Cambodia Part 2: Siem Reap

Tricia’s friend Jordan who was now traveling with us has a friend who started an orphanage in Siem Reap along with a Cambodian guy named Sak who now runs it. So she had made plans for us to visit the orphanage the day after our arrival. We bought a few things that we thought they may need to take with us, but really we had no idea what to expect.

As soon as we got there the kids rushed to the van to greet us. Right away it became clear that the children knew just what to do with us. They just wanted to play. A little girl grabbed my hand and pulled me away to show me around. She first showed me a dog with all her newborn puppies that were cuddled up behind the wooden shack that they use for a classroom. They she and several others gave me some pictures that they had drawn for us.

Vince and Josh had been commandeered by the older boys for a game of volleyball, which must have been brutal in the heat-I was dying just playing tag and monkey in the middle with them. They did all of our hair, sang songs for us, learned a couple of new songs from us (we are teachers after all), and played and played and played. They were so adorable and so much fun. I think we definitely had more fun than they did. And their English was unbelievable-way better than most of my rich kids students that have a huge advantage with their expensive education. These students deserve and could make much better use of Western teachers. I would love to go volunteer there for a month once I am done teaching, hopefully I can make that work out.

As for the orphanage itself there was the small one room shack and another small open-air hut that served as classrooms. There was also a small 3-walled shelter for a kitchen and a 6 room building (3 girls bedrooms and 3 boys bedrooms) where all ~40 kids lived. The entire living space that they all shared was about 1.5 times the size of my last apartment. The entire experience caused me to really reflect on just how much I have and how superfluous my lifestyle is. I feel like I am very appreciative of that already, but this was really an entirely new perspective on it.

The children were all so precious, and so affectionate and loving. They were all just hanging onto us and laying on us and cuddling up to us all day. They just needed to be loved. It was one of the most incredible experiences of my life.

Sak, the guy that runs the orphanage, also gives tours of Angkor to raise money for the orphanage, so we asked him to be our tour guide there the following day. I didn’t realize it before going there, but there is way more to it than just Angkor Wat. Angkor was actually an ancient complex of almost Roman proportions that existed for centuries. Unlike Rome, nothing has been built over it so there are many square miles of ruins spanning several centuries to be seen there. Angkor Wat is just the most famous temple among the ruins. It is so large that you can buy 3-day and week long passes for those who want to try to take it all in. I feel like we saw all of the really important stuff, at least the things I cared about seeing, in 1 day. After a while all the temples just kind of start to blur together. Sak was a great tour guide and they had bottles of cold water and ice coffees in a cooler in the van for us all day, which was very good to have in the intense summer heat. Angkor was unbelievable and we saw all the best parts of it on our tour. And Sak only asked for whatever we wanted to contribute to the orphanage in return. He really made Siem Reap for us.

Other than that the rest of our time there was spent hanging out eating and drinking in the cute downtown area. Khmer food is awesome, I really loved everything I had there. It is very similar to Thai food, but with anise in a lot of stuff which normally I’m not a big fan of. Here, however, I really liked it. It’s something in the way they blend it with other flavors that was really nice. Also, there was bread and cheese everywhere thanks to all the French influence, so that was really great since I miss out on them in Thailand.

The city itself is kind of odd in that it is all new and it fells more like you are walking around in Nassau or St. Thomas than Cambodia. But outside the few blocks of downtown that they have fancied up for tourists the rest of the city, and really the rest of the country, is abject poverty, as bad as I have seen anywhere. Because of the terrible socio-economic and political conditions of the country the begging is really bad. Mostly by children or people with excruciating deformities. It is so unbelievably hard not to give money to a 5 year old child asking you how they are supposed to eat, or how you can afford to eat in a restaurant and vacation but can’t just give them a dollar. Of course, you can’t give them all money and, much more importantly, you can’t support children begging. They should be allowed to be children. They should be in school or playing with friends. They should not be out on the streets alone all night asking strangers for money. If they never get any money they wouldn’t be sent out to beg, but as long as people give them anything it will continue to happen. Again, all these young kids were better at English than the majority of my students, but for totally the wrong reasons.

I will give Cambodia credit for a couple of very wise decisions it has made in order to cash in on tourism dollars. The first is the widespread usage of English. There is some French there as well because of their imperialistic influence, but English is everywhere and that is quite impressive considering how isolated it was until relatively recently. In comparison to Thailand the difference in English usage was astonishing and tourism is a much larger industry here. Additionally, they use the US dollar everywhere as accepted currency, it’s even more widely used than the riel. Prices are usually listed in dollars on most menus or signs too, so the prices seem really low even though they are drastically inflated over what they should be. Then when you pay in dollars your change usually comes in riel, since they don’t take any coins, and with an exchange rate of around 4000:1 it can be quite confusing so you better be paying attention. It’s quite brilliant on their part actually.

Our day at the orphanage

One of the oldest temples at Angkor

Lighting some incense in one of Angkor’s temples

This part of Angkor was taken over by the trees and left that way. It’s my favorite part.

A group shot at the “Angelina Jolie Temple”. She shot Tomb Raider here and Cambodians are obsessed with her so that’s what they call it.

Our album cover photo.

Angkor Wat

Cambodia part 1: Poipet

We began our journey by crossing the border at Poipet over the Thai-Cambodia Friendship Bridge, which must be the most ironically named border crossing anywhere since there is neither a bridge nor any sort of friendliness to be found. The group I was with consisted of 6 people-Tricia, Shanna, Lizzy, and Vince, who have all been living and working in Thailand with me for the last 6 months, and Josh an acquaintance of Shanna’s who has been traveling around the world and has spent the last 4ish months in Asia. So we are all fairly well-seasoned travelers, although spending so much time in Thailand does make you let your guard down quite a bit since you can trust people so much there. Also, we had read up on this border crossing and knew to watch out for scams as they are quite prevalent there. Supposedly, it has been cleaned up in the last few years, but it’s always good to be aware so we knew what everything should cost and the procedures to follow. We were prepared.

The spot the bus dropped us off is a few kilometers from the border, so you have to take a tuk-tuk the rest of the way. We knew what the rate should be for the ride and were prepared to bargain hard. Refreshingly, the first price they told was right about what we should be paying so we hopped on in.

A Cambodian visa costs 20 USD or 700 Thai Baht (slightly more). However, as we were filling out our visa applications they said it would be 1000 baht plus a 200 baht fee. 1200 baht is almost exactly 40 USD so double what it should be, although, in fairness, I didn’t have USD, only baht. Either way they