Last days in Chiang Mai

Since the last time I posted,

• Gordon Brown has become England's new Prime Minister
• Robert Mugabe has made more crazy threats, this time to seize foreign firms in Zimbabwe
• Dave not only got out of bed before 9am, but made it to breakfast with me and Zach at 20 past 7
• I have discovered that I will actually, rooly, trooly have a proper job, and that it sounds super duper exciting and busy

Chiang Mai clouds at sunset

After all the months of wondering exactly what I would be doing in Thailand, I met my new boss on Tuesday night. We had a long discussion about work and the situation, and where nebulousness reigned before, excitement now prevails! It looks like I will get a major project for my MPH out of this as well (now I just have to apply, find a supervisor, write a research proposal - blah) and to boot I am really hoping - and am now optimistic that - I will be able to do some work which will continue to bring some returns after I have left, and provide a base for others to follow. I'll write a bit more about the specifics once we have nutted them out a little more - probably over the next few weeks.

This morning I had my Thai end-of-course exam. It was supposed to take 3 hours but I finished by 10 so we spent the rest of the morning fine-tuning the lesson notes for next weeks' new intake of students and then went out for massive luxe buffet lunch. I am really sorry to be leaving the language centre - I have had such a good time with them over the last 5 weeks, I'd forgotten what a joy it is to learn a new language and all the girls there are so much fun. I'm hopeless at goodbyes so I kind of just slipped out after thanking everyone quickly and hoped that nobody would be offended.

Tonight we're going out and then tomorrow I'll be in a hilltribe village somewhere planting trees. Tomorrow night I'm staying at Benjawan's, and then that's it - Sunday is the big move!

I'm so glad that I managed to meet my boss before going; when I last posted I was just feeling sad about leaving Chiang Mai, and it was hard to get excited about the next step when I had no idea what it was about. Now that I know a bit more, I'm looking forward to this next chapter for whatever it is to bring, and it's kind of revitalised my commitment and passion in what I came here to do.

Who knows? Maybe sometime soon I might have something interesting to say!

Life in Thailand, part 2: Bangkok

My flight landed at Suvarnabhumi (pronounced, "Soo-ahn-a-poom") Airport about 30 minutes late, and I was left rueing that I hadn't listened to the dodgy looking middle-aged farang-who-lives-in-Thailand guy who told me, in the check-in line, to try and just take my small suitcase on the plane as hand luggage. It took 55 minutes for the first bag to appear on the carousel. Apparently (that word again!) Suvarnabhumi is notorious for that. Store it away for next time.

On the way to Chiang Mai airport I had been pretty stoked, because I had my most successful exchange in Thai EVER. The taxi driver and I chatted quite merrily for the whole 20 minutes and I didn't lapse into English once. Good, right? I don't know what happened to my brain during that 1 hour flight though, because during the 20 minute ride to my hotel in Bangkok, I struggled to understand anything the driver said in his thick Southern accent.

I've never been to Bangkok before. In fact, it's been a long time since I was in a truly modern, fully industrialised Asian city - maybe not since China, and that was nearly 10 years ago. Bangkok is a massive, pulsing metropolis, with tangled expressways cutting swathes across endless twinkling lights, impressive traffic jams and equally impressive smog.











The view from my hotel room; the Skytrain pulling into the station

My digs were pretty plush. I'm not used to staying in such places and to be honest I'm not sure that I felt comfortable about it (Thais opening doors for me, pressing lift buttons for me, bringing things to my room, etc) but it was nice. Spacious room, cable TV, plus I managed to dodge paying exhorbitant prices for the hotel wireless network and found free WiFi through my mobile phone company.

I headed out after breakfast on Saturday, crossed the road, and found myself in a big square slap bang in the centre of the highest concentration of massive shopping malls I have ever seen! Heaven. Amazingly, even earlyish on a Saturday morning, the traffic was bumper-to-bumper with the usual Thai traffic chaos being controlled (with variable effect) by shouting traffic police. The central Skytrain station is right near here so there is activity everywhere - above, below, around. Lots of sensory stimulation.

I like cities.

