Jamison’s Misadventures In Asia

Hello everyone.  It is now the month of October.  In Thailand, school is closed for most of October.  They call it ‘bid term’ (’bid’ means closed).  Bid term is a good thing.

Before I talk about my bid term plans, let me fill you in on the past few weeks.  There actually isn’t a whole lot to report.  September was a month of getting back in touch with my schools, students, and teachers.  It went pretty smoothly, though I continue to have doubts about working at one of my schools. 

In the second week of September, my Peace Corps Program Manager, Rumpai, came to visit me at site.  The  site visit is a standard check up for the Program Managers to make sure that volunteers are happy and assist in ironing out any project details with Thai counterparts.  I’m good friends with Rumpai, and she was supportive and happy about how everything is going so far.  It was a fun visit, and we even had a chance to hike up a beautful mountain overlooking Laos.

Last week, I headed to the town of Chaiyaphum in Issan, the northeastern region of Thailand.  Chaiyaphum is rumored to be the Thai province least visited by tourists, which is somewhat understandable.  Chaiyaphum is the Fresno of Thailand. I went to Chaiyaphum to help another volunteer run an English Camp for 180 primary school students.  There were a handful of volunteers who came to help, and the camp was enjoyable. 

Each volunteer was assigned to a different learning station, with the students rotating in smaller groups from station to station.  I was lucky enough to be in charge of the ‘American football’ station, which consisted of teaching the students how to throw a spiral, run a route, catch, and how to say the words ‘throw’, ‘catch’, ‘touch’, ‘run’.  The vocabulary was the easy part, but keeping Thai kids motivated while standing in blazing heat for an hour can be a little difficult.  In the end, I’m pretty sure they all had a good time, and I was impressed with their skills. 

The weekend following the camp, several more volunteers showed up in Chaiyaphum for a party.  On Friday night, we went to a little backwater Thai club, filled almost completely with men, and I did my best to make friends.  There was one guy dancing onstage who would repeatedly show the crowd his ample belly, and I took each showing as an opporunity to slap said belly.  I believe he enjoyed this gesture of friendship across international and cultural lines, and I left the club feeling good about my role as an emissary of good will. 

On Saturday, we were treated to some great cooking and managed to make it through the weekend without setting the house on fire, despite our best efforts.  Due to its lack of tourism and generally being out of the way, Chaiyaphum is a pain in the ass as far as bus schedules go.  To avoid a half-day layover in central Thailand, I had to hop on a bus at 1:30 a.m. on Sunday morning.  I’ve spent most of this week trying to recover. 

Next week, I head to Chantaburi, in the southeastern corner of the mainland.  I will be participating in an HIV/AIDS training, and I am eager to learn new skills to bring back to site.  Starting tomorrow, I will be visiting with HIV-infected patients every Friday.  I hope to learn more about the disease and the support and education programs in the community, with the ultimate goal of bringing together different community groups to improve awareness. 

Before I finish, I’ll give you a nibble of my daily life:  the bathroom setup.  Traditionally, Thai people have used squatting toilets, basically a porcelain hole in the ground.  The squatter is the type of toilet most commonly found in Thailand.  I particularly enjoy seeing ‘American Standard’ brand squatting toilets–the irony always gives me a little smirk before I squat. 

Toilet paper is widely used in Thailand:  as tissues, napkins, and sometimes in the bathroom.  One will more likely find a bucket full of water or a small hose in place of toilet paper.  The hose can be applied directly, but the bucket of water is not used for wiping as much as it is used for cleaning one’s hand after wiping.  I could explain in more detail, but I will assume that the procedure is satisfactorily clear. 

Sometimes, if one is lucky enough to have toilet paper in the bathroom, there still may be the problem of where to put it when wiping has finished.  For some reason, Thai people have decided that certain toilets accept toilet paper, while other toilets do not. 

At my host family’s house, there was toilet paper available, though for the first month of living there, I assumed that I could not flush it.  This assumption brought forth the aforementioned problem of what to do with my paper.  In this case, I decided to employ a t.p. bag–a ziploc bag to carry my used toilet paper.  This system worked pretty well, though I would often stuff it in my shirt or pants to conceal it from my host family.  Unfortunately, one day, the bag went missing.  I don’t know where it went–whether I lost it at our training site, my school, or my house.  This unfortunate event encouraged me to ask resident Thai culture expert, Chaturon, about what to do with my toilet paper.  He informed me that I could probably just send it down the tube. 

At my house in Thoeng, I am blessed with a western-style toilet that flushes (sometimes they don’t).  in the wiping department, I tend to favor the hose method over paper.  It’s a kind of poor man’s bodet, with the only drawback being a lingering moisture. 

I think that I’ve delivered far more personal details than most of you would care to know, so I think it’s about time I wrap this one up.  Congratulations, Oakland A’s, on a solid season of baseball.  Shame on you, Oakland A’s fans, for our lean attendance numbers down the stretch.  Kudos, to the first person who sends me Ryan Adams’ new album, Jacksonville Nights.  I hope you all are well. 

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