Cups of strong, black coffee.
Putting my feet as high in the air as I want.
Driving.
Never hearing the word farang.
Hugging, running, laughing, and eating with friends and family I have missed dearly.
Banishing quick dry to the depths of my closet.
Bounteous supplies of toilet paper.
O, the creature comforts I have reveled in this past month since landing in the US of A! But as I emerge from the glow that hangs over the first few weeks after a traveler's homecoming, it seems I'm not fully back. These six weeks are the longest I've been home in two years, and time has re-shaped people and places here in Virginia as much or more as it has me. So this is a re acquaintance as well as a reunion.
Processing has barely begun for my time in Thailand; I want to share a few of the reflections that came out of our final official meeting as a program and were heartily affirmed in the endless "toast off" of the naksuksa (students).
*What does Thai culture have to teach American students?
generosity
the value of communal meals
dressing as a sign of respect for others
tact
reverence to older people
importance of being with family members
keeping your cool, saving face
living in relationship to the environment, natural world
greater accessibility to being self sufficient
*What will we do after this experience?
ask questions and listen
understand the history of a place - both of its people and its ecology
garden - grow at least some of our own food and connect to seasons and natural processes
vermiculture - step one to saving the planet
use alternate transportation to cut down on fossil fuel use and emissions
write and talk about our experiences
live simply by using and buying less
practice hospitality - because we've been the weird foreigners who can't speak the language
seek out like minded people so we don't lose momentum
visit the Amish!
These are the things that are on tumble cycle in my mind as I plan for school in the fall and beyond that into jobs and apartments. So much of what I have learned while at Houghton and even in high school has strayed outside of the lines of formal education. When I think back to times of growth I see people, relationships, things I have looked at and touched. I can point to the girls I lived with at Mustard Seeds in WV, everything about Buffalo, friends I have known for 5 to 10 years, family (even ancestors!), and now what I have come through in Thailand and trace much of who I am spiritually, intellectually, and socially.
Anyway, a full head, late night, and a few cups of coffee produce 'musings', as Teepa would call them, like this one for me. I appreciate so much those of you who have followed my scattered postings and encouraged me while I was away.
Ok, tata for now!
Melissa
- If you have any Thai friends, I would love to talk to them. Right now I am listening to recordings and going to Thai restaurants because I miss speaking Thai!
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Friday, June 19, 2009
Mae Hong Son - again!
Hello friends and family,
First, thanks to everyone who sent birthday wishes and cards! It was a great day and even better due to the mail that has continued to appear for me every time I go into ISDSI - always a wonderful sight! We finished our official studies last week with a final seminar and Thai test (ak!) and all but two of my fellow students have left Chiang Mai, on to their next pursuits.
After a lot of deliberation, planning, and re-planning, I've changed my plane ticket to July 1 and am coming home early instead of spending the whole summer here as I originally thought. Life at home is to precious to miss out on right now, and I am now feeling that this is the right decision. So this time in Mae Hong Son is going to cap off my experience in Thailand, and even though I have already spent some time in the village, Huay Hee, I am anticipating learning so much more.
I will be spending about a week living in a Karen mountain village and working on a video project about traditional weaving. Any of you who have worked in Buffalo and seen the beautiful bags, shirts, and skirts that the Karen wear will understand why it is so fascinating! I am able to use my school's equipment and connections, so it has been much easier to set up than if I tried to do it on my own.
This experience will be a good reflection setting for understanding my time in Thailand. This whole time we have been talking about resource access and looking at the price local communities pay in large development schemes like dams or commercial activity like trawler fishing. One of the reasons, besides weaving, that I am interested in living in Huay Hee is that I think the Karen lifestyle has a lot to teach. They may be, according to student surveys from I believe several years ago, an example of a community with an ecological footprint of below one world. If you are not familiar with that term, it means that their level of resource use would allow everyone to have enough of the earth's resources, theoretically. Also, community and family life are cultural values and tangibly different than even Thai society, which to a westerner looks close knit.
I am just starting to read Deep Economy by Bill McKibben, which is about a return to community based economy instead of this endless model of growth. This fits with so many themes of this past semester, though I am still trying to work out an understanding of place and other questions I have mentioned in previous posts (I think!). Other friends and I have been talking about how to implement these concerns about sustainability and more when we come home - even as college students who have flown around the world to learn we have a long way to go to reconcile our ideals with our practice. I will look forward to sharing these questions and thoughts with you and also reconnecting with your lives in Virginia in two weeks, or wherever we meet next. Thanks for your encouragement as always!
With love,
Melissa
I don't thing I mentioned
First, thanks to everyone who sent birthday wishes and cards! It was a great day and even better due to the mail that has continued to appear for me every time I go into ISDSI - always a wonderful sight! We finished our official studies last week with a final seminar and Thai test (ak!) and all but two of my fellow students have left Chiang Mai, on to their next pursuits.
After a lot of deliberation, planning, and re-planning, I've changed my plane ticket to July 1 and am coming home early instead of spending the whole summer here as I originally thought. Life at home is to precious to miss out on right now, and I am now feeling that this is the right decision. So this time in Mae Hong Son is going to cap off my experience in Thailand, and even though I have already spent some time in the village, Huay Hee, I am anticipating learning so much more.
I will be spending about a week living in a Karen mountain village and working on a video project about traditional weaving. Any of you who have worked in Buffalo and seen the beautiful bags, shirts, and skirts that the Karen wear will understand why it is so fascinating! I am able to use my school's equipment and connections, so it has been much easier to set up than if I tried to do it on my own.
This experience will be a good reflection setting for understanding my time in Thailand. This whole time we have been talking about resource access and looking at the price local communities pay in large development schemes like dams or commercial activity like trawler fishing. One of the reasons, besides weaving, that I am interested in living in Huay Hee is that I think the Karen lifestyle has a lot to teach. They may be, according to student surveys from I believe several years ago, an example of a community with an ecological footprint of below one world. If you are not familiar with that term, it means that their level of resource use would allow everyone to have enough of the earth's resources, theoretically. Also, community and family life are cultural values and tangibly different than even Thai society, which to a westerner looks close knit.
