lost in translation

i have been back from my asian adventure for more than two weeks now, and i am still struggling to find the words to sum up an experience that was simply indescribable.  for those of you who do not know, i spent two weeks traveling in bangkok and the northern hills of thailand studying social justice issues with a group of students from the university of san francisco.  after my program ended, pat came over and we traveled to phuket, thailand and then spent another week touring tokyo,japan.  to try and explain to you my month in asia would not only be impossible, but there aren't enough words in the english language to even be probable. but i guess i will give it a shot anyway.  here it goes...

amazingly heartbreaking  completely empowering  absolutely gorgeous  thoroughly humbling  constantly thrilling   obviously emotional  truly intense  unbelievably friendly  sadly hopeless  clearly enjoyable  instantly wonderful  always new  strangely familiar  extremely luxurious  incredibly life-changing  continuously terrifying  endlessly eye-opening and  simply incredible.

i realize these adjectives are probably vague, contradictory and in desperate need of an explanation.  but until i can find a way to take you all with me, these loose translations will simply have to do.  

there is nothing like returning to a place

that remains unchanged to find the ways

in which you yourself have altered

[nelson mandela]