Monico Family Travels

Sunrise from the stunning balcony where the girls do school, and where Bella and I hangout of an early morning doing puzzle books and drinking turmeric tea / fruit smoothies

This week James and I attended (embraced!) a tantric workshop together which (for us) was not so much enlightening, but rather entertaining and sometimes excruciating.

About 80 of us joined together for 3 hours of tantric edification and application (all fully dressed I hasten to add!).  Most of it we managed just fine, but when practicing ‘exploring the Ecstatic Orgasmic Breath to supercharge your Life-Force Energy’ we dissolved into uncontrollable giggles.  It went like this:

• We sit cross-legged facing each other
• James projects his male energy out of his groin towards my groin
• I then receive and welcome his energy and carry it up through my body to my breast
• I then pass it out through my breast and back across to James who receives it into his breast and then sends it back down to his groin.

There were accompanying hand-movements………. and deep breathing.

We really did manage it quite seriously for at least 5 minutes, but then James hammed it up a bit and I totally lost it.  So then he lost it.   Unfortunately we also ‘infected’ our neighbouring couple too.  Everyone else was taking it so seriously, so our giggle-guilt just made it worse.  The exercise went on for about another 15 minutes in total…..eek!

On the excruciating end we had to perform private dances for each other (no not THAT kind – that would have been MUCH easier that what we ACTUALLY had to do).  One person sat on a block on the floor and maintained full eye contact with the other who danced their ‘shadow’……………for what felt like a lifetime (but was probably only about 10 minutes) to the other person.  We both started with a good effort, but then it was a case of just willing the music to PLEASE STOP!  Then we swapped.

Worth going? On balance, yes.  Highly unconvinced that we will incorporate anything we learned into our personal lives, but glad we gave it a try, and at a minimum they say that laughing has huge health benefits in itself!

Emily opted for a much more sensible Ubud special – the braids!!!  Her hair is so thick that end-to-end braiding and beading took a good 2 hours of work.

The end result was fabulous though:

Anyone notice that Millie is actually taller than her gorgeous stylist?

Here she is rocking her new look

Back at home, more break time fun with spinning whizzer pinger thingies!

Now many of you (particularly our Argentinian friends) would be surprised to hear that we have lasted so long in a new home without a single attempt to grill our dinner.  Well, the day came that James could no longer hold out, and solicited help from our wonderful villa manager to secure this little number. It was a somewhat tragic scenario.  The charcoal we had was bamboo based……and not particularly flammable.  With his usual unorthodox ingenuity, James decided to get the charcoal blazing in a sieve over the gas hob before depositing it in what can only be described as a sorry excuse for a BBQ.  He then wafted it a bit with a fan before depositing the (thankfully precooked) chicken drumsticks.  The whole event was a slightly sad state of affairs, and a slightly deflated Jimbob, but dinner was delicious that night none-the-less.

Over these few weeks, we all came down sequentially with a hideous bug reminiscent of some kind of bird flu.  Emily had such extreme fevers that I basically had to surround her with bags of ice.  She is still now (3 weeks later) still trying to clear the snot/plegm.  Nice!  It manifested with Bella in a hacking cough and some truly amazing bogies.  James fell ‘dangerously ill’ (to coin a Senor Jonesism) and sweated it out in bed for 3 days  straight.  Having nursed the rest of them out of the worst of it I finally succumbed myself to a somewhat milder version of the whole suite of symptoms. James  trying to kick as I writ. 

Theo our wonderful yoga teacher and vedic practitioner recommended the remedy Javanese Jamu.  I have to say I think it probably did more than a pure placebo!

The rice in the paddys outside our house has turned from bright green to golden brown, and harvest is kicking off.

With all the craziness around us, we are forever grateful and thankful to Wyan and Augus who bless us, our house, our pool, our kitchen, and our garden temple on a daily basis.  I’m sure it helps.