YOU WANT TO LEAVE the city for a smaller town in the hills, to walk in cooler temperatures and climb roads that meander into valleys. You want to buy a glass of steaming milk from the man who sells his dairy in giant pots that rests on a kerosene stove. You want to sip the sweetened milk and watch late summer tourists take horse rides around the central area of town. You want to be alone in crowded market areas where families seek small town pleasures before heading back to their polluted cities. You want to buy trinkets from shops selling cheap ornaments and overpriced sweaters. You want to take your booklet and your favorite pen and write a few lines. You want to write alone, in a town where no one knows you, observing things in seclusion, in indulgent isolation.
And so you decide to go. Take the night bus alone unlike the other passengers who are accompanied by their families; families consisting of cranky children, bored husbands and housewives in colorful clothes. There will be single men who take the bus too, plenty of them, and only one of you.
