T is for period

I've been back in America for nearly 2 months now, and unfortunately the previous year of my life has already faded into a dream. I try to close my eyes and walk myself through a day in Chiang Mai, but it still feels so disconnected. Grading papers, preparing lesson plans, teaching classes. Was that me?

I don't really think of it that often, but for some reason every time I'm in church I am overcome with the desire to steal away in the night; pack my bags for Pakistan and never come back. I don't know why I feel that, but it sure is real.

In all honesty, I really enjoy being back home. Not so much being home (this isn't my home). Not so much being with my family (a grown man is evolutionarily designed not to live with his parents). Really it's just about control.

The pastor at my Dad's church gave a very insightful sermon on Sunday. He mentioned self-control as one of the attributes of being a leader and I really began to realize how important and how powerful self-discipline is.

I am a logical person, and rigorously so. Logic is about control, about making wise decisions despite confounding factors. Do you control what you eat and drink or do your wants? your hormones? commercials? fancy boxes? fructose and sucrose? I know I control what I eat. We are no longer animals that need to be driven by obsolete chemical processes.

Do you control what you wear or do the people around you make those decisions? the TV? magazines?

Do you control what you say or do you let your limbic system take over?

There's a part of an O.A.R. song I like that says "when no substance can control you, you done conquered that fool". I don't want to be controlled by anything.


Yams!

Which brings me to what I enjoy about being back here. I enjoy strengthening my body with exercise and proper nutrition, and that is finally back in my hands again. It's fun, it's challenging, it celebrates the tremendous gift that my healthy body is. True I'm bored most of the time. True I feel useless without a job. I'll take care of that soon enough.

Plus, there's this:

Borrowed Time

They don't know what love is

That's why when they stumble they fall

They don't know what love is

Hatred has conquered them all

Can't praise God with your carnal mind

Let's Review

September 2008:

17th Arrive in DC
18th Interview at Georgetown
19th Hang out with Gretchen. Fly out to Cleveland - awesome day
20th Play golf with Case Western's dean of student life
21st Go to Indians game with Bob
22nd Interview at Case Western. Hitch a ride down to Columbus with fellow interviewee. Eat the biggest burger of all time with Tori and her sister.
23rd Hang out at Ohio State University and get free stuff. Bus to Cincinnati and have Thai food with Jules.
24th Get free food at Xavier. Meet up with old lab colleague. Hang out with Jules and housemates.
25th Begin Greyhound bus ride at 6:15am
26th Arrive in Winston-Salem, North Carolina at 3:30am (nothing like a 21 hour bus ride with 2 breakdowns!) Interview at Wake Forest at 10am.
27th Take it easy in Sheevaun's friend's apartment
28th Miss flight to New Orleans this morning.

Who knows what's next?

Righteous!

Your Current Demographics Information:

Date of Birth: 06/21/1984
Gender: Male
Work Environment: Academia & Education
Discipline: Physical & Earth Sciences
Field of Work or Study (Primary): PHYS - 619 Analytical Chemistry
Country of Citizenship: United States
Country of Residence: United States

Sigma Xi like what!

Lacrymosa

In my teenage and adult life I have cried a total of 3 times, and I think I am approaching my 4th.

Pain has never been a stimulus for crying, at least not since I was a child. Rolled ankles, broken fingers and toes, a broken wrist, and even a ruptured urethra didn't produce a single tear. In May 2006 I left my home and family for the first time when I went to Cincinnati to start what would become my senior research project. I was one of the first students to arrive at Xavier University, and there was hardly around. That night, I felt so alone I shed a few tears. Ironically, 3 months later, thanks to the connections I had made in Cincinnati, I would fight back tears leaving the same place that had originally induced my first feelings of loneliness.

Why do we cry? Crying is a complicated process involving both the limbic and thalamic areas of the brain, as far as I know. Emotions stimulate the production of hormones which act on cranial nerves which cause the lacrimal gland to flood the eyes with tears which expel the very hormones that set the whole process in motion. What a funny thing.

October 2007: I was just finishing up my last email to Liz and double checking my list to make sure I had packed everything I would need for the next year in Asia, when I felt the terrible choking sensation that precedes a very cathartic cry. Trevor came over minutes later to drop off some t-shirts he had got me from ET before I left. I could hardly look him in the eye, and spent less than a minute saying goodbye to him because I knew I would start crying. I had no idea I would feel that way.

In all likelihood I am set to cry for the 4th time in my adult life very soon. What a strange thing to look forward to.

Medical Medical

On Saturday I jumped as high as I could off a 165 foot tower, plummeting down towards a small murky pond in the middle of the jungle and lived to tell the tale. Bungee jumping: check.

Moments later, I stubbed my toe dang hard and was in pain for the rest of the day. I still manage to make a one hour hike a leap off a 20 foot waterfall into a pool of water, hike back, and play tennis with bearable pain. The next morning I woke up to a terribly swollen sesamoid surrounded by a worrysome ring of black and blue veins. It was so gnarly I was almost sure it was broken, or perhaps some broken phalanges. I took a trip to the Chiang Mai Ram hospital and got hooked up with an X-ray and a doctor visit which revealed only a soft tissue injury (whew). What's so cool about this is that it was totally covered by my Thai health insurance, and then this morning one of the nurses called from the hospital to check up on me! How cool!

Today my foot feels a lot better.

Yesterday I also got an email from Trevor that he had posted some of our skate stuff on YouTube. For those of ya'll that don't know, skateboarding was just about all I did from middle school through high school. Enjoy!


Weird Intro: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypVxwLEs-dM
Dave's Vid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sq2gOtTFIHw
Skate parks: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAKTLmjxRLg

Thoughts and Poetry on Scraps of Paper

While volunteering in Sri Lanka, the first two days left me a lot of time on my own with nothing to do, so I began to write on scraps of paper I found in my backpack and on the street. Eventually I'd like to scan and post them up on here but the writing is so small it would be illegible, so this is for my own records...

