so much past inside my present.

Thailand can smell of shit to my over-sterilized American nose. I can see how these smells could be confused with having a bad experience here. I'm doing my best to take it all in and embrace it, knowing that I very well could miss these things once I'm gone. The toilets, along with many of the shops, have a strong stench of mothballs and piss. Perhaps it's something that you become accustomed to, like how the locals become accustomed to the smell of fish hanging in the local night market, or seeing a pig's head sitting on the table next to slabs of the rest of the very same pig. There was a tear in the pig's eye, and thinking about the pig's struggle to hold on to life is what kept me from eating meat that night. Later the same night, I ordered fish thinking my stomach would be able to hold that. They brought out a whole red snapper, scales and all. Needless to say, I couldn't eat it and I should probably be a vegetarian instead of someone who is only okay with eating meat that has been deconstructed and prepared behind the scenes.

A group of thirteen of us took a trip last weekend. Koh Tao is a beautiful Island in southern Thailand. The ride there was on a bus which wreaked of mothballs at 1 o'clock in the morning and lasted for about five hours. We then reached the boat station which was run by a group of four roosters, crowing abrasively. Leather skinned and toned European and Australian men, divers I presume, ran rampant both on the boat and at the island. There were far more charred skinned Caucasians than there were vendors or taxi drivers to accommodate them. We reached the station just in time to watch the sun rise over the ocean. The roosters were an annoyance, and most of the people vomited on the two hour boat ride, excluding me.

Koh Tao is one of the most aesthetically beautiful places that I have ever visited. The overwhelming amount of tourism - one of Thailand's chief economies - was a bit of a damper on my personal experience despite the immense numbers of attractive Europeans. I expected it, though, going to one of the biggest spots for scuba in Thailand. Koh Tao is also where Leo Dicaprio pranced about through the jungle in the feature film, "The Beach." I didn't see any marijuana fields, though.
In Koh Tao, we stayed in a bungalow that had a view of the crystal clear water. It was Jessica, Sarah, John, and I who shared the fungalow. To be honest, that's not where most of the fun happened. Most of the fun happened at Moove, a bar on the beach owned by Mr. Moo. Moo knows how to party. His beach is filled mats for sitting, candles recessed into the ground, and with lights draped with colorful fabric. If getting drunk was the mission for the night, then I'd say that the thirteen of us who went to Koh Tao were successful. We danced around on the beach to mixing done by the DJ inside the bar. Some of us got to release lanterns into the sky and watch them float away into obscurity above the water. Probably trance music, or pop hits from the states and 3 years ago. The drinks were terrible, but strong. I ordered a gin and cranberry and it tasted like a bloody mary without the tomato juice. mmm... mmm...

















The next day, most people were hungover or depressed, excluding me because I didn't get all that drunk. People have been surpassing me every night since I've been here, and I'm okay with that. We went to town to go shopping. I bought a couple of postcards, season two of the Showtime hit "Weeds" for $9, and "Factory Girl" for $3. The sun was going to go down in a few hours so we decided to go kayaking around the series of bays near our bungalow. This was the best part of my trip. I can't really put it into words eloquently that could convey any sort of feeling that I was having. Jessica and I shared a kayak and made our way out through the choppy waves. It was pretty rocky, so we started to feel a bit queasy and made our way back nearer to shore. There, we talked about our lives, how dad's suck, how strange it is to be conscious tourists in such a far away place, the things that we want to get out of our trip, and of course about our lives back home. It made me realize how much the past affects the way that I am today; Feist also helped me to realize this. Sometimes this realization stresses me out, like when I eat spicy food and I confuse it with bad stress. But most of the time I am thankful for the things I have been through, good and bad. They make me who I am, and they make me more of a conscious person I think. We then lied back and watched the sun set behind the clouds, dip beneath the earth as we knew it.



That night, we watched a man dance with fire on the beach.

Our return back home went much more smoothly than the ride to Koh Tao. We sat on the inside of the boat this time and watched "Transformers" which is pretty entertaining. No one even vomited!




Then we came back to VIP and I went to school for three days. Homesickness strikes me arbitrarily. It's what I assume is homesickness, but I cannot label the feeling as so directly. It's a void inside myself, the desire to have familiar ones around me. I love the people who I spend my days with here, but there's something to be said about a high-context relationship with my friends and family at home. There are implications there that cannot be learned in the amount of time that I have been here. My new friends and I are becoming closer everyday, but I need to have patience with them and I think that these bonds will last all of my life. The circumstance that I find myself in creates indescribable friendships. Soon they will understand me, and the elusive feelings of depression will become easier. I still miss everyone. That's how I was feeling during those three days.

