A New Yoga Teacher- Me

I took the second yoga class at TVC today- amazing. I did Bikram’s on my balcony yesterday and it felt wonderful, but there’s something different about enjoying the experience with others that made today exciting and replenishing. Trish, a girl from Seattle, taught tonight for the first time and she did a great job. It was very different from Jen’s class on Tuesday, wonderful in its own way. My desire to try teaching yoga has grown significantly since Tuesday. I shared this desire with Trish and she invited me to teach next week, so I’ll be thinking about what flow of postures I can put together for a sensational yoga class. What an incredible opportunity!

Shout out to my parents for sending me a care package full of organic, whole grain oatmeal (the fact that I’m writing about oatmeal says something about the lack of several healthy foods I’ve grown accustomed to in the US) and coloring books, games, etc. for the kids. Looking through all of the cards and stickers got me excited about teaching again. Thank you! Perfect timing since we start teaching again on Monday. Unfortunately, this means that tomorrow is my last day at Thaikea. Steve, the project manager who has been here for 5 months, will be leaving this week as well. He is a great example to me of a great person and an excellent manager (values everyone’s opinion, encourages group decisions, includes us in everything that is going on with Thaikea, and has a heart that is truly vested in what he is doing to help rebuild community and normality here). He showed us a video with pictures of Thaikea from a few months ago to remind us what it’s all about, especially during this “sticky time” where finances and the future of Thaikea are uncertain and plans are changing on a daily basis. Then, he began crying because he the realization that he is leaving very soon had just hit him. If you want to learn more about Thaikea and how it has evolved over the past 5 months, or if you’re interested in coming over and participating in such a rebuilding effort, visit Steve’s blog (http://www.ontheline.org.nz/diary/). I think there is currently more information there about the Thaikea than is on TVC’s website (http://www.tsunamivolunteer.net).

Other great news- the playground project that we have been building furniture for celebrated its completion today. We were asked to create a basketball hoop for the court 2 hours before the party, and of course Thaikea delivered! As some of the guys were installing the hoop, a little Thai boy waited anxiously with a basketball in hand to take the first shot. It was such a positive experience to see local Thai’s and TVC volunteers celebrating the completion of this community project that is sure to bring life and good energy back into the village.

Team Thaikea with local villagers

Back to THAIKEA

The last day of English camp at Chao Tai Mai School was cancelled because the Aiesecers and other volunteers needed to return to Bangkok by a certain time and were afraid that flooding would prevent this if they did not leave early this morning.

Instead, I met with the Thaikea crew and we discussed where the project is, where it is going, and what we could do to help raise needed funds. We decided to work a half day rather than at night and tomorrow we’ll return to a full day at the workshop in Thap Tawaan. Surprisingly, we had a few villagers show up today to make furniture. Hopefully, we’ll have some more to help tomorrow.

After work, I went to yoga at TVC. The class was rejuvinating. It felt so good to be doing yoga again. I’ve had a hard time practicing on my own in a house full of people, so I was thrilled to have someone lead and to be on a balcony overlooking the beautiful Khao Lak beach at sunset, enjoying yoga with a group of people who obviously share some sort of common interest with me. It is still warm enough to do yoga outside at night and we gazed up at the stars during several postures, which is how I want to do my practice from now on. I am so grateful for this experience today.

Thailand Fever

This morning I went to Chao Tai Mai School to help teach at the English camp that’s mostly taught in Thai. I felt much more useful today than yesterday though. We helped the kids plant morning glory, the purpose of which was to teach them to appreciate and respect their natural resources and the hard work it takes to get something like a seed to the dinner table. We were pressured into eating lunch at the school- Thai culture. I’m reading “Thailand Fever”. It’s written for couples with a Western and a Thai partner, but I’m reading it to find out more about Thai culture. One of the sections I read today was about how generosity is very important to Thai’s. They want to be hospitable, which explains why they insisted so much that we eat lunch with them today. They also find it important to keep each other company, especially guests, so there’s rarely a moment alone. This tends to clash with the Western value of privacy.

Now that I’ve begun to re-write the book, on to something else. There were a lot of new volunteers at the TVC Monday night meeting, which is exciting especially since I think most of the projects could use a lot more help.

