Leg 3, Day 39 – Funk Town

Meg Dyos By

Day 39 – Funk Town

As I’m sure you’ve read, this whole rowing experience is a bit of a challenge! With every beautiful sunset, there is a rain cloud around the corner and with every bit of flat and calm there is swell and splashing salty waves. All are beautiful in different ways, but it’s appreciating them at all times that is the hard bit! In other challenges that I have done, there is always either a time limit, or similar to this there is a mileage countdown, but they normally correlate, and so with one you can normally work out the other. Yet with this challenge, each and every two hour shift is completely changeable, and if using the amount of miles covered on a two hour shift, or even in a day as a guide to our arrival date to cairns, you can honestly turn yourself loopy. As a result it is imperative to stay in the moment, and not project into the future. Since leaving Samoa, I have been having constant chats with myself to make sure that I am in check with how I am feeling. Whether it is telling myself to ‘choose your attitude’ or that ‘I can do it’, or even to try and distract my mind from how much longer we may be at sea for, it is these pep talks that help me to find the strength to get back out on the oars and keep me balanced.

So it is today that I would like to introduce you to Funk Town. Discovered by my best friend Rose and her brother after their time together in New Zealand last summer, Funk Town is a metaphorical place to live out a bad mood. It’s a brilliant way of making a bad mood into a good mood, and as I’ve been teaching the girls on Doris to embrace the funk, I thought I’d do the same with you. Let me explain! So there I was on the oars, rowing in the back seat, battling a current and barely moving, when in my mind I saw a sign post that said 0.2 miles to Funk Town. I jumped, I wasn’t sure if I was ready to embrace the funk, so I managed to have a chat with myself and change mood direction. But I don’t want to scare you away from Funk Town in your lives, because it really is a fabulous place!

How can I embrace the funk I hear you say? Firstly, when a bad mood hits, accept that a visit to Funk Town would be beneficial. Ensure that your team mates know that you might be visiting for a bit so they know where you are. (They might be able to help you to de-funkify later on) Head through the welcome gates, and decide what you want to achieve in Funk Town. Most head into funk festival, a bar with other funkers. By all means do engage in conversation with other residents, but be careful not to be funked downwards into the funking spiral. Others enjoy funk de la mar, a chilled place by the sea where they can reflect on their funk. Whatever floats your boat you will find, (as after all it is a mental concept!) But by the time you have have spent some time in your funk town place, you may have decided if you are ready to leave funk town and re-enter the real world. If not, you can stay the night. I’d suggest not getting too comfortable. Some stay at the luxurious hotel de funk but then end up staying a week – funky hostel is a better option.

At any given moment, after you feel your bad mood beginning to lift, and are ready to re-enter the real world, it is time to funk out. Funking out involves plugging in an iPod, and headphones, and turning on a funk town classic. There’s a few out there – from the song ‘freak out’ to the song ‘funky town’ it really can be any song whereby the lyrics can include the words ‘funk out’. After discovering your song, and with lots of practice, it may well be that you find that you no longer need to visit Funk Town, and instead the song funks you out, which is awesome! It is also important to note that as well as funking out with music, in such a small space such as Doris that if one finds there to be a cause of the funk in the first place, that they let their team mates help them to resolve the particular situation.

So there you go. Funk Town. Next time you’re in a bad mood, try it. We’d love to hear what funk town looks like to you at doris@coxlesscrew.com. Be sure to take a photo and post to us on social media, (unfortunately we can’t receive photos) and remember what it looks like to successfully funk out of funk town!

Update – we are still in the absolutely incredibly calm, glass like ocean state! It’s completely mesmerising how the water of the mighty Pacific can go like this. It’s hot and we are battling another current, but one stroke at a time we are bobbing along, admiring the fish and the wildlife getting more excited by the day for Christmas! The stars have also been quite incredible this week, so life on Doris is good.

Glassy

The Twelve Days of Christmas

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me a striped cane of candy.
On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me two boats a passing.
On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me three sharks a circling.
On the fourth day of Christmas my true love gave to me four Christmas hats.
On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me, five Tupperware
On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me, six boobies flying

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7 Comments

  1. JB says:

    So good to hear that mighty town has made it to the Pacific! To funk out is to live – metaphorically speaking – after all. There is aplenty of Funk Towning likely this weekend; the losing Strictly finalists might be in the bar at The Funk and Raspberries, Father Christmas’s elves might pop into Funk Town before their long ride, Father Funkness himself might even make an appearance – but – come what may, the Funk will be with you, and get you to the other side of where you may be headed, which is of course the funky Pacific for you clever girls. So, as your oars funk on through the waves we’ll all be right behind you and think you are all funking great.

  2. Penny says:

    Meg, you are an inspiration to us all. Mad but an inspiration!!!

