Thailand - Journal #2

Friday, August 19 -- Sunday, August 21
Friday was technically a "slower" day - that's all relative on this trip of course and I do use the term lightly! Having not gotten to bed/sleep until after 4:00 a.m. one would think I would have slept all day - I would have liked to! We did get a little rest though as our first scheduled event wasn't until 1:00 p.m. when we had to meet for a brief orientation. But before that we needed some lunch so we all went to the cafeteria. Sadly, as much as I love it, food is the bane of my very existence!

Now, I really really do love food but I face some serious challenges in this part of my life - even in the states. First of all - I eat very few foods that are white (rice, frosting (yes, it IS a food), ice-cream, and potatoes are glaring exceptions to this "rule"). Mostly this means no spoiled dairy products such as sour cream or yogurt. The mother of all unedible foods is the dreaded COTTAGE CHEESE! (shudder). When it comes to a lot of other foods I'm actually afraid of if I can't quickly deduce what the basic ingredients are. I'm a real ball of fun at picnics, potlucks, and ethnic restaurants (don't get me started on Greek food for instance - double shudder). All this is to preface that, aside from the geckos, centipedes, scorpions, snakes, lizards, and the humidity, the thing I struggle with the most in Thailand is the food. Now, no offense to the lovely people at the cafeteria here at the university, but they make, hands down, the most unusual foods I've ever seen (or tasted - aside from the aforementioned Greek food). All this to say that it was of little surprise to me when I went to the cafeteria and surveyed the food and found that I had NO IDEA WHAT I was looking at it. And if I don't know what it is I'm soooooo not going to eat it. I recognized a plate of vegetables and some watermelon - so that was my lunch. (FYI - after several hours of not having enough food I do tend to get cranky - thus it is always best to play it safe and keep me fed every few hours).
OK, enough of that - after our orientation we headed to Tesco Lotus. What, you ask, is a Tesco Lotus? It's Thailand's answer to Walmart! We stocked up on some supplies here - especially for me who needs an alternative when I don't recognize the cafeteria food. There are challenges to food shopping in Thailand. Baked goods are not really eaten here - I suppose that's a good thing. So finding things like whole-grained breads is not really possible. But we make do with the bread we can find, which is slightly better than Wonder Bread. A little PB&J and I'm good for my breakfasts. Things are very very inexpensive here, which makes any kind of shopping, food or otherwise, a lot of fun!

After shopping we had dinner at The Pizza Company. One of the best pizzas I've ever eaten. Then over to Swenson's for ice-cream. We partook of something called an earthquake. Eight different scoops of ice-cream that eight people share. I'll digress here just long enough to point out that I'm a bit of a germophobe, because without that little bit of info you can't possibly appreciate how brave it was of me to share a bowl of ice-cream with eight other people -- most of whom I'd only known for a few hours.
From Tesco Lotus we dashed home, changed, and went to vespers. That brought the day to an end.

Saturday morning we went to church, which was followed by a potluck. Then we drove out to the farm where we'll be working for the next two weeks. We had a brief worship service with the farmer and some students from the university who come out to spend time with him every weekend. We surveyed the damaged roads on the farm to see what we'll be working on the next two weeks. The heavy rains have literally damaged the roads around the farm beyond repair. The wife does all the work on the farm and her small tractor can no longer maneuver the deep, water-filled ruts. Being unable to access much of the farm means that their corn crop is in danger of not being harvested. The rains have already damaged the crops so they need to be able to harvest anything the can. It really is a bad situation and I'm so glad we can be here to help out. Monday morning we'll start hauling rock and building new roads to allow the tractor to get to the corn crops.

From the farm we headed to the White Buddha. A huge statute built on the side of the mountain. To get to the Buddha requires climbing several hundred stairs straight up the side of a mountain. And we did this feat on what was the most humid day I've ever experienced. It was exhausting!!!! The view is almost worth it though. It is spectacular. My legs may never be the same again (although they did finally recuperate from my experience climbing this same mountain three years ago).

You'd think that would be the end of a very long day - but NOOOOO. No, we still needed to drive into Bangkok and meet the students who'd been forced to delay their flights in order to get visas. So at 9:00 we headed to Bangkok - a 2.5 hour drive. Our driver got very lost trying to get home so it was about 2:30 a.m. before that adventure was over.

A mere seven hours later and we were up and on our way to the wildlife refuge. Beautiful scenery but it seemed that was all there was going to be. Mostly this is a wildlife refuge that you drive through looking for wildlife. There are various watch towers and campgrounds throughout the park. However, the sign that read "Cobra Crossing" was enough to convince me I would NOT be venturing off the main road if and when I were to get outta the car. However, I did brave a brief venture in the area around the visitors' center. This included a walk across a rope bridge and a short hike to a small waterfall. Along that little sojourn I picked up my first leech. I would note that prior to this moment the forest was alive with the sounds of unseen monkeys and exotic birds. After my discovering the leech on my ankle the forest went very strangely quiet. I guess the forest wildlife found my hysterical screaming a bit much and fled for a quieter section of the refuge.

We saw a couple deer and a kimono water dragon but it seemed as if that were to be it. I was certain, however, that we would see something before getting out of the park, and sure enough just a couple miles from the entrance we finally encountered a large group of monkeys. Sooooo exciting.






From there we went to a place where we could ride elephants through the forest and through the river. Vie got to ride on the elephant's head and steer him through the river. We had a stubborn teenage elephant who had a mind of his own -- it was hysterical. But not near as hysterical as when the lead elephant directly in front of us decided to release some of his pent-up gas. I'm amazed that I'm still alive to write this story!



After stopping at a wonderful little fruit stand we finally arrived home. I was starving!!!! The food at the little vendors where we stopped was more than I could bear so I didn't eat any of it. I set to making a big batch of Kraft Mac & Cheese with tuna (all of which I'd brought with me). Then we finally got a chance to just stop and catch our breath. Tomorrow we start working at rebuilding the farm roads. Looking forward to the work but the day starts early.

To be continued. . . .