Highs and Lows

Hey Everyone!

So I haven't been very good about posting. Woops. But here is the (hopefully) entertaining and interesting post you've all been desperately waiting for.

Anyone who knows me in any kind of wilderness/outdoors/group bonding/peace n’ love/OMG BEST FRANDZZZZ setting knows that I really enjoy Highs and Lows (or Roses and Thorns, Veggies and Compost, ect). So for the sake of simplicity here are my lows and highs since moving up to UHDP and coming back to the city yesterday:

Lows

• ·      The first few days at UHDP were kind of (read: HELLA) slow. Ajaan Da (the teacher I was supposed to be working with) left for Chiang Mai the same day I arrived at the farm and in typical Thai style, I was not told until I arrived bright eyed and bushy tailed. Consequentially, I spent the first few days at UHDP living on my own fairly bored and somewhat frustrated, friendless, and fearful.
• ·      Food. I LOVE Thai food but unfortunately I’m not too good at making it. As a result, I spent most of my time at UHDP living on various combinations of rice and eggs (mostly fried rice, omelets, and stir fry). While I’ve progressively gotten better and more creative, I still feel like my options are fairly limited by my lack of skill and familiarity with the ingredients. (Any and all suggestions for how to spice things up (ha, pun) are VERY much appreciated!)
• ·      There is something living in my ceiling. It is large and makes loud scary scratching noises right above my bed while I’m trying to fall asleep. I think it might be a rat but an over active imagination, wayyyy too much free time, and the fact that I live alone, means that I’ve created all kinds of terrifying monsters in my head. I know it’s illogical but I can’t help myself.
• ·      Interviews and Thai. Thai is HARD. Talking about citizenship is hard. Talking about citizenship in Thai is EXTRA hard. This si comounded by the fact that my meeting/interviews are generally VERY well attended and tend to get distracted and off topic. One of my “interviews” ended up with me asking a room of 41 PEOPLE questions about citizenship and then about half of them trying to answer me at the same time. Because of things like this and my non-fluency in Thai, my interviews have not been going as smoothly as I would like. It’s hella frustrating and I tend to get really down about it so that’s a definite low.

Sooo that was kind of a downer. Now on to:

Highs! (things get better, I promise!)

• ·      Making friends. This was trickier than I thought at first. I think I might have a shy side (which is weird and more than a little disconcerting) and I was definitely very awkward about talking to people initially. But things have improved. I started hanging out at the seed bank office to do work during the day, which was and awesome change of pace from being on my own in my room. And the people at UHDP are just some of the friendliest ever and have been incredibly welcoming and helpful. I like nice people. They’re great.
• ·      My host family. They are literally the best. Ever. Coming back from UHDP yesterday and staying the night with them was just so easy and simple. They have been so welcoming from the very start and I can’t imagine life in Thailand without them. Just so so so wonderful and loving.
• ·      Driving. To be clear, I am not doing ANY driving. That would be bad and dangerous. But we do have to get out to the villages to do interviews somehow so Ajaan Da and I have been spending a lot of quality time in the car together. The rides themselves are a little much. Lots of ups and downs and potholes and carsickness on Emma’s part but it is entirely worth it for the views. Rice paddies and mountains and rivers and SO MUCH GREEN. Pictures below. Definitely a highlight.
• ·      Interviews. I know I just put that as a low but interviews are also hella fun. I have something to do with my time and everyone has been super nice and helpful. I can't quite believe that these Palaung villagers are so willing to let this rando farang into their homes and talk to me for hours about citizenship and the problems their community faces. It's pretty fantastic. And on the understanding side, things are slowly but steadily getting better. I’m starting to understand more and what I am understanding is FACINATING. UHDP and the different villages have set up such a cool grassroots organization that helps each other out and does cool stuff like planning a sports day and meetings to discuss citizenship and other important issues. What I’m finding out is that a lot of the time, government doesn’t have much of a presence in these villages because most people are not citizens. What this means is that villagers have to rely on each other and have created infrastructure on their own without government help. I’ll say more as I find out more but I’m hella pumped about this and my SIP topic as a whole and that’s a damn good thing.
• ·      Thai. Again, I know this was also a low but then I had a half-hour long, 80% mutually understood conversation about democracy and government power and US interventionalism with Ajaan Da the other day entirely in Thai. It was awesome. I’m going to chase that feeling…
• ·      I knew coming back to Thailand wasn’t going to be the same as before. I’m more on my own this time and I have more freedom to do what I want, when I want. But it’s one thing to think that and another to experience it. And in some ways that’s a little daunting. I have a SIP to write and no one is going to tell me to write it except myself so I have no one to blame if it sucks. But on the other hand, I have a lot of agency with this. I can choose what I want to do and when to do it. I have more control. And I like that. Despite the fact that it’s a little terrifying.
• ·     Friends. Friends are great. Last night I moved back into the apartments with Cassie and we had dinner at CMU with Daniel and Reid. It was great and kind of felt like ISDSI all over again in the best way. Friends are awesome.
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  This PYT is leaving on Saturday. Gonna miss you, Cass.
  