I’m at the Khao Lak Nature Resort at the moment. Just finished a BBQ with the English camp volunteers who are staying here until tomorrow. There’s a guy named Gan (kind of sounds like “gun”) who’s been really friendly, including me in everything.

It’s difficult to tell which guys are gay here because most of them dress and/or act “camp” (British term for a guy who appears gay). I asked Ae, one of the members of the OC (organizing committee) for the English camp and a member of Aiesec Thailand, what the long pinky fingernail means on guys here and he said it means they’re gay. I have a feeling it might mean something else as well since one of the guys at Thaikea with the long fingernail hit on one of the female volunteers, and the other is married and has 1 kid.

It’s been raining hard and not so hard for 24 hours now, and I hear it will be like this for the next 4 days. However, the end of the rainy season is supposed to be the end of September. I wish the weather would just follow the calendar sometimes. It’s been cooling down a bit too, which means those cold showers that were feeling great just a couple weeks ago aren’t as pleasant anymore. Hopefully my Southwestern experience of cold showers to help wake me up at 5:30a will help out here.

English Camp and Football

Today was the first day of the English camp at Chao Tai Mai School. Only 2 hours between 8:30a-3:30p are set aside for English lessons, but even during that time I heard mainly Thai being spoken. Actually, I ended up questioning why I was there because I felt so useless. Still, it's always great to see the kids and their bright smiles.
Eating lunch with the kids
Everyone helps clean up by washing their own dishes after lunch


Football (soccer) makes everything better…
I watched Chelsea play Everton at the Marlin Bar tonight- good game with a tying score of 1-1. The English Premier is the thing right now, I think because there are a ton of Brits present. It’s great!
I feel so filled up with smoke right now. This is still probably the only thing keeping me from moving abroad for a more permanent period of time. Thank God for California, where smoking is not allowed indoors. Everywhere else I’ve been in the world has smoky bars, cafes, restaurants, etc. which makes it difficult for me to go out and enjoy some of the things I love, such as live music, dancing, relaxing and chatting in cafes, eating out occasionally, watching football matches in a pub, etc. Thailand has been no different in regard to the smoking situation.

Night with Aiesecers

Aiesec Thailand seems to be great at surprising us. All the housemates and I had planned on visiting Phang Nga Bay this weekend, but we had a surprise visit from Ae (pronounced like the English vowel “a”), who is on the MC for Aiesec Thailand (national staff). He said there would be an English camp Sunday-Tuesday and that our help was needed.

The lack of equality (not a Thai, but a Western cultural value, I’m discovering) is not very important here. For example, if I respond to an American email immediately in the US, I usually expect to hear back quickly. If I take a while to respond, however, I don’t expect to receive an immediate response. This expectation does not hold up well as far as I’ve experienced with Aiesec Bangkok and Aiesec Thailand, which led to some frustration when I was told that we needed to stay in town for the English camp this weekend. I feel like we give them plenty of time to respond and they still usually don’t until the very last minute. However, they also contact us with a need at the last minute and expect us to deliver. According to “Thailand Fever”, a book I’m reading, this might be accounted for by the clash between the Western values of fairness and equality and the Thai value of generosity. The book implies that they are giving us an opportunity to show that we are generous, which is looked highly upon in Thai culture, by requesting things of us in the manner they do.

Anyway, Ae invited us to a “cooking party” with the 40 volunteers from Bangkok who came down to teach at the English camp. I was excited because I have been wanting to learn how to cook Thai food since before I arrived. Unfortunately, I did not learn in a very hands on way because there were so many people, speaking in Thai, running all over the place to cook all at once. I’m thankful I was still able to see how some things were made, and I asked about the sauces since they seem to be the only part I’m unsure of for my fave dishes.
At the "cooking party"

After dinner, there was an Aiesec meeting, even though the volunteers were not all Aiesecers. Just before dinner they had asked us trainees to make up a roll call and amazingly enough, we came up with the best one I’ve seen in a while, inspired by one of Will Ferrell’s SNL cheerleading acts (“sha sha booya”). After roll call, I was asked to help lead some of the Aiesec dances- Represent! The Indian song that makes Aiesec look like a cult instead of a CULTural organization, which is one of my faves, is not as popular here. And, they have a different dance for it- so unfortunate.