I am just starting to read Deep Economy by Bill McKibben, which is about a return to community based economy instead of this endless model of growth. This fits with so many themes of this past semester, though I am still trying to work out an understanding of place and other questions I have mentioned in previous posts (I think!). Other friends and I have been talking about how to implement these concerns about sustainability and more when we come home - even as college students who have flown around the world to learn we have a long way to go to reconcile our ideals with our practice. I will look forward to sharing these questions and thoughts with you and also reconnecting with your lives in Virginia in two weeks, or wherever we meet next. Thanks for your encouragement as always!
With love,
Melissa
I don't thing I mentioned
Monday, April 20, 2009
In the hall of the mountain king
It's Monday night and after a rare cup of genuine, un(condensed milk)defiled coffee, I am recharged and excited to be on the edge of the second half of the ISDSI semester.
Two friends, Annie and Stephanie, and I spent the last three days mostly underground crawling through muddy passages on a caving course with a local climbing group called CMRCA, and it was amazing! There are no pictures because I am still waiting for my camera to resurface, but honestly they could not capture it anyway. The goal of the course is to teach some basics of cave exploration so that hopefully you can explore on your own in the future. We learned how to set up an anchor and some knots to allow us to rappel into shafts and then come back up the ropes using all kinds of fun and expensive gadgets clipped into our harnesses. The furthest down we rappelled was about 30 meters into a dark hole, and in another descent we passed through a space so small that several of us almost got stuck on our hips (too much sticky rice!) or chest depending on gender.... Looking back up into the opening from the darkness of the room below, I saw a rennaissance masterpiece of sunlight and blending shadows as the next climber eased down the rope, backlit. It was overwhelming and too beautiful to stop staring at.
Because it was rainy season, some of the cave passages were flooded with mud and water, and we got to duckwalk withour heads tilted to fit into the small space of air above the water and swim in mud and guano (bat poop) enriched pools. The most intense part of the course for me was not descending into dark pits but putting my helmeted head underwater to duck through a small hole in the rock and resurface in the next room. Underwater+underground+claustrophobia+ no light= very memorable, to say the least.
The last day we got to "lead" our guides through a cave and decide which passages to pursue to try to find the exit. This place was infested with bats and we spent the last 1/2 hour crawling on our bellies in puddingesque mud through a tight tunnel with the occasional bat flapping by. Needless to say, we felt pretty hardcore emerging into the sunlit world a solitary brown/grey and sloshing back to the parking lot victorious! Our guides were really knowledgable and we are planning to revisit CMRCA to boulder on their wall and maybe do some climbing later.
I have been refreshed so much in the past week and a half by growing relationships with my fellow students, reconnecting with my host family, and spending time out of doors using my body and spirit and not just my mind. I was surprised by the effect of the caves on me, from living formations to even fairly creepy cave dwellers (animals, not people, just to clarify!). Emerging from a tiny passage into a hall of colums and stones that have been forming mostly unseen, drip by drip, I felt like I stumbled into a cathedral. I found worship in just taking in that place.
I got a call from my host mom inviting me to gin khao (eat) with my family and a list of almost all the people I had met while living in Mae Rim for five weeks. Kat, the other girl who lived near me, and I arrived on Saturday night to find out that they were all related, which I could actually identify with due to many a Mennonite gathering, and it was a New Year family reunion! That was illuminating for all of the relationships we had been trying to figure out and also tons of fun. We made it into the family picture for the year, almost got added into the family tree, and got third (actually last) place in a banana eating competition. So good. Our families have been nothing but generous with us and as we learn more Thai we are able to know them better too.
Today I met with Katheryn, a British woman who works with the Summer Institute of Linguistics, about a possible internship for this summer. I think I reinforced all kinds of stereotypes and amused the rot deng (the closest thing to public transportation) driver when I asked to be taken to THE McDonalds in Chiang Mai, which was a landmark close to our meeting place. His response was, "Go Mac Donnal? Hahahahaha.."
Anyway, the project that I have been e-mailing with Katheryn and her boss Liz about is really exciting! They are working with the Thai government and minority communities to develop multilingual education curricula, which would enable children to be taught in their ethnic language and standard Thai. This is a really big deal for validating and helping to preserve the cultures of groups that are classified as 'low caste' by Thai society and have even been referred to as animals by some in government. From what Katheryn said, it sounds like the communities have varying goals and time tables for these multilingual projects, and SIL is having to work with complicated issues like what script to use for instruction and how to evaluate the effectiveness of programs for government requirements. There is movement also to use TPR, total physical response, with younger minority children learning Thai. This is something we also tried to use in Buffalo to teach refugee students a new language through methods involving the use of the whole body and allowing kids to communicate understanding through more means than written or spoken language. Very exciting!
The downturn is that is doesn't seem there is really a place for me to work with them as an intern this summer. I have not by any means mastered Thai and have minimal training and experience in an area that is mainly for people with masters degrees or more. If I did intern with SIL I would be doing mostly observation for this literacy aspect and then data analysis for the Survey department, which would mean lots of slave labor paperwork and computer research in an office. So.... plans change! One of my best and oldest friends (Becky, that's you!) gave me some great advice on this subject - I am experienceing new things I never knew about before, so I shouldn't be afraid to divert from what I always thought I would do to match this growing world. Thanks friend:)
So, this week will be sorting through internship options via ISDSI, reading intense amounts to prepare for our next expedition course into the forests of Mae Hong Son province, and going climbing for free on Ladies Night at CMRCA. On this course we will be backpacking and spending time in Karen villages in northern Thailand, and it is one of the big reasons I wanted to come to Thailand. Rousing discussion is already beginning as we are looking into preservation vs. conservation of wilderness and trying to understand the skewed balance between people and the natural world.
It seems that the protests and riots in Thailand are at least at a stall, and things feel less tense than they did a week ago. Chiang Mai was not affected at all like Bangkok, but there were some road closings nearby by the red shirts and everyone was talking about the latest news from the ASEAN summit or the capitol (al?). I asked my Pau for his opinion and he said," I go to work, I eat rice, I don't like to think about it." The protests this year, both in the airport closing and now during Songkran, have really hurt the tourism industry which is a significant part of Thailand's economy. One shop owner I talked with estimated that only 20-30% of expected tourists came to Chiang Mai, which is ordinarily the destination for New YEar's, for Songkran this year.
