So there's a lot to catch up on.......and I have to do it sometime, here we go!
Many of you have probably heard from either Flora or myself that I left Mae Hong Son to travel on my own and she is still there. In the simplest terms possible - the man we were staying with made me feel very uncomfortable. He treated me very differently from Flora and those differences were starting to effect me quite a lot so I decided that I needed to move out of his house. SO many decisions were made within a matter of days - Flora and I spent the night in a monastery not far from Mae Hong Son and our time there was doubtless incredibly helpful in figuring out what to do. I love Mae Hong Son, but for a variety of reasons I decided that travel was the best thing for me after that. My mom is meeting me in Bangkok on May 10, so I didn't have too much time left anyway, I had envisioned more travel in my time in Southeast Asia than had happened, and I wanted to get away from him. Flora stayed behind and has had to deal with more issues surrounding our host........when I told him that I was leaving he became incredibly emotional and unstable (affirming my decision to leave) and asked Flora to move out as well. She's still in Mae Hong Son, living with a friend until she moves into a guest house and working for the other organization we had been involved with.
The week period surrounding the epicenter of these issues was incredibly difficult for both Flora and I.....luckily other NGO workers in the area who we have made friends with supported us in every way imaginable making us feel comfortable and loved. Another upside - it taught me that I need to listen to my instincts. When a man is making me feel uncomfortable, I need to acknowledge that and not try to explain it away. I should never feel that I need to accommodate someone who is being inappropriate because I don't want to situation to be uncomfortable. It was a lesson in sticking to my guns and doing what was best, healthiest, and safest for me. I'm proud of how we both responded to the situation and how we recognized that the the best circumstance for each of us meant that we'd have to split up for a month even if we didn't truly want to be apart. I'd also like to thank my parents for being so supportive from thousands of miles away - I know it's difficult to let your little girl travel on her own and I am so glad that you trust me to do so.
SO! Flora and I parted in the Mae Hong Son nus station - she for a border run to Burma and me for Laos.....both of our visas were expiring. I went to Pai, a backpacker mecca that Flora and I visited about a month ago, to arrange a bus and boat into Laos and within hours I ran into people Flora and I knew from the monastery! I have quickly learned that traveling alone does NOT mean you are alone. Backpackers from Europe in their 20s are generally a VERY warm and welcoming bunch. So I had dinner with two Londoners and a German man and then off I went on a night van to the border. There were monsoon rains and MANY hairpin turns......no sleep, but friends were born of common misery!
After crossing into Laos I took a two-day boat ride up the Mekong river to history Luang Prabang. The boat ride was not only spectacularly gorgeous, but I made loads of friends. The three people I have seen most since being in Laos are a British woman who is on her home after three years in Australia and New Zealand and two Irish guys who are traveling the world after University (college). We played loads of cards and talked about anything and everything (we were on the boat for a long, long time.....) and I know them quite well now, really! I also saw a lot of Quebecoise people, Australians, a Japanese guy, and heaps of people from all over the UK. I am the only American in the bunch and they take great pleasure in talking in accents so thick/slang so random that i have no clue what's going on. The Irish boys especially decided to train me up in sarcastic/dark Irish/UK humor.......they spent a couple months in the US and were absolutely baffled by how gullible our nation is.
Luang Prabang was the capitol of Laos many years ago and is chalk-full of history. On my first day here I went with the Irish and British people to probably the most beautiful place I've ever seen - a series of very safe to swim in pools and waterfalls. The water is quite deep and there was one place you could jump in from high up - Sandra, the British woman, got a sweet video of me and the Irish "lads" jumping in!
I've also spent a lot of time meandering through ancient and historic Wats (temples), up hills to catch gorgeous views of a Luang Prabang (which i really not a city at all but an overgrown village in the jungle), and wandering through markets and town. Yesterday I went on a five hour walk by myself anywhere that my feet would take me. That's really the joy of traveling alone. I've been lucky to have friends....honestly, we humans are social people and need to have someone to share things with every once in a while......but at the end of the day, I'm just beholden to myself. While in one temple, a friendly monk came over to me and we talked for over an hour about religion, living in Laos, our families.....one of my favorite travel experiences yet. He invited me to come back tonight to watch the monks chant in the evening.
