4th rv a traveler's memoirs- hostel stay 2

     Hostel stay                 
           2.

July 3rd. 2001
Back to Portland again. I came to work during weekends
as a part-time housekeeper for Joice Hotel 5 minutes walk
away from this hostel I am staying. A Vietnamese named
Ken with citizenship in USA working there recommended
the hotel manager to let me begin to work. This afternoon 
I learned from a Janitor named Ann how to use vacuum cleaner,
a bunch of number keys and other scrubbing things.
Now I come to earn my living here in this city!
Several years staying in New York I love as a backpack traveler,
I happened to be intimate with a black janitor working
in a timeworn hotel where I was staying near Time Square,
eyeing enviously her earning her way. I remember murmuring
to myself at that time, eyeing enviously her earning her way: 
" Could I loiter on the street without uneasiness about expenditure,
seeing Jackson Pollock's paintings in a gallery on So-Ho,or
sipping Americano on the Madison Square Garden, the scene
of 'Cop and the Anthem', one of short stories by O. Henry, 
how happy I would be!".
In Central Plaza Hostel
Mn

   
July 7th
I found a way for traveler in Seattle,
I come to be a  traveler in the true sense of the word here in Portland: 
This idea suddenly hits me.What does the word of a true traveler
mean? The free spirit  of a wanderer without care about money ?
Probably so. because I can earn living during my stay in this city.
'Could I go away farther, free from what throws me into despair!'
Everyone lives with such a hope, but nobody knows how to live
free from what confines him. Nor can even a traveler, 
as free as an unbridled horse, find out his own way to get it.
Most travelers on the road are likely to hurry up to return their home. 
Surprisingly here in Portland I feel I have my eyes widely opened.
In Seattle I experienced hosteling for the first time ,
Here Today I served my first day to my part-time job, So, I feel lucky
to enjoy a different way of travelling from before , not worrying about
money too much. What is more, I feel as if I  came to be a true hosteller, 
who could become a friend to any stranger of yesterday,
and would be ready to say good-bye tomorrow to the friend of today,
I spent this morning giving a glance to the book-stack at Central Library.
In it the marble stairs was classically beautiful enough to catch
my eyes. At noon leaning on the stone stairs at Pioneer Square
I enjoyed the Mexican britos I love, small size, for lunch and
spent afternoon strolling idly about downtown.
Tomorrow before noon will idle at  the café in Powell Books, and 
afternoon will go by tram crossing Willamette river to the blackberry hill
in Gresham. Now I steal a glance at the blue-looking hosteller lying
in his bed, gazing up at the ceiling. What on earth makes him look
so triste?
I think of Tyler, the young hostellers from Minnesota rolling in bed,
reading a paperback titled 'How I started to write?' by Carlos Fuentes,
a celebrated Mexican novelist. And Eunrei from Taiwan slipping
his sleeping bag into my bed for me liable to catch cold.
How sweet was the days in Seattle when I shared   personal talks
over bottles of wine with them 20 years or more junior to me!

July 9th
 A line scribbled on the memo paper stained with coffee and
sweat put in the backpack: 
What journey gives me a feeling of pain. The Willameate
awoke me to the sense of it, when I was walking
along the long, downtown side, bank of the river.
Another line: 
In Portland are there Central Library with the marble stairway
to the reading room on the second floor, the café of Powel Book
the aroma of coffee from which takes a 10-dollars  note, and
the blackberry hill where I fortunately got my stomachache over
thanks to a handful of blackberries. Probably without these,
this city would not to be so meaningful to me.

mn

 
      2.

July 22nd. 2001
As the gutter life of this city gets more and more accustomed to me, 
I go more and more often to the embankment of Willamette river.
Sometimes in the morning I turn my steps on my way to Central Library
 in spite of myself toward the embankment. In the afternoon
I walk along the river almost everyday. And I come to prefer going
to the river embankment, keeping to myself, than to café or Pioneer Square
to come along with many youths,
In the city the contrast between light and shadow is deep and wide.
Pioneer Square midday is filled with sunlight and  laughter. on the contrary,
The atmosphere of the hotel of low grade named Joice Hotel I started
to work for is dull under the shadow of gloom. And many guest rooms
have been occupied by long-term lodgers who seem to have no place
to go to visit and no one to love or to be loved by. In the corner
of the room for a long-term lodger who gets hysterical  the bed
is covered with bloodstained bedspread and in men's restroom are 
there a garbage-can where  a couple of used syringes of morphine and
Marijuana stubs catch my eyes.
When I come to Portland I got my heart to be too full for words ,
having a feeling of happiness that for the first time I become
a true traveler. But  in a way I get surprised to see homeless
neighbors 'roaming here and there'.
Yesterday Ken who helped me to have a part-time job therel
left for Alaska. He wanted to go there to become a well-paid sailor
of a deep sea vessel to catch king crabs. he said, "In such
a circumstance he is, he cannot save money enough to bring
his wife in Vietnam to his side,  adding that 2 years have passed
since she was married to him at their hometown of Vietnam.
And this morning a Mexican-American roommate asked me
to join him for a serious thing in relation with James,
another roommate as a long term lodger here,
which embarrassed me. Below is the talks between us:
: Hi, Moon, a moment please.
: Okay.
: Eh, I would rather go out to the embankment with you.
:  Good. Then you look somewhat serious. 
: (by the riverside) Frankly to speak, we have to do something
in relation with Lee in our room, You know he is a psychoneurotic.
Ordinarily the guy is gentle and good-mannered,
However, he often gets emotionally unstable, You know
a man under his mental disorder can causes dangerous problem.
Last night he made a disturbance in the room, shouting  I am a FBI
to keep watch on him and hurting himself with a knife
while there were no one but the guy and me in the room. 
He even said all of employees here are spies for the Federal Government.
: Really? Unbelievable.
: So, I want you to do one thing for it.
: What's that on earth?
: This morning I discussed with David, you know, the clerk of front desk,
and we concluded that he should be confined to a sanatorium for the insane.
Then as we don't know where his family live, we have to solve this problem.
 I agreed that I will be a witness, Then he said there should be another witness
more for it. Would you mind signing as a witness?
: What? Hey, Gabriel!  How can I do it ?
: I know that the guy gets on well with you.
:Hi, Gabriel. I dislike his highly religious-mindedness
and that he smells of Marijuana by him. but I don't think he has given
to others including me a feeling of uneasiness or offensiveness.
 Furthermore, it is just a week since I have meet you and James.
Hi, Gabriel. I can't do that.

At the embankment of Willamette river, Portland.

mn

?????Currently, it's serious mental illness.
....

A person to be more witnesses besides you..

-......Marijuana is the statement you want to share know well.

has become the world's so unrealistic.