oh what a time

my lovely friend kelly stepped gracefully into her thirtieth year this past weekend and oh what a celebration we had.

her, ali, and i went down to jalishwae for the weekend. its south east, almost to the very most southeast tip of the island and its quite possibly my newest n dearest place in the world.

its tiny. and its slow. and its happy.

the juxtaposition of lush rolling mountains to baby blue sky to turquoise sea is at once calming and stirring until it settles into a peaceful feeling of recognizing that you are exactly where you should be.

paradise.

we arrived around eleven am, split a veggie omelet, some toast, and a salad before changing into our bikinis and sun hats and walking down to the beach [about a two minute walk]. the beach was a little torn up from the recent typhoons so we stepped among driftwood and treasures until we settled under a rainbow umbrella.

i realised while playing in the surf that afternoon that ive never spent so much time in the sea. ive never lived so close to the ocean and im starting to learn its in and outs. i can notice its patterns and how it changes the areas around it. i like our new found relationship.

we spent hours reading, musing, sipping cold beers from our cooler, and swimming. it was the most lovely n relaxing cycle of activities. kelly read us love poems from pablo neruda and ali shot photos of sea treasures and i read and wrote and finally the three of us napped under our big umbrella. 


working doubles has caught up with me and while they woke from their siesta after an hour i kept dreaming under my sun hat cuddled up in the cool shady sand. i awoke to ali shrieking and telling me we got the apartment! our new home is ours. it was relieving and exciting and exactly what was meant to happen. i feel so happy and excited.


we sauntered back to our beautiful hotel room soon after. it was complete with an epic shower, an outdoor patio with big wooden sliding doors to the outside where you could see the beach and a lovely birds cage light fixture above the bed.


we had heard of a pizza place in a rock garden that was a must so i called them up to make reservations and a mellowed out guy told me i was in luck because his 'wife was away for the weekend, so come on by n stay late.' we grabbed our bottle of champagne, a bottle of red, and some of the fireworks we had purchased for the weekend and set out for the secret garden. a sweet charcoal gray stray dog we took to calling maggie walked us the entire way and protected us. she ended up falling in love with the dog at the garden and stayed with us all night. the garden was lush and magical and smelt of night jasmine. the owner was a guy named johnathan from toronto who took quite a liking to us and we ended up staying for hours and hours eating the most delicious Mediterranean and veggie pizzas and enjoying champagne then wine then taiwan beers then had him video tape us setting off sparklers which were actually definitely fireworks while we danced around to neil young. it was perfect. he told us of wild n whimsical tales about living where he gets to. he pays equivalent to 150 cdn for a house on the beach with this wonderful garden in the backyard where he serves delicious pizza whenever he feels like working. he told us of a ship that had been shipwrecked on the beach only about a year and a half ago. of the treasures he found and of the indian man whose wallet he was finally able to return. 


finally, we made it home. each showered and fell into a deep and restful sleep that i havent experienced in some time. we slept til we woke, showered again, and sauntered to a breakfast of banana walnut pancakes, blueberry pancakes, banana chocolate chip pancakes, and eggs and hashbrowns and good coffee. and all included in the price of the hotel room. if you can even fathom that.


slipped into bikinis again and meandered back down to our spot on the beach. we swam even longer the second day and played in the waves that jalishwae is so known for. surfers littered the surf and it was so fun being able to watch their gracefulness on the crest of the waves. we snacked on cherries and grapes and sprayed a lemon n chamomile potion into our hair to bring out the gold. we left brown n blonde [ali left perfectly bronzed n brunette] and threw on dresses before heading back to kaohsiung.


oh what a time.


i certainly do live on a special little tropical island, i do i do.


happy birthday kelly, you are lovely