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  From a walk I took around UHDP.

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  Rain outside my little house at UHDP.

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  Ok, so maybe this isn't the best picture to show it but if you tell me that Thailand is not the most beautiful country ever I will disagree with you. Forcefully.

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•      I don't know why there are so many dots. Silly Blogger...
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  Again I still haven't gotten my act together with pics but I promise to promise to try to do better next time!
  
  
  Sunshine to you, wherever you are!

City Happenings

This is a post I wrote a while ago but then never posted. Typical. But better late than never, right? Enjoy!


Lists are GREAT. I could never manage to go grocery shopping in any kind of productive way without them so here is a list of things that have happened during this first little bit of SUMMER 2KTHAILAND.

• After helping out at school on Friday, one of Mae Toi's 17 year old students asked for my number and email. His reasoning? "Thai girls are too short." I took this to mean that clocking in at a womping 5'5" (a full 3 inches taller than the average Thai woman, mind you) I have clearly missed my true calling and the only remedy is to immediately move here permanently and embrace my future as a Thai supermodel. I think I'll go by the name Waffle. (See this is funny because there's actually a real Thai supermodel who goes by Pancake. You can laugh now...)
• I got a haircut! It's a little too short and I feel like I look like a cross between a suburban mother and a 9 year old boy BUT that does mean I now have a PRIME excuse to go ridiculous Thai hair accessory shopping. I haven't really done very much traveling, but Thailand seems to have cornered the market in absolutely ludicrous trinkets with which one can adorn one's scalp. Seriously. Chances are, if you can dream it, they have already made it with more sparkles. I thinking something a la Carmen Miranda but am 100% open to suggestions.
• On Saturday, I spent most of my time in the city hanging out with my friends Katie and Ross, who recently got married and are on their honeymoon in Thailand. They're thuper cool and like practically real adults now which is neat. We spent the afternoon getting gloriously turned around in the Old City (sorry about that, y'all) and talking and eating. Katie is one of my bestest old(er) people friends and Ross is pretty cool too and I had a great time derping around with them. Mmmh. Friends.
• FRISBEE HAPPENED! And it was great. I hadn't played since the Chiang Mai Hat Tournament in February so I was definitely a little rusty and hella slow but it was oodles and oodles of fun. I went with Cassie (former ISDSI roomie), who is also back this summer doing research and despite the fact that everyone else was running circles around me and I was drenched in sweat it was a wonderful time.
• Speaking of Cassie, I got to see her for the first time in simply ages! Cassie, if you recall was my first roommate when we moved into the apartments. She's back this summer doing thesis research about the negative affects of dams on local river communities in Thailand. (Basically shit's fucked up with forced relocation, destruction of natural resources, flooding, ect. so there are a ton of cool things to research. Anywho...) Catching up with Cass has been really nice. She's done super well for herself alone in the city for the past few weeks despite various complications (such as a nasty bout of dengue) and it's just generally nice to have friends around who you know well enough to make fun of (and vice versa).
• I'd forgotten how exhausting this all is. Sometimes my brain just wants to shut off and most of the time that's not an option. Basic conversations require so much more energy when you're working in another language you only half remember and were never great at to begin with. Patience is key, and being semi-confused is constant. At the same time, I enjoy the challenge of it all and I'm sure the once jet-lag/initial adjustment has run it's course, things will get easier.
• Things I've Been Really Bad At: Taking pictures. I'll do better next time. Promise.

Should be another post coming up soon about things since moving to UHDP. Stay tuned!