Spent the day with my friend Gam (my roommate at a conference back in 2000) and a bunch of her friends. Whilst wandering on my own for a while in the afternoon, I stumbled across what appears to have been a huge highschool scrabble tournament. Also saw lots of Thai popstars performing at stages in and around the shopping malls. I didn't know who they were, but I squealed along with all the other girls, just for fun. On Sunday we went to Chatuchak Market, which is impressive in both size and also for being one of the hottest places I have ever been. Melting.

Embarrassing "Q is an idiot" story for the week: I'd bought a dress on the Saturday at a small boutique in Siam, and was wearing it at Chatuchak. We found the stall where the designer sells a few of her things on weekends, where it was pointed out by the girl working there that I was wearing the dress back to front. Niiiiiiiiiiice.

Anyway, overall my Thai shopping vocabulary ("Lot iik daay may? Phaeng maak maak!" - semi-weird phonetic spelling, nobody knows how to romanise Thai, Thais included) has improved immensely and I've got to know just a little bit of the big city. I'll have to go back there sometime.

So that was my little taste of Bangkok. Or rather, Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahinthara Ayuthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udomratchaniwet Mahasathan Amon Piman Awatan Sathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukam Prasit. Unsurprisingly, Thais shorten it to "Krung Thep" ("City of Angels"). Whatever you want to call it, it was like a different planet.

The most surprising thing - and it felt kind of odd - was what happened when I arrived back in Chiang Mai. I was sitting in the taxi, chatting to the driver, and I had this funny feeling in my stomach; I realised that it felt like I was coming home. In the evening I headed out to the Sunday "walking street" (night market) for the last time with Zach and Jenny, and ambling along those crowded streets with all the lights, the laughter and the banter, made me realise that even though I've only been here for a month (a month tomorrow!) I am already beginning to leave things that I love behind. And I have been here long enough now to realise that Chiang Mai is not about the Night Bazaar or the elephant shows or the rooftop bars near Tha Phae Gate or the cooking schools. It's about the easygoing people, chatting with random vendors, the relaxed feel, the balmy nights, the crazily varied food, walking for 10 minutes and being in the forest, quiet afternoons in airy, spacious temples, buying soy milk at the same trolley every night, the insane motorbike drivers, the feeling that even though things are changing, this is still a place with a soul.

Ugh - so soppy!










View of the walking street from atop Tha Phae Gate; a random truck full of dragonfruit

Clearly, I'm feeling pretty reluctant to leave next weekend. But I'm here to start a job, and I really am excited about doing that. Tonight I have a meeting with the doctor I'll be working with - she has a whole host of projects and work she'd like me to consider. It's nice that others have given it so much thought.

Milestones: two big and bad, one small and good

Today is Daw Aung Sung Suu Kyi's 62nd birthday, her 18th since first being placed under house arrest in 1989 and her 5th since being re-arrested in May 2003.

The UNHCR has reported that refugee numbers are up for the first time in 5 years, largely due to the Iraq war.

This blog notched up its 1000th hit today (and it's not counting my own pageloads!).

Edit: Also, apparently we had an earthquake here in Chiang Mai today, measuring 4.something on the Richter scale. I was eating lunch. Found out about 2 hours later.

Life in Thailand, part 1: Hilltribe Village

I got back today after spending a couple of nights in a Karen (largest hilltribe in Thailand, live here and in Burma, in the mountainous border regions) village. I don't know what I expected; this is a bit cynical of me but I thought that "homestay" might be pushing it a bit, and that perhaps it'd be sort a bit human zoo-like (as I keep hearing the Padaung - long-neck Karen - villages are). I was wrong, thankfully.

The village has about 20 houses, 100 or so people including about 20 kids of primary school age or younger. To get there, we drove about 2 hours out of Chiang Mai, up into the mountains and deep into Khun Chae National Park. There was an almost-hidden turn-off somewhere, and then a 2km, very bumpy stretch of unmade road down to the village which was completely hidden in the jungle.

We got there and were welcomed by one of the village leaders, had a brief chat, and then had the afternoon to get ourselves settled and check out the village, which didn't take us very long - it wasn't very big! The kids eyed us off curiously, relinquished some of the fruit they were munching on (having pulled it off nearby trees) and then ran away giggling.