7/21 Day 1:
Plans fell through to take me into town so I spent a good 2-3 hours reading my Marquez book. Sitting outside drinking tea with my mom wrapping wood and her brother chopping it, I had already obtained the kind of "real" cultural experience I was looking for. Hot sleep fell upon me like a heavy blanket that night.

7/22 Day 2:
Herot is a wiry construction worker up the road with the best English in town an my new best friend. I see him 4 times per day as I walk to the hospital purged from the excitement of the new and embraced by the reality of the mundane.
-He talks to me about herbal medicine over coconut water.
-He takes me to his house. 50% of me thrilled, 50% of me ready to fend of a 50% chance of being mugged.
Later that night I ride on the back of a motorcycle down 1 foot wide paths in the monsoon downpour.

7/23 Day 3:
By the way things are run here, I have come to understand that most of the time here I must spend in waste- staring off into the distance of a very proximal wall or watching the doctor digitally examine lymph nodes, listen to breathing, and scribble prescriptions (all this if I am lucky!). I did, however, observe the doctor anesthetize a woman's toe before tearing off the nail and excise some tissue hindering proper nail growth.

7/23 Side entry:
There is no touch so pleasing as the familiar
No sound so sweet as the expected
I lay in my Singhalese bed calling Thailand my home...

7/23 Side entry:
I (needlessly?) fear the resentment of my presence from my 5'7'' 250+ lb host, Maey.
7/31 Add on:
Turns out it is nothing short of language barrier frustration and jealousy for my time.


7/24 Day 4:
Sticky nights, spicy dal with rice powder, hopeless thoughts of evading Herot, solitude in the evening. Doctor seems indifferent (dare I say aggravated?) by a young child's pain. I observe the largest Buddha in South Asia. My 2 companions purchase 2 snacks each and give both to me. I possess a Sri Lankan SIM card. 500 rupees to the ageless monk watching cricket in the temple. Itch and sting of countless mosquito bites. Exploring new writing! My first thoughts of real failure entertained, boiled and simmered, accepted?

7/25 Day 5:
4 cups of tea and 3.5 rotis all before lunch. Lots of learning and explanations before 11, then one hour with shirtless doctors smoking cigarettes, drinking tea, and reviewing records. Return home at 4 to find myself trapped by drunken Singhalese soldiers. Songs, dancing, vegetables, cigarettes, whiskey, whiskey, ballroom dancing with interlaced fingers with Maey. My own music brings on longing for a God-fearing woman for my own?

7/26 Day 6:
Realities of free medicine in a rural area. Scabies, epilepsy, the terrifying cervix! My first attempt to cannulate a vein. I fail but so does the doctor. Maey takes pains to show me a fish in the garden pot. Did he buy it? Herot gives me a monstrous green papaya. Circus dog!
7/31 Add on:
Turns out the fish are giant catfish in there!


7/27 Day 7:
Analogies of being milked or preyed upon by parasites faded much faster than they had manifested. Two requests to use the internet took me to a Dutch fort in Galle and a large statue of Buddha in Kosgoda. Talk of starting my own volunteer organization took shape for the first time. World's most annoying chicken this morning! I look forward to morning "rounds" quite surprisingly. How masked in uncertainty my future seems to be! An unfrequented box is your fate, dear note!!

7/28 Day 8:
More blood than I've ever seen and more exposure to others in pain. Why do I want to be a doctor? Why does it matter? A woman breathes her last breaths as the doctor struggles and fails to start an IV. No matter. A baby is born. I jump in a random car that takes me to the hospital. Counting pills. Singhalese words dance on the tip of my tongue and flee whether or not I pursue. A letter reveals some of my bitter thoughts. The idea of love. Memories fly by, nostalgia flows from where they pierce.

7/29 Day 9:
Chip! Chip! Get that cat out of here. Another papaya from Herot, far from ripe. 100 Rp for cigarettes or drugs, I don't care. A very satisfying "good job today" after taking blood pressures of all the women at the prenatal clinic. "It is better to die after eating" as they say here. The perplexing yet truly simple decision to take a 2 day journey for 26k Rp alone or just remain here doing my thing at the hospital. Boredom vs. danger vs. adventure vs. spending! Hopes of attempting another cannulation weigh heavily...

7/30 Day 10:
After breakfast I was already satisfied with my decision to stay. An average morning then tea with the minister of health. Drinking a king coconut with Herot. Later, joking about climbing a 15 meter palm tree, a boy scales it dropping down a plethora of the golden fruit. I drink and consume the tropical treat amidst the herbal garden. Beli fruit smoothie for 7:00pm snack. After 2 weeks I'm just starting to feel comfortable here. Why so anxious for solitude? So desperate to be "away"? In my own defense I am not needed nor do I need anyone Perhaps I'm drawn to the dramatics of it? I feel no guilt. What can possibly come from all these unique experiences? Who can understand how alone it makes me?

7/30 My first poem entitled: Worth a Shot-
Eyes wide open to an impenetrable darkness evokes the seduction of simplicity
Texture smoth, sound a clear ringing, unmistakable the sickly-sweet scent of nostalgia
A voice beckons, without reason, startlingly unprovoked, languageless
Novelty and profanity seem equitable opponents
Yet curiosity remains a clay jar riddled with the cruelest cracks

7/31 Day 11:
Once again the blood pressures of the entire maternity ward are my responsibility. Instruments: 1 stethoscope, 1 mercuric sphygmomanometer. A trip to the rocky beach to Maey's brother's donated house. More food than is comfortable to eat. Delicious. Handfuls of sugar in everything puts Thailand to shame. Explains Susy's diabetes. Herot's darkside revealed in a tense residential encounter. A dangerous man to the naive, a possible splinter to the experienced traveler. Playing with children never fails to make me happy. Another cup of buffalo curd?

On a roll

"...I never stopped dawdling like an eight-year-old on a spring morning on his way to school. Anything can make me stop and look and wonder, and sometimes learn. I am a very happy man..."

There's a life-goal

False Dichotomy

Which is the better advice?