Then the icebreaker party came at Webster, and I sang Karaoke with my new friends. Bohemian Rhapsody, Yesterday, Backstreet Boys, Like a Prayer, Zombie by The Cranberries. Oh wow. Clearly I was intoxicated for this. And the dancing!


Yesterday (Sunday) I went to monkey mountain. There were monkeys everywhere, and a Buddhist temple at the top. The monkeys were scandalous and certainly do not stand for honesty. One in particular was especially sketchy. He stole Amy's water bottle and soaked himself with the contents of it. Then he proceeded to climb up my leg and jump across me onto my bag, where he attempted to go rummage through the insides of it. He was cute nonetheless, but not as cute as the babies! I still don't know how I feel about these monkeys becoming so accustomed to interaction with humans. It's definitely better than a zoo because these monkeys are certainly not caged. We climbed to the top of the "mountain" where there was a temple and monks. I donated some money to the monks and they gave me a bracelet and incense. I offered the incense at the temple. It wasn't quite a spiritual experience; maybe at a later date. Probably one of my favorite things so far were the monkeys. Their expressions are so ape/human.




























I have realized so much about myself since I have been here. Ethnocentrism is a concept that I have heard time and time again in the context of college courses, but something that I never had a firm grasp on until I came to Thailand. Living in one place all of my life, I never really realized that there are different routes to take as far as living are concerned. Not every place is drowned in excess, concerned with time, getting stressed over the small details. As a result of this way of life and an increasingly global economy, Thailand has become one of many countries like it which is easily exploited by foreign countries and large corporations. I've only seen this through the tourist industry, which is definitely the lightest of the harm done. I would like to explore this exploitation further with my camera. I just hope that I will be allowed to bring my camera with me to see some of the atrocities being done in Thailand. I would like to change something, if only it is inside of myself during this trip, and I think the only way to do that is to face the consequences of a society that lives in excess and how it affects societies thousands of miles away. I would love to see the economy of Thailand in a vacuum and how it would have developed had it not been affected by globalization.

My blogs are long and random, bear with me. Next weekend we go to Bangkok.

exit does not exist

The airport in Tokyo was cool and breezy. We were still a seven hour flight away from Bangkok, and I found immense comfort in that. Everything was so new, and so scary, but that was the beauty of it. Tokyo's cleaning crews do it undercover and immaculately. Where there was glass, there were no fingerprints. The airport's staff was starched and white-toothed smiles. The procedure went from complicated to simple with a thirteen hour flight from the shit-hole that is Detroit to the crisp air of Tokyo. The man at the counter gave us our hotel vouchers and said "Go up the stairs, then go down the escalator." So that's what we did, and Sarah and I loaded the bus to the Radisson, where the breezes flew happily through the hallways. We ate for free: chicken cordon bleu, miso soup, clams with cuttle fish, seaweed salad. The hotel provided us with slippers which my western feet did not fit into. Then we slept. We woke up and looked out at the groomed trees in the garden, a trademark of Japan. I ducked beneath the shower head and felt ready, and almost relieved from jetlag.






































The ride from Tokyo to Bangkok was a hundred times more pleasant than the one we experienced earlier, with the two hour stay in the plane on the runway in Anchorage, Alaska. The snow taunted us outside as we sat patiently for the plane to refuel, de-ice, and the unstable medical emergencies to exit. All the while, the plane staff condescended to the passengers who were disoriented from the flight. But on Japan Airlines they know how to treat their passengers; they keep the booze flowing and give you a selection of films to watch on your personal television. I was content to be in the airplane on the way to Thailand. Landing was something different.

The descent into Bangkok was a lucid nightmare which I woke up from with cold sweats around my calves and seeping out of my palms. My mind immediately went to scenarios of what was going to go wrong. My bowels were going to be bloody and move loosely about as if my body had been overthrown by flesh-eating parasites. My finger nails would not be enough relief from the mosquito bites which I feared would cover my body head to toe. I didn't think I knew myself well enough to be in Thailand. Existentialism was going to ruin everything. When we hit the runway and began bouncing, my stomach was in the air and my mouth began to water. I refused to let myself vomit, and sat back counting so as to begin relaxing. Thailand was Tokyo dipped in the fryer for two and a half minutes.