Nephew of the village chief; weeding around rice shoots; stepped rice paddies

In the evening we sat in the village chief's house (turns out the guy we talked to at the beginning was the brother of the chief - the whole village is like a sort of extended family) and he told us a bit about the way they live. There has been a bit of tension between the hilltribe population (not just the Karens) and the Thai Government regarding issues of conservation. I guess this is inevitable; the hilltribes are rotational farmers and traditionally have farmed the land for a period (which varies between weeks and years), before moving on to the next bit of land/next temporary village and doing it all again. With the conservation movement becoming more prominent, striking the balance seems to have been a little tricky - but overall it seems to be working for this village in particular at the moment.

In terms of "mod cons", the town has its own drinking water supply that comes from rain-water and also from the stream. The rest of the water supply is pumped directly from the stream, and they have a limited electricity supply from small solar panels arranged randomly in good spots around the village. During the rainy season they generally don't have any electricity at all. They eat the food that they farm - their own rice, fruit, vegetables, meat, eggs. The kids go to a little school in the village which sorts them out for primary school, then have to go further away for secondary. Their curriculum includes Thai language, their own language, culture, practices and agricultural methods, as well as the other "usual" stuff. The girls marry around the age of 20, men around 30. There are a few now going to study at tertiary level further away.I'm not sure what this will mean for the life of the village in the long-term - I guess it's an inevitable change with the times.

On Saturday we went hiking, Thai-style. The guides we had with us (two girls and a guy, the latter seemed to be with us mostly for comic relief and to drive the ute) kept saying, "How far can you walk? It depends on you. Can you walk 1 hour? 2 hours? 4 kilometres? 5 kilometres?". Leah (American girl who came too) and I said, "Oh, we can walk as far as you like - 5 or 6 kilometres is fine, further is fine too."

As it turned out, Saturday's schedule ended up consisting of: 1 hour walk, stopping at bamboo shelter overlooking rice paddies for 3 hours while snacking, then having a nap, then eating lunch, walking 1 hour back. The "timetable" for Saturday had us returning to the village from the fields at about 5pm. We got back at 1:15 and then played with the kids all afternoon. In the evening we were supposed to have another chat with the village leader but all the village inhabitants were totally preoccupied with trying to fix the satellite/antenna thing outside the chief's house so that they could all crowd inside, watch TV and drink beer. So we played cards late into the evening instead.









Picnic, village-style; our new friends (the woman in the background is wearing traditional hilltribe dress)









Flowers from the girls (the boys gave us a lime!); a sign nailed to the wall of the village school










Yesterday we left the village behind in the morning and had breakfast at Cabbages & Condoms. This is a fascinating franchise that has had quite a lot of success in spreading the safe sex message around Thailand - Here's a link that gives you a bit of an idea, although this is about the original Bangkok flagship. The food is good, too.

After having not slept at all for a couple of nights (mice, heat, mosquitoes) I crashed out when I got home and then went out for dinner with friends, then to the walking street (vibrant, busy night market, different from the horrible soulless cesspit that is the Night Bazaar) for the third Sunday in as many weeks. Ate a few things, thought about buying lots of things, came home with just a bag of mangoes.

Life's not bad.

Next weekend, part 2: Bangkok.

The 2 1/2 week itch

Phil left yesterday morning, so the whirlwind of activity (and consequent heat rash :((((() has died down considerably. I spent yesterday evening slacking off in my room with the aircon on, eating large amounts of food. It was even medically indicated - a certain dermatology registrar told me that the best way to get rid of my itchy scourge (sounds so appealing, I know) was to sit in air conditioned rooms as much as possible.

Don't worry, I am not going to post pics of the rash. Ew. Suffice it to say I looked like I was wearing a massive red collar. Grosssssss. If someone gave me a choice between having that rash again and death, I would pick death. Hands down. Nothing to make one long for death more than itch - although perhaps itch PLUS hunger, constipation and cold?







Photographic examples of bad Thai soap. I wish I'd had the camera out when the weird bat-thing made the girl in the middle go demonic with red glowing eyes. Note the royal insignia in the top left corner of the screen.

I'm off to a hilltribe village about 2 hours away tomorrow for a 3 day/2 night hilltribe homestay. Nong (marketing manager at the language centre with wickedly sarcastic - esp for a Thai girl - sense of humour) has decided to come along "just for fun". We have a pack of cards at the ready. It's going to be good. PLUS it will offer some night-time respite from the heat (she says, with the aircon thermostat set at 23 degrees); they told me to bring a jacket.

