For the week since we got to Koh Lanta, Karin has been working the local Swedish rental mafia to create some housing options for us.  It’s actually quite busy here until the end of March so my attitude when we were in Victoria of “relax, I’m sure we’ll find good places once we get there” wasn’t leading to ulcers, but it also wasn’t leading to leases.  So thanks to the internet and some hustle (relative to the pace of this place, which is slow), we ended up choosing between a couple of apartments, both connected to the bungalows / hotel where we were staying already. 

So on Thursday, we moved into a furnished apartment.  It has an open livingroom and kitchen in the main room and then a large bedroom with room for our bed, another bed, Max’s bed around the corner, closets, and an en suite bathroom.  Both rooms have balconies and big windows that look out into 2nd floor greenery. 

I think total apartment is about 50 sq meters / 500 square feet.  (I’ll attach photos later.)  

Now the relativity bit.  If we had moved here directly from our place in Victoria which was signficantly larger and had way more “stuff”, I believe we would have said something like “This place is fine.  I’m sure it’ll be fine for our stay.”

But after just 2 weeks of staying in smaller hotel rooms and one-room bungalows, This 2-room home is a PALACE.  All 3 of us are a bit giddy at having more space.  Max now has his “library” and “toy garage” organized.   We’ve got a gourmet kitchen (fridge big enough to hold yoghurt and fruit, 2 stove elements, a sink that isn’t right next to the toilet).  Clothes can actually be unpacked.

Anyway, there’s a lesson in here, especially coming fresh on the heels of a massive, weeks-long purging exercise in Victoria during which we sold a house and 2 cars and then gave, sold, threw out, donated, recycled, and eventually stored massive quantities of stuff.  It shocked us just how much STUFF we had accumulated.  3 people don’t need that much plastic, metal, wood, cotton, and whatever else.  It’s just silly.  Oh, there are always excuses.  “We combined 2 households” (that was years ago and it still doesn’t explain the things we had 3 or 4 of) and “You need it when you have a kid”  (No, the kid didn’t buy any of it and doesn’t use 98% of it.)  Thank goodness for the friends and family who took, used, and/or helped to place a lot of it.  If you need anything else, just let me know and we’ll give you the key to the storage locker.

Whatever self-image I might have had as someone who was travelling light in this world, those delusions were put to rest by the physical evidence and vivid images of multiple car-loads of stuff driving away followed by a moving truck full of stuff heading to storage.

I mentioned to a friend that I wasn’t quite ready to become a Buddhist monk and renounce all material things, but this chapter and this perspective (which is likely going to fade again eventually) definitely invites some reflection on choices and the accumulation of STUFF.