Say unto others as you would have said unto you.

If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.



I'll continue to hold my tongue... and alcohol in contempt while I'm at it.

Thoughts and Photos

I've been looking through old pictures and having a great time, listening to the new music Liz sent me from the other side of the planet.



I gotta grow my hair back, man.





You better believe I rocked that mullet for over a week at school, hehe.



Camp is hecka fun. My two favorite kids are Gun and Beam. I'm not sure what grade they're in, maybe 3rd or 4th? 2nd? I really don't know, they're hilarious though. They both have energy forever and like to sing to themselves and run around. Great kids.



I got skrillz.



My best friend, miss that guy.



Snapped and developed by yours truly.



I was in the one on the left, and I've got the surgical scar on my shoulder prove it.



In my sleep.



Youngest, oldest, middle.



Zoolander.

Peace.

Whetstones and nerve conduction

I was just reading my old journals due to boredom and discovered I'm something of a witty little fellow, eh?

Hehe, I was reading about how my mind tends to wander in such funny ways. Holding someone's hand and starting to think about nerve conduction and electron manipulation, then forgetting I was holding someone's hand and moving my fingers around. Hehe.

I was beginning to wonder if I'd lost that silly sense of random scientific curiosity when I remembered I read about how the degree of amylopectin branching determines the "stickiness" of short grain rices just hours ago.

I also stumbled upon something I had been meaning to write but never got around to it. I've always been fascinated with our ability to talk to ourself in our heads. That is the most incredible thing. Firstly, language is symbolism. To paraphrase someone smarter than me, we use sounds to represent objects and actions and link them together with more symbols. Tiger is just some sound to represent that large striped thing that you need to run away from. So the fascination begins when we create language symbols for things that don't even exist concretely: love, justice... Now that's bizarre...

But then we can actually create words in our head. While brushing my teeth I considered that creating words in our head is the same as creating an image in our head or performing simple arithmetic. Or is it? Research actually shows that the same nerves fire when we see an object and imagine an object. So it's not the same. Broca's or Wernicke's area must fire when we put words together, opposed to the occipital lobe going to town while picturing an object. I wonder what happens when you perform mental arithmetic. 5 + 2 is most likely a recovery of memory from the hippocampus, but what about 27824/12?

What is so interesting to me about talking in your head is the ability for thoughts to flow so fluidly and orderly, opposed to the concentration and deliberation it takes to crunch numbers or attempt to continually construct mental images. I can talk all day long without pause in my head.

So what happens? When I think the word puppy I open and close some sodium membranes in some nerves in the language center of my brain. Some action potentials fire, but where do the efferent nerves terminate? Where does that potential get carried to? If I move my arm I'm sending an impulse to the arm, ya know, it terminates in a muscle that twitches my arm. If I speak puppy well then the end of the line is a collaboration between my vocal cords, mouth, tongue, lips, etc... but what about when you think something? Where does it go?

That oughtta keep me busy for awhile.

Reflection Eternal

It's rather surreal, or just plain hard to believe that I am about to give a speech at a high school graduation as a teacher. I only graduated from high school 5 years ago and now I am the teacher at the podium presenting awards to the graduating class. How strange. Tomorrow is graduation.

I remember being in high school with dreams of becoming a teacher. I think every student at one time or another wants to be a teacher, to make up for their own teachers' shortcomings or to be like that one great teacher they had. I remember watching one of my teachers one day in high school and thinking "I don't want to do that". Now here I am as a high school teacher, graduating my first class. Who would have thunk?

------------------------------------

I submitted my primary medical school application and now I'm waiting for my transcripts to be verified. Once everything is ready to go, secondaries will start to come, first from the schools that send them to everyone and then hopefully some after I've been screened first.

I don't like when people ask me what school I want to go to. I really don't care. Not because I'm a poor applicant or that I'm apathetic, it's just that I want to go to school. I don't care where because I'll be just as happy at an unranked school than at a top ten school in California. I just want to learn. Honestly.

Unfortunately there is a whole year before I can actually do that, but one step at a time. Complete all my grades by next week, go SCUBA diving on Koh Tao, work summer camp, go volunteer in Sri Lanka (maybe?), complete the first quarter, move back to the United States, then a whole flurry of things to do once I'm back there. Not like it's a chore what I'm doing here, I love it, in fact it's the returning to the US thing I'm not thrilled about.

Ow kanuun mai?

Well I've gathered more phrases which I quite like, and I've also embraced new fruit experiences.

So over the weekend I went with Paula up the road to try our hands at purchasing a giant jackfruit (kanuun). We bought a jackfruit which weighed about 10 kg, and I hung on to it like a baby on the back of the motorbike on the way back. We weren't too sure how to cut it and had absolutely not idea what would be inside. We chopped it down the middle and went to work digging through the vines and pulling out little jackfruits which look like yellow parachutes and have a slight rubbery consistency. The fruit wasn't perfectly ripe, but it was tons of fun going for it. Later that night I started talking to the Thai staff about jackfruit and learned that there is a ghost that lives in the jackfruit trees, much like the ghost that lives in the banana tree which brings us to our first phrase.

Ong ja ton klooey rue? Which means: "did you come from the banana tree"? It's a phrase used when people are either wearing green or are in traditional Thai dress. The ghost that lives in the banana tree is green and so if you're wearing the color, you might be the ghost.

Phrase number two: bai lai quia rue? Which translates: "are you chasing a buffalo"? This is a phrase used when people are walking too fast, which are usually farang.

The weather up here is fantastic as the rainy season approaches and last night we had the most spectacular lightning show. The only downside is that any time a storm blows in the power goes with it, and since my building is on a hill, the water pump shuts down meaning no power or water. Sleeping in the heat and then waking up to no shower is not fun, but hey, I can't complain.

