Laos

I took advantage of the summer break to venture outside of Thailand to nearby Laos. I've been told it's like Thailand 50 years ago. At some points, it felt just like I was at site.

View of Laos from Nong Khai, border town on the Thai side
After several attempts, Andy caught the lightning on my camera

Sunset over the Mekong River

Mulberries, an organic silk farm

I helped out making thread from silkworm cocoons!

(I wonder if the ladies working look forward to tours
for the break they get because of tourists wanting to give their job a try. Silly tourists.)

Haiku: Unexploded Ordinance (UXO)

Beware of UXOs!
May look phallic but they're deadly.
Bomb makers, perverts?

Between 1964 and 1973, the U.S. dropped over 270 million "bombies" on Laos.
Up to 30% failed to detonate. Approximately 80 million UXO remained in Laos after the war.
http://www.uxolao.org/

The presence of UXOs still affects the lives and livelihoods of Lao people who cannot farm uncleared land.
Children play with bombies, some the size of tennis balls, thinking they are toys.
People can be killed or injured from UXOs that explode when struck or stepped on.

MAG International is an organization that conducts the long, painstaking process of clearing UXO.
The white part of the blocks on either side of the trail mark safe places to walk.
(Great work they're doing, but I think their logo and slogan could pass for a sarcastic drug ad.)
http://www.maginternational.org/where-we-work/where-mag-works/lao-pdr-/

Trees growing out of bomb craters

This is how people in some villages get water to their houses.
Hey, that's just like my site.

Plain of Jars
It's like the Stonehenge of Laos

Shart-Scented Phone Finds New Home

I flushed my phone down the toilet a couple weeks ago. You always hear about people dropping their phones in the toilet but who actually flushes it too? It must have been half hanging out of the pocket of my hoodie and fell out at the exact same time I reached to flush the toilet. The sound startled me but I didn't know what it was at first; I thought I had knocked the toilet seat down. I only realized what had happened when a minute or two later, I heard the voice of a British lady: "It is 6 o'clock. Time to get up. It is 6 o'clock. Time to get up." My alarm snooze going off. From my toilet.

The teachers got a good laugh about it at school. I joked that it would have been funny if the British lady's voice had sounded like it were coming from underwater. That same day, I got a new SIM card with the same number and my old credit on it free of charge from the phone service company and my host cousin gave me his old phone. Everything turned out alright...

Until a couple days later I discovered my toilet was clogged. (I warn you now, I will spare you no details.) I found this out the hard way on a not-unusual day in Thailand when I had diarrhea. Not everything was going down like it is supposed to. I tried to unclog the toilet, first with an auger, or plumbing snake (I didn't know what this was until I had to use it). That didn't work even after several attempts. Then I tried a plunger - but imagine a plunger with a short handle so that only one hand can grasp it. This requires you to get closer to the toilet. This is what I was using. (Side note: I had started out using rubber gloves, but by this time I had given up trying to keep my hands clean and taken them off.)

I couldn't unclog it. My host cousin had to help me. He cut open the pipe leading from my toilet under my house to the septic tank. After trying to shove several things up the toilet to dislodge the phone, including my hand, the plumbing snake, and a wire coat hanger, we (he) pushed the phone up and out of the toilet using a water hose. My host cousin joked that I should hang the cell phone on my bathroom wall as a souvenir. I said it would make for a sh*tty air freshener.


Edited (5/14/12): Thanks for the title, Jeremy!

2012 Thai Youth Theatre Festival!!!

After all the work that went into the TYT Festival, this title deserves some exclamation points.

It was so rewarding to see the product of our hard work at the 2012 TYT Festival (January 27-29). There was a lot of running on our end as organizers but everyone - students, teachers, volunteers - all had fun! The students put on some amazing performances on Sunday and the work that they put into their productions showed.

Improv

Volunteers "dying" in stage fighting demonstration

Students trying their hands at stage fighting

Student performer in make-up and costume. Break a leg!

"Alice in Wonderland" performed by a student group from Sa Kaeo province

Photos taken by Denise Silfee

Mom and Dad in Thailand

My parents came to visit in January after New Year's. It was great to show them my home in Northern Thailand. I met them at the airport in Chiang Mai and did some sightseeing there over the weekend.

The best part (in my opinion) was their visit to my community. It was touching to see how warm and welcoming everyone was.

I'd planned on flying us from Chiang Mai to Mae Hong Son, but my landlady's family offered to take us back from Chiang Mai. My host cousin drove 5 hours to pick us up and stopped at the must-see places along the way: Pai, Ban Rak Thai (Chinese village) and finally Mae Hong Son.

My parents' visit to Mae Hong Son conveniently coincided with my landlady's son's 10th birthday. (Below is a picture of the 4-year-old son playing with a toy my parents brought from the U.S.)

Usually people in Thailand celebrate by eating the less delicious Thai version of Korean BBQ. However, my land-fam (with my mom and dad in photo below) spent the whole day preparing ingredients for Burmese dishes so my parents could taste real Burmese food.

To top off the wonderful food and company, my landlady's family also gave my parents gifts of traditional Karenni products - a Karenni shirt (dad) and bag (mom).

The people in my community are still asking when they'll come to visit again. :)

Children's Day

Today, we celebrated Children's Day at school.

Happy Children's Day!

It was like Christmas-

gift exchanges

raffles and prizes,

some of which I had the honor of handing out

games,

this one involved tying a long cucumber-like vegetable around your waist and then racing to hit the ball to the finish line (and yes, they know exactly what it looks like)

And lots of snacks! No wonder the students get so excited.

There were also dance performances like there are at every school event/ festival.

This kindergarten student was very into her dancing.

Students of all ages joined in.

Other students showed their talents in other ways.

Trust me, hula hooping while kneeling is not easy!

We had ice cream too so I'll chalk it up to a good day.

Monday is Teacher's Day I was told this morning.

"Cool, what do we do on Teacher's Day?" I asked.

"We don't teach."