Most of my friends have moved on to Vang Vieng (a real tourist mecca) but I've stayed behind to do a little more wandering. I was thinking about going there myself, but I want to have some time free of friends......I had expected to have two and a half weeks! I don't think I'll spend as much time as "planned" (I'm by myself so plans are inherently flexible) because being here I've realized just how touristy that place is. There is a lot to see in Laos, so I htink I'll head to the far south which is supposed to be hardly touched by tourism and one of the most relaxing places in the world!
I love you all, hope you're well.
~Alice
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Monday, April 21, 2008
Random quips 4-16
~Flora
- Our Host-dad is trying his hardest to help us feel comfortable and often wants to inform us of the goings on in his house. At least twice a day, he tells us, and I quote, “I go there; I come back.” As you can see this is critical information and really does help us to know the plan. He is trying to tell us he’ll be gone for a few minutes. But there are never any specifics. We don’t know where he is going, or how long he is gone. But, let me tell you, it is still great to hear.
- There is a colony of ants living in our bathroom. You wouldn’t think this would be such great entertainment, but at least weekly, Alice and I give each other reports on recent activity. The ants have this well-laid-out route along the side of the wall (about two feet off the ground......right at squat toilet level!), and they often carry large dead bugs across the whole of the bathroom. It takes at least fifty ants to hold the larger carcasses and keep them near the wall - the other week, Alice got really excited about a particularly long and slender twig that they maneuvered around the corner! It is quite fun to watch them make their way toward their home - it literally takes hours......this is essentially the kind of entertainment we're into these days!
- Our favorite restaurant in MHS, Salween River, is a favorite amongst all the NGO workers in the area. It serves great food, and they are friendly. But it is family-run. In the US would be great - you would want to support them even more, but in Thailand, this means they can take time off whenever they want. They literally decided last week to take a day off to get drunk by the river, and so the café was closed for the day. “Sorry, will be open Thursday (when we’re done drinking).”
- We went to a festival in one of the long-necked villages last week, and experienced all sorts of new things. Within twenty minutes of our arrival we were served steaming hot rice wine. It would have been an insult if we hadn’t had any, so we sipped happily (Alice feigned enthusiasm to make up for the lack of intake - hepatitis!). And while we were drinking, we were informed that before these refugees left Burma rice wine was all they drank. No water, no tea, just rice wine. The next day we went around the neighborhood visiting houses, as is the custom, and at each house we were served a new glass of rice wine. Given how hot it is I don’t know how they drink hot drinks, but more importantly how are they not all completely wasted?
- Alice and I have visited many internet shops in MHS in the past month and a half, and in nearly every one there is an over-abundance of teenagers. That at first doesn’t seem so surprising, but they are not there to be on the internet. They are there to play computer games. Namely a Thai version of Dance Dance Revolution. Most of these places are completely full just from Thai DDR users. Apparently this is the thing to do, maybe we should try it out instead of updating the blog.
- The oldest child in our family, Sai Meh, is only 8, but she often takes in on herself to care for us. She will often help us to clear and wash our dishes. And sometimes fill our water bottles for us when they are getting low. But my personal favorite is when I go into the bathroom at night, thinking I will be fine with no light, and she runs down the stairs after me to turn it on. What can I say, she wants me to be happy.
- For our English classes Alice and I have been writing our own worksheets with sentences and other exercises for the students to do. For some reason whenever I am assigned this task, all of the names begin with “J”. I don’t try to do it, but those are always the first names I think of: Jack, John, Joe, Julie, Jody, Jill, and it just goes on. I’ve really try to make a concerted effort to use different names, but still after the editing at least fifty percent of them start with “J.” Our students probably think all English names start with “J.”
