Finally, in the paradise, I was feeling like I had win the EuroMillions lottery, although I was just as poor as always. It wasn’t my first time in the island, but I was way too excited for living a period of my life without much worries, and more relaxing and chilling out (thinking about it now, maybe I was looking for throwing back to my teenagerhood, lovely times), in my mind everything sounded just beautiful.
We spent some time in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria before sailing to the next islands. I had whole month of holiday, I was a perfect tourist for the entire month (if you remember that I mentioned in one of the previous text, that I had a budget for one year that lasted half year, this whole month behaving like a true tourist was the main cause), furthermore, it was my birthday…all the reasons to live la vida.
After working like a donkey in London, I spent the first two weeks in the island almost like a goddess. Now I was enjoying the sun (everyone knows the weather in London, no need to talk about it, I’m just going to say very happily ‘NO MORE COLD!), my summer clothes all day and night, reading without saving time, practicing yoga more often, visiting new places (at this time we had visited the whole island), sometimes eating out (we were abusing on sushi) and sometimes I was trying to create new recipes at the boat, once or twice going to the spa… I was doing everything I wanted to do when I didn’t have time, when I had everything to do and very little to not do. Everything was simply wonderful during these first two weeks.
Strangely, something went very wrong after so much fun, and it took me some time to realize what it could be. Normally, we struggle to adapt to hard times or to something we don’t like, so I never thought I would have hard time adapting to “good life”, with no much worries and a lot of free time (and here it’s good to remember that everything is good, always, within limits). This reminded me of a story in one of the boring history classes, that I never could understand, until passing through this experience of mine:
‘There was a king that fought to save his life and his wife, and fled to Brazil, where they had a big and beautiful house with a big garden full of fruit trees and beautiful flowers, where they would peacefully spend their days. After a while he committed suicide in the “paradise”’.
When I say to people that living in “the paradise” is frustrating and tedious, nobody believe me (who never passed through the experience, looks at me like I am the devil’s best friend).
Already used to my busy life where I was previously living, working for long hours as a mixologist-bartender, and for a short period studying as well, I found myself quite disoriented with the big change of lifestyle. It was a shift from too busy to not busy at all, therefore this quick change had a big impact on me, that was reflecting on my behavior: lack of tolerance, constant changes of mood and easily getting annoyed, laughing in a moment and crying in the next (at a point I was concerned if I wasn’t developing a bipolar disorder). I had too much free time although all the activities I was up to. I had more, eight free hours every day and I didn’t know what to do with them. Sometimes I would feel sad or irritated or moody and I couldn’t understand the reason why. After all I was in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, the golden beaches island, stunning volcanic and dunes landscapes classified by UNESCO, the island of health-giving properties of the climate, so there was no reason in my mind, to feel what I was feeling. For two slow passing weeks I was feeling lost, It felt like I was wasting my time and I was wondering if I shouldn’t be working to make more money or “studying to assure my future” (just everything we have ever been taught by our parents and society). I was confused, way too confused and had a mix of thoughts and feelings that would contradict each other (this is supposedly a characteristic of those that born under the Libra Zodiac sign, me).
Kleanthis noticed my strange behavior, which guided us to a serious and very supportive conversation, in the end that was all I needed. And everything got even better when the time to prepare Nala for the ocean came. Finally, some job to be done and keep my body and mind busy again.
Apart from my bitter period of time, my first months living in Nala were painfully funny. I mean, the sources of pain, as a new sailor, were so varied. The interior height of the boat is about 1,75 meters, this on the tallest point, which is in a 70-centimeters square space. I am 1,73 meters height (two centimeters, only, above your head is not the most comfortable thing), then I invite you to imagine the situation when I free my Afro hair (I would say that being able to walk straight at home, sometimes, is a privilege). Over and above that, as part of the decoration, there is a thin wood screwed to the whole roof, and if the boat was a living being I could definitely say that I wasn’t welcome in it, by the amount of hair I lost, being pulled out from my scalp when tangled on the screws (well, all of us know that, if someone pulls you a bunch of hair it’s painful, but pulling only one single hair, that takes you to the hell), what a sharp pain!
When you live in a house/apartment, you walk and run around as freely as a chicken with open wings, and still sometimes you hit on the corners. Well, here I couldn’t shrink myself more to get in the back cabin or in the toilet, sometimes I get in sideways just to vary. And you know the little toe so many of us hit, mostly, against the leg of the table, right here I have so many spots to hit mine against, I can bet you guys are jealous now.
While getting used to the boat, I was looking forward to finally start the job on it.