  3. Nix says:

    One of my favourite bands ever….Tower of power…my first thought when reading this post. Party on funkifyers!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OHJ4j2ety8

    You got to funkifize
    You got to funkifize
    You got to funkifize
    You got to funkifize

    Move to the music, shout and sing-a-ling
    You got to groove with the rhythm, girl
    Get slick and shake that thing
    Shake that thing, yeah

    To let it be for real
    If you got the power
    Now, you all know what you got to do
    You can’t lay dead just catch that groove

    You got to funkifize
    I say
    You got to funkifize

    If you want to get funky
    Like a bow-legged monkey
    I’m telling you
    You got to funkifize

    You got to kick to the back beat
    Before you get too old
    You got to flash to the fire
    And let it grab your soul
    Grab your soul

    Let it be for real, bop to the rock
    If you got the power
    Now you all know what you got to do
    You can’t lay dead just catch that groove

    You got to funkifize
    Well
    You got to funkifize

    Now, if you want to get funky
    Like a bow-legged monkey
    I’m telling you
    You got to funkifize

    Got to say it’s in the blood
    In the blood, in the blood
    Yeah, they say it’s in the blood, yeah
    In the blood, in the blood

    Somebody said it’s in the blood
    In the blood, in the blood
    Well, they say it’s in the blood, yeah
    In the blood, in the blood

    But don’t you know it’s in your soul
    Don’t you know it’s in your soul
    Don’t you know it’s in your soul, boy
    Don’t you know it’s in your soul

    Don’t you know it’s in your soul, mama
    Don’t you know it’s in your soul
    Don’t you know it’s in your soul, women
    Don’t you know it’s in your soul

    You got to funkifize
    You got to funkifize
    (I’m telling you now)
    You got to funkifize
    You got to funkifize
    (That’s all you got to do now)
    You got to funkifize
    (Talking about the funky nation, yeah, yeah)

    You got to funkifize
    (Oh, oh, yeah)
    You got to funkifize
    (If you got the power)
    You got to funkifize
    (Then let it be for real why don’tcha
    You got to funkifize
    (And I’m telling you right now)
    You got to funkifize

  4. JG says:

    Meg you are not mad, just normal and in charge of yourself.
    I hate crowds and Funk town is too crowded for me. If I get grumpy or snappy and less fun to live with I create a mirror image of myself in my mind. Bit like a twin, and I swap places with it. In my new incarnation I look at the other me and give it a severe bollocking and dressing down and ask it what the hell it thinks it is doing. Quickly other me is remorseful and promises to do better at which point I switch back out of the mirror image and dismiss it ready for the next time. I call it JG1 and JG2. So in lieu of Funk town I switch on JG2. Works well for me in every situation, including normal every day mistakes where JG2 tells me to learn from my errors and stop being stupid.
    What a pity the current isn’t with you on these flat calm days.
    Footage on BBC news of Tim Peake the astronaut newly arrived on Soyuz. Absolutley fascinating to realise that you can’t even pour a cup of tea normally in space. I suppose if you sneeze you shoot off like a jet plane and crash into the bulkhead. The mind boggles.
    Take care Crew and kjeep safe.

  5. Barney says:

    Hmmm, can’t relate to Funk Town but can relate to that beautiful photo. You chose the words perfectly, “absolutely incredibly calm, glass like ocean state”. I have seen the Cam like a sheet of glass but could never imagine the Pacific like that. Hope you will be sharing the best photos when you get home!! Stay in the moment ‘cos it looks gorgeous!

  6. Jim Andrews says:

    Enjoyable read Meg, no Funk town for me either really. I spend very little time angry, when I do, it is generally another person who has ruined my moment, so I crush their heads! It causes them no pain in fact they are often unaware that their head is being crushed. I hold up my fore finger and thumb leaving a small gap, I look through the gap and place the head of the offender therein. I then take a moment to take in the smugness of the situation, then with no remorse I squeeze, gotcha you B******! Then my anger subsides and I feel a little sympathy for the victim. No violence has been committed, no one got hurt but vengeance has been accomplished.
    You describe the current situation in the big blue, beautifully. I love those moments in life where, for that magical moment, nothing could be nicer, you make the Pacific sound like that! I find my piece of heaven, very often, sitting in my garden in the spring, late afternoon (likely with a nice glass of red), just listening to the birds and insects expressing their joy and being grateful. Then Geraldine might interrupt my thoughts by asking me to carry out some mindless chore. So I crush her head :)
    Stay safe. XX

  7. Allen says:

    Many thanks for “Funk town” As a canoeist, I have lots of different Funk places to go.. Some of them real and others not so real!
    I am very blessed to have so many good experiences.. But long to add to my overflowing cup!

    Enjoy every moment.. Looking forward to seeing you safe and sound in Australia.
    Best wishes.
    Allen.

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