- The other night I was doing a one-on-one teaching session with our host-dad, and it was not going particularly well. Alice was listening from the next room and felt like she HAD to do something to alleviate the clear suffering, so so she played comforting music from my computer to make me feel better. The problem was the rest of the family had loud, awful Thai music blaring from their room, and Maung-Hla shouts in the calmest of situations. I could hardly hear with all three going on. I was completely overwhelmed by noises. She tried!
~Flora
Friday, April 18, 2008
'Tis The Season!
I missed Christmas in the States....but it seems I came to Thailand just in time for a couple of masssssssive New Years festivals! I'll talkabout one this blog and another the next blog.....but first:
The Migrant hide-out
A week and a half ago I went on a short walk by myself. This wouldn’t be blog-worthy material except for what – more accurately, who – greeted me when I came home. In the twenty minutes or so that I was gone, four illegal migrants had come to our house to hide from the police who were doing a routine search for illegals. The only member of the family who was home apart from Flora was Me Meh, the three year old. Flora said she felt like she should comfort Me Meh but quickly realized that the child was in no distress whatsoever…..police raids are a part of life.
We spent the afternoon talking to one of the women (Maung-Hla’s niece as it turns out) who has fairly good English. We didn’t really know what to do about lunch since Maung-Hla had told us to fry the eggs ourselves and eat the curry he had left for us but we didn’t think there would be enough for everyone. Eventually our hunger got the best of us, so we moved toward the kitchen (which is in a separate building/structure). Immediately, a couple of the people in hiding left their hide-outs to help us prepare lunch! Ah! Hospitality will drive you mad sometimes. We’ve asserted ourselves enough with Maung-Hla’s family to be able to wash our own dishes…..but our new friends were NOT going to have that. She ripped that scrub-brush from my clutches!
When Maung-Hla came home he poked his head in to our room to say hi. I told him he had some “friends over” and pointed to the room adjacent to ours that was in total darkness. Without a pause or any insinuation of surprise he said, “How many friends?” and went over to talk to them. They may have come to Maung-Hla’s house for any of a variety of reasons– it’s at the end of the road, his family is a bit better off than most in the neighborhood, he has been in Thailand for many years and has a clean record….but in the end, it was more proof that he is a community leader.
Huay Pe Keng New Year’s
At some point you have probably seen pictures or read stories about the “Long-neck” people – the people who wear gold rings around their necks and below their knees. They are the Kaya people from Karenni state in Burma but many have fled persecution there and settled in Thailand. When most Burmese enter Thailand, they are sent to refugee camps and held there in a permanent limbo state for years, never knowing their future, not able to go backwards or forwards. The Thai government saw an opportunity to earn big tourism bucks with Kaya people because of their cultural practice of wearing neck rings. The result? Kaya people can choose to remain in the refugee camps where conditions are atrocious but they still have a hope of getting out at some point. (Out when or to where they do not know). Or, alternately, Kaya people can opt to forfeit their refugee status and move into one of many villages set up for them by the Thai government. Conditions in these villages are better than in the camps, but the villagers are not allowed to leave, and have hardly any way to change their impoverished condition. The Thai government keeps all of the money earned by tourism except when tourists buy souvenirs directly from the villagers (their only source of income). Some of these villages are like human zoos – people come and stare at the Kaya women’s necks, snap pictures, and leave, never learning their story.
Flora first visited Huay Pe Keng village about two months ago with a group of people connected with NGOs in the area and sent many of you an email about her experience. We had a similar opportunity to visit the village as guests for the most important holiday in their culture (a New Years celebration). People from the three Kaya villages in the Mae Hong Son area as well as in the camps come together each year (rotating the meeting place between the four). Maung-Maung, our boss from the EMFS, told us on Monday night that we should skip class on Tuesday and instead spend the night with someone who’s connected to the EMFS and lives in Huay Pe Keng. The next afternoon we drove to the village, motorbike caravan style, with one of our students (Hon Bil).