Ok, I am off to catch up on other world news and then ride out the rest of my caffeine buzz on a wave of forest ecology readings. Thanks for checking out my blog; know you are in my thoughts and much loved!
Melissa
Two friends, Annie and Stephanie, and I spent the last three days mostly underground crawling through muddy passages on a caving course with a local climbing group called CMRCA, and it was amazing! There are no pictures because I am still waiting for my camera to resurface, but honestly they could not capture it anyway. The goal of the course is to teach some basics of cave exploration so that hopefully you can explore on your own in the future. We learned how to set up an anchor and some knots to allow us to rappel into shafts and then come back up the ropes using all kinds of fun and expensive gadgets clipped into our harnesses. The furthest down we rappelled was about 30 meters into a dark hole, and in another descent we passed through a space so small that several of us almost got stuck on our hips (too much sticky rice!) or chest depending on gender.... Looking back up into the opening from the darkness of the room below, I saw a rennaissance masterpiece of sunlight and blending shadows as the next climber eased down the rope, backlit. It was overwhelming and too beautiful to stop staring at.
Because it was rainy season, some of the cave passages were flooded with mud and water, and we got to duckwalk withour heads tilted to fit into the small space of air above the water and swim in mud and guano (bat poop) enriched pools. The most intense part of the course for me was not descending into dark pits but putting my helmeted head underwater to duck through a small hole in the rock and resurface in the next room. Underwater+underground+claustrophobia+ no light= very memorable, to say the least.
The last day we got to "lead" our guides through a cave and decide which passages to pursue to try to find the exit. This place was infested with bats and we spent the last 1/2 hour crawling on our bellies in puddingesque mud through a tight tunnel with the occasional bat flapping by. Needless to say, we felt pretty hardcore emerging into the sunlit world a solitary brown/grey and sloshing back to the parking lot victorious! Our guides were really knowledgable and we are planning to revisit CMRCA to boulder on their wall and maybe do some climbing later.
I have been refreshed so much in the past week and a half by growing relationships with my fellow students, reconnecting with my host family, and spending time out of doors using my body and spirit and not just my mind. I was surprised by the effect of the caves on me, from living formations to even fairly creepy cave dwellers (animals, not people, just to clarify!). Emerging from a tiny passage into a hall of colums and stones that have been forming mostly unseen, drip by drip, I felt like I stumbled into a cathedral. I found worship in just taking in that place.
I got a call from my host mom inviting me to gin khao (eat) with my family and a list of almost all the people I had met while living in Mae Rim for five weeks. Kat, the other girl who lived near me, and I arrived on Saturday night to find out that they were all related, which I could actually identify with due to many a Mennonite gathering, and it was a New Year family reunion! That was illuminating for all of the relationships we had been trying to figure out and also tons of fun. We made it into the family picture for the year, almost got added into the family tree, and got third (actually last) place in a banana eating competition. So good. Our families have been nothing but generous with us and as we learn more Thai we are able to know them better too.
Today I met with Katheryn, a British woman who works with the Summer Institute of Linguistics, about a possible internship for this summer. I think I reinforced all kinds of stereotypes and amused the rot deng (the closest thing to public transportation) driver when I asked to be taken to THE McDonalds in Chiang Mai, which was a landmark close to our meeting place. His response was, "Go Mac Donnal? Hahahahaha.."
Anyway, the project that I have been e-mailing with Katheryn and her boss Liz about is really exciting! They are working with the Thai government and minority communities to develop multilingual education curricula, which would enable children to be taught in their ethnic language and standard Thai. This is a really big deal for validating and helping to preserve the cultures of groups that are classified as 'low caste' by Thai society and have even been referred to as animals by some in government. From what Katheryn said, it sounds like the communities have varying goals and time tables for these multilingual projects, and SIL is having to work with complicated issues like what script to use for instruction and how to evaluate the effectiveness of programs for government requirements. There is movement also to use TPR, total physical response, with younger minority children learning Thai. This is something we also tried to use in Buffalo to teach refugee students a new language through methods involving the use of the whole body and allowing kids to communicate understanding through more means than written or spoken language. Very exciting!
The downturn is that is doesn't seem there is really a place for me to work with them as an intern this summer. I have not by any means mastered Thai and have minimal training and experience in an area that is mainly for people with masters degrees or more. If I did intern with SIL I would be doing mostly observation for this literacy aspect and then data analysis for the Survey department, which would mean lots of slave labor paperwork and computer research in an office. So.... plans change! One of my best and oldest friends (Becky, that's you!) gave me some great advice on this subject - I am experienceing new things I never knew about before, so I shouldn't be afraid to divert from what I always thought I would do to match this growing world. Thanks friend:)
So, this week will be sorting through internship options via ISDSI, reading intense amounts to prepare for our next expedition course into the forests of Mae Hong Son province, and going climbing for free on Ladies Night at CMRCA. On this course we will be backpacking and spending time in Karen villages in northern Thailand, and it is one of the big reasons I wanted to come to Thailand. Rousing discussion is already beginning as we are looking into preservation vs. conservation of wilderness and trying to understand the skewed balance between people and the natural world.
It seems that the protests and riots in Thailand are at least at a stall, and things feel less tense than they did a week ago. Chiang Mai was not affected at all like Bangkok, but there were some road closings nearby by the red shirts and everyone was talking about the latest news from the ASEAN summit or the capitol (al?). I asked my Pau for his opinion and he said," I go to work, I eat rice, I don't like to think about it." The protests this year, both in the airport closing and now during Songkran, have really hurt the tourism industry which is a significant part of Thailand's economy. One shop owner I talked with estimated that only 20-30% of expected tourists came to Chiang Mai, which is ordinarily the destination for New YEar's, for Songkran this year.
Ok, I am off to catch up on other world news and then ride out the rest of my caffeine buzz on a wave of forest ecology readings. Thanks for checking out my blog; know you are in my thoughts and much loved!
Melissa
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Songkran and Sukothai
Hello friends and family!
Right now I am sitting in an internet cafe, waiting to catch a bus back to Chiang Mai from the ancient capital of the Sukothai kingdom. The ruins here are preserved as a UN world heritage sight and I came up with a few friends to bai tiaow, or vacation, on our spring break. We rented some bicycles and pedaled around through ancient temples and ponds yesterday under a bright blue sky, and then spent this morning and afternoon hiking up Khao Luang, a forested mountain that looks down over the province. It was a perfect way to recharge after our last course and also get ready for the next block in Mae Hong Son, which according to ISDSI legend involves intense backpacking up and down steep inclines and valleys. We shall see....