Later, all of us trainees talked about why we were here and what we had gotten out of the experience so far. During our mini speeches, one of the monkeys from the Khao Lak Nature Resort decided to join the meeting, which freaked everyone out. It looked so cute and cuddly until it opened its mouth and its fangs popped out. Eventually, someone from the resort came in, first with a rake, then with a banana, and the monkey left the meeting.

THAIKEA Update (Funding Needed) and Visa Run to Burma

I haven’t written in a while, and it’s not just because I don’t want to pay at an internet café. I’ve been working hard and playing hard. Today we delivered 2 pieces of furniture to an elderly couple who are not capable of coming to THAIKEA and making furniture. They appeared extremely decrepit and still the husband was able to smile with his 4 brown teeth. I had brought my camera to take pictures, but when we put the furniture inside of the house, I felt that would have been inappropriate. I don’t think the couple would have necessarily minded, but I just had a disturbing feeling about it.

There are a few girls that always visit and play around THAIKEA. There were only 3 of us volunteers working- a ton of people left last week- so I think the girls felt comfortable coming into the shop and using the tools. I ended up babysitting for a couple hours throughout the day because they were playing tag around the tables, taking the tools from each and other and from me, and kept plugging tools into the outlets immediately after I had unplugged them for their own protection. I got really frustrated at one point and then Steve, our project manager, told me the youngest girl had lost her mom in the tsunami. I wish it wouldn’t have taken that fact to extend me patience, but it did. I also found out that Lek, one of our local helpers who speaks some English, lost his baby girl in the tsunami. He saved his son, who was clinging onto his neck, but his wife wasn’t able to hand onto the baby. Lek has moved back into a house in the town he lived in before the tsunami, but he will not go near the sea’s edge. He doesn’t want to see the ocean. I think almost everyone in Thap Tawan, the village that THAIKEA is currently located in, has a similar story, Every single villager was affected either directly or indirectly by the tsunami taking away their loved ones. The courage and strength these people have to move back into their houses near the water is incredible, especially when there are still no solid warning systems or protection in place. Supposedly, the government is in charge of this and corruption and greed have kept them from rebuilding southern Thailand. I believe economy comes into play here as well. The number of people who live in this area is insignificant to the government. Their only interest seems to be in tourism.

Visa Run to Burma (October 16, 2005)

I have no interest in ever going to Burma again, and not just because of the story I’m about to tell.

We left Khao Lak at 10am on Sunday and arrived in Ranon, Thailand on the border next to Burma a few hours later. There is a small bay where Burma and Thailand connect, so a couple of the immigration offices are on the water, or shall I say sewage, in the bay. We had to get departure stamps on land in Ranong, then drive and walk to a nearby boat dock. Once we got on the small long boat, we waited for our “boat driver”(?) to dock at an immigration checkpoint and have them check our passports. Then we took the boat across the bay to Burma. After another immigration checkpoint, we docked and went onto land in Burma. Our passports were stamped again for entry into Burma, and we were taken away by local teens to a nearby restaurant. We ate quickly as these boys waited for us and then told us we needed to get back on the boat because the tide was going down. We hurried back onto the boat and made it most of the way back to our original boat dock until we got stuck. The low tide was stopping several boats, but a few were getting by alright with just a few people on them (we had 11 total).

An important note is that the immigration office in Ranong closes at 4:15p, and if you don’t make it back to get a re-entry stamp in time, you have to do the entire boat ride/visa run over again. Another important note: It was 3:45 when our boat got stuck. The boat driver held his open hand up and said, “5”. He didn’t mean 5 minutes, he meant wait til 5pm until the tide rises again for the boat to continue on. Since none of us wanted to stay in Ranong or drive back again the following day, we all jumped out of the boat and waded through sewage water to get to another boat, which took us back to a different dock, from which we had to walk speedily to our truck and drive back to Ranong’s immigration office. We made it with 1 minute to spare! And, we had a free mud bath! What more could we ask for? ☺ As gross as it was, I was happy to be with the people who went. We all laughed it off and agreed that our visa run would go down as one of the greatest visa run stories for TVC.
Katherine (British) wading through the nasty sewage water to complete the visa run in time

Despite all the excitement and adventure, I am not interested in going to Burma again. I realize we were in a border town, but it was a slum- way worse than Tijuana. Little kids help people smuggle drugs across the border every day and they are beaten on a regular basis if the higher ups think they’ve been sending people to the competition. The people were friendly, but the filth and poverty were completely overwhelming.