After the pleasant but awkward meet and greet with the woman (Lay Lay Wha) who graciously took us in, we headed to the village field for a massive volleyball tournament. We saw a boys game first and they are GOOD. It’s a pity American men don’t usually play volleyball; it’s such an athletic and exciting sport! The real excitement, though, was watching the young women play some scrappy and fierce volleyball with a good stock of fans cheering them on. Most played with their rings on (they can take the rings off if they want to). They were also barefoot which was particularly impressive given the hard-packed earth and rock mix they were playing on. The crowd was rapt and, best of all, the young women were completely serious about their game; they didn’t for a second try to be “feminine” by not giving it their all. Some of them are gifted players! The Kaya in the villages and the refugees in the camps are all obsessed with volleyball. It’s an excellent outlet for young men who have been stripped of their bread-winning status and feel aimless.
The games continued, but Flora and I decided to take a little tour of the village before dinner time. When most tourists get off the river-crossing boat and arrive in Huay Pe Keng, they don’t venture far. People are selling their wares along one main path (bracelets, post-cards, elephant or neck-ringed women figurines, clothe bags….) and that seems to be enough for the average tourist. If you journey 350 meters past the first village along a carefully marked path, you enter the “New Village”. Apparently most tourists aren’t fit enough for that big trek because the New Village gets a fraction of the tourist traffic of the Old village. The Thai government created the New Village in 2007 and promised that people who moved there from the Old Village or elsewhere would have better facilities, conditions, etc. It is fair to say that they have NOT delivered. People in this village are even more impoverished than their Old Village counterparts – outhouses are poorly located, food is scarce. Flora stayed here when she visited two months ago.
The music and dance festivities were supposed to begin at 8pm, but this isn’t America so the timetable didn’t rule supreme. In the interim hours, we met some hilarious Evergreen State college students who we’ve run into several times in MHS (they’re here on a semester program). We were given food by yet more friendly locals and had to eat; hospitality in both directions trumps all.
The festivities (an elaborate dance competition) got underway at about 10:30 and were pretty fantastic. Pictures do justice better than words here. Dance groups from each village did performances decked out in their colorful cultural dress which includes vibrant head-bands. There was plenty of painfully loud music and crowd support and I felt utterly blessed to be a part of the whole thing.
A word on the rings…One legend goes that the woman began wearing the rings to protect their necks from tigers. Girls begin wearing the rings when they are about five years old and add three as often as they can, depending on how fast they grow. It’s considered desirable to peek at about 25 rings. The rings are undeniably bad for the health of women who wear them; their collar bones are crushed, their backs permanently arched in old age, and their overall life expectancy is decreased by seven years. In recent years, some women have chosen not to wear the rings. Muby, a woman we know through work in Mae Hong Son, is one of the most feminist, forward-thinking women you’ll ever meet. She chose to take off her rings years ago partly because it is easier in the workplace and partly because she doesn’t think she should have to do that to her body because she is a woman. Still, she has total respect for the women who still wear the rings. Not only is it an engrained and ancient part of their culture, but the rings are now the only source of their income in the villages. Western outsiders can inform the women of the medical dangers of wearing the rings, but the practice is not ours to judge.
The next morning was the big ceremony! Naturally it started a couple hours late, so I had time to wander around with a friendly Dutchwoman anthropologist who I had met the night before. The main idea to the ceremony is the raising of a big pole (about 35 feet tall) that represents the first tree. Poles from previous years are all in the same area – in a clearing on the top of a small hill. Before anything got underway, over a hundred young men (women aren’t allowed up there) danced around this configuration of giant poles for a couple of hours, playing music…..gongs, cymbals, drums – solid rhythm, really fun to listen to! Eventually, each village brought out a chicken and asked it questions about their fortune for the coming year. Meanwhile, the shamans blessed the pole and then the men began raising the pole…..it took over a hundred men and A LOT of muscle power/rope leverage! Once the pole was raised and secured – music and dance continuing all the while – someone from each village sacrificed the chicken. They then stuck small sticks in the thighbones of the chickens and the shamans read the fortunes of their villages based on which direction the bones tipped. Three of four fortunes were quite good – the New Village is supposed to get more visitors in the coming year….I sure hope so. One of the villages, however, had quite a bad fortune, so people were pretty upset.