I don't even have a jacket!

My weekends are pretty much all filled now. This weekend it's this trip, the weekend after that I'm flying to Bangkok to see my friend Gam (a doctor working in Nakhon Si Thammarat, we met at a conference years and years ago) and then the weekend after that I'm planning to spend a day planting trees on a mountain (one of the AYADs is getting a group together for her work) before moving my little Thai life 350km west, to Mae Hong Son.

What happens then is a complete mystery. The more questions I ask re job, the more nebulous and brief the answers become. This is a strange aid world phenomenon. Maybe I won't be training medics. Maybe it's all a big conspiracy. Who knows?

Anyway, I'm in good spirits, no doubt assisted by resolution of the itch that was stealing hours of sleep earlier in the week. I'm sure the calamine, local anaesthetic cream, antihistamines and topical steroids did nothing whatsoever to assist, but they made me feel like I was doing something. Because I'm like, a doctor, right?

Poodles, elephants, oxen, waterfalls - just your average weekend

Be warned: extremely long and picture-ful post ahead.

Sorry for being slack; Phil arrived on Thursday and despite (or perhaps) my worry that he might not find enough things to do, we have been going pretty much non-stop for his entire visit so far. As I type he is trekking in the jungle. Probably with leeches. Gross.

Anyway, he is dutifully eating - even enjoying! - everything on offer and has become quite obsessed with banana rotee. Although really - who can blame him? Such sugary, buttery, gooey, banana-y goodness.

The tale of a little red dog, a restaurant on a mountain, and a big night out, Thai-style

I thought that Phil might like to meet some of the friendly and funny expats I've met since I got here, so we arranged to meet up with Zach, Jenny and Dave after dinner on Friday night. Before hitting the town with them, Phil and I headed up Doi Suthep to a restaurant halfway up the mountain. Lucky songthaews are manual vehicles - I'm not sure an auto could get up there on the winding and extremely steep roads. The restaurant had a spectacular view over all of Chiang Mai, as well as having an extremely attractive lake directly below the verandah where we were seated (by candlelight - very noice). The food was spectacular, and they had what I would describe as a Thai country and western (but quite versatile) live band who knew just about every cheesy 60s, 70s and 80s ballad you can think of. There was also a clown (why? who can say?) who roamed the restaurant making balloon animals. He was so cool that he like, didn't even need to look at what he was doing.

He gave me a red poodle.

After dinner we met up with the others at a club/bar/pub type place called Warm Up - massively popular haunt of Chiang Mai Uni students. My prudish opinions regarding sartorial appropriateness in Asia were sorely tested - these girls wear the smallest skirts, the tiniest tops and the highest heels I've ever seen! There was was in my hidjus, hidjus silver plastic shoes, long trousers and new top (might I say in my defence, a very Karen Walker-esque blouse), feeling oddly - well, Amish, in my modesty. Anyway, we downed a few drinks in the "New Age Lounge" whilst Ole (Danish, 6 foot 6 and a bit) mutilated my poor poodle and much merriment was had.














































After that we went to another place called the Monkey Club. There was a live band playing; they were clearly very famous because it was PACKED and everyone knew the words to every song. We didn't know the words, and Phil and Ole were about 3 heads taller than everyone else, but we jumped up and down and sang along (words? who needs words?) anyway.

On the way home I had little pork dumplings. Who wouldn't love a country where you can get delicious food at 2:30am?

I am too old for this

On the way home from our big Friday night Phil and I had raved enthusiastically that, "Hey, it doesn't feel late at all! This is easy!". Then we got up at 8 the next morning to go to elephant camp. (This one time, at elephant camp...) Actually, to start with we were fine.

The elephant camp at Mae Taeng was probably the most touristy place I'll go to in my entire time in Thailand (Benjawan says that Thai people never go to the elephant camps, of which there are many in this region) but it was amaaaaazing! They are such beautiful, intelligent creatures; enlarge the pic of the elephant in front of the easel to reveal his painting in all its glory, complete with his name signed across the bottom of the bunch of flowers that he painstakingly painted in front of a live audience. He can also paint elephants. Like, pictures of elephants.