Other than working at THAIKEA and having a memorable visa run, I have been having some good conversations with people of all ages and ethnic backgrounds; reading more books for leisure than I ever have before; playing a little guitar; teaching my roomies guitar; singing; dancing; eating a lot of tofu, vegetables and rice; witnessing incredible sunsets that blow my mind and put me in a state of awe daily; trying to decide when I should attempt dreadlocks followed by a shaved head; playing British and Thai games like deck tennis; swimming in the warm ocean; and playing fooseball at the local Fisherman’s Bar.

I recently found out that some people from TVC are going to Pakistan as soon as they raise enough funds to go. They will be doing immediate relief, helping the numerous people who just suffered a huge earthquake. I’m not sure if I could stomach some of what they are sure to see, but a part of me really wants to go help there for a while and then come back to Thailand to help with the reconstruction.

We were also informed at tonight’s weekly TVC meeting that we are broke and will have to stop some of the projects if we can’t raise funds. If you visit TVC’s website (http://www.tsunamivolunteer.net\), you can see exactly what we are doing to help the local people get back on their feet and have some normalcy in their lives after a deeply wounding natural disaster. On the TVC website, there is a link for donations- you can even make $1 donations. I know, personally, for the THAIKEA project, that we need more funds to move into our new location to help a different village. We have already met the needs of the villagers in Thap Tawan, but it will be extremely difficult to move on if we cannot raise funds so that we can pay for the tools, wood and other materials that will provide furniture to yet another tsunami affected village.

Joining THAIKEA

I started working with TVC yesterday. Anna, one of my housemates and I are at THAIKEA. I’m enjoying it so far. I’ve learned how to use all of the power tools and a Chinese saw. I helped assemble a TV stand and saw it through the entire process of cutting wood, sanding, measuring, drilling, assembling, sanding and staining. The villagers want to build TV stands even though they don’t yet own TVs. I don’t know, maybe they use them for something else, or maybe they just want the stands because they know we are leaving soon.

Our work schedule goes something like this:
~8:20a Picked up on the side of the road in front of our house
~8:45a Arrive, briefing, set up, begin to work
~11a Short break
~11:30-1:30p Work
~1:30-2:30p Lunch
~2:30-4:30/5p Work

Today we got to be really creative. Instead of just making the normal pieces of furniture. We were told that a nearby playground, which is being built by TVC, needed some benches, chairs, and tables. We are building these things from scrap wood from the boat yard project. The girls I’m working with decided to make a bench using coconuts for the legs.
Kattia (German) and I sanding the bench top

We were also invited to a vegetarian breakfast in Thap Tawan this morning. 3 monks were present to bring the villagers out and to teach vegetarianism, vegetarian ways of cooking, etc. I guess the monks are kind of used as celebrities to draw in a crowd.

Weekend in Phuket

We stayed with a Thai woman who is the English teacher at Chow Tai Mai School. The guys are building a green house there and she invited all of us to come and stay with her during the festival.

Enjoying the feast Pi Ya, the English teacher, made for us

Phuket Town itself is a slum. The dirtiness is accentuated by the various smells as you walk through the downtown areas. To get away from this filth, we went to a clean movie theatre and saw Red Eye- OK movie.

On Saturday we walked around the town a bit and then decided to go to Phatang beach. Housemates and I on Phatong beach
We took a tuk tuk (small taxi type vehicle that overcharges) to the west side of the island and there we found a very touristy paradise. The beach was gorgeous, with warm water full of jet skis, parasailing boats and water skiers. Instead of returning to Phuket Town to see people in the festival walk on coals, we stayed on the beach. They have a lot of outdoor bars right on the sidewalk and a lot of street vendors to bargain with. After dinner we sat at an outdoor restaurant and enjoyed live music from two bands that were taking requests all night. One of the bands had all African American members and they played mainly salsa, reggae and island type music. The other group was Thai and they played all of the same songs we heard at the boat yard about a week ago from a different Thai band. I wonder, do they all share 1 play list?