The rest of the day was free-for-all socializing time! Our friend from Mae Hong Son, Muby, took us to half a dozen homes of her friends and family members to meet and be offered more food than we could possibly handle (or should possibly take form these impoverished families). Because it’s the New Year, it’s customary to go around saying hello to everyone in your village. The young men were still dancing, but at this point, winding their way through town, having water thrown on them.
It was an absolutely fantastic 24 hours……I felt very fortunate to be there, and proud to be involved with the EMFS. This was all on the 8th and 9th of April. Since then, the New Years festival for greater Southeast Asia has taken place – more on THAT next time! This is already preposterously long.
Love to you all! (Don’t be shy about leaving comments….it’s fun to know if you’re reading.)
~Alice
The Migrant hide-out
A week and a half ago I went on a short walk by myself. This wouldn’t be blog-worthy material except for what – more accurately, who – greeted me when I came home. In the twenty minutes or so that I was gone, four illegal migrants had come to our house to hide from the police who were doing a routine search for illegals. The only member of the family who was home apart from Flora was Me Meh, the three year old. Flora said she felt like she should comfort Me Meh but quickly realized that the child was in no distress whatsoever…..police raids are a part of life.
We spent the afternoon talking to one of the women (Maung-Hla’s niece as it turns out) who has fairly good English. We didn’t really know what to do about lunch since Maung-Hla had told us to fry the eggs ourselves and eat the curry he had left for us but we didn’t think there would be enough for everyone. Eventually our hunger got the best of us, so we moved toward the kitchen (which is in a separate building/structure). Immediately, a couple of the people in hiding left their hide-outs to help us prepare lunch! Ah! Hospitality will drive you mad sometimes. We’ve asserted ourselves enough with Maung-Hla’s family to be able to wash our own dishes…..but our new friends were NOT going to have that. She ripped that scrub-brush from my clutches!
When Maung-Hla came home he poked his head in to our room to say hi. I told him he had some “friends over” and pointed to the room adjacent to ours that was in total darkness. Without a pause or any insinuation of surprise he said, “How many friends?” and went over to talk to them. They may have come to Maung-Hla’s house for any of a variety of reasons– it’s at the end of the road, his family is a bit better off than most in the neighborhood, he has been in Thailand for many years and has a clean record….but in the end, it was more proof that he is a community leader.
Huay Pe Keng New Year’s
At some point you have probably seen pictures or read stories about the “Long-neck” people – the people who wear gold rings around their necks and below their knees. They are the Kaya people from Karenni state in Burma but many have fled persecution there and settled in Thailand. When most Burmese enter Thailand, they are sent to refugee camps and held there in a permanent limbo state for years, never knowing their future, not able to go backwards or forwards. The Thai government saw an opportunity to earn big tourism bucks with Kaya people because of their cultural practice of wearing neck rings. The result? Kaya people can choose to remain in the refugee camps where conditions are atrocious but they still have a hope of getting out at some point. (Out when or to where they do not know). Or, alternately, Kaya people can opt to forfeit their refugee status and move into one of many villages set up for them by the Thai government. Conditions in these villages are better than in the camps, but the villagers are not allowed to leave, and have hardly any way to change their impoverished condition. The Thai government keeps all of the money earned by tourism except when tourists buy souvenirs directly from the villagers (their only source of income). Some of these villages are like human zoos – people come and stare at the Kaya women’s necks, snap pictures, and leave, never learning their story.
