I have been traveling for almost 3 months now. And although I'm happy to be far away from the cold Winter in Sweden I'm currently having a challenging time. Maybe I had too high expectations, hoping my next step in life would reveal itself during my travels and that my travels would take me somewhere on my path so to speak. But, at least so far, I don't have that feeling at all. I have more or less constantly been challenged by my 'usual' health issues, at the moment I'm very low on energy. And of course, that affects my mental state. It's just hard to feel excited about new places when all you really want to do is rest and have some peace and quiet.
That being said though, I am very grateful for all the places I have seen so far, I know these experiences have expanded me and increased my understanding. But it has been too much stimuli for me for a too long time. I can feel it in my system. I have spent most of these 3 months in bigger cities. And it's interesting to me why I made these choices, I must have for a reason. But I feel it's time to change this.
I'm currently in Malacca (or Melaka), Malaysia (I'll probably share more about this place in a different post), and even though it's not really a big place it's very busy because of the Chinese New Year. I was told though that yesterday was the last day of the celebrations (they have been going on for 2 weeks) so hopefully it'll be quieter next week. This is a big holiday in Malaysia so you see a lot of local tourists.
My plan was more or less to go back to Thailand next Tuesday (I have a flight ticket that I bought already a long time for immigration reasons) but yesterday I felt it was too soon to be moving around again (even though my plan for Thailand is to go to an island for some beach time). So I extended my stay here in Malacca one week. I'm currently in an Airbnb and even though this place has a kind of an abandoned wibe sometimes (maybe I will write a separate post about that, haha) I like it here. I didn't feel safe in the beginning though and couldn't sleep much but I do now. The host has also been very kind and on Tuesday I'll change to a similar flat, just with a somewhat better view (I believe). Beacuse the sea view does something to my system, espcially seeing ships. It's very special to me. It's also an environment I'm designed for (according to Human Design, something I'm learning more about at the moment).
This is also the first flat I'm in and even though this doesn't feel like a home, it's still reminds of how much I miss that. But I don't have a home in Sweden, or anywhere, so that's still a big unknown for me. Something I hoped would become clear during my travels. Even though I don't have much of a time frame, I kind of feel that I'll return to Europe in April-May. But still, I have no clue where to go or how to support myself (that's also something that I hoped would become clear to me).
Traveling solo can become very lonely at times. Especially when you don't feel well and don't have the energy to go out and meet people. On one of my first days here in Malacca though, I went into a bar that had just opened (at 1 PM) asking if they served food. I was the only customer there and the guy running the place was very kind, he gave me a lot of tips about Melaka. The place was really nice, he had a lot of vinyl records and I spent an afternoon listening to David Bowie. He said that I now have a friend here in Malacca but I haven't been back, maybe next week.
I don't want to complain too much, I know I'm privileged to be able to travel like this. It just has its challenges. Traveling long-term is very different from going on a holiday for a couple of weeks after all.
Hopefully I'll feel better soon and I might post more next week due to my extra time here.
Thanks for reading 🌸
Wishing you a lovely day 💚