Enjoy some pictures:

The Quest

So in the spirit of the lychee season, my middle school teacher friend, Paula, and I went out after dinner the other night to gather lychees. We found a tree just outside of school with some deep red fruits that looked absolutely delicious. I climbed up to the appropriate branch and began shaking but with no luck. Lychees are too firmly attached to their branches to shake them, you actually have to pick them off. Dangling from the branch now, I slowly began hand-over-handing my way to the end of the branch in an attempt to bend it low enough for Paula to grab the fruits. SNAP! I come tumbling down with an entire branch of the lychee tree. Now I'm not talking about a little branch, I'm talking about a full on bough. Aghh, I felt so bad. I had completely demolished a whole section of the tree. Turns out the lychees weren't even that good, and to add insult to injury (I wasn't actually injured), right behind that tree there was a lychee whose branches bowed all the way to the ground, you actually had to bend over to pick them.

Crud.

Just another day in Thailand.

Paula and I have a little thing going called "the quest for the normal day". It's actually more of my quest being observed by her. It just seems like everywhere I go something strange happens. The next day we decided to go into town to go to this organic restaurant that has the most amazing homegrown food. After about 20 attempts at the kick start, it was pretty clear Paula's moto was not going to start. Hearing our commotion, some 80 year old gardener wanders over and gets on the bike and starts trying with his rather feeble kicks. Seeing the old man on the bike brought over another gardener. Long story short, after taking apart pieces of the bike, they fixed the dang thang and we had an amazing day.

On the way back up the mountain we bought 2 kilo's of lychees, 20 something bananas, a giant papaya, and 5 avocados all for 3 US dollars. Love it.

Still looking for that normal day.

Psh

Now that it's the season, I can walk out of my apartment, jump up and pick some lychees off the tree outside and I've got myself a delicious little snack. Holy moly they're good.

Not missing the USA.

Hehe

What did the Siamese cat say when he didn't want to eat his food?

Mai ow!

...

Oh, Thailand...

Jing rue?

You know you live in Thailand when you:

-Take off your shoes before entering your apartment.

-Eat with a spoon and fork even when eating in your own home.

-Start ending questions with "chai mai" or "mai".

-Start agreeing by saying "ok krap" or "chai lao".

-Answer yes or no questions with just "krap".

-Start speaking English with tones.

-Put dried chili, chili paste, or chili sauce on everything.

-Smile and bow to everyone you see.

-Get hungry at 11:40pm and eat noodles with chilis.

-Even have noodles and chilis in your fridge in the first place.

-Say "oui!" when you're surprised.

-You're idea of a taxi is the back of a pickup truck (songtaew).

-Stand up before movies to honor the King.

-Consider food the ultimate gift.

-Speak broken English even to other English speakers.

-Show up 15 minutes late and you're still considered early.

-See at least 10 men dressed as women per day in town and don't even think twice about it.

-Consider 2 dollars for a meal insanely expensive.

-Seeing a family of four and their dog all piled on a motorbike doesn’t surprise you.

-Eat rice with every meal.

-Everyone you know owns at least one yellow shirt.

-3 dollars/night is a reasonable price for a 2 bed 1 bath room.


And the list goes on...

Poot dai nit noy krap!

More.

Have you ever wondered why Asians say "hello" as herro and a word like "courage" comes out as coulage? I always thought that it was because Asians didn't have an "L" or an "R" in their language, but as far as what I've learned about Khmai, Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese, and Japanese, this is not the case.

In Thai, for example, there are tons of words with R sounds and L sounds, the problem is that they're considered interchangeable when speaking Thai. They are not interchangeable when speaking English. So if I want to say 120 in Thai I can say roy yee sip or I can say loy yee sip and the listener would understand me just the same. Conversely, in English, a Land Rover is much different than a Rand Lover. It also happens that when r's occur in the middle of the words they are often dropped. A great example is when kids call to me and I hear: khu khap! I know what they are really saying is kroo krap, which is the way you address a teacher.

So next time you hear an Asian mix up his L's and R's, don't make fun, because in their native language it's perfectly acceptable to interchange.

Poot pasaat Tai dai mai?

Let's talk about Thailand. The little things are the best part...

In English if we want to say something is really easy we say "that's a piece of cake!". Well here in Thailand, we don't eat cake, but there is an equivalent phrase. In Thai, you say "kruey kruey!" which is literally "banana banana", but means that something is really easy. "Kruey" is pronounced with a falling tone and it's really fun to say. Kruey kruey! I like to say it at the most random moments.

A recent English phenomenon is "lol" which obviously stands for laugh out loud. Well since Thai has a totally different alphabet there isn't a direct translation, but once again there is an equivalent term. Here in Thailand, kids write 555. In Thai, the number five is pronounced "haah" with a falling tone. So 555 is "haah haah haah", it's laughing! Took me a long time to figure that one out no doubt. I thought people were writing the area code for someone's phone.

One more.

Let me introduce you to my new favorite animal:

Behold, the Tokay Gecko. In Cambodia, they call them "took-ow" geckos. In Thailand it's called a "took-keh" gecko. It has this name for a very specific reason. Like all geckos, the Tokay gecko has a voice, but man what a voice he's got. I remember the first time I heard one was in Cambodia in our room early in the morning. All of a sudden I was awoken by what I thought was my dad shouting "UH-OH!". It was a pretty deep voice and it was loud, like he was using a raised voice right next to me. Turns out it was a "took-ow" gecko. Yesterday I was in my room when I heard a huge, booming "TOOK-KEH!". To me it's really funny, and I've never actually seen one in person but, man, I can hear them just fine.

Turns out Thai people are terrified of this lizard. First, they can bite, and they can bite pretty hard. They're very aggressive too and nearly a foot long. Second, there is a snake here in the jungle that can make the same noise. The snake uses the noise to attract the female Tokay's and then eat them. But there's another side to these beasts...

In America, if you want some good, sound advice you ask a daisy as you pluck it's flowers: "She loves me, she loves me not, she loves me...". In Thailand you ask the took-keh. "She loves me" "TOOK-KEH!" "She loves me not" "TOOK-KEH"... Once the took-keh stops, you're left with the last option you said, just like the daisy leaves you with its last petal. People also use took-keh's to pick lottery numbers. If the took-keh responds to your number, you choose it, if he doesn't you pick a new one.

