love. Yet I thought it must start to feel different, once that hobby becomes an obligation of sorts.. Since with a job, comes responsibilities and rules that you probably never really had to give much thought to when you were just diving for fun. It's like married life, you know. Once the kids (jobs) come, there are just some things that you can no longer freely do, because you have the responsibility to make sure your kids (students) are taken care of. Hah.

Then on our very last night, while talking to sneaky about working as an instructor, his story of going from feeling like the luckiest person in the world to constantly having to reinforce to himself the notion of "Luke! You're so lucky!" made me laugh because while I could totally relate, it also made me think back on a post I had previously wrote, about how sometimes, contentment can so easily become such an inadequate sense of satisfaction. Which, can be seen as a natural progression since we're constantly being exposed to so many different aspects of life that we can't possibly expect our sense of contentment to remain static for an extended period of time. I guess if one were to live life fully, it would then mean that contentment would never suffice?

Right... pardon my ramblings. Anyway!

Audeee and me.

Did my first couple of dives with Audeee and she, is super cool. Haha (:

So after we bid Koh Tao a sad sad sad goodbye, we headed back to Bangkok where Maine and Manda attempted to buy half of Bangkok back with them. There were many moments of "It's only $5! I might as well..." Haha. Though I have to admit that there really were a shit ton of good steals.. If I had not been on a budget, I am pretty sure I would have gone bananas too. (:

Got my visa settled the moment I came back from the trip too! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it gets approved soon. That would be an awesome awesome birthday present ;) and yesss I'm turning 24 in a couple of days! It's a travesty, I am almost a quarter century old now... to think I feel like I just turned 16 yesterday. Haha.

Alright, swedish lesson to end this off.



Consumerism

and its pitfalls.

So a friend showed me this after hearing that I've been to the Tiger Temple at Kanchanaburi. It's a horrible account of a British tourist's trip to the temple in December last year. When we were there, we did think it was kind of dodgy, cause the tigers all looked pretty doped up.. and the handlers were kinda herding us around as though we were animals too. Eric pretty much hated it. But because our 'tour' was the cheapest we could find, we weren't "entitled" to everything that the Brit experienced and did not witness the things she did. Still, it's shocking and horrible and we should have researched more on it before heading to that 'attraction'. I was naive to believe the brief accounts that I read about it being a sanctuary for tigers. The campaign and drive for action to be taken is starting to gain in strength and numbers though and I really really hope that the push is successful. So if you know of anyone who is visiting Thailand, please pass the message on. Lest they fall prey to lending a hand in the abuse of these tigers.

Coincidentally, this actually ties in with an entry that Audrey did, on the pervasiveness of consumerism. In this age that we live in, the act of buying and owning tangible goods have become a way of life. The phenomenon of consumerism has managed to slide itself subtly into every nook and cranny of the society, from the affluent to the developing. Anywhere that a cent can be found, you can be sure that there's an ad inducing you to give that cent up for something else, something that will satisfy your desires, your needs, soothe the itch of instant gratification. 

In Bangkok, the ads and brochures for the Tiger Temple are virtually in every tour package, every tour agency. With pretty pictures of roaming tigers that appeal to that animal lover in you, and pictures of monks leading these tigers appealing to that compassionate side in you, it's not surprising that so many cough up money for such an experience. And in the process, unknowingly contributing to these tigers' abuse. But it's not that we're not aware of consumerism at work. We are aware, we know that advertisements are meant to lure us, to tempt us. Yet so often, we just go along with the flow, letting the temptation of satisfying a self-serving need in us win over. I liked how Drey summed it up, that 'our outlook to the awareness of the inherent consumerism that exists today, should settle for some introspection for the things we consume and pursue'. Being consumers, we do have the power to decide where and what our spending money is channeled into.

I'm sure many hope that the tigers from the temple will get their reprieve. But with consumerism and it's prevalence in society today, where it's money, demand and supply that's keeping the economy going, I can't help but wonder how far the government will actually be willing to go, in stopping something that plays a part in the pumping of cash flow into their economy. 

Today's swedish word is, missbruka, which means abuse. It can be used in two ways.

Djur missbrukare - means animal abuse.

Ett missbrukat ord - means a misused word.