Walking out of the airplane, I began to feel a bit more at ease. I was happy to be grounded and the smiling faces of the Thai air crew were a relief. The air smelt of grease and humid remnants of potato chips. We got our baggage and boarded a van, the apolstery stained, and the air conditioning restrained. As we began to drive, the motorbikes we were told about raced around us on all sides as our driver turned out, cutting in front of others, hoping not to be wrecked - the Thai way of driving. My mind went back home and to the fact that I wouldn't be seeing it in over four months. Was I really prepared for the filth that I passed on the street, a thick barrier of humidity separating me and the van from the toned dark construction workers and run down apartment buildings? I was scared again, so I put on my headphones and shuffled through my ipod for familiarity. I found it in Wilco and Phosphorescent.

Something that I realized on that ride was that while I see the filth of Bangkok and the areas which we passed on our three hour ride south to Cha-Am and my apartment, there is a tremendous amount of beauty in being displaced and being forced to find what makes a new area so beautiful, that seems to be so very scary and different. I always associate unkempt things with danger, but Thailand is not dangerous. The people here are some of the friendliest I have met, and they are all extremely accommodating. I found this out once I arrived to my apartment and found out how we are not taken advantage of for being ignorant Americans in a new country. The people who run the convenience store could charge us soo much more for the things that are so cheap here. A large bottle of water is only 13 baht (less than fifty cents), the internet is only 350 baht per month (about 11 dollars), they could charge at least double for both of those things. But that is just so "American" of me to think that they should take advantage of us just to make a buck.


After sleeping for about four hours, I went downstairs to the pool with Sarah, and we found the pool in front of the ocean. I have never been anywhere more beautiful than this. A group of Thai
women circle the pool swooshing flower pedals and leaves with brooms made of feathers, while one woman fills the surrounding pottery with water and the buds of flowers. That night we went out to an Irish Pub. Yes, an Irish Pub on my first real night in Thailand. Sarah and I went with our new friends, Jessica and Chris. They are two of the nicest people I have ever met, and I'm so grateful that I met them. I think that we have the same intentions in mind as far as why we are here and what we want to get out of our trip together.














new friends

I drank my first Guinness at an Irish Pub in Hua Hin, Thailand. We then moved along to the more local type places which were filled with snooty Europeans who gladly turned their noses up at a group of twelve American tourists, looking us up and down as if we were clueless, which we were. The burnt flesh was almost disturbing to me and the smirks of the foreigners visiting Thailand made me weary more about my safety around them than the local Thai vendors who constantly are recruiting new drunk customers at the bar to buy multi-note whistles, and they do. Sitting across from us was a Western man who was in his late 40's, balding and overweight. He bounced a young Thai girl on his knee, singing along to a Thai cover band. The girl was for hire and I can only imagine that she only looked happy because she was intoxicated. These men are everywhere. Some sit across from their clients, straight-faced, worn out, and unentertained. Others become intoxicated, and look jovial bouncing on the knees of westerners.

Yesterday we went to the palace of King Rama V. It was beautiful. We rode a cable car to get to the top of the mountain. Looking down on the city of Phetchaburi, it was blanketed with humid fog. And I saw a large image of the Buddha being constructed. The grid surrounded it, as if it were just another building. The view really helped me to realize where I was.


The food here is great. I actually enjoy waiting for my food. It reminds me that time flows here, and impatience is looked down upon. I cannot lose face with anyone; confrontation is not the way to get what you want here the way it is in the United States. You are served when your food is ready. Everything tastes so great when it is new. Let's hope that it lasts. I start classes tomorrow and while I love laying by the pool all day, I think that I'm ready to learn something. Photography tomorrow.














campus


I am in love with Thailand right now. It is said that the honeymooners stage is the first stage of culture shock. I am on a honeymoon, and my lover is foreign to me, mysterious, and full of smiles. I can only hope that these smiles are sincere. The cold sweats have gone and the hot sweats of high noon are here to stay, and probably only going to become heavier. The fear is overwhelming, but my psyche is good for now, and I'm ready to find out more about myself, this place that I have been displaced to, and the unfamiliar world of my accidental home back in St. Louis.

I will add more pictures to this post.
I miss you all, and I will see you soon.