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 |   ON THE WRITE PATH: travel journal for Around-the-World in 2015, 16, 18. |
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For there are many paths.  A tlog. A travel blog. A keeping-track of my trials, er.. travels. February 26, 2015 until ... June 18,2015. January 12, 2016 until February 15, 2016. November 13 to 30 2018 ... 2019, 2020: Taiwain. I went nowhere in 2021. 2022: Portugal, Thailand. Will include: Hawai'i, Japan, Australia, South Africa, Untied Arab Emirates, Portugal, Norway, Ireland and... (2015) ... Norway and Estonia (2016), México (2018), Taiwan, Balkans, Baltics, Turkey, Costa Rica, Nicaragua. Vi får se.  "Where I have traveled, stayed and visited. Over 181 places."     |
| Bus trip through nowhere I muse... If one bus is late the other will wait. I converse with a football player in school in the city. He gets off at a stop betweeen nowhere and nowhere, where one person waits to get on and go west. We roll over the iron rails of abandoned tracks, our tracks bound by white lines on the edges divided in two by yellow down the middle. We are grey-haired, fair-haired, the missing generation in-between is at work somewhere. Mustard blazes in fields under a scrape of white across blue. Sun bursts forth with hawkeye and dandelion. Lupine makes a new home on disturbed soil. I'm in peace with their wands of purple, pink and blue. White waves of wild carrots bid us on. A glimmer of river, a glance, no time to gaze. The bus presses on through white peaking over pine. We ascend from the advance of Summer to the retreat of Winter. We carry with us the tastes and smells of Spring: orange chocolate on the tongue, a late night dinner's leftovers, gas escaping. Aurdal. 12:12, an auspicious hour. A roof of scalloped slate. Sons of trolls live here between the ruins of stones. As flowers recede we enter the last strongholds of the Snow Queen. What seep of rock don't we see? What weep of the odorless rot of a child that wasted away centuries ago? Here history lays with the plague, witnesses the famine. We jiggle along a windy road, my nerves jarred, my jaw opens in a yawn. Birch greens on the scree. A lip of snow snarls at moss. Below we welcome the return to short-lived Spring. © Kåre Enga 11.june.2015 (edited June 30th) Note: while taking the bus from Lillehammer to Borlaug. |
| The park under the bridge 9. In a circle of men, a dog ignores the passing pipe, hacky-sack and hoops. Music wafts from the other side of the parking lot. Smoke rings the air. Too hot to move. Evening slows to a trot as old music gallops by. Breeze flutters bronzing maple wings. Half-a-moon hangs high in the hazy sky. Bird flit to soft chatter, a smile, laughter. Above green watered lawns, mountains loom losing thier color to drought. What purpose drives this Summer gathering? Nothing I can see or overhear. © Kåre Enga 25.06.2015. 10. Sitting on a fish that doesn't move, I pet a white dog as a band sings to classic cars, weeds waving in the flow of warm water. Scant clouds hover over relentless heat; tomorrow it will be warmer, 100º. These fish will still be bronzing in the sun, still swimming up their gravel stream path past Ty of the mismatched socks, glowing tie-die shorts and floppy hat. He smiles with his wide blue eyes, an incredible, totally edible, Ty. © Kåre Enga 26.06.2015. |
| In repose Start at the corner where wild strawberries bloom, where moss clings to walls of rough granite. Climb past the place where you shower, where you sleep. Take a photo of roses, fjord and sky. Don't shy away from the wind thru the lilacs. Embrace a new driveway, marvel at old wood, older stone. Clover clings to grass, lilacs arch overhead. The road will divide you. Choose. Orchards of apple and pear will protect you regardless. Now Solvorn lies half-hidden below, huddles of white, red and grey. Dots nestle between lumpy mountains hugging the inlet. Birch waves in a breeze, a hammer pounds at the addition to a house. The old road still goes up. Go down towards the white church. Children play this raw day, flit between tents, the other side of the fence from mown hay, oblivious of the cold. Wonder whether your hands will ever be warm again. Stuff them in a pocket then view a slope of uncaring lupines, daisies white as fresh snow. Reach the church and open the wrought iron cross of the gate. The church bells are silent, the door locked beneath a lit lamp. Visit the dead: a Walaker gone at 14, a Solvorn who lived to be 