Children kebabs, anyone?

So I’m helping out a friend by agreeing to supervise a school tree planting day at the local reservoir. And not just any kids – some of the highly pampered variety from a UK international school south of Bangkok. The weather’s OK, we’re all set to go and then we get to the planting site and there’s a big “home-made” rocket festival happening on the adjacent field, a couple of hundred metres away........ What to do, what to do? The area’s not restricted, so we make a start. I’m trying hard not to think about relaxed Thai safety precautions and that most Thai rocket launchers are made out of bamboo. These were big rockets too – travelling hundreds of metres before whine-ing their way back to earth. I think all of the teachers were thinking up emergency evacuation plans just in case. Would a bus or a clump of bamboo save us if we were in the firing line? I wasn’t all that confident. And a few were pretty close for comfort. We soldiered on anyway, with no rocket-skewering-children mishaps. Would not have been a good advertisement for the volunteering program.... phew! Kind of made the pre-planting “OH&S Site Induction” about wasps and digging equipment seem a bit trivial........

Yesterday I saw what I’ll call a poignant moment. I was in the local shopping mall to escape the heat and see a movie, when in the distance I saw a hill tribe family confronting an escalator for I think the first time – causing quite a commotion. Casting an eye around the consumeristic westernised interior of the mall I could only imagine their bewilderment at this new world (a.k.a. locals experiencing culture shock). Such a highly divided country to live in – witnessing that really made it obvious.

Last week I went to see the English-teaching afternoon program in an urban “slum” area. I’ve enlisted as a substitute teacher – there are lots of willing helpers already which is great. The volunteers are lovely, caring people – all from America. Lots of expats here.

Today I planted some trees with kids at a Children’s Home. They are learning about gardening at the moment. They all knew me from last week’s lesson and are really sweet. I'll be taking a group of them up to the national park research nursery this week.

The kids with their "big people" gardening gloves Abby with her "weed flower" thankyou

I’ve been enjoying the cycle to work every day and went for a kayak up river in town with some friends last week. Been swimming a fair bit in the uni pool. Wish you were here......

The next few weeks are going to be pretty low key as I plan the itineries for my sibling’s visits – both at the end of July and intercepting long enough for a dinner somewhere – there’ll be lots of photos. Alison will be passing through for 3 days from a holiday mostly in America, and will be heading to work in the UK soon for 2 years. Graham will be passing through for a week following a short term mission in Bangladesh.

Rural Rovings

FORRU runs a local education program that provides forest restoration support to 12 rural communities in northern Thailand.

3 of us education staff are just back from a visit to one of them, a 5 hour (jeep) drive away. We had a lovely homestay with the local coordinator, and crammed a lot of activities in.

We planted trees with some school group kids and visited the local group of senior citizens who are developing a bush foods & herb garden in the temple grounds.

We visited some of the beautiful (rustic) stilted teak houses, saw local biogas setups and traditional rural artifacts such as bamboo water mills and rice threshers.

The main activity was heading along with a group of Thai and Hmong villagers to the watershed forest about an hour away. There was a pig slaughter to thank the forest spirit for providing water, and then the following 2 hours involved chopping the pig up for a feast. On this occasion I managed to miss the big event by going on a challenging group hike up through the river to see some waterfalls. When I got back the cleaning of the entrails was in full swing. Sorry if the photos are a bit gory but it was a very interesting biology lesson! Traditional forest ceremonies are not available to the average tourist – this day was certainly an experience I should treasure.

One of the waterfalls enroute Our journey with the pig into the jungle


Feast preparations and lots of home brew rice whisky


Pork mince – just add chillies and you have yourself a delicacy Entrail stew anyone?

I was saddened by the amount of forest clearing I could see continuing to happen in the Pha Yao province, and especially the disregard for erosion and land degradation caused by planting maize right into drainage lines and on steep slopes. Also in maintaining traditional forest ceremonies while destruction of the watershed forest which is the sponge for the water source continues. Lots to ponder. How to kick off Landcare with uneducated subsistence farmers?!?!

Some all too common scenes of land degradation in the hills

Not two hours after writing this yesterday I found myself sitting in a sustainable agriculture conference run by an organisation called ECHO that provides support to Christians working in the agricultural sector in developing countries. How about that!

Also I should mention that I’ve actually been planting willows in the last week and I’ve changed my way of thinking and now believe that willows are an excellent plant choice for stabilising river foreshores (I’ve joined the dark side!). He he he…………

Thai travel is not necessarily confidence building

Some amusing / brutal encounters this week:

- heading into a clothes shop and being greeted enthusiastically with “Come in, come in! We stock lots of Extra Large!”
- on a similar vein, having a few helpful “perhaps you could try slimming” comments from Thai friends

Thai’s can be as subtle as a brick when it comes to commenting about appearances. We were warned about it in the cultural training, and it’s surely true.

I just spent 3 days in a Thai farming village without seeing another westerner or hearing much English in that time. I kind of gathered that it was off the tourist trail with the amount of commotion made when I headed to a school planting event and down to the local market. Still feeling like I have the Thai conversational skills of a 3 year old. I was very privileged to be there though- I experienced what few tourists could. An account and some ripper photos to follow shortly.

Unfortunately the farang tendency to sweat a lot makes the task of planting trees a very muddy one. I've worked out that it's not only the weather that causes thirst. A 3 letter acronym: MSG.

I have 3 nights of Thai classes left. It’s been a very full couple of weeks. I’m in an all male class, so there’s plenty of Thai talk about beer and girls. And eating in toilets? Funny but perhaps not so helpful for work communications!

By the way the new FORRU website (developed by previous aussie volunteer) is up & running: http://www.forru.org/

Myanmar market mayhem and unfriendlies of the animal kind

Just "freshly" back from a weekend up the north - about a 4 hour bus ride away.

The main purpose was to cross the closest border into Burma to get another 3 months on my visa - it was a great excuse to see some of the Chiang Rai district though. Beautiful mountains and river scenery.

I spent about 40min in Burma, walking through the markets in the border town - checking out the animal products on sale, looking at the different ethnic groups and steering clear of the children beggars and particularly the cigarette hawkers. Talk about pester value!

Myanmar border - bridge crossing View across to the Myanmar mountains

We had to stop at 3 police checkpoints between Chiang Mai and the border - lots of effort goes into making sure that refugees stay in their restricted areas. A doctor friend in Chiang Mai said that 12% of the population in the bordering Burma provence have malaria. Big problems there....

I headed back to Chiang Rai for the night, passing some terrific karst (limestone) mountain scenery - plenty of caving to do in the next trip. In Chiang Rai I learnt more about the 9 hilltribe groups in Thailand (6 main ones) - almost 1 million people at last count in 1994. I also headed to a nearby cave system to check it out. The picture below should indicate my adrenalin levels at being in a dark cave on my own with bats - no that didn't scare me - it had more to do with a close encounter with a couple of territorial alsatians on the way in.... Thai dogs can be scary, with about 6% of them at any given time being rabid.

Couldn't-quite-hold-the-camera-steady vs Chiang Rai street - minus adrenalin