More as it comes. Till then, follow this link to hear a took-keh in action. Dadadadada TOOK-KEH!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokay_gecko

Thanks Toi

Nice way to end a 14 hour day

Top of the Pop

School is going great and I love teaching. What more could I ask for?

Praise God.

Monday morning I was approached by the basketball coach and asked if I could fill in for her for today's game since she would be out. I said ok, for really no other reason than that I have made it my job to say "yes" here. I have made it my duty to do everything I possibly can to assist staff, students, and the school in general here.

So today I showed up to the gym at 3:30. Not only do I have no experience in coaching a basketball team, I don't even know all the rules. As the game went on I learned more and more. A turning point for me was figuring out how to sub people, hehe. So the game began. Sure our team had a 100% unexperienced coach (not to mention unexperienced basketball player). Sure not all of our players had uniforms (wearing gym shorts and "I Love to Read!" shirts). Sure most of our team were playing in slip on shoes. Maybe we didn't "know the rules", maybe we didn't have a "game plan", hehe. Long story short, we all had a great time (especially me), and we won! We won 25 to 17! I think that was the first game these girls won before, and they were so happy. I shook hands with the other coach and walked back to my classroom and returned to grading. Just another instance of switching hats around here.

I can't help but think God is putting his hand on everything I've been doing here. I am finding success in places I never imagined I could before. Teaching, advising, tutoring, coaching?! What next? Every good and perfect gift comes from above. No doubt. These are all good things, and Lord knows these successes are not mine.

Praise God.

Life to me is like black keys and ivory

Apples don't grow in South East Asia, unless you're talking about rose apples.

I haven't had an apple since November, and then today my friend bought me a bag-full, knowing I'm from the US and like apples. Apples here are imported.

Oh man, they never tasted so good. First time I've eaten a whole apple. Everything but the seeds.

A Grief Observed

Thoughts from "A Grief Observed" by C.S. Lewis.

Have you ever had the experience of someone "acting out of character" or "I thought I knew this person and then she said/did..."? You thought that your lover was acting out of character when she did X, but how can you be anything other than you are?

The problem is that you are constantly forming an image of your friend, your brother, your coworker. You are like a painter constantly looking up at your subject and then painting what you see. Then, when you see something different than your picture, you are shocked. Then you are angry, frustrated, disheartened. You constructed the wrong image. You only know that you constructed the wrong image when that person violates the image you constructed.

Think about your view of God. Think of when you get angry at God. This most often happens when you "thought you knew God". "I thought God was good, but then X happened". CS Lewis calls this the house of cards. You build this image of God in your mind. The only way you find out your image is an inadequate house of cards is when God knocks it down.

We are all constantly trying to tape everyone down. "Oh, I've finally got you figured out". We do the same thing with God. Every time we try to put God in a box, he breaks out of it. Every time we try to build an image of God, he knocks it down. How often will he knock it down? How often will he smash your entire world? As often as you build the wrong image. How often will you build the wrong image? As often as you undertake to build an image in the first place.

I've got to just swallow my humanity and accept that I must let God be God.

-----------------------------------------------------

If anything I just smashed my own image of myself. When I stood up from reading to come express my thoughts, I imagined I would be able to express them so eloquently. Upon letting my thoughts stream through my fingers, I find now that I am quite unable to express myself the way I wanted to through writing.

This is for me.

28.75 Hours

Thursday:

7:45 Faculty Meeting
8:30 - 3:00 Classes
3:00-9:30 Residential Duty (Middle School)
Total: 13.75 hours

Friday:
8:30-3:00 Classes
3:00-11:30 Residential Duty (High School)
Total: 14 hours

28.75 hours of work in 2 days? Bring it.

Too bad I'm not getting paid by the hour!

Tah Ton

Estuve sorprendido de mi conocimiento de Espanol dos semanas pasadas. Recibi un email cerca de un posicion para ensenar Ingles en un proyecto de ecologico en Argentina. Aplique a la posicion y recibi un documento en Espanol con instruciones que leer y escribir una respuesta en Espanol para evaluar mi conocimiento de la idioma. Escribi una respuesta al hombre y el dijo que mi Espanol es bueno y puedo aprender mas de la idioma cuando trabajando con los personas del proyecto. Solo problemo es que el Espanol que aprendi es Castellano y el dijo que eso es la manera de Espanol mas difacil para el entender.

So now, per his request, we are only communicating in English. I will not be able to do the original teaching position I was hoping for because it starts before my contract here terminates. We'll see if I can work something out...

As I was standing by the Maekok river a few kilometers from the Burmese border this morning I thought to myself "what did everyone else do this past week?" Probably attended school, sat at work, the usual. Not me. Naomi, Ajarn Arunee, and I took a trip up to the very northernmost region of Thailand to a place called Tah Ton. With us came 14 12th graders. The trip was part of a project called "Classroom Without Walls". Our group was staying at a river resort which arranged for us to volunteer at a local school dedicated to educating hill tribe minorities. The students were in charge of teaching 5 different ESL classes in the morning, and painting during the afternoon. I was so surprised at how well the students did and how much time and effort they put into making the trip worthwhile - good kids. On Thursday we spent the night in one of the villages with a host family. I stayed with 2 of the boys in a thatch hut sleeping on bamboo. It was such a cool experience. In the morning we were served breakfast by the family: omlettes, fishy rice, fishy noodles, and oranges right off the tree. It was the perfect authentic Thai experience that I had been waiting for ever since I got here. It was so memorable, and I'm glad the kids got to experience it as well. It was also an excellent opportunity to get to know my students better and establish a good rapport with them. Also, seeing them teach renewed by enthusiasm to teach - I'm fired up for Monday (it also helps that I reviewed the next chapters for all my classes hardcore).