We rode an ox cart through breathtaking jungle, mountain and pastoral scenery (green, green and more green), then we rode an elephant (we decided ours was a dissident elephant - much cooler than the others, making her own path through most of the trail) then, after lunch, hopped on a bamboo raft and floated peacefully down the river through lush jungle. Well, peacefully apart from the bits where Phil was trying to steer the raft.

Then we went to an orchid farm - by this stage I was falling asleep in the car, thence home for a long nap.

Yesterday we were both still exhausted, despite 9 hours of sleep overnight and our siesta the day before. Tragically we had to drag ourselves out of bed to go to a waterfall, so off we went to Mae Wang, to a beautiful and not-infested-with-tourists waterfall amidst more lush jungle. Phil went swimming, but I was too self conscious to strip down to my togs in front of young Thai men who were already looking at me curiously. Hmmm.











We popped in at a Karen (largest hilltribe in Thailand) village, where the cows roam free, the houses and huts are built the way they've done it for a hundred years and where, despite the traditional lifestyle, there are still satellites to pick up cable tv so that everyone can clamber around the television to watch Thai boxing.














We also went to an artisan village. Phil bought a bowl.

Monday - an unfortunate realisation

Had a massive sleep last night, and I toddled off to my Thai classes this morning whilst Phil and Jaran went off to trek in the jungle somewhere. As you do.

Thai has been quite easy until now. Today I started learning to read and write Thai script. There are 44 consonant characters alone.

Bugger!

No problem!

This afternoon after I finished my language classes (they're becoming more and more casual; we study the hardcore stuff in the morning, then go out for lunch to a different place each day and then return for the afternoon class which then involves mostly chatting about food - to be fair, we chat mostly in Thai!) I braved the afternoon heat and took a songthaew (I don't know how to anglicise Thai - and I can't get the symbols for phonetics) up Nimmanhemin Rd, which is one of the trendier parts of town. It's outside of the old town, very close to Chiang Mai Uni, so there are heaps of trendy places to eat and drink, bars, pubs, and stylish boutiques and shops. Also the requisite restaurants and food trolleys, naturellement. Anyway, that was fun - and then I came home and stuffed myself stupid.














Yesterday in the afternoon I went on a bit of a tour around a few places. Went up to the Hilltribe Museum, which was really interesting - fascinating cultures. I'm doing a homestay with a hilltribe family (not sure which tribe) starting Friday week for 3 days, so that's something to look forward to. Then Jaran (guide) took me to a nearby town which is artisan central - silk, silver, jewellery, umbrellas, leathergoods, lacquerware - you name it! Jaran is really cool - he's the guide who has been a singer, a barber, a teacher, a tourguide, etc. His answer to every request is, "No problem!" and it's pretty much been true so far.











Hello silkwormies; they eat and eat and then work hard to make these nice cocoons; then the poor buggers get boiled to spin thread for Q's wardrobe.

Tomorrow morning Phil arrives and in honour of this great occasion I went to Kasem (grocery place that sells some Western stuff) and bought some Coopers, as well as stocking the fridge with fruit. I'm not sure yet exactly what we're going to do - have some sketchy ideas.

Phil wants to ride an elephant. I told Jaran this and he said - you guessed it - "No problem!".

Benjawan (Thai teacher) asked me today what I thought the reason was for Thailand having so many ladyboys.

I said I didn't know. She asked if it was chromosomal. I said, probably not.

More rain

It's pouring with rain again - lightning, thunder, BBC World and CNN down, channel showing the tennis down. The latter is a particular bummer - I was enjoying watching Lleyton Poowit being beaten by someone younger and better than him. Quite well-timed, though - it didn't start raining until after I returned to my room with my dinner haul.
Didn't get up to anything too exciting today - went to Thai classes, had lunch with Kate, Seamus, Tyler (the beautiful baby) and Benjawan (Thai teacher), talked about food in Thailish with Benjawan most of the afternoon (this passed as learning, I think) and then headed home. It's so hot in the afternoons at the moment that it's hard to go anywhere without drowning in sweat and becoming really listless. Kate and Seamus' Thai friends and acquaintances are horrified that they're out and about with the baby so soon - she's supposed to be confined for a month! Why are you letting her out?! Your baby will get sick! Naturally, both mother and baby are perfectly fine - serene, even.