80. Find the grave of a Kaare who was alive when you first came here. The sun has come out, scant warmth for the living. The dead respond in stone: Takk For Alt. Among pansies and geraniums, one last pink tulip spreads his lips this 15th of June. Begonias bloom. Fragrant carnations grace a painted stone: "Tenkar på deg". Yes, let's think of you over the rumble of a tractor, distant yelps of the youth. Can the dead hear the living close the gate as they leave? Two cars bounce over the speed bumbs "farts dempere" before you. Look out over deep blue brackish water. Notice how dry your mouth is. Turn left at the sign with the apple that points to your temporary home. the dead in repose the day in repose © Kåre Enga 15.June.2015; Solvorn, Noreg. Note: original in notebook. Edited 25.June.2015. |
| Glitter All that glitters isn't gold; diamonds sparkle. In the souq it's buy and sell or perish. All bearers of dirhams or euros or dollars are welcome. Even back alley cats know this. They meow and deign to be petted. One can be poor in a country that shares. Men walk by, casual or formal, western or eastern, old and young. Women stroll in black or black with glitter. The Indians and Africans burst forth in color upon color. Dubai is a feast for the eyes. The world shops here, works here, eats here. I eat cashew cookies from Oman, feta from Egypt, Phillipine crackers. I drown it with rose milk, cardamom milk, water from the tap. I could die of thirst in this desert. But even without money I wouldn't starve here. a black dress glitters, hides gold © Kåre Enga 22.april.2015 Note: earlier version was written on a post card sent from Dubai to Gary McPike. NB: earlier version: All that glitters isn't gold; diamonds sparkle. In the souq it's buy and sell or perish. All bearers of dirhams or euros or dollars are welcome. Even the cats of the back alleys know this. They meow and deign to be petted. One can be poor in a country that shares. Men walk by, casual or formal, western or eastern, old and young. Women stroll in black or black with glitter. The Indians and Africans burst forth in color upon color. Dubai is a feast for the eyes. The world shops here, works here, eats here. I eat cashew cookies from Oman, crackers from Phillipines, feta from Egypt. I drown it with rose milk, cardamom milk, water from the tap. I won't starve here. |
| Entry that didn't get posted? ...hope to edit what I've written in my notepad. Hope to get back into daily writing. My writing has suffered this trip. Hopefully, my notes and my photos will help. Today is repacking, sending the last post cards, counting my wounds and my money. At least I know where my key is! And Lavinia was kind enough to remind me of the building security code. I've lost keys and forgotten the code before... My futue trips: Costa Rica: hopefully very soon... as soon as I can find cheap flights. Would like be there July 15-August 15. Seattle: between August 19th and September 23rd as my mother (age 93) is visiting my sister. Norway: January 12th. My ticket is already purchased. May go north to Tromsø. Japan: will return. No idea when. Portugal: will return. May link to another trip. Sénégal: still on my thoughts. December-April is best. Weather is better in December; festivals in April. Iceland and/or Alaska: could be one-way back from Norway. Balkans: on hold. Burkina Faso/Togo/Benin/Niger, Cameroon, Uganda/Rwanda/Kenya: on hold. Colombia: could be alternative trip December/January instead of Costa Rica. Antarctica: when someone buys me a one-way ticket.  263 |
| Solvorn Smooth asphalt, stones own the middle. I walk past white spirea and rhubarb in bloom, though the faint smell of the last apple blossoms. Snow glints off the tops of mountain. It's been a cold Spring. A distant fall of water greets the ears. I meet a young woman climbing. Easier to allow the breeze show the way down, descend into the aroma of lilacs in full bloom. Sun comes out. Blue sky in the west. Upturned canoes, yellow and scarlet. Zig under a flag waving, zag again to the left. Double pink lilacs beg me to inhale by the upscale hotel. Food! The small store is open! Every day until 9. I'm in luck. I go down to the harbor. A man skips a stone. Ten jumps over clear water. Green weeds hug the shore. I go up again by another path through tree roses (a.k.a. apples), the least traveled path. Weeds growing over stones, ending in a cul-de-sac. I retrace my steps. Shadows now guard the way. Sun still high in the south-west. I go through a tunnel of white picket fences, hedges and wasps. Once again the curves. Nothing is straight in an old settlement. A cloud sneaks in between me and the sun. I find the parking lot. And a secret way between white blooms guiding me up to Eplet's Bed and Apple. a yellow hose snakes across strewn petals. © Kåre Enga 2015.06.14. Solvorn, Norway. 274 |