I am so blessed. God is so good to me. I got to have an amazing week. Before we left we took a little speedy skiff to the Burmese border, scoped out the armed guards, and toured around the Maekok river for awhile taking in the most beautiful natural scene of bright green rice patties extending all the way up to the rolling hills of orange orchards. What an incredible job I've fallen in to. Of course now it's back to reality and I've got grades and student comments to prepare by the end of the quarter next month on top of some visa troubles I'm having since the administration put off my visa renewal until the day of the expiration. I'm sure I'm going to get stuck paying a fat fine for this. I just hope they don't make me do another border run. Oh dear me no.

Blessed be the name of the Lord.

Role Playing

So,

Last week the high school math teacher just up and left one day. He had had a lot of personal problems, and then 2 weeks ago, when Chris died, it pushed him over the edge I suppose. The whole thing was a huge ordeal and was hard on everybody, but especially on him. They had spent quite a bit of time together and both liked to go out.

Well guess who is taking over? I've been pulled out of Sakthong house as a homestay parent and a new contract is being drafted to instate me officially as full time high school faculty. So I came to Thailand to teach ESL, got a job as a residential advisor, and am now a high school math teacher! Hehe, it's all so sudden it's quite absurd. It's funny, when I was in high school I always wanted to be a high school teacher, and now here I am, living out one of my teenage dreams. It's a heavy load, 23 periods a week - Geometry, Business Math, Math 2 (my same middle school class), Precalculus, an SAT prep course, and 3 computer sections. It's going to be challenging, but I love challenges. It was a little bit difficult for me to make this decision because I was making about 38,000 THB per month by basically sitting on my butt all day watching TV and reading books with the kids, swimming, and taking them on trips to town at Sakthong. Now I'm making 43,000 THB by teaching full time. It's a lot more work for not a lot more money. This was my first week and I was surprised at how exhausted I am. I haven't worked full time since, hm, since Summer 2006, and teaching is especially exhausting - you've got to be "on" the whole time. I like it though. It's not that I was bored working in Sakthong, but I just felt sometimes like I was wasting my time - it was just too easy. This will be good for me, really push me for the rest of the year.

Another perk is that I'll be replacing the old teacher on our Classroom Without Walls trip next week. I'll be going with the 12th graders up to the Burmese border to do volunteer work with a hill tribe that lives there. We'll be doing construction and some of the kids will teach English. It sounds really cool.

So I finished off my first week. Geometry and Business Math are very straight forward. I prepare lesson plans right from the book and it's no problem. Computer class is frustrating for me because there is absolutely no curriculum and I had been told just to make up something for these 3 classes to do. I don't know what to teach them. This week in precal was really difficult for me. The kids were at the end of the chapter where they had "learned" to graph all the complicated trigonometric functions. I essentially had to teach myself how to graph the hardest of the hardest so I could at least have some authority when trying to help them review for my test. I was scared, I thought I made the test too easy and they would finish it way ahead of time. As it turned out, only 3 people we're even capable of attempting the graphing section and none of them got them all right. Apparently they had just been doing all their graphing on a calculator. That's not math!

After Classroom Without Walls we start a brand new chapter together and I have this whole weekend and any free time during CWW to get on top of the new material. I started it today and I love it! It's about verifying and simplifying complex trig functions. It's so much fun, they're like little puzzles or mazes. I totally lost track of time tonight doing my lesson plans. I find the hardest problems and make sure I can do them so that I'll feel comfortable teaching the easy ones and asking questions. I love the mental stimulation. My mind is more mature than when I first took precalculus, so the hard problems are like little brain teasers - they take me awhile to figure out but they're completely doable.

This weekend is the Samoeng Strawberry Festival. I might go tomorrow, but Doi went and brought me back a bunch of strawberries and a starfruit! I can't wait to cut open the starfruit and have a go. I've never had one before.

Latest news on my volunteering aspirations: If I get a holiday I plan on going to Tacloban, Philippines to volunteer in a clinic (I want to so bad), but I may have no break at all, in which case I'll just be working straight from here till June.

I walked out of Central Airport Plaza last night with my KFC soft serve chocolate icecream (bought for 30 cents), smiled, and thought: "I am so happy here".

I miss India

To: "my email" CC: Subject: Hay david,I am rahul from india Date: Sun, 3 Feb 2008 23:57:51 -0800 (PST)

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"I am happy there and i hope that you are happy there.perhaps you have forgoten me but i will never forget you.you told me that i would send my picture in your id..will you com to india for deepu's brother's marry in april.deepu told me that david would come but i am saying that you will have to come. please keep in touch"

This is the email I got from the guy who took me on his bike into Faridabad for McDonalds.

What if the wedding was during my week off in April and I went to Deepu's brother's wedding? I would surely be treated like a king for coming, hehe. I had told Deepu I wanted to go to his brother's wedding and would try to come if I could, but that was mostly just to be polite. It actually is a possibility though, depending on the date...

Frustration

I didn't sleep well last night and this morning my appetite was completely gone. I was not hungry for the entire day and was plagued by some pretty intense lethargy, body aches, and headache. Farang Fever, as it is known. No big deal, I consider it practice in thankfulness. How is it possible for me to complain about illness having had great health for the whole month?

My frustration did not come from being sick, from kids continually being disobedient, from kids shouting at all hours. My frustration certainly did not come from the completely random torrential rain that is still going on as I type. For the past 8 years, one teacher told me, it has NEVER rained during the dry season. Some people consider it a strange coincidence - the dark clouds in the sky correspond to the dark cloud that has descended over this school due to recent events.

Chris Beatty was a 23 year old Canadian who lived one floor below me. Last Friday I went with Chris to help chaperon the high school kids on a trip to a local resort to order desserts. We got to talk and joke around, he was a really fun kid. I say "was" because 2 days later he hopped on his moto and attempted to drive back home drunk. He fell off his bike that night not wearing a helmet. The impact, among other things, fractured his skull causing internal bleeding in the brain - his brain stem ceased to function. For a few days he remained brain dead in a hospital in Chiang Mai before his family arrived and pulled him off life support.