I am going to wait for another post to tell stories from the rivers course that we just finished in Issan, the eastern part of Thailand. It was a really powerful time of living with dam affected communities and exploring the rivers that our hosts call home and I want to give it the space it deserves. More to come on that!
What I would like to describe is the craziness of Songkran, or Thai New Year, that has been literally raging in the streets for the past week. Picture the biggest waterfight you have ever seen or been a part of, probably involving super soakers, hoses, buckets of water dashing onto the heads of unsuspecting passerby, and people being pushed into large bodies of water. Now magnify this to a citywide level and add blasting music, pickup trucks packed with people wielding all of these items patrolling the street, and lots and lots of whiskey. This is Songkran, and Chiang Mai is the place to be for Thai New Year so many of the students here have had the chance to celebrate with our host families during our spring break. In the 800 meters between my apartment and the internet cafe nearby, I probably had about 6 buckets of water dumped on my head/body and many more donations to my soggy state from squirtguns, hoses, and passing trucks. Another tradition that we encountered in Sukothai on the last day of the festival is the tradition of smearing a rice powder paste onto the face to bring good luck in the new year. I have never had so many people touch my face in one day, and I had flashbacks to old zombie movies as outstretched hands rushed from everywhere to wish chok dii (good luck) and happy new year to the farang via a swipe of scented goo. However, in the celebrations in the streets and splashing of water in the sunlight it is impossible to resist getting into the party too.
After we return to Chiang Mai, two other students and I are going on a 3 day caving expedition before starting our next block on Monday. Monday afternoon I am planning to meet with Katheryn, a woman who works with SIL in Chiang Mai, about an internship for this summer. I will be making a decision about my summer plans that week, so I appreciate your thoughts and prayers!
One other small thing...... my camera has gone MIA so I am not able to post pictures! I hope to find it soon so I can share the sights of my last few months here in Thailand. Thanks as always for your e-mails, letters, messages, and calls - it means a lot!
Much love and look for another update again soon.
Melissa
Right now I am sitting in an internet cafe, waiting to catch a bus back to Chiang Mai from the ancient capital of the Sukothai kingdom. The ruins here are preserved as a UN world heritage sight and I came up with a few friends to bai tiaow, or vacation, on our spring break. We rented some bicycles and pedaled around through ancient temples and ponds yesterday under a bright blue sky, and then spent this morning and afternoon hiking up Khao Luang, a forested mountain that looks down over the province. It was a perfect way to recharge after our last course and also get ready for the next block in Mae Hong Son, which according to ISDSI legend involves intense backpacking up and down steep inclines and valleys. We shall see....
I am going to wait for another post to tell stories from the rivers course that we just finished in Issan, the eastern part of Thailand. It was a really powerful time of living with dam affected communities and exploring the rivers that our hosts call home and I want to give it the space it deserves. More to come on that!
What I would like to describe is the craziness of Songkran, or Thai New Year, that has been literally raging in the streets for the past week. Picture the biggest waterfight you have ever seen or been a part of, probably involving super soakers, hoses, buckets of water dashing onto the heads of unsuspecting passerby, and people being pushed into large bodies of water. Now magnify this to a citywide level and add blasting music, pickup trucks packed with people wielding all of these items patrolling the street, and lots and lots of whiskey. This is Songkran, and Chiang Mai is the place to be for Thai New Year so many of the students here have had the chance to celebrate with our host families during our spring break. In the 800 meters between my apartment and the internet cafe nearby, I probably had about 6 buckets of water dumped on my head/body and many more donations to my soggy state from squirtguns, hoses, and passing trucks. Another tradition that we encountered in Sukothai on the last day of the festival is the tradition of smearing a rice powder paste onto the face to bring good luck in the new year. I have never had so many people touch my face in one day, and I had flashbacks to old zombie movies as outstretched hands rushed from everywhere to wish chok dii (good luck) and happy new year to the farang via a swipe of scented goo. However, in the celebrations in the streets and splashing of water in the sunlight it is impossible to resist getting into the party too.
After we return to Chiang Mai, two other students and I are going on a 3 day caving expedition before starting our next block on Monday. Monday afternoon I am planning to meet with Katheryn, a woman who works with SIL in Chiang Mai, about an internship for this summer. I will be making a decision about my summer plans that week, so I appreciate your thoughts and prayers!
One other small thing...... my camera has gone MIA so I am not able to post pictures! I hope to find it soon so I can share the sights of my last few months here in Thailand. Thanks as always for your e-mails, letters, messages, and calls - it means a lot!
Much love and look for another update again soon.
Melissa
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Chiang Mai to Issan
Hello friends and family!
Six weeks later and I am getting ready to leave Chiang Mai tomorrow morning for the next block course in the semester. I'll be going to the north eastern region of Thailand for a course focusing on the effects that large dams have had on both ecology and human rights in this country. We have already had one week of classroom lecture on this topic and now we'll go see it live.
I have to apologize to you who are actually checking this blog because I am going to give to a surface level recap of the past month here instead of good juicy details. I think some of my fellow nagsuksa (students) have been posting so if you just need more adventures from Thailand you can check out their blogs and pictures too.
I'm just going to tell you about one of the days of my homestay so you can get an idea of what our first course was like. There was really, at least for me, not really a "typical" day because Thai life is very fluid. Sometimes just when I thought I was about to go to bed a posse of family members would come collect me and the other student that lived nearby and we would head out and about, or in our case a family member unexpectedly died and we were involved with the whole neighborhood in the week long funeral ceremonies. My family was so gracious and it was kind of hard to move out at the end, though also nice to regain the young adult independence I am so used to as a college student. This week has been more exploration of the city with other students and transitioning to not going home to Thai life every day.
