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The end of The Odyssey?

9 months on the road and off the road. Solo travels are over.

9 months. Today.
One would expect that after 9 months I’m going to give birth, and yes, it’s actually kind of true. I will be having a baby!
Not baby as child, but baby as girl :-) Irene is coming to Bali in just 2 days.
Today, after 9 months I arrived to Bali by ferry from Lombok, and as it usually goes after 9 months, one era is over, and another era begins. In a way my Odyssey is over, or at least its “first book” (although it’s unknown how many books it will have). My solo travels are over, at least for some time. Could be for one week or forever, but for the time being solitary roaming ends.

But if Odysseus finally meets Penelope, does it mean that this island is Ithaca? I know at least one person who would jump for joy it Bali was my Ithaca, but no I don’t think so. But anyway, from here it’s not me and my journey anymore, it’s us and our, hmmm, our journey. My formative period is over, it’s time to DO something. What’s next I have no clue, except that in 2 weeks we fly to Darwin in Australia.

With exception of few weeks with Samo, Janka, Jirka, Viktor and Hanka, I spent 9 months in such isolation that I’m not sure too many can imagine. Sure it made me bit weird, but that’s the way I like it. I started to practice mediation, I reached enlightenment on human happiness :-), I started and quit smoking, I re-started programming, had some pretty weird flirts with Hinduism, Buddhism and now with Bible, drank the least amount of alcohol per month since I had been a teenager, with exception of the time in Australia I usually didn’t speak with anyone, lost and found the most expensive material possession I have ever had, wrecked one car, wrote 157 A4 pages of blog, shoot more than 50 000 photographs, trimmed my beard twice and cut my hair 0 times.
What’s next? Let’s see…
Zeus, Shiva, Krishna, Buddha, Jehova and Jesus, bring it on! And Irene :-)

PS: When I was in minibus in Lombok on my way to the ferry two women got on the bus, and they started talking to me. They were from Hong Kong and were very sympathetic. After approximately 10 sentences they said: “We are Jehova Witnesses”. And then they added: “So now you met Jehova Witnesses … AGAIN :-)” and burst out in laughter. I loved that moment when they made fun of themselves and told them that exactly this item was missing on my check-list, so now my journey is complete :-)


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     MARCEL STRBAK | www.strbak.com | www.facebook.com/marcel.strbak