Today I found a memorial group on Facebook dedicated to celebrating his life. There was a post that invited people in Canada to meet at a bar and drink to celebrate his life. To be honest I felt furious for a second. "You want to celebrate this man's life by using the drug that killed him?!", I said out loud to myself. How horrifying. Here's some stats:

5% of all deaths from diseases of the circulatory system are attributed to alcohol.
15% of all deaths from diseases of the respiratory system are attributed to alcohol.
30% of all deaths from accidents caused by fire and flames are attributed to alcohol.
30% of all accidental drownings are attributed to alcohol.
30% of all suicides are attributed to alcohol.
40% of all deaths due to accidental falls are attributed to alcohol.
45% of all deaths in automobile accidents are attributed to alcohol.
60% of all homicides are attributed to alcohol.

Approximately 100,000 people die from alcohol each year. What can I say? This is my frustration.

Why don't I drink? Because alcohol wrecks lives, tears friends and family apart, and commits murder. Alcohol has nearly claimed the life of my brother, and it just took the life of a close friend. I don't support that drug.

Significance

So now that I've had the same dream about 5 times now, I figured it's worth writing about. I can remember 4 of them specifically.

The dreams I have follow the same formula: I find myself in the United States somewhere and all of a sudden realize I need to get back to Thailand immediately.

One of the dreams had me at Del Rey Hills Church where I was meeting a bunch of old friends. They asked me how Thailand was and were surprised to see me back. I all of a sudden realized I had come back to the US too early and had to get back to Thailand.

I was back in Westchester when I realized I needed to get a flight back to Thailand immediately. I had a large backpack on and began running up El Manor then down Sepulveda towards the airport.

I just entered the LMU gym and passed by Garret Garton from some of my LMU classes. He was asking what I had been doing after graduation. I told him I was teaching in Thailand but I was back here for a little break, but then realized I had to get back and the dream ended.

Last night the dream came in two parts. First I made a surprise visit to my family who were living in futuristic apartment. I rang the doorbell and my Dad answered and unenthusiastically led me into the small main room where my Mom and brother were. They were all standing watching a small flat screen TV on the wall and were totally disinterested in me or the fact that I had just came back from Thailand. There was a large flight of wooden stairs leading up to a large wooden hut sort of building in the middle of a bunch of green fields. I was a the top when Paddy (the new science teacher) appeared and asked me what I was doing here. I all of sudden realized it was April and I had come back to the US way too early. "We've got to get back to Thailand now!", I shouted. I jumped in a para gliding device and we were wisped away.

Strange dreams. I would say they are a product of my recent research and planning for when I come home, but I didn't start that till lately and I've been having these dreams since I first arrived in Chiang Mai. I have so many opportunities and so many different things that I could do that I'm getting overly excited I think. Currently I'm planning a trip to Indonesia, looking at moving to Argentina in July for a few months, and looking for jobs when I return to the US. It's so much to think about at one time, but I'm so overwhelmed with the freedom that I have. I can do anything I want! I can go anywhere in the world if I want! I have absolutely nothing holding me down (except my commitment to apply and attend medical school).

Freedom

What a weekend!

On Friday I went down with some coworkers to see the Umbrella Festival which featured shops covered in bright colored paper parasols and women dressed in traditional outfits carrying similar umbrellas down the street. Cameron and I walked the entire length of the street, then had an iced coffee and watched the umbrellas go by. We moved on to a shopping street where I grabbed a pork sausage stuffed with sticky rice off a street vendor for 10 Baht. It was so good.

On the way back up to the school I suddenly decided that I should take full advantage of my one day off. I had the driver drop me off at Airport Plaza, said goodbye to everyone, then hopped into the back of a pick up truck taxi (songtaew) and headed to Thae Pae Gate in the old city. I called Paula who was in town and we met up with Alila and hung out with a bunch of people at a rasta bar for awhile before getting dinner (25 Baht for a huge bowl of pork and noodle soup). Paula and I split off and went to a Jazz bar and watched some live Jazz performed by some students from Chiang Mai University. It was awesome. Killer guitarist.

Paula graciously let me stay at her apartment in town and then in the morning we got a bomb breakfast at my friend Took's place (40 Baht for 2 eggs, potatos and onions, and beans). We took Paula's moto up to Doi Suthep, the most famous temple at the top of the second highest mountain in Chiang Mai. After enjoying the temple we moto'd around the mountains and valleys for awhile before going to visit the Temple of 999 steps (it was definitely more). It was a great workout and the temple at the top offered a spectacular view.

Ahh. It was so nice to just get off the mountain for a bit, eat food off the street, do some of the touristy stuff, practice my Thai, and take plenty of 15 Baht Banana and coffee smoothies.

I've got to admit it's pretty fun to meet people in Thailand and answer "so how long are you traveling in Thailand?" with "oh, I'm not traveling, I live here". I've got the bank and insurance card to prove it!

Alternating Current

In Faridabad, the power goes out quite frequently, at least a handful of times per night. One night the volunteers, Mama and Baba Ji, and some guests were gathered around the low table at night. This was early on in our trip and someone had asked me what my profession was. I told them I was a teacher and taught Math and Chemistry. No sooner had I said the word "chemistry" then the power died and the dim lighting that we had went completely out. When the lights go out at the ashram, it is literally pitch black because there are no other lights for miles around. To my surprise the conversation carried on in the complete darkness...

Someone spoke and the only words I could understand through the thick accent were "sodium" and "water". I said yes and silence ensued, only to be followed up with some Hindi. A moment later I heard the same sentence, and I just said yes. After about the 4th round of this, I finally understand someone was asking what happens when you mix sodium and water. Having understood the question, I told them that it explodes. "Sodium in water? Like bomb, boom!". It was such an awkward and random conversation that in the future, every time the lights went out I would wait a second and then say "sodium" and we'd all laugh.