So, in the mornings I would wake up around six to the sound of stir frying vegetables and eggs as Mae (mom) Ree, who probably went to bed later than me and got up earlier, cooked breakfast. It is important to greet people when you first meet them in the morning or after school, and also when you are leaving. Mae will always ask "aroy, mai?" (literally: is this food delicious or not?) and I would answer "Aroy!" ( It is delicious!) or, if it was stir fried beans which I really love, "Aroy mak mak!" (It is very delicious!). Usually I swept the house and then met Kat, the other ISDSI student who lived in my neighborhood, to catch the rot luang (this is the public transportation which is kind of like a covered pick up truck/bus with two long benches in the back. It is possible to fit 27 people in one, we have discovered!) into Chiang Mai. At ISDSI, Thai class runs from 8 -12 in the morning. For lunch we head out to a local market or restaurant that Pi Pookie, a Thai staff member who helped plan the course, thought would be especially tasty.
In the afternoon, Ajaan (professor) Christina, an anthropologist who has lived in Thailand for 20ish years, would teach about Thai culture, history, politics, or religion. Friday afternoon are fieldtrip days and we visited places like a royal farm modelling self sufficient agriculture, a Buddhist wat (temple), and NGOs.
This is such a broad overview! Next month will be better! I will be keeping journals for class that I can post when I return in 3 weeks.
On the particular day I want to tell you about, Kat and I took some time after school to buy pancake ingredients and fruit, as we planned to make American breakfast for our families on the morning before we moved to the student apartments in Chiang Mai. "Family" here includes uncles, aunts, and cousins living nearby, my Yai (grandmother) Moon, and neighbors who may or may not be related, so we got a formidable amount of mix! After shopping we took the rot luang back to our village, Mae Rim, and I greeted Yai and Nong Poo, a neighbor boy she babysits, before being directed to take a cool shower. Thai people shower a lot and really emphasize being clean and tidy, so you can understand why the sight of the sweaty, dreadlocked, unkempt western backpackers who cruise around Chiang Mai raises eyebrows and embarrased giggles.
Mae came home around 6 and makes dinner for Yai and me, which probably involved pork, vegetables, spice, and always rice. Later I went to Kat's house and learned Faun Jan, a traditional northern Thai dance involving twirling umbrellas, from Pi Dao our amazing cousin. Somehow Kat and I later ended up performing this dance infront of all the host families, students, and staff at the farewell dinner for the host families. AHH! Though we were nervous, wearing bright pink, and made up like china dolls, it was really fun and I think we made Pi Dao proud:)
On this night, after practicing, I came home to find Pau (dad) Lin home and watching Thai soap operas. We talked a little bit about our days and what I learned in Thai class, but I was feeling really sleepy as it was around 10 and past my Thai bedtime:) My neighbor Pang, who is about my age, came over to say hi and we talked for a little while too. Later after bidding my parents good night with a wai (think praying hands with fingertips raised up to about mouth level), I finally rolled into bed and beautiful sleep. When you are taking in so much new information , flavors, sights, and sounds and learning to form a new language, it is surprisingly exhausting. I feel like I understand why babies sleep so much, and why sometimes in my English classroom in Buffalo last summer I would see a student, head down on folded arms, just passed out at their desk at the end of the day.
Like I said, there was no typical day and I will save the week of funeral experience for another post, but this is something of how we have been living for 5 weeks.
This next course is going to be a mix of human rights, political science, and river ecology as far as the academic content. We will also be in homestay for a week in eastern Thailand (Issan) in a community affected by the construction of a large dam, and then returning to northern Thailand to spend around a week paddling down a river that may soon be dammed and altered. An uneasy thought lingering in the back of our student minds is the food we will encounter in Issan. Larp, a dish of raw intestines, blood, and bile, is one local dish, as well as raw fermented fish. I guess I'll just smile and swallow as fast as I can if I ever find that on my plate.
Thanks for everyone who has written letters and e-mails and is keeping me in prayer - it means a lot! I am going to be making a decision about where to intern this summer soon here; right now I am not sure if I will intern with Wycliffe/SIL or pursue something else through ISDSI.
Ok, thanks for reading. You are all in my heart and mind a lot these days. Keep an eye out for many more pictures and stories in a few weeks.
With lots of love,
Melissa
Six weeks later and I am getting ready to leave Chiang Mai tomorrow morning for the next block course in the semester. I'll be going to the north eastern region of Thailand for a course focusing on the effects that large dams have had on both ecology and human rights in this country. We have already had one week of classroom lecture on this topic and now we'll go see it live.
I have to apologize to you who are actually checking this blog because I am going to give to a surface level recap of the past month here instead of good juicy details. I think some of my fellow nagsuksa (students) have been posting so if you just need more adventures from Thailand you can check out their blogs and pictures too.
I'm just going to tell you about one of the days of my homestay so you can get an idea of what our first course was like. There was really, at least for me, not really a "typical" day because Thai life is very fluid. Sometimes just when I thought I was about to go to bed a posse of family members would come collect me and the other student that lived nearby and we would head out and about, or in our case a family member unexpectedly died and we were involved with the whole neighborhood in the week long funeral ceremonies. My family was so gracious and it was kind of hard to move out at the end, though also nice to regain the young adult independence I am so used to as a college student. This week has been more exploration of the city with other students and transitioning to not going home to Thai life every day.
So, in the mornings I would wake up around six to the sound of stir frying vegetables and eggs as Mae (mom) Ree, who probably went to bed later than me and got up earlier, cooked breakfast. It is important to greet people when you first meet them in the morning or after school, and also when you are leaving. Mae will always ask "aroy, mai?" (literally: is this food delicious or not?) and I would answer "Aroy!" ( It is delicious!) or, if it was stir fried beans which I really love, "Aroy mak mak!" (It is very delicious!). Usually I swept the house and then met Kat, the other ISDSI student who lived in my neighborhood, to catch the rot luang (this is the public transportation which is kind of like a covered pick up truck/bus with two long benches in the back. It is possible to fit 27 people in one, we have discovered!) into Chiang Mai. At ISDSI, Thai class runs from 8 -12 in the morning. For lunch we head out to a local market or restaurant that Pi Pookie, a Thai staff member who helped plan the course, thought would be especially tasty.
In the afternoon, Ajaan (professor) Christina, an anthropologist who has lived in Thailand for 20ish years, would teach about Thai culture, history, politics, or religion. Friday afternoon are fieldtrip days and we visited places like a royal farm modelling self sufficient agriculture, a Buddhist wat (temple), and NGOs.
This is such a broad overview! Next month will be better! I will be keeping journals for class that I can post when I return in 3 weeks.
