Onwards

After moving on Saturday, I spent Sunday in the office helping to get exams and review sheets written for the school. In the afternoon, my old neighbor had the culmination of his art project in Mae Sot with a migrant children’s art exhibition. I dropped in for some food and art, then headed back to the office to plan a workshop to help the students at the school work towards greater maturity and sense of responsibility.

Monday morning, bright and early, I was on a truck heading up to camp for a high energy day of workshop activities. I taught Tuesday morning, then jumped in a truck and headed back to Mae Sot. I had a brief time to shower, pack and check in with everyone at the office before I was off in another truck heading to Bangkok.


On a bus, the trip usually takes between 8-10 hours, depending on how many stops it has to make. With my boss driving, it took less than 6. (Speed limits being another one of those things that aren’t terribly regulated around here.) We checked into the most luxurious hotel I have ever stayed in. The CenterPoint Executive suites are not, by far, the most luxurious hotel there is, only the most fabulous I have ever had the privilege to experience. I had the corner room on the 22nd floor, looking out over the madness of Bangkok in an air-conditioned, cotton wrapped cocoon of luxury. In the afternoons, I floated on my back in a magnificent blue pool, looking past the fronds of palm tree up into the gray sky, never seeing the tangle of traffic or the heat and the sweat of the streets.



My first day in Bangkok was spent at the British Club where there is a monthly meeting of all registered NGO’s working with refugees in Thailand to share information and coordinate. It’s a fabulous place to meet and link up with people who are usually out in the field, or far away in Bangkok, or working in other areas of Thailand. There was a really informative presentation about land mind use in Burma, as well as good discussion about the chances of increased military action in the area as we move out of the wet season. The morning is a general open session and in the afternoon various subcommittees meet, including the education subcommittee, which I attended.

It seemed strange to me to wash the mud off my feet and put on something nice, sit in the air-conditioned, high-ceilinged colonial splendor of the British Club, and drink coffee served by people in white suits. Outside, there seemed to be an oasis of calm in the monstrous city, complete with manicured lawns, a tennis court and a pool where people swam lazy laps.

Our hotel was opposite Pantip Plaza, also known as IT Center, also known as the computer lovers land of dreams. There are floors upon floors upon floors of hard ware, software, pirated DVD’s, computer parts, gadgets, flashing neon lights, loudspeakers and general chaos. It was an opportunity to stock up on DVD’s that could not be resisted, especially as I passed a booth with Mr. and Mrs. Smith featured prominently. And for $2.50 a pop, how can you say no? So our first night was spent ordering pizza (Pizza!!!) and wallowing in our executive suites watching movies.

Thursday was the beginning of the launch of our new project, known as SHIELD. SHIELD is an acronym I haven’t yet entirely mastered, but it has to do with providing support to health, institution building, and education to migrant and refugee communities in six provinces of Thailand. The two-day launch workshop was held at the Amari Atrium hotel, an even more luxurious location than our digs. So while we were completely happy with our breakfasts of espresso coffee and omelets delivered by omelets chefs on toasted whole-wheat bread, our lunches were an endless buffet of delights including a full sushi bar and a selection of cheeses and breads. At first, amidst all the suits and administrative managers attending the workshop, I could not help but feel like a country girl crashing the party, especially when it came to my obvious delight about the food. But then I saw one of the recently arrived senior managers sitting down at his table with two plates simply heaped with mountains of food and I felt a little better.

The launch was fascinating for me. I worked in groups with the country director of a large international aid organization, with people with years of education and experience and with people who sit behind desks all day, with lawyers versed in international law, US contract regulations and refugee advocacy. I spoke with people who had just arrived into the country with no experience at all with the situation and I spoke with people who had been in the country for years but rarely in the field. It was an interesting coming together of so many different kinds of people and experience and it takes all of us working together to make the project happen. It was such a pleasure to have an opportunity to speak to new people, learn new things and get out of the usual context of my muddy life.

Strange for me to have gone from my books and theory in University, to the muddy reality of the refugee camp, and find myself once again, spending all day talking. And after two days of doing nothing but talk, I felt ready to get back to Mae Sot and start doing the doing.