There And Back Again

(Mmmh literary cliches...)

I'm going back. Back to Thailand and Thai and the most beautiful host family and rain and mosquitos and dengue (but hopefully not) and bucket showers and confusion and tukes and sticky rice and capsaicin and stupid moments and rice fields and mountains and feral dogs and cities and lights and noise and nonsense and and friends and regular people going about their everyday lives and mistakes and recoveries and adventures and being lost and new questions to answer and new answers to question.

I leave in the morning and AND I AM SO FREAKING EXCITED OHMYGOD. And nervous and scared and other things but if we don't think about them they go away, right? (Wrong, on so many levels, but we're going to ignore that for now.)

I'm heading back this summer on numerous grants to do research for my SIP, which is fancy Kollege-speak for a big senior-year paper that's supposed to be cool or something. I will be researching and interviewing and derping around with the Upland Holistic Development Project (UHDP), which you may remember from a previous post as the place where we killed and ate a pig. Basically, it's this super cool organization that works with a bunch of different hill tribe villages to promote sustainable development.

Here's a photo the view from UHDP during said pig harvest.
Ohh baby that sky.

I will be working with them to research the barriers that hill tribe peoples face in gaining citizenship. Citizenship is really important because it affects things like the right to vote, land holdings, travel, education, and access to health care. Unfortunately, many hill tribe communities lack access to this basic right. I'll be looking at why this is and what can be done to change it. Basically, roughly, something like that.

It MAY sound to you like I have absolutely NO idea what I'm doing this summer, and if you thought that, BRAVA! 10 points to Gryffindor! You're be pretty much spot on. But that's ok because at some point, sometime in the future I might, possibly, maybe have some idea and AND I'll have loads of fun trying to figure it all out and that could be what's important, maybe.

Now, on to 20+ hours of flights and wat lies beyond. (What puns? Wat puns. So good.)

Wish me luck!

Back From the Dead: A Zombie Blog

WOAH! BLOG!

So as some of you may or may not know, I'M GOING BACK TO THAILAND THIS SUMMER!!! And as such I've decided to reawaken the long dead blog. :0)

Ever so much as happened since I last posted about Ocean, which was MONTHS ON MONTHS ago, so here is the briefest of recaps.

The Dolce/Yamada clan came to visit me over winter break! It was both lovely and strange to have them there. I did enjoy the family time very much and impressing them with the simplest of things like being able to order food in Thai, despite the usual family vaca stress. But none of us died so score one for that! This is Mom and Dad looking cute and awkward at Wat Prah Singh.

I did an internship! With a beautiful organization called NEED Burma. NEED is kinda sorta a bit like ISDSI in some ways. It operates as a school for young people from Burma to learn about sustainable development, organic agriculture, leadership and empowerment, community building and a whole host of other things. During my time there I got to meet some truly wonderful people. The staff was so much fun to work with and the students were such a unique, talented, hilarious, kind, intelligent, and caring group. It was so great to get to know other people my age who case about the environment and people and important things and it was sooo wonderful to learn from everyone at NEED. Here is their website if you want to know more: http://www.need-burma.org/ 

Another great thing about my last month in Thailand was these people (plus some more who weren't on this particular venture).  Our last month was spent in Chiang Mai working as interns at various NGOs. As such, we had a lot more time to hang out and explore the city than we did during field courses and I really couldn't have asked for a better group of Kalamakrazies (plus some CC'ers, and randos from Colby and Woo) to spend copious amounts of time with. They're literally some of the best people ever and I'm gonna miss adventuring with them when I'm back this summer.

And then Charlotte and I went to INDONESIA! This is the view from our little bungalow one morning. We stayed and WWOOOFed at the beautiful Portibi Farms just outside of Bogor, a suburb of Jakarta. It was a super awesome and fun experience and I had a great time hanging out with Charlotte. She has a much better way with words than I do so here is a link to her blog post about our time in Indonesia:
http://pomegranatesandpassersby.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-cooking-altar-indo-adventures.html  

And here we are at the Jakarta Zoo with HIPPOS!!! It was one of the best moment of my short life and I'm so happy Charlotte could share it with me. Ask me about it sometime. It was literally the best ever. 

