Dateline :: 21 September 2006 :: 15:53 China Time

right now, for some reason i am happy. i don't know why, i just am. i'm sitting in the train station, an hour before my overnight train to chengdu. there are hundred if not a thousand chinese people going by.
i have no idea what anyone is saying.
i have no idea what any of the signs say or what the train schedule board says.
hell, i'm not sure if i'm even getting on the right train.
but i'm sitting here watching. just watching. the screaming, the yelling, the announcements on the speaker in mandarin. none of it makes sense, yet it all makes sense. i am here, but i feel removed from it all. i'm an observer outside looking in, but i'm in the middle of it.
it's wonderful.
it's as if at this very place, at this very time, i should be right here, right now. everything is in it's right place at the right time.
throughout the hectic, fast paced scrambling happening around me, i am calm, i am contemplative, and i am happy. there is something special about being alone in a place where nothing makes sense. your senses are more keen to what's going on around you. you absorb so much of your surroundings, and you are caught up only in this exact moment in time. this must be the road to buddhist enlightenment that i've only heard of.
because for right now i am happy.
and i will continue to ride this wave as long as it lasts.

although, only one thing could make it better, Dónde está Ché Pelotas?