A friend from Dubai is here and life is slipping into the old familiar territory of excess as I attempt to cling to my frugality. I tried my best to bring her to my side ("I know there is good in you!") and show her the beauty of 60 cent meals in rickety looking shacks but she is on holiday and she will have her Starbucks Latte in the morning and her glass of wine in the afternoon, price be damned. And, well, I am not made of stone. I love to drink gin and tonic on the beach with a friend in the presence of a spectacular sunset. And so the budget suffers, calling to me with a wounded, accusing voice, asking what it has done to deserve this abuse.
We're on Gili Air at the moment; an unimaginable island paradise surrounded by water of a blue, fantasy-color that I thought only existed in postcards. The island has a diameter of about a kilometer, no motor vehicles are allowed, the restaurants and hotels are generally overpriced (by 8KUSD standards, at least), and there are magic mushrooms available for sale at various, openly advertised locations. I walk around in a daze, not quite believing the evidence of my senses, wondering where I am and if I am really the same guy who washed his clothes in a bucket during his weekly shower in the rural hills of Nepal, or if I am perhaps some different guy, vaguely related but not at all the same. With some difficulty I find a way shrug off these considerations and tentatively order another cocktail from a seat in a softly lit cabana, watching the sky change colors over the ocean.
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