Flora first visited Huay Pe Keng village about two months ago with a group of people connected with NGOs in the area and sent many of you an email about her experience. We had a similar opportunity to visit the village as guests for the most important holiday in their culture (a New Years celebration). People from the three Kaya villages in the Mae Hong Son area as well as in the camps come together each year (rotating the meeting place between the four). Maung-Maung, our boss from the EMFS, told us on Monday night that we should skip class on Tuesday and instead spend the night with someone who’s connected to the EMFS and lives in Huay Pe Keng. The next afternoon we drove to the village, motorbike caravan style, with one of our students (Hon Bil).
After the pleasant but awkward meet and greet with the woman (Lay Lay Wha) who graciously took us in, we headed to the village field for a massive volleyball tournament. We saw a boys game first and they are GOOD. It’s a pity American men don’t usually play volleyball; it’s such an athletic and exciting sport! The real excitement, though, was watching the young women play some scrappy and fierce volleyball with a good stock of fans cheering them on. Most played with their rings on (they can take the rings off if they want to). They were also barefoot which was particularly impressive given the hard-packed earth and rock mix they were playing on. The crowd was rapt and, best of all, the young women were completely serious about their game; they didn’t for a second try to be “feminine” by not giving it their all. Some of them are gifted players! The Kaya in the villages and the refugees in the camps are all obsessed with volleyball. It’s an excellent outlet for young men who have been stripped of their bread-winning status and feel aimless.
The games continued, but Flora and I decided to take a little tour of the village before dinner time. When most tourists get off the river-crossing boat and arrive in Huay Pe Keng, they don’t venture far. People are selling their wares along one main path (bracelets, post-cards, elephant or neck-ringed women figurines, clothe bags….) and that seems to be enough for the average tourist. If you journey 350 meters past the first village along a carefully marked path, you enter the “New Village”. Apparently most tourists aren’t fit enough for that big trek because the New Village gets a fraction of the tourist traffic of the Old village. The Thai government created the New Village in 2007 and promised that people who moved there from the Old Village or elsewhere would have better facilities, conditions, etc. It is fair to say that they have NOT delivered. People in this village are even more impoverished than their Old Village counterparts – outhouses are poorly located, food is scarce. Flora stayed here when she visited two months ago.
The music and dance festivities were supposed to begin at 8pm, but this isn’t America so the timetable didn’t rule supreme. In the interim hours, we met some hilarious Evergreen State college students who we’ve run into several times in MHS (they’re here on a semester program). We were given food by yet more friendly locals and had to eat; hospitality in both directions trumps all.
The festivities (an elaborate dance competition) got underway at about 10:30 and were pretty fantastic. Pictures do justice better than words here. Dance groups from each village did performances decked out in their colorful cultural dress which includes vibrant head-bands. There was plenty of painfully loud music and crowd support and I felt utterly blessed to be a part of the whole thing.
A word on the rings…One legend goes that the woman began wearing the rings to protect their necks from tigers. Girls begin wearing the rings when they are about five years old and add three as often as they can, depending on how fast they grow. It’s considered desirable to peek at about 25 rings. The rings are undeniably bad for the health of women who wear them; their collar bones are crushed, their backs permanently arched in old age, and their overall life expectancy is decreased by seven years. In recent years, some women have chosen not to wear the rings. Muby, a woman we know through work in Mae Hong Son, is one of the most feminist, forward-thinking women you’ll ever meet. She chose to take off her rings years ago partly because it is easier in the workplace and partly because she doesn’t think she should have to do that to her body because she is a woman. Still, she has total respect for the women who still wear the rings. Not only is it an engrained and ancient part of their culture, but the rings are now the only source of their income in the villages. Western outsiders can inform the women of the medical dangers of wearing the rings, but the practice is not ours to judge.