I've been generally more chipper today - I guess I was right yesterday, the ups and downs are probably just part and parcel of the adjustment process. I'm not used to spending so much time on my own, so it's a fairly steep learning curve. Thank goodness for Skype - I still find it vaguely unbelievable that it's free! Things are slowly falling into place here. I'm more familiar with getting around (in songthew, which are the main mode of public transport here), my "essentials" in Thai are improving, Phil's coming to visit on Thursday, plus Zach (American guy who understands irony and sarcasm, unbelievable) is moving into a place nearby in the next couple of days.

Noted with interest that Charles Taylor's trial in The Hague started today. 18 months, they reckon.

What's happening back home?

Downtime

Had a bit of an up and down weekend - probably to be expected given the move, the weather, the adjustment, the end of the first week, being by myself in a new country, etc. Had a very farang morning yesterday - scrambled eggs for breakfast, Western grocery store - and then spent the afternoon variously napping, talking to friends back home, writing emails, perusing my new map of Chiang Mai, that sort of thing. Last night I went out for dinner with a couple of expats which was not bad - I think everyone was sort of a bit tired though. We wanted to have a couple of beers after dinner (perfect beer weather - this from a strictly wine girl!) but couldn't quite find a place to our specifications, and somehow ended up at a bar in the red light district (no skimpily clad girls chorusing, "Sawadee kha" in suggestive tones at the place we went though). I guess it's good to go there once, if only for future reference (ie to avoid at all costs hereafter).

Today I slept in and wandered down the street around lunchtime, got the world's largest takeaway pad thai and struggled through it here - it took me two goes in the end. A fairly famous temple in the forest is about 1km from where I'm staying so I walked up there this afternoon. They have talks by foreigner monks on Sunday afternoons so I was hoping for a bit of interesting discussion but in the end the session was monopolised by weird, new-agey American tourists asking odd questions, answered very nebulously by one of the monks (I wanted to know what the other one had to say!) and so I left and watched the fish in the lake for a while instead, before meandering home.

Tonight I hit one of the "walking markets" - not the famed Night Bazaar, but loads of fun nonetheless. Brightly lit stalls as far as the eye can see, cheerful sellers, lots of Thai people as well as farang, lots of chat, sooooo much food and just lots of colour and buzzing activity. Had good company too, which always helps, and then wound down with a beer at the end of the night. My head has been spinning with a million things, so a cruisy evening of talking and wandering was probably just the right tonic.

On a completely different note, last night as I was walking home I saw The. World's. Biggest. Centipede. crossing the road in the dark. I thought it was a piece of debris until I realised it was moving. Seriously, it was the width of my thumb and nearly my hand-span in length. I was going to take a photo, but it was dark and I thought it might eat me.

Back to school tomorrow.

Weekend

Last night I met up with the other AVIs (and one of the world's most gorgeous 10 day old babies) for dinner and drinks - kind of weird initially to be in a big group of expats, but they were all great and it was a fun night. We went out for Italian (oddly it was really pretty good), downed some coloured cocktails and many beers before moving on to some bar somewhere nearby (with lots of NGO workers) that had good cocktails and a couple of the cutest cats I've ever seen.

So this morning I tried valiantly to sleep in (not with a lot of success) and then met up with one of the other girls who took me on an "essentials" tour of this side of Chiang Mai and also out for breakfast. I ate scrambled eggs and have been feeling vaguely heavy and a bit sick since then - I think buttered toast and eggs are just a bit weightier than the food I've been eating. Anyway, I'm quite tired so I'm planning to spend the afternoon in my room napping, writing, examining my new map and hopefully motivating myself to do some Thai study. Tonight I'm heading out for dinner with another couple of expats I met last night and tomorrow - I'm not sure yet. Maybe a massage, maybe the Sunday market, maybe lazing, maybe going to a talk at a nearby temple. The options are endless. If only my energy were similarly so!

As a postscript to the air conditioner situation I posted the other day - as promised, 3 repair type men knocked on my door on Thursday afternoon and marched into my room with their toolboxes. They turned on the aircon, opened their eyes wide in wonder at the racket, then turned it off and walked out of the room, never to be seen again.

Apparently it's getting fixed on Monday by an "air conditioner specialist service man".