Intermission: Thailand, and Getting There

Don't ask me who the guy is

A quick 15-minute break from my Tale of Two Villages. 

There really is nothing like an American passport. Just a simple looking book with U.S.A. stamped on the front, it acts as gate key to most of the planet. Leaving for Thailand was as easy as leaving for the bathroom, and required about as much planning. 

Okay enough italicized text for one post! To Thailand!

Happy New Year?

     It happened to be December 31, and I was still feeling good from the previous days in Mo Jiang. In Jinghong, I checked into a cheap hostel and went out looking for activity. Finding oneself suddenly alone always amplifies the sense of solitude. It did not help that it was New Year’s Eve. During my stroll through Jinghong, I was hit hard with tiredness, partly due to so much driving and so little sleep. But the real culprit was the nature of the work in the villages. Holding meetings with villagers requires that you maintain an intense level of focus. You have to be acutely aware of your audience, constantly gauging people’s feelings, thoughts, and levels of understanding, while appearing to lead a smooth, controlled discussion. At the same time, you should adjust teaching tactics to match what you discover, and struggle with funky accents. If you screw up, the long term consequences could be significant. The tiredness was mental, manifested physically.

Having neither Ruth by my side to celebrate, nor the interest of going into a crowded restaurant alone, I grabbed some quick street food and hit the hay at 8:30. I happened to wake at 11:54, but it was not interesting enough to hold my attention and I felt right back to sleep. In this way I dodged sickness and loneliness going into the New Year.

Boat Life

     From Xishuanbanna, I bused to a dark and dirty little town on the border of China and Burma. The guy who met me there on the street asked that I pay up front. I was immediately hesitant – I would have preferred to pay after boarding the ship. But he insisted, said it was easier this way, and I put my doubt aside and paid him the 450RMB for passage to Thailand. Then we waited. For what I still don't know now. Two dogs got in a fight, and as I watched, the man and his motorcycle disappeared! Shock. Stupidity. Anger. Why had I not gone with my gut? I always go with my gut. What a simple scam – and I had fallen into it despite seeing through it. Just as I was formulating a plan to track him down, he showed up, offered me a cigarette, and bought me dinner, a tasty one at that. Faith in Man restored. He took me to the harbor where I boarded a cargo boat headed to Thailand via the Mekong River. 

We left after a day of waiting and the boat moved only during the day, with Laos passing on the left and Burma on the right. The spot where the three very different countries met looked completely unremarkable! All sides were the same – water, sand, rocks, and vegetation. I’m not sure how I expected them to look different from one another. I was the only non-crew passenger, and experiencing two days of life on a boat was one of the highlights of the trip. I didn't have to work, but still felt like part of the crew. I ate well cooked meals with them and slept in their ratty bunks. One thing I did not like was how everything to be discarded was simply tossed overboard. I mean EVERYTHING – used cooking oil, giant plastic bags, beer bottles, cigarettes, urine, you name it. I tried saving my trash together, but when it was discovered, it was tossed by the first mate. We stopped only once to buy a deer-like animal from some Burmese hunters sitting on the banks of the river. I hopped onshore to collect some sand (and so I can say I’ve been to Myanmar illegally). Back on deck, I watched them dissemble the animal, and the only body-part that went overboard was the lungs. I watched them use a car battery wired to long poles to ingeniously blast for fish while we were docked. It was both fascinating and horribly unfair. Despite all this excitement, the boat ride itself took twelve hours, so there was plenty of time for lounging around, enjoying warm weather, and listening to Pimsleur Thai audio lessons. I thoroughly enjoyed the journey, but it’s definitely not the way I would take my mother to Thailand.

Racing the sun... before stopping for the night

The Hobo Arrives

     Arriving Chiang Saen was a trip. Clearing customs took no time at all, and suddenly there I was – in a country where I was illiterate, homeless, hungry, penniless, and spoke hardly a phrase. What a great feeling! Most my problems were solved within the hour, but the problem of not speaking or reading Thai has not been, nor will ever be solved. A night in Chaing Saen, a bus through Chiang Rai, and finally I  arrived at my first destination: Chiang Mai.

Following the well worn backpacker’s trails through Thailand’s hub of the north, I found new friends, fantastic eating, muy thai boxing, lady-boys (yikes), and live tigers. I took a sleeper train to Bangkok, and there I met up with one of my freshman-year roommates, who found some time to show me around (he became a new father only two days later!). For those of you who are wondering, the answer is: yes - one night in Bangkok did make me humble. Never mind.

The Drifter Departs

     After a bit more exploring and meeting fellow travelers, I decided hedonistic travel is only partially-satisfying. Traveling without purpose is just drifting, while traveling with one becomes an adventure! So after a week and a half of drifting, I was more than ready to head back to Kunming and back to my mission.