1 of the many temples used during the week long Vegetarian Festival

This morning we woke up early to go watch the parade for the Vegetarian Festival. The streets were packed with people in white clothes (representing purity). Wearing white clothes is one of the criteria you must meet in order to enter the temple. I’m not sure exactly what goes on in the temple, but I think I witnessed more than enough on the streets. There were shrines on tables all over the place and groups of people in the parade clustered together around 1 person who had a large object pierced through the side of his/her (I only saw 1 girl with the piercing) mouth.

Crowd gathered around a table altar as part of the procession (parade) on Sunday. Most people wear white as a sign of purity because the Vegetarian Festival is about purity and cleansing.

Possessed by gods

The kids at Ban Lam Pi love to learn all the “cool” stuff we did as American kids. We’ve been showing them some handshakes and hi fives lately. In the process, we’ve also discovered that those before us have already taught them the fake-out hi five. O yeah, remember that? The kids get a huge laugh out of it. Also, don’t know if I mentioned this before, but when the girls give us kisses on either side of the cheek, they don’t actually kiss with their lips. They suck their lips in as if they didn’t have any and instead they smell us. This big inhale of our scent is their way of giving a peck on the cheek.

On the way to school, we saw a few trucks full of people in white and yellow shirts. They were standing, some of them shaking from side to side, others playing drums, and some with a piercing through opposite ends of the skin above their upper lip. Although the piercing nearly made me faint, I was even more disturbed by what I saw and heard about later this afternoon. On the way back from school, I saw more trucks full of the same looking people, but a couple of guys looked possessed. They appeared to be shaking uncontrollably with only the whites of their eyes showing. I later heard that a few doors down from our house there were people hitting themselves on the back with a ball full of spikes, which caused a lot of bleeding, but apparently no pain due to the trance these people were in. Doesn’t this sound a lot like The Da Vinci Code? I’m currently reading this book, which may be why I was especially bothered today by what I saw and heard. I think the guys that scared me the most are called “shaman” here. They are chosen- I’m not sure by who or when- and get into a trance for this annual festival. I haven’t seen it, but I’ve heard they walk on coals and do other outrageous things too.

My roomies and I are going to Phuket this weekend for the Vegetarian Festival, so I’m sure they’ll be more craziness to tell about soon.

Drug Bust

Hitched a ride home with 2 policemen today. Some funny things happened. First, the guy in the front passenger’s seat was talking on his cell phone and suddenly passed it to Carrie in the back seat. Carrie didn’t seem to really understand what the girl on the other end of the line wanted, but she repeated, “Merlin hotel, Khao Lak Inn, 5 minutes, OK.” Needless to say, we didn’t know what we were doing when we soon pulled into the Merlin Resort in Khao Lak. We began to wonder, Is this a drug bust? Are they going to give us guns so we can provide backup?”

The driver asked us what our names where, and we all gave him our Thai nicknames: Carrie = Tuk Ta, which means doll, Jessica = Ploi, which means gem/diamond, and mine, Nam Pung, which means honey. The guy was shocked because obviously we’re not Thai. We then decided that in similar future circumstances, we should introduce ourselves as something like Princess or Goddess. We ended up running errands with the cops, who needed to make copies and return them to one of the guys’ girlfriend who I’m assuming works at the Merlin Resort.

This morning our last V-STAYers for the next 3 months arrived. Jiri is an Indonesian guy from The Netherlands and Anna is from Portugal. Our house is full and has more energy now which is nice.

TVC Orientation and the Beginning of a Great Month

We didn’t teach at Ban Lam Pi today because it is a Buddhist holiday and almost everyone went to the temple during the day. I’ve also heard there will be a big festival celebration tonight, but am not sure where. As far as I understand it, today is when the Buddhists start their annual practice of something that seems similar to the Catholic period of Lent. Until the end of this month, they are supposed to abstain from alcohol, lying, committing adultery, stealing, killing, and EATING MEAT! The first week of this abstinence period is called the Vegetarian Festival. Did I come to Thailand at the right time, or what?!