On the particular day I want to tell you about, Kat and I took some time after school to buy pancake ingredients and fruit, as we planned to make American breakfast for our families on the morning before we moved to the student apartments in Chiang Mai. "Family" here includes uncles, aunts, and cousins living nearby, my Yai (grandmother) Moon, and neighbors who may or may not be related, so we got a formidable amount of mix! After shopping we took the rot luang back to our village, Mae Rim, and I greeted Yai and Nong Poo, a neighbor boy she babysits, before being directed to take a cool shower. Thai people shower a lot and really emphasize being clean and tidy, so you can understand why the sight of the sweaty, dreadlocked, unkempt western backpackers who cruise around Chiang Mai raises eyebrows and embarrased giggles.
Mae came home around 6 and makes dinner for Yai and me, which probably involved pork, vegetables, spice, and always rice. Later I went to Kat's house and learned Faun Jan, a traditional northern Thai dance involving twirling umbrellas, from Pi Dao our amazing cousin. Somehow Kat and I later ended up performing this dance infront of all the host families, students, and staff at the farewell dinner for the host families. AHH! Though we were nervous, wearing bright pink, and made up like china dolls, it was really fun and I think we made Pi Dao proud:)
On this night, after practicing, I came home to find Pau (dad) Lin home and watching Thai soap operas. We talked a little bit about our days and what I learned in Thai class, but I was feeling really sleepy as it was around 10 and past my Thai bedtime:) My neighbor Pang, who is about my age, came over to say hi and we talked for a little while too. Later after bidding my parents good night with a wai (think praying hands with fingertips raised up to about mouth level), I finally rolled into bed and beautiful sleep. When you are taking in so much new information , flavors, sights, and sounds and learning to form a new language, it is surprisingly exhausting. I feel like I understand why babies sleep so much, and why sometimes in my English classroom in Buffalo last summer I would see a student, head down on folded arms, just passed out at their desk at the end of the day.
Like I said, there was no typical day and I will save the week of funeral experience for another post, but this is something of how we have been living for 5 weeks.
This next course is going to be a mix of human rights, political science, and river ecology as far as the academic content. We will also be in homestay for a week in eastern Thailand (Issan) in a community affected by the construction of a large dam, and then returning to northern Thailand to spend around a week paddling down a river that may soon be dammed and altered. An uneasy thought lingering in the back of our student minds is the food we will encounter in Issan. Larp, a dish of raw intestines, blood, and bile, is one local dish, as well as raw fermented fish. I guess I'll just smile and swallow as fast as I can if I ever find that on my plate.
Thanks for everyone who has written letters and e-mails and is keeping me in prayer - it means a lot! I am going to be making a decision about where to intern this summer soon here; right now I am not sure if I will intern with Wycliffe/SIL or pursue something else through ISDSI.
Ok, thanks for reading. You are all in my heart and mind a lot these days. Keep an eye out for many more pictures and stories in a few weeks.
With lots of love,
Melissa
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Phase: Next
Hello from Chiang Mai -
Exciting news; I passed my written and practical test for the WFR course, so I am certified with a laminated card and everything - yes! Our whole class was able to pass, and I really have to admire the Thai staff who took an entire course and test on medical terminology in a second language. The actual test day was on Thursday, and that finished off chapter one of my time in Thailand. The ISDSI director, Mark Ritchie, took some video which I am excited to tell you you can watch at http://www.isdsi.org/wmi.html to get an idea of what the past 10 days have been like. Notes about the background music; the first song is (ironically, you'll see what I mean) one that has the right rhythm to get a rate of 100 chest compressions per minute, so we would have it playing while we practiced CPR on our Actar dummies. We were cautioned not to sing that (or "The wheels on the bus go round and round", another song with the right beat) out loud in an actual emergency situation. Indeed. The second song is country because our Australian instuctor impersonated Billy Bob the country hick to simulate angina pectoris, and it was absolutely hilarious. You can also see the car accident scenario I mentioned in the last post at the end of the video. We had amazing instructors and a really great group of people, so I am kind of missing it!
Thursday night some of the Kalamazoo students who have just finished up their semester were getting rid of clothes and other items they don't want to take back to the states. So I inherited some school uniforms, a gym membership, and a cell phone! It was great to hear some of their expereinces and I am impatient to begin the actual semester.
Here is some contact information:
cell: 081-168-1004 I am still figuring out how to check messages, so no guarantees there.
mailing:
Melissa Blosser
ISDSI
PO Box 222
Prasingh
Chiang Mai, 50205
THAILAND
package:
Melissa Blosser
ISDSI
48/1 Chiang Mai-Lampang Road (Superhighway)
Muang, Chiang Mai, 50300
THAILAND
(if you are shipping, ISDSI recommends DHL)
Dennis picked me up on Friday from the guesthouse, so I am now staying with the Layman family. After staying by myself in a guesthouse for 12 days, it is nice to be back in a home. Bread is now a part of my life again (there is a sandwich shop in Chiang Mai that with the tagline - "A Shady oasis in an ocean of rice". I have been swimming in that delicious ocean since I came and loving it, but it is also good to experience american food after 2 weeks.) Plans for this week: I am going to try to get in touch with SIL people and define some more concrete details for this summer internship. I have some phone numbers from Houghton people, Dr. Ritchie, the Laymans, and I could probably ask the Gallmans too, so there is a good web of connections. Apparently this city is a huge SIL center. Sarah and I are going to do some exploring of the city and I will probably go with her for a day or two to the children's home in a city north of Chiang Mai where she volunteers. We are going to check out a night safari at the zoo here (since I didn't end up going to Tanzania........) and maybe also another night bazaar similar to the Sunday walking street. So, good plans.
Friday I will be going back to the guesthouse and the semester will begin. My fellow classmates are rolling in on the 6th and we will all spend the first night at Mountainview. Saturday we will meet our Thai host families and stay with them for the weekend, and then Monday morning we will begin intensive Thai in our first course. I am so excited about the language learning after wandering around for 2 weeks, illiterate and only able to say "hello" (incorrectly) and a word that just indicates politeness and I don't think has any definite meaning.