I celebrated the end of three luxurious days away from Mae Sot by doing a little shopping. Bangkok is perhaps the only place where I will be able to find shoes that are my size in this country, so I took advantage. Everyone else was too tired from the endless meetings and stayed in. I went out into the madness.

I ended up in a small club near Lumphini Park called Brown Sugar. It was packed but I found a spot at the bar and ordered a margarita. Can I even remember the last time I drank a margarita?? I sat back with my cool drink and let the fabulous sounds of live jazz roll over me, eyes closed with a huge smile on my face.

From Cave to Treehouse

One of the nicest things about Thailand is a general lack of rules and regulations regarding those things which, in North America, we have governed to death. You cannot, for example, drive in this country if you are unwilling to make a U-turn. The road system depends on it that you will. You will also encounter a large number of people going the wrong way down one way streets (although traffic police occasionally intervene in that case although more, I suspect, for financial motivations than for a concern about safety.) Housing likewise seems pretty unregulated. I do not have a lease and I start paying rent on the day that I move in. Sometimes I forget and that’s ok too.

I recently decided to move houses. I had been living across the street from a monastery in the middle flat of a triplex. It was hard to keep clean because it was so big and I am not around very often. There was a large tiled area downstairs and two bedrooms made of wood upstairs. There was a total of two windows in the entire place, which got my place known as The Cave. On a bright, sunny day, I had to have lights on. All the plants I bought soon died. My house opened directly onto a somewhat busy street where Burmese factory workers would stroll by, peering curiously into my house. I had finally had enough.


Unfortunately, my move came at a rather bad time. I gave the landlady notice (not because I had to but because I thought it was a nice thing to do) and arranged a truck to help me move. But then a million things came up, all at the same time, as they do. For one, I was supposed to attend the launch of my organization’s new project: a large five-year grant from the United States Agency for International Development. We are partnering with the International Rescue Committee and a small organization called PATH to implement the project and so we had our first big meeting to plan and get to know each other in Bangkok at the end of the week. Before I left for that, I needed to get everything organized and ready to roll back at the homestead. In addition, some issues came up at the school which needed to be dealt with, so that had me running around consulting people, getting advice and making plans. The usual school business took more time than usual as we are coming into exam time soon, so we need to review and prepare exams. And at the last minute, it seemed everyone’s plans changed and nobody seemed to know what was going on.

I came back from the refugee camp on Friday night and still had nothing in my house packed. I packed all morning until the mover came. The two of us struggled with my massive mattress (Thai mattresses are made of stone) and my table and all the various other detritus I seemed to have picked up in my year here. Then we drove them to the new place and wrestled them up the stairs.

My new house is on the other side of town. Thankfully, there is no monastery nearby to wake me up in the morning with the loud chanting of monks on loudspeakers. It is a traditional Thai-style wooden house on very high stilts. I am high above everyone with a view of everything. My front balcony looks out over an empty field to a cemetery. Just beyond the cemetery is the main highway and the infamous Country Pub (but that’s another story). Behind my house is a little canal system where Burmese people, I am told, wander and meet for romantic trysts at night. The Northern Market is just down the street where you can buy fresh vegetables, meat, fruit, flowers and freshly baked goods.

I have seven windows in my house, so it is always full of light and breeze. And bugs. The bugs aren’t such a big deal as I sleep under a mosquito net at night anyways. When the windows are closed, however, as they must be while I am traveling, the house becomes a sauna of heat and steam. Not very pleasant to come home to. And although I have lost my monks, I have a neighbor now who, although he lives in a wooden shack with lots of cracks and holes, has a wicked stereo system that rivals the monks and their loudspeaker any day.

My fridge is being delivered on Monday and with that, my move into the Treehouse is complete. When I don’t wake up to Thai music from next door, I wake up to the sun in my face and the call of birds and insects from outside (and only sometimes inside). From my bed, I can see the green leaves swaying outside in the breeze and hear my wind chimes chiming for the first time since I bought them. It’s a nice way to wake up in the morning.