And you have to be perfect, because...?

Letter:

Hi,

I also cook great food ;0)

I have been bad at updating my blog. there is too much going on in my life to write. This week I will be away most of the week and busy with work. I have to stay in a hotel in a city near Amsterdam, and I consider this a trial run for my trip to Xxxx (almost the same right?). It is not only Xxxx, Xxxx doesn't allow even tourists with HIV to enter but many countries will not give residency or more to HIV+, that means that in about half the world I will not be accepted as a worker, student, or a wife of a local (whether positive or not). This includes Australia, Israel, USA and some EU countries too. Many countries will not accept a HIV test from another country but you have time make a new one from their own doctors. The difference with Xxxx is this includes also a tourist visa.

But if I decide that I want to go I will not let HIV stop me. After all, I have been in these parts of the world including working legally with a work permit in Japan when I was in fact much sicker than now, the only difference was I didn't know it.

In fact, this might be my last job, there are a lot of issues with health insurance and social security. I don't know who would hire me when I am done here, and on the other hand, in 1.5 years my social security in Israel expires (even though I pay it every month like I do here) and I will not be covered for health insurance anymore unless I return and start working there. Catch 22 huh? Israel has these little tricks to prevent people from leaving. For example, if I got settled in another country and wanted to bring my parents to live with me when they are old, all the money they paid to social security during decades of work would go down the drain, b/c an Israeli can't collect that while living abroad even after retirement (unlike a European). Not that Europe is perfect. There are users and abusers everywhere.

When I was very sick (CD<100) I found it helpful to go out in the fresh air (and here it is really cold) and do sports. I ate a lot of kiwis for vitamin C (also cos I was smoking a lot for the stress). Kiwis have more vit C than anything in the world and also vit E. Now my eating is far less healthy, but at least I smoke less (1-4 a day usually at night) and am more relaxed and sleep better, so it balances out I guess. And of course I am much happier than when I was diagnosed, a period during which I fell into a tar pit of emotions so terrible I didn't know I had the capacity to feel them (and now I am discovering emotions so good I had no idea they existed - not all the time right, but once in a while I am suprised with the bliss I can feel - but this is X-rated ;0)).

Yesterday I watched Borat at the cinema, hilarious! One of the guys we were with has a rare lung disease. He is one of a few people in the NL to have this. He told us about it and about having to be extra careful, taking antibiotics etc, and mostly about living with the constant awareness that something could go really wrong. I really felt like sharing and saying I know exactly how you feel, but I couldn't do that around the dinner table.

Yes, life isn't easy. But life is full of perks and bonuses and good things to enjoy, if we just grab them. Not in a greedy way. In a thoughtful way. Enjoy what we have because we have a lot. Life isn't about what "they" tell us it's about, it isn't about being perfect at all.

Be well,
Yours TH