The next morning was the big ceremony! Naturally it started a couple hours late, so I had time to wander around with a friendly Dutchwoman anthropologist who I had met the night before. The main idea to the ceremony is the raising of a big pole (about 35 feet tall) that represents the first tree. Poles from previous years are all in the same area – in a clearing on the top of a small hill. Before anything got underway, over a hundred young men (women aren’t allowed up there) danced around this configuration of giant poles for a couple of hours, playing music…..gongs, cymbals, drums – solid rhythm, really fun to listen to! Eventually, each village brought out a chicken and asked it questions about their fortune for the coming year. Meanwhile, the shamans blessed the pole and then the men began raising the pole…..it took over a hundred men and A LOT of muscle power/rope leverage! Once the pole was raised and secured – music and dance continuing all the while – someone from each village sacrificed the chicken. They then stuck small sticks in the thighbones of the chickens and the shamans read the fortunes of their villages based on which direction the bones tipped. Three of four fortunes were quite good – the New Village is supposed to get more visitors in the coming year….I sure hope so. One of the villages, however, had quite a bad fortune, so people were pretty upset.
The rest of the day was free-for-all socializing time! Our friend from Mae Hong Son, Muby, took us to half a dozen homes of her friends and family members to meet and be offered more food than we could possibly handle (or should possibly take form these impoverished families). Because it’s the New Year, it’s customary to go around saying hello to everyone in your village. The young men were still dancing, but at this point, winding their way through town, having water thrown on them.
It was an absolutely fantastic 24 hours……I felt very fortunate to be there, and proud to be involved with the EMFS. This was all on the 8th and 9th of April. Since then, the New Years festival for greater Southeast Asia has taken place – more on THAT next time! This is already preposterously long.
Love to you all! (Don’t be shy about leaving comments….it’s fun to know if you’re reading.)
~Alice
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Back in the saddle again!
You may not have known it....but I was out of the saddle for a while, so to speak. About two weeks ago I got a horrific headache, breathing problems, fever.....it wasn't great. I felt better the next morning (after one kind friend had me stay at her house while she was away for the weekend and another two friends stayed there with me so Flora could shuttle back and forth to our host-family's house.....). Flora and I spent the next couple of days in denial. Sure, I had no energy, all sorts of weird symptoms that you don't want to know about, and felt crappy, but I was getting better and had some medicine, right? Right? Wrong. In the middle of Monday night I had a breakdown.....As avid blog readers will remember, I had QUITE a breakdown on an Indian train this fall which involved quoting Fifty Cent to passersby, losing all control of my facilities, attempting to launch myself off my bunk-bed......all in all giving Kate and Deepa quite the workout.
WELL. Apparently one of my subconscious goals for my year-off was to have as many of my best friends as possible get the chance to see delirious! Yippee! My breakdown last week wasn't as bad as the one in India, but it was one of my worser moments, so I went to the hospital. I tested negative for malaria, so they told me I had food poisoning. (Code for - we don't know what's up and have to say something.) Flora and I eventually went to Chiang Mai so I could go to a bigger hospital. It turns out I had mild hepatitis. AND, interestingly enough, that bump on my finger that I talked about in a blog about a month ago? The one I got from giving henna to the children at the Children's Home? Well it morphed into quite a nasty little wart so I had that removed as well. Flora returned to Mae Hong Son and I watched movies at Liz's house for almost a week....Pride and Prejudice, Chariots of Fire, Rocky, The Hot Chick, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.....I was certainly no longer suffering.
I've been back in Chiang Mai since Tuesday and I'm so happy to be here! I still have very low energy, but am infinitely better. I went to the Mae Hong Son hospital on Thursday and told them exactly what to test for, and I'm looking normal! Today, Flora and I turned to the tricky business of buying food for our host family (because they will NOT accept money and we will NOT accept a free ride). We had very little clue what to get, but a friend came and shopped with us, and we were pretty proud of the results......chicken, eggplant, mango, oranges, fish, vegetables I don't recognize, herbs I don't recognize, Burmese salad mix - All fresh!
In other big news - we know our address now and would love to get mail from you!
Nay Chi Labour Union
P.O. Box 113
Mae Hong Son, 58000
Thailand
Before I sign out on this one.....here's a little list I've been keeping in my journal:
You know you've been in tropical Asia for a while WHEN....
