As a part of a creative writing the Seasia group is doing, a lot of us wrote a little creative piece about a particularly memorable moment in Thailand, as we write these, a few of us will post them on the group blog.
The following was written about an event that occurred on March 23 in Korat, during our last night in Thailand.
-Paige
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“Let’s try and get to the roof,” Julia had said. She had led the way up the last set of stairs, had found the door to the outside, had turned the corner, had found the open space.
All the while I’d been thinking, “what if we get locked out?”
I stepped gingerly over the pipes that crisscrossed the flat grew roof, ducking under a clothesline. Following Julia’s purple tank top, I turned the corner around the door Id just emerged from.
And stopped in my tracks.
Any thoughts of getting stuck on the roof of a random building in a strange city, any skepticism, any thoughts that this was anything but a good idea, any worries I might have had, fled.
Before me hanging heavy and clear and bold in the sky was the most magnificent sun I’d ever seen.
It was the sort of red poets use to describe rubies. It was the red of blood, the red of the roses my dad always gives to my mom on valentines day, the red of parched earth, the red of aged wine the red that crackles around logs in a fire place that warms your very bones.
The sun hung there in the blue, blue sky. It hummed quietly, sinking slowly under the weight of the day.
the light from the red sun cast deep shadows on the worlds around me. A city fell before my feet. The streets crossed and dashed below the sky. Buildings of every color and character sprouted up like grass.
The city thrummed under the red sun, filled up with the sounds of people and cars and day old vegetables, of sleeping babies and hungry dogs, of TV dramas and footballs passed between friend. The air felt like the end of the day as shops closed and people began their drive home and school kids flocked to convenience stores.
Reverently, I lay down my yoga mat. And there, on a lonely rooftop somewhere in Thailand, step by step, movement after movement, I greeted the sun, I greeted the cinder block city, I greeted the people around me I’d never see.
My feet were warmed by the sun kissed roof, my sweat dripped onto the concrete, mixing with the city grime. I breathed in and out and in under the great sun, breathing my thanks and farewell to a beautiful country.