The Laymans live in a lower traffic area, which also means I will be able to go for runs while I am here. There are so many cars, motorbikes, bikes, and tuk tuks zipping around every street and corner in the main city that running is really difficult. I went one day for 30 minutes and spent 20 running and 10 waiting to dart across intersections, probably to the amusement of all onlooking Thais who somehow stroll through the rush of traffic like it's a field of daisies.
So enjoy the video and look for anther update in a week or so. Hope you are all doing well.
And - - - hooray for 27 years for Mom and Dad! Each year you celebrate is a gift for me and Erik too.
With love,
Melissa
Exciting news; I passed my written and practical test for the WFR course, so I am certified with a laminated card and everything - yes! Our whole class was able to pass, and I really have to admire the Thai staff who took an entire course and test on medical terminology in a second language. The actual test day was on Thursday, and that finished off chapter one of my time in Thailand. The ISDSI director, Mark Ritchie, took some video which I am excited to tell you you can watch at http://www.isdsi.org/wmi.html to get an idea of what the past 10 days have been like. Notes about the background music; the first song is (ironically, you'll see what I mean) one that has the right rhythm to get a rate of 100 chest compressions per minute, so we would have it playing while we practiced CPR on our Actar dummies. We were cautioned not to sing that (or "The wheels on the bus go round and round", another song with the right beat) out loud in an actual emergency situation. Indeed. The second song is country because our Australian instuctor impersonated Billy Bob the country hick to simulate angina pectoris, and it was absolutely hilarious. You can also see the car accident scenario I mentioned in the last post at the end of the video. We had amazing instructors and a really great group of people, so I am kind of missing it!
Thursday night some of the Kalamazoo students who have just finished up their semester were getting rid of clothes and other items they don't want to take back to the states. So I inherited some school uniforms, a gym membership, and a cell phone! It was great to hear some of their expereinces and I am impatient to begin the actual semester.
Here is some contact information:
cell: 081-168-1004 I am still figuring out how to check messages, so no guarantees there.
mailing:
Melissa Blosser
ISDSI
PO Box 222
Prasingh
Chiang Mai, 50205
THAILAND
package:
Melissa Blosser
ISDSI
48/1 Chiang Mai-Lampang Road (Superhighway)
Muang, Chiang Mai, 50300
THAILAND
(if you are shipping, ISDSI recommends DHL)
Dennis picked me up on Friday from the guesthouse, so I am now staying with the Layman family. After staying by myself in a guesthouse for 12 days, it is nice to be back in a home. Bread is now a part of my life again (there is a sandwich shop in Chiang Mai that with the tagline - "A Shady oasis in an ocean of rice". I have been swimming in that delicious ocean since I came and loving it, but it is also good to experience american food after 2 weeks.) Plans for this week: I am going to try to get in touch with SIL people and define some more concrete details for this summer internship. I have some phone numbers from Houghton people, Dr. Ritchie, the Laymans, and I could probably ask the Gallmans too, so there is a good web of connections. Apparently this city is a huge SIL center. Sarah and I are going to do some exploring of the city and I will probably go with her for a day or two to the children's home in a city north of Chiang Mai where she volunteers. We are going to check out a night safari at the zoo here (since I didn't end up going to Tanzania........) and maybe also another night bazaar similar to the Sunday walking street. So, good plans.
Friday I will be going back to the guesthouse and the semester will begin. My fellow classmates are rolling in on the 6th and we will all spend the first night at Mountainview. Saturday we will meet our Thai host families and stay with them for the weekend, and then Monday morning we will begin intensive Thai in our first course. I am so excited about the language learning after wandering around for 2 weeks, illiterate and only able to say "hello" (incorrectly) and a word that just indicates politeness and I don't think has any definite meaning.
The Laymans live in a lower traffic area, which also means I will be able to go for runs while I am here. There are so many cars, motorbikes, bikes, and tuk tuks zipping around every street and corner in the main city that running is really difficult. I went one day for 30 minutes and spent 20 running and 10 waiting to dart across intersections, probably to the amusement of all onlooking Thais who somehow stroll through the rush of traffic like it's a field of daisies.
So enjoy the video and look for anther update in a week or so. Hope you are all doing well.
And - - - hooray for 27 years for Mom and Dad! Each year you celebrate is a gift for me and Erik too.
With love,
Melissa
Sunday, January 25, 2009
blood and trauma (but not mine!)
Hi there friends and family,
It is time for a break from wound care and fractures to update you on my first week in Thailand. Thanks for everyone who has been e-mailing and facebooking; it is so good to hear from you!
Starting this past Tuesday, I have been spending most of my time in a Wilderness First Responder course that ISDSI, the organiation I will soon be studying with, is hosting. This is a mini course before the actual semester begins, and I am the only student from the spring semester that is here so far. Most of the other people taking the class are either staff from ISDSI or other people whose work involves outdoor recreation and travel in remote locations, and there is one girl who just finished a fall version of the program I am about to do. It is fascinating to hear the stories that a lot of these guys have from their work and travel around SE Asia.
This WFR class is one that I have been wanting to take since I came to college, so I am really enjoying it even though it is like trying to drink out of the proverbial fire hydrant:) Class runs from 8 to 5 every day and I am at the half way point with five days to go. NOLS staff is teaching the course through their Wilderness Medicine Insitute, and we have excellent teachers who are both knowledgable and hilarious. The format is really hands on, so maybe we will learn about musculoskeletal injuries and pracitce making splints, and then we will be put into a scenario where we have to respond to and assess a patient and try to treat them. Our most recent scenario was a car/motorcycle accident with multiple victims with injuries including paralysis, hand amputation, impalement, femur fracture, and severe head injury. I got to have open fractures on each of my wrists, complete with protruding "bones" (sticks) and fake blood everywhere (nice!). The instructors have all kinds of crazy makeup so injuries are often frighteningly realistic, and we use cars and other things as props to make a scene as true to life as possible. Pretty challenging, pretty sweet too. We have a format that we go through in any situation to help us be consistant and thorough in an emergency, and there is a lot to remember. Also, with this level of training we will not be able to solve a lot of the issues we can discover.
