About courage

Courage has been one of my core values for quite a while. I value this value a lot. I could not resist this repetition even if it is a cheap trick. Am I a courageous person though? In some ways, definitely, but in some not at all. I would like to blame some of my shortcomings on my upbringing and my overprotective mother, but I had a lot of time to fix some problems. The fact is that I do not swim, and I do not ski because I was afraid of deep water and speed on slippery tracks. Some excuse may be that growing up in the middle of Poland there was no water or mountains around. I am aware that it is only a weak excuse and that I should own up to the fact that I am not able to do those things that an average Australian can. I can boast, however, that I walked on fire, though. Twice!

                                                                            

                                         

I am talking about physical courage, and there are of course other types. I may score better in some other disciplines of courage. I am not sure what I may come up with when I begin to reflect and analyse my case.

The reason why this subject came to my mind today is that I started to think about and plan my Christmas. One could say: already??? For a person who does not have the family around, Christmas is a time of challenge that needs solutions and planning. Strangely enough, I noticed that one of my posts about Christmas had been read recently few times. It is not only me who thinks about Christmas is September then.   What has this to do with courage? Not much, but it has a bit, the way I look at it. I always wanted to see Angkor Wat, and I was not sure how I could do it. It seemed a bit risky. There are few places in the world I would like to see and wonder if it is not beyond me to travel solo to India and South America. Africa somehow does not work on my imagination enough to want to go there, and nobody is trying to convince me otherwise. Europe is another kettle of fish. Europe is home, and I feel relatively comfortable traveling there especially that I perhaps could have the company of my fabulous niece, Martyna and my old Uni friend Basia. Maybe even of my young nephew Peter. For the coming year I am planning to go Madrid and with some luck to Italy again, Arezzo is firmly on my mind.

Dreaming of Italy again and Piero della Francesca's frescos

                                  

This was a bit of dreaming about future travels and by verbalizing the aspirations, I feel energized and hopeful that I will make them a reality. 

Going back to the trigger of this post and the possibility of spending Christmas and the New Year in Cambodia and Laos; it all started as a random thought after reading a coincidental email notifying me of the possibility.  After few minutes looking at the literary, prices and dates, I realized that having sufficient courage I should decide to go.  I will be fulfilling one of my dreams which I had classified as unrealistic.  Why unrealistic? Heavy suitcase, demanding walks, the behaviour of my heart? It is all manageable if I have the courage and stop to play safe and sensible. Suddenly I got a shot of enthusiasm and started to think that it is not always safe to play safe. My always wise friend Basia cautiously approved of my new idea, but I was sensing some reservations. It made me hesitant again. But perhaps it is better not to think too long about “to go or not to go,” pluck up the courage and just book the trip. The issue is still open.

                                 

Memories of Christmas

Christmas went by in a way that it was not too exuberant for me. Nice and homely though.  There were no Polish excesses of 12 dishes on my Christmas Eve table this year but my Aussie favourites – oysters, prawns and a blue swimmer crab. Even if I do not follow the lessons of my original catholic upbringing, I still follow the tradition of fasting on Christmas Eve. Fasting in the sense that no meat should be present on the table this special day. In this case, I am more catholic than the Pope. The Christmas Eve fast has been actually abolished some time ago by Vatican. But at my family home there was never any meat this evennig and for some reason it is important to me to keep the tradition.

Even if it was a non event Christmas, I got two presents that I enjoy very much and that have left a mark of Christmas 2014. I am a tea drinker and all accessories related to tea are very important to me. I have many tea pots and special tea cups but I still stop at tea shops and examine any possibilities to add to my collection. My friend recognising the weakness of mine, gave me for Christmas a lovely tea pot and matching mugs. I am enjoying my tea in the new mug while I am writing this post.

Another special gift from another dear friend was a book by John Baxter – The Most Beautiful Walk in the World. John Baxter is an Australian writer who lives in Paris. As it turns out we, John Baxter and I, have at least one thing in common. Love for Paris is the thing. For many years I have been fascinated by France and French and especially Paris. A promise of three years of life in Paris many years ago, made me leave my home country. It turned out to be only eleven moths and the Paris assignment continued, to my chagrin, in Dusseldorf but I had great time in this wonderful city even if at that time I was home sick crazy.

The book about Paris woke up my love and fascination with Paris. It also reminded me of flaneur-ing. I heard first the word flaneur from another friend of mine, who likes the word so much that he is going to camino flaneur-ing in Spain. This is taking the word flaneur to its extreme. So many kilometres of flaneur-ing! I think that this is a great plan, Hans, and I envy you.

So what does it mean to flaneur? It is to wonder the streets without an intent to get somewhere but just to observe what’s around. Diane Johnson, in her book Le Divorce, defines it as "mess[ing] around with no guilty sense of being unoccupied." So maybe Hans will  not  exactly flaneur in Spain as his intention is to get to Santiago de Compostela is clear.

Rain should not stop a real flaneur

After reading the book and under its influence, I took into flaneur-ing in Mosman. My observations include inspecting the neighbouring properties. Checking the architecture, gardens, size of the houses, local pets.... I am wondering if being a flaneur in Mosman does not carry a bit of danger of being misunderstood for a Peepping Tom. Paris is definitely the ideal place to flaneur, but for now Sydney suburbs will have to do for me.

Curiosity and need for detail in observations are important to a flaneur

Flaneur-ing in Mosman made me notice that gardens of the properties are shrinking and the houses expend their living space. This is not a happy observation. Green spaces are shrinking. Mosman Council pay attention!