| Hot and Cold 1. I'm a lava rock, searing through your nightmares. You send me to Hot Springs to let out stream, to let my worry flow to bigger waters where drops of anguish meld with joy and vanish on their way to oceans of tranquility. Banished, I soak in pools with elk and deer. Pines enclose me here among hills that bison once called home, where they still roam imprisoned by wire and ignorance... ours. I slumber with grey wolves on smooth hot stones where sulphur cleanses as lavender wafts its fragrance, peaches bloom and melons ripen. I save a spot for you beside me. As seasons pass and snowflakes land on my tongue and golden leaves drop one-by-one, I share them with you. But once awake, this nearby place, these Hot Springs, like your heart, stays hidden from me. 2. Your eyes glaze over ice you cannot skate. Cold breath hangs frozen by stiff winds. In dreams we journey south to where black penguins gather, where nothing grows, where humans huddle in low slung huts. Where clothing, food and shelter obey one rule: what must come in must go out. I ask, where do they put their piss and shit? I wait for your answer ear to mouth. Your silence speaks. At work your gut now grumbles. And I wonder if it's that bullshit they feed you every day. Where do you put it all? Can you let it out? In your dream, while Antarctica sleeps, you keep your wisdom far far away, your warm flesh further. Note: for Listowel wrokshop. Write about two places you have never been, one far, one close. 231 |
| Will be off to Trá Lí tomorrow. Not ready for the travel-writing workshop! Ack. I wrote yesterday and today but don't seem to make the time to edit or post. Help! 224 |
| Saga of the Sock Along the Askerselva I ran away from grey skies and the grey person who owned me once; sought color among the scents of dandelions, mustards and glossy buttercups in bloom. I set my sights high. I wanted to climb oaks and maples, nestle in arms of a mother elm. But without a leg to hoist me up... I fell. Exhausted I lie here now. Do not mourn me as you pass. I am surrounded by angelwings of mapleseeds, caressed by souls of shoes. © Kåre Enga [Oslo, 23.mai.2015.] Notes: 1. 'wings of green mapleseeds' changed to 'angelwings of mapleseeds'. Better image and rhythm. First posted, with photo that inspired it, on facebook. 2. 'souls' is intended. |
I don't know what to write. Our workshop leader suggested we use people to help drive our narrative... but people are seldom part of my narrative. I live alone. I travel alone. I meet and greet and talk to people all the time, but... they are seldom part of my journey. Argh.  Mandal, Norway: White on white Decide to take the bus. Run to it. Pray it won't leave for a few minutes if you get there at the last second... maybe... Sit behind a woman on crutches, point the camera out the window. Try, real hard, to capture something interesting in a landscape of pine, birch, rock and water. Lo! A horse! Did you click on the shutter quick enough? Find out later. There's more boring landscape to witness. Try to imagine it as exciting. Try harder. Don't bother. Mandal is a white town. White houses. White buildings. White flowers in front of white lace in white windows. Try your hardest to make something of that! Only the people, in various hues, add some color. And they are few. Mandal is a small town with a small wooden center, a harbor of small boats, a couple bridges... white, of course and low and short. The only big thing around are the rocks. Huge rocks. Hard dark igneous rocks that look like they'd been tossed around by giants. White buildings huddle in their shadows. Except for today. There are no shadows! The Sun has taken a Spring Vacation and sent her grey minions to shower their love upon you. You grumble your gratefulness and seek shelter. Snap a few last pictures. Find a postcard of white buildings. Avoid that pale wet whitish slant coming for you... run to the bus. Say thank-you to the women who chases after you with your dropped scarf. A bright green-yellow-orange plaid scarf. A welcomed spot of color. © Kåre Enga 18.mai.2015 i Kristiansand, Noreg. |
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