Six Months and Counting

by Daniel Gerken (United States of America)

A leap into the unknown Indonesia

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I came off of shift at 07:00am on November 4, 2018. I left fire station #7 and drove back to Chicago to our friends’ home, where they had graciously let us stay since we had moved out of our sub-leased studio apartment. Silvia was up and ready, gathering our backpacks and favorite Trader Joe’s snacks. We loaded Caduco to the gills and said our goodbyes. By 09:00am we were on the Eisenhower Expressway with the Chicago skyline in our rear view mirror. We had a loose road trip itinerary taking us from Illinois to California and then down to Arizona and Florida. In one month we managed to put 10,000 miles on Caduco before finally selling him in Orlando. We visited friends, family, bustling cities and beautiful National Parks. This was only one month in, and we had not even left the country yet. On December 19, 2018 we boarded a flight to Rio de Janeiro with one-way tickets. Since celebrating Christmas and New Year’s with Silvia’s family and two million of our closest friends on Copacabana Beach in Brazil, we have been to China, Thailand, Laos, and Vietnam. Currently we are on the island of Gili Trawangan in Indonesia; a small island you can walk around in about two hours. There are no motorized vehicles here, only bicycles and horse drawn carts. We are thousands of miles from where we started six months ago in every sense. Part of the freedom with having a year to travel is making plans, and then changing those plans when you feel like it. We initially were only going to spend one month in Thailand. We quickly went to the immigration office to extend our visas. After hearing about the “slow boat” from Thailand to Laos, we were on a bus to the Thailand/Laos border ready to board the boat. Having the time and freedom to change our plans was something I was really looking forward to and something that I have really enjoyed. Our friends from Illinois are in Portland? See you for dinner! Volunteer on a farm, living, cooking and laughing with other good people? Hand me a shovel. You say there is another beautiful, even smaller island next to this one? I just bought our boat tickets and it leaves in two hours. The first six months have flown by. I have not found the meaning of life, the fountain of youth or reached enlightenment. Some days I miss having a place to call home, I miss riding around in a fire engine with the lights and sirens going, and I miss my friends. Other days I discover more things I want to accomplish in this short time I have here. (Insert existential crisis rant here.) I want to thru-hike the Pacific Crest Trail before age fifty, hike the Annapurna Circuit in Nepal and Patagonia in Chile & Argentina. I want to live in a Spanish speaking country and become fluent in Spanish. I want to build a tiny home. I want to spend time with my family, more than once a year. One of the most valuable things we have is time. How you choose to spend that time and with whom you spend it is very important. Do you spend the next twenty years working for a secure future? What goals do I have that I will still able to do in twenty years? What family and friends will still be around after I retire? In six months, we will return to Chicago. I’ll get back to the routine that I am so accustomed to. We’ll binge watch Netflix in the winter and spend as much time as we can outside in the summer. We’ll make our annual pilgrimages to visit our families. I’ll max out my vacation, leaving just enough time to get back for work. I’ll work hard and try to excel at my job. I will never thru-hike the PCT before I am fifty. I will not live in a Spanish speaking country. I will struggle to visit my family more than once per year. I wrote this post six months ago and of course, we did not go back to Chicago.