Decisions decisions decisions

There hadn't been enought time. As always. It wasn't too long after my brother returned from Germany that I was on the way to just there, for a six weeks holiday in the city where I was born to catch up with my family and friends. It's amazing how much more you can enjoy a place when you're only on holiday. The temporary nature of things gives you such a different perspective on things. All the things that usually would have annoyed me in the past now made me smile only due to the knowledge of it being temporary and me not having to really deal with it at all.

It was a short six weeks until I was back in Thailand. I had set my mind on two things. Leaving towards New Zealand to come closer to my ultimate goal, Australia, and finishing the bathroom before I did so. I had bought a ticket and two months to go. As always, things would turn out a bit different.

Andrew and I actually did put the effort in, and some weeks later, despite a good couple of road trips with my friends, the bathroom was all shiny new and finished. The cross we made couldn't have been bigger, only to be beaten by the size of our pride.
 

I ultimately felt free. The house was finished and the world was open. Only one minor annoyance, my Australian visa was still not approved. I started to use my remaining time in Thailand and the new freedom to dig even deeper into the culture and ended up seeing my friends so much more often and getting involved in all sorts of new activities. One of those would be rock climbing, in Sukthothai.

I had already met Muak on a couple of occasions and he had told me about his passion for the sport. We had never gone beyond that, until now. He finally introduced me to the little crag near Kirimat, only about 40 minutes from town. I had spent two years in Sukhothai without knowing, rock climbing was that close!

Well, it actually hadn't been, not the whole time. Everything was brand new. Muak and his friend Son had only just started developing it less than a year before I first got to touch it for myself, with six routes put up. Not much, compared to the hundreds in Tonsai or in Chiang Mai, but only three climbers ever used them, and that would include me! And they were beautiful, and there was so much more potential. I did, what I then felt I had to do. I cancelled my ticket and decided to get involved and become a regular rock climber again. And there were no regrets. Only difficulties ahead.