This class takes up most of my time and focus, so I have only explored the city a little but I will have more time in the coming months so not to worry. Today I was able to meet up with the Gallmans, two of my professors from Houghton who are teaching here for a few months, which was great. Later I explored the Sunday walking street, which is actually several streets blocked off to motor traffic and loaded with people playing music, performing, and selling handicrafts, food, and just about anything else. It is there every Sunday night so I will definitely be revisitng. And for those of you EMW's, I have found the Thai counterpart for sladoled, labelled enigmatically as "ancient ice cream". It comes on a stick in a frozen block of delectable and interesting varieties such as coconut, black bean, and lemon. My next flavor: sweet potato. And it is only 10 baht (US 30 cents)! Eat your heart out, 5 kuna:)
My my this post is getting long and the morning is coming soon. Our class location is hard to find so I have stopped trying to get there by songtaw (like a taxi/bus), which usually ended in getting lost, and am walking about 40 min to and from class. It is refreshing before and after long days of lecture, but due to insane traffic and the fleets of motorbikes that everyone seems to drive street crossings are never dull.
I am still really excited to be meeting so many interesting and remarkable people here. One guy in my class is a doctor for the Free Burma Rangers, an NGO that trains teams of medics to operate in places where the Burmese army is destroying villages and placing land mines. I had heard of them through people in Buffalo and have been getting their e-mail updates for a while. The teams are armed but only for defense and try to protect and treat villagers that are fleeing from the army. He had one story about a time when a group that had been previously attacked by the army had a chance to treat a group of soldiers, their enemies, who had been wounded. They chose to treat them in an incredible act of non-retaliation. Amazing. Some other people in my class are missionaries who travel to remote locations to bring Bibles to churches that can't get them, people working in adventure sports companies, people working at a local climbing gym (where I hope to go some during the semester!), and all the ISDSI staff (thai and american). So it is a great group.
Well, I am back to studying a bit and then sleep. I have been thinking of many of you and so thankful for your places in my life as I am far away and noticing some vacancies that you usually fill! However, I trust that God has good plans and people for me here and I am excited to start tracing them out as my life here for the next months unfolds. Pray for good relationships and discernment for me to listen as God is speaking, eyes to see like he does. And also for, as Todd wrote in an e-mail, and "extra absorbant layer" to soak in every detail and moment.
This has been in my mind this week:
Where can I go from your spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
I am in good hands.
With love,
Melissa
It is time for a break from wound care and fractures to update you on my first week in Thailand. Thanks for everyone who has been e-mailing and facebooking; it is so good to hear from you!
Starting this past Tuesday, I have been spending most of my time in a Wilderness First Responder course that ISDSI, the organiation I will soon be studying with, is hosting. This is a mini course before the actual semester begins, and I am the only student from the spring semester that is here so far. Most of the other people taking the class are either staff from ISDSI or other people whose work involves outdoor recreation and travel in remote locations, and there is one girl who just finished a fall version of the program I am about to do. It is fascinating to hear the stories that a lot of these guys have from their work and travel around SE Asia.
This WFR class is one that I have been wanting to take since I came to college, so I am really enjoying it even though it is like trying to drink out of the proverbial fire hydrant:) Class runs from 8 to 5 every day and I am at the half way point with five days to go. NOLS staff is teaching the course through their Wilderness Medicine Insitute, and we have excellent teachers who are both knowledgable and hilarious. The format is really hands on, so maybe we will learn about musculoskeletal injuries and pracitce making splints, and then we will be put into a scenario where we have to respond to and assess a patient and try to treat them. Our most recent scenario was a car/motorcycle accident with multiple victims with injuries including paralysis, hand amputation, impalement, femur fracture, and severe head injury. I got to have open fractures on each of my wrists, complete with protruding "bones" (sticks) and fake blood everywhere (nice!). The instructors have all kinds of crazy makeup so injuries are often frighteningly realistic, and we use cars and other things as props to make a scene as true to life as possible. Pretty challenging, pretty sweet too. We have a format that we go through in any situation to help us be consistant and thorough in an emergency, and there is a lot to remember. Also, with this level of training we will not be able to solve a lot of the issues we can discover.
This class takes up most of my time and focus, so I have only explored the city a little but I will have more time in the coming months so not to worry. Today I was able to meet up with the Gallmans, two of my professors from Houghton who are teaching here for a few months, which was great. Later I explored the Sunday walking street, which is actually several streets blocked off to motor traffic and loaded with people playing music, performing, and selling handicrafts, food, and just about anything else. It is there every Sunday night so I will definitely be revisitng. And for those of you EMW's, I have found the Thai counterpart for sladoled, labelled enigmatically as "ancient ice cream". It comes on a stick in a frozen block of delectable and interesting varieties such as coconut, black bean, and lemon. My next flavor: sweet potato. And it is only 10 baht (US 30 cents)! Eat your heart out, 5 kuna:)
My my this post is getting long and the morning is coming soon. Our class location is hard to find so I have stopped trying to get there by songtaw (like a taxi/bus), which usually ended in getting lost, and am walking about 40 min to and from class. It is refreshing before and after long days of lecture, but due to insane traffic and the fleets of motorbikes that everyone seems to drive street crossings are never dull.
I am still really excited to be meeting so many interesting and remarkable people here. One guy in my class is a doctor for the Free Burma Rangers, an NGO that trains teams of medics to operate in places where the Burmese army is destroying villages and placing land mines. I had heard of them through people in Buffalo and have been getting their e-mail updates for a while. The teams are armed but only for defense and try to protect and treat villagers that are fleeing from the army. He had one story about a time when a group that had been previously attacked by the army had a chance to treat a group of soldiers, their enemies, who had been wounded. They chose to treat them in an incredible act of non-retaliation. Amazing. Some other people in my class are missionaries who travel to remote locations to bring Bibles to churches that can't get them, people working in adventure sports companies, people working at a local climbing gym (where I hope to go some during the semester!), and all the ISDSI staff (thai and american). So it is a great group.
Well, I am back to studying a bit and then sleep. I have been thinking of many of you and so thankful for your places in my life as I am far away and noticing some vacancies that you usually fill! However, I trust that God has good plans and people for me here and I am excited to start tracing them out as my life here for the next months unfolds. Pray for good relationships and discernment for me to listen as God is speaking, eyes to see like he does. And also for, as Todd wrote in an e-mail, and "extra absorbant layer" to soak in every detail and moment.
This has been in my mind this week:
Where can I go from your spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
I am in good hands.
With love,
Melissa
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