Since there was no school today, and the semester break is October 10th-31st, all 6 of us in the house have decided to see how else we can be of service. The Tsunami Volunteer Center (TVC) office is pretty flexible, so we registered with them and attended their weekly orientation. TVC has 4 basic construction projects going on right now:
1. The Boat House/Yard- 50 boats that are sponsored by companies to be built for some of the people who lost their boats in the tsunami.
2. Thap Tawan- re-building homes in the village of Tap Tawan for the Morgan/Sea Gypsy people who live there. The Morgan’s have a very unique style for their houses. The main part of the homes is propped up to be a level above the ground and most of the walls are made of bamboo weaved into cool designs- very artistic.
3. Kho Khor Khao- This is an island off the coast about 25 minutes north of Ban Niang. They are building houses on the island and have a separate site for building the parts (i.e. wiring bars together for the walls). We didn’t get to see it because they weren’t working today, but how nice to work on a small island?
4. Thaikea- There is a building in Thap Tawan that TVC uses to provide tools, materials and expertise to help the locals build furniture for themselves. They are currently doing a research study to see if they have reached a saturation point for making furniture for that specific village. No matter the result of the study, this project also involves building a new Thaikea building in another nearby village so that TVC can begin to help another village create the furniture they need and desire.

I’ll be meeting with a guy named T-Vo from TVC on Thursday to figure out which project I’ll be working on during the 3 weeks of semester break at Ban Lam Pi.

Motorcycle Tour and Boat Release

V-STAY Biker Gang


Renting motorcycles here is cheap (~$4/day), and it feels so amazing to ride with the wind cooling you down and a great view of the beach. We all rented bikes and began a beautiful day by driving north about 25 minutes to a relief camp. The last V-STAY group worked there, playing with the kids and teaching them. The kids at Ban Lam Pi have a lot of energy, but I’m not sure I could endure the never-ending sugar rush the kids at the relief camp seem to posess, They were literally jumping off the walls the whole time we were there. I was sitting down after Weaw showed us around the camp and one little boy ran behind me and climbed up my back to my shoulders. Apparently, I was the monkey bars for him.

We left the relief camp to see the town now called Tsunami Village (I think Ban Lam is the actual name of the town) because it was the most damaged by the tsunami. It has also been the quickest to begin being rebuilt. The military came in immediately following the tsunami and put up several houses within days. There are two huge boats still sitting in the middle of Tsunami Village. The blue one with 3 levels is propped up against a house, but has not caused any noticeable damage to the house. The orange one, which is almost as large as the blue boat, is resting along the side of one of the main roads.

It started raining on our way back to the house. A lot of Thai people pull over under small bamboo structures and wait for the rain to pass. We, however, did not. We were trying to get back and go to this amazing boat release party…
Releasing the boat


When we arrived, the sun was setting and had gone from a soft peach color to a blend of bright purples, pinks and oranges. We watched from the beach, which was lined with coconut trees and a beach with the perfect curvature. It was truly one of the most incredible sunsets I’ve ever experienced. The workshop where the boats are built is one of TVC’s projects. The goal is to build 50 boats and they have finished buildin 25, so they were releasing one into the water to celebrate reaching the half-way mark. We all helped the vessel enter the water and then we partied! A few of us played guitar and sang around a huge bonfire on the beach, which the boat workshop is located on, there was a ton of free food and drinks, and a band from the Ko Samui island played. There were crabs and shrimp spread across a large table and people were gathered around talking and eating straight from the table. There was a very communal vibe about it.

Sunset at the boat yard

Huge bonfire


Although I wouldn’t recommend the band to anyone, I have to give props to them for playing songs that encouraged dancing. They also gave me the once in a lifetime opportunity to witness the first 60+ year-old male ballerina/human jack in the box- a volunteer named Gordon who had a little sparkler firework in hand and was “dancing” his heart out.

The other main entertainment for the evening was a female volunteer with hair down to her shoulders who had her friends help give her a zig zag mohawk. It didn’t look good, so they decided to shave her head completely. I’ve been thinking of shaving my head as well after trying dread locks out for a while- guess you’ll have to wait for the pictures for an update on that.

Later on, some of the TVC volunteers started fire twirling and a group of us went to enjoy a huge bonfire on the beach. We sang, played guitar, and met some of the other volunteers we hope to be doing construction with over the next few weeks during Ban Lam Pi School’s semester break.