Mental Health Break

My two days in Ghent have been a nice break. Although I could have spent all the day walking around and visiting every single little inch of the town I chose instead to only spend yesterday afternoon doing the main tourist area with all the old structures and the rest of my time has been spent resting. I have been fighting a cold rather unsuccessfully for the last 4 days. I am not fully convinced it is a cold but rather a body saying ‘take a day off already.’

So, taking some of my own advice that I regularly give my clients at work, I took a mental health day. I know that it sounds crazy as I am supposed to already be on vacation but every day so far has involved a lot of aggressive city walking and travel days with only pauses for a few hours here and there to regain energy. Some days I arrive back at the hostels and I cannot even think for myself anymore and I can barely make it up stairs (in my defense we were on the fourth floor in Paris which equated to 72 excruciating steps. Yes I counted. After doing it 6-8 times a day you start to get curious.)

To continue, I had been talking to a young fellow at the reception desk yesterday and he told me that there was a lake in this town, ‘just follow the water and eventually you will get to the lake.’ So today I set off in the direction he showed me. I was ecstatic that along the way I walked right past an English secondhand bookstore as I have already finished the one book I allowed myself to pack. I bought two smaller ones and hope that when I finish these I will come across another place to buy another. I will abandon my finished novel here on the hostel communal bookshelf with my name and home printed on the cover. Hopefully someone gets to pick it up someday and enjoy it.

After what seemed like hours of walking, which in reality was maybe only an hour with my stops to look at books and to get lunch, I finally saw some local people carrying inflatable water toys heading in the direction I was going. I followed them for another 5 minutes and was happy to finally arrive at my destination.
I don’t think that many tourists manage to make it out this far as it is not listed or shown on the maps that are given out and it is well away from all the main attractions. It was nice to be surrounded by locals for a change. My camera stayed inside my bag, my headphones went in and I just sat in the shade enjoying the company of my music, my book and the people of Ghent.

Everyone needs a day off sometimes, even when you are traveling. Today, I pretended I was at home by the water doing what I would normally do on a sunny day off. Listen to music, read and people watch. And you know, it almost felt the same.