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Rhymes needed batteries for his camera, but Deepu didn't seem to understand what exactly he needed or how to procure the item. I had seen them in a shack in town and so I decided to take matters into my own hands. A couple days earlier I had made a rather clever observation that Indian people sometimes don't understand English words unless you say them in an Indian accent, to which our Indian-American volunteer agreed. I walked up to the shack and pointed to the batteries hanging on the wall and said "doh batteries". The guy just looked at me. Sticking my jaw out I tried again: "Doh bahtehres". He instantly understood, reached back, and presented us with the batteries which were subsequently purchased. This became another one of our many running gags...

Busy much?

January I work 25/26 days
February I work 27/29 days
This weekend I work 7am-11pm Saturday and Sunday.

I think I get a week off in March though, and I will find out by the end of this week I hope. If I get the time off I am strongly considering flying to Greece to hang out with some friends for 5 days. On the plus side it would be fun to see friends and Greece. On the downside it's 46,000 Baht just for the flight, and it's a long trip just to see friends for only 5 days. Decisions, decisions, decisions...

Continued Stream of Consciousness

Every morning I was awoken by the head chef, and one time one of the cooking girls, standing over me with a cup of chai. Blind without my contacts, and dreary eyed I steadied my hands and slowly focused on slipping my index finger through the loop of the tea cup. Upon lifting the cup I tilted my head left slowly with a smile. Propped up on one hand I sipped my chai slowly, and then got back under the covers.

There is no translation for "thank you" in Hindi. Kindness is expected. One only need acknowledge service.

Everyday, families would come from the poor villages and donate clothes, food, and sweets to the orphanage. On my first day, one such family had arrived. I remarked to the man of the family that what he was doing was very good. He looked at me puzzled, and said something to the effect that this was normal; expected. He rather plainly stated that this is what everyone should be doing. People who say Hinduism is a selfish religion have never met a Hindu in their life.

Because the cafeteria does not open for another day, I had to fend for myself for the first time up in the mountains tonight. I went to a shack just outside the school and saw a fish sitting on a bowl of coals. I ate that fish and a large lump of sticky rice for 39 Baht. Ah, Thailand. One thing that I missed - interaction with women. The woman who sold me my fish was giddy to speak to me in English and Thai, giddy to offer me sticky rice, giddy to explain she had no beer, giddy that I denied the 1 baht change. I completely forgot how friendly Thais are. Indian hospitality is unmatched. Is the Thais ability to be personable their claim to fame?

I have a feeling that most of my greatest moments from India will seep into my memory beyond manual recollection. I imagine these memories will pop up randomly in conversation: "that reminds me of when I was in India..." and I look forward to that.

God is good. When I arrived in Chiang Mai I was given Alila. When I arrived in Laos, I, by seeming chance, befriended a well spoken Laotian who drove myself and my companion over an hour into Vientianne for free. Upon re-entering Chiang Mai I was at a total loss as to how to get back up the mountain. A coworker happened to have just got off another airplane and flagged me down across the baggage claim. She hailed a cab and we split the fare up the mountain. God is good. I make an effort to smile continuously.

I pray I never complain again.

Books I've read in the past 2 months: Jesus of Suburbia, Hot Zone, Yoga Sutra of Patanjali, Siddartha, Essays on the Gita, Passage through India, Job, John, and Acts. I forgot how enjoyable reading can be.

Blessed be the name of the Lord

On the back of a 1 hour motorcycle ride in freezing temperatures through the crowded traffic of India one has time to think. The front of my body completely pressed against the driver and my back side against our other passenger, the awkward uncomfortable feeling of being that close to two strangers had long since passed. It would be much longer before the feeling in my legs would return.

2 days prior I had found myself being whisked from temple to temple, from the Taj Mahal to the Agra Fort, and to Mathura. Thinking we were finally headed for home, we pulled up to another temple in Vrindaban, which turns out to be the birth place of Sri Krishna. We were lead into a white temple ablaze with song, dance, and warmth. "Hare Krishna hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, hare hare, hare Rama hare Rama, Rama Rama, hare hare!" My companion and I both burst into song as soon as we entered the holy place. "Let's go get darshan", I yelled over the music. We danced, we sang, young girls spun around clasping each other's hands. I bought a Bhagavad Gita. I bought 2 cheesy t-shirts. I bought a box of sweets to reward our driver and appease our exhausted friend, both of whom were sealed in the tiny car from the biting cold of the night. We made for home, and heeded the writing on the back of every truck "Blow Horn, Use Dipper at Night".

Rahul's moto took us to a large modern mall in the heart of Faridabad. "Will you take McDonald's?" I tilted my head to one side smoothly and he purchased a McAloo Tiki burger and Coke for me. Afterwards, "will you take ice cream?" Tilt. After that, "will you take corn?". I tilted and he continued to smile. 1 hour ago, and back when I still had warm blood in my lower extremities, my new friend had taken me into his village, and had me as his guest at his parents house. An Indian knows no greater honor than to show hospitality to a foreigner. [Read "Passage to India" if you don't believe me, I did.] I took chai and more cookies and spicy potato crisps than I wanted, but saw how it pleased them. "It's ok?" "Bohod atcha". They were thrilled with my Hindi and began to talk and laugh loudly with each other. Everyone from his family came to meet me, or just look at me. The week before I had been taken by another new friend and shown to everyone in the village he knew. I took tea or hot milk and sweets at every family's house I visited.

We left the mall and remounted the motorcycle. It must have been only one day past since we had been pulled into a car by the father of the orphanage, Baba Ji, and escorted to a park in the town of Pulwal with no explanation given. We were brought to a massive Puja where all the towns swamis had gathered. Orange linen were laid around our necks and we were brought to the center sacrificial fire. The most honored positions were given to us as pourers of the gi. "Swaha!", we shouted as we poured small teaspoons of gi into a massive bonfire. We were given pictures of all the great fathers of India and prasad in the form of a banana and a sweet mix of spices and thin potato crisps. Roses were sprinkled over us and a blessing was pronounced over us by the entire town's holy men. An article would be written about us the following day in the local paper. I kept the newspaper as a souvenir.

More as it comes. Facebook for images.