1) You see the mountains ablaze at night and think, "oh. Crop burning season." instead of, "Run for your life!"
2) Your English student apologizes for missing a class and explains that he was "beating back a fire from his house". He's excused.
3) Toilet paper is a fun luxury item
4) Your friend invites you over to use her shower and embarks an a lively description of its excellent water-pressure, ensuring you it's the best shower in Thailand.
5) The doctor says, "It's probably malaria. Everyone gets malaria at one point or another."
6) You can tell the difference between Northern Thai rice and Southern Indian rice (and wish you couldn't)
7) When you see a cockroach crawl across your backpack you experience immense relief because it's nothing sinister
8) When the doctor tells you that you actually have mild hepatitis you're positively giddy because it's NOT malaria (or dengue or yellow fever or...)
9) You hear more about the Burma situation than the US election
10) You broke almost a year of vegetarianism for pig intestines so as not to be rude....
11) All your friends want to know what YOU will be up to for the mid-summer water festival!
Much love,
~Alice
PS - I'm going to be at the fish caves with Maung-Hla and his family for the water festival, where will YOU be???
WELL. Apparently one of my subconscious goals for my year-off was to have as many of my best friends as possible get the chance to see delirious! Yippee! My breakdown last week wasn't as bad as the one in India, but it was one of my worser moments, so I went to the hospital. I tested negative for malaria, so they told me I had food poisoning. (Code for - we don't know what's up and have to say something.) Flora and I eventually went to Chiang Mai so I could go to a bigger hospital. It turns out I had mild hepatitis. AND, interestingly enough, that bump on my finger that I talked about in a blog about a month ago? The one I got from giving henna to the children at the Children's Home? Well it morphed into quite a nasty little wart so I had that removed as well. Flora returned to Mae Hong Son and I watched movies at Liz's house for almost a week....Pride and Prejudice, Chariots of Fire, Rocky, The Hot Chick, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.....I was certainly no longer suffering.
I've been back in Chiang Mai since Tuesday and I'm so happy to be here! I still have very low energy, but am infinitely better. I went to the Mae Hong Son hospital on Thursday and told them exactly what to test for, and I'm looking normal! Today, Flora and I turned to the tricky business of buying food for our host family (because they will NOT accept money and we will NOT accept a free ride). We had very little clue what to get, but a friend came and shopped with us, and we were pretty proud of the results......chicken, eggplant, mango, oranges, fish, vegetables I don't recognize, herbs I don't recognize, Burmese salad mix - All fresh!
In other big news - we know our address now and would love to get mail from you!
Nay Chi Labour Union
P.O. Box 113
Mae Hong Son, 58000
Thailand
Before I sign out on this one.....here's a little list I've been keeping in my journal:
You know you've been in tropical Asia for a while WHEN....
1) You see the mountains ablaze at night and think, "oh. Crop burning season." instead of, "Run for your life!"
2) Your English student apologizes for missing a class and explains that he was "beating back a fire from his house". He's excused.
3) Toilet paper is a fun luxury item
4) Your friend invites you over to use her shower and embarks an a lively description of its excellent water-pressure, ensuring you it's the best shower in Thailand.
5) The doctor says, "It's probably malaria. Everyone gets malaria at one point or another."
6) You can tell the difference between Northern Thai rice and Southern Indian rice (and wish you couldn't)
7) When you see a cockroach crawl across your backpack you experience immense relief because it's nothing sinister
8) When the doctor tells you that you actually have mild hepatitis you're positively giddy because it's NOT malaria (or dengue or yellow fever or...)
9) You hear more about the Burma situation than the US election
10) You broke almost a year of vegetarianism for pig intestines so as not to be rude....
11) All your friends want to know what YOU will be up to for the mid-summer water festival!
Much love,
~Alice
PS - I'm going to be at the fish caves with Maung-Hla and his family for the water festival, where will YOU be???
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