So there you have it. I didn't think I could adequately sum up 2+ months of experiences in 5 photos plus captions and it turns out I was totally 100% right but at least maybe you have some idea kinda sorta? Ask me question if you wanna know more. I love questions. I may even have a few answers for you. Probably not, but ask anyway.

Anywho, at some point, preferably before I leave in 7 days (OHMYGODWHAT), I will write about this summer and it will be glorious and exciting.

Happy Thoughts to you, wherever you are!

The Andaman- So So Late...

OCEANS!

...was amazing, incredible, beautiful, awe-inspiring, magical, tropical, chill, sandy, and sublime. Oceans is the last and "capstone" course at ISDSI. The issues involved in the costal and island communities are super complicated and really interesting and engaging. We stayed with two different communities during our time down south. The first was a Thai-Muslim costal community in a village called Ban Jao Mai. The second was the Urak Lawoi community that likes on Lipe Island in the Adang Archipelago farther south. The whole thing was beautiful sunrises and sunsets, gorgeous reefs (but I don't have any pictures of those), super cool beach nature friends, fish, sun, sand, surf, and awesome people.

It was the best ever basically. In so many ways.

First look at Ban Jao Mai! BJM is a muslim fishing community close to Trang. It's also home to the most wonderful host families ever! They were so good to us and fed us ridiculous amounts of food. Such a wonderful, beautiful place!

More of the beach. In Ban Jao Mai our time was mostly spent learning about mangroves and their importance to costal communities. Ban Jao Mai is a fishing village but is becoming less so as fisheries dry up and marine resources become more scarce.

The Mudflats! One of my favorite activities. Basically we got to wander around on this HUGE mudflat/sandbar during low tide and observe all the different crabs and mudskippers, and shellfish that live there. Lots of fun, super interesting and reminded me a lot of similar things my dad and I have done on pervious beach excursions.

Another sunset.  I took a LOT of these. Just so beautiful!

Ma Noo and Nong Meen! One of my favorite host family experiences. They were so kind and loving and happy to talk to me about the sea and their lives and food and anything else we could think of. Talking with them made me realize just how much my Thai has improved over the course of this trip as well as all I still need to learn.

Rotii!!!! The best thing ever! It's basically fried rice flour dough with condensed milk and sugar on top with ridiculous amounts of margarine and oil but it is also the greatest thing in the world. Ma Teh taught us how to make it on  our last day in the village and it was so much fun. This is Sara, the Rotii Queen, with her creation and Eli creeping in the background.

My beautiful family! On the last night all the host families and students had a big dinner together at the restaurant by the beach. The Ma's all played Thai-Muslim barbie with  us so we all wore hijabs and had a ridiculous amount of makeup caked on our faces. After a delicious dinner of seafood and a goat that had been slaughtered earlier in the day, we all gathered and the students made speeches about how we would miss our families and all the cool things we did with them. It was lots of fun and a great way to say goodbye to our amazing families.

All the host families and students. So many pictures were taken. So. Many.

Nong Meen and I! He was the best. I miss him.

After Ban Jao Mai we headed south to the Adang Archiapelago in Tarutao National Park, right on the boarder with Malaysia. 

Longtail boats off of Koh Adang in the sunset.

These guys! I LOVED our group on Oceans. It was the first course where us students really got to spend a lot of quality time together while camping in the archipelago unlike other courses where we were separated in homestays. I got to get to know some people that I didn't know well before and also get to know some well known people even better. All in all it was lovely.

Harriet the Hermit Crab! There were crabs EVERYWHERE on Ko Rawi where we were camping. They were a lot of fun to watch and play with. We saw (and facilitated) several crabs moving into new shells which was soooo cool and dug a trench so we could race them down the beach. So many nature friends!!!

Another sunrise. Most of us slept right on the beach sans tent so I have a lot of these. I don't think I could ever get tired of watching the sun rise or sink over the ocean.

Making friends on Lipe! Lipe is the only developed Island in the Adang Archipelago. However mot of this development has happened rather quickly in the past 10-15 years. As a result things like waste disposal, police, and medical services are poor or non-existent. This makes Lipe a super interesting case study especially since it is still home to the Urak Lawoi, a semi-nomadic community of small scale fisherfolk who have lived in the area for centuries. 

The morning we left the Andaman. A sad, sad day.

Boat ride home.

Surprise! Our host families came to drop the other group off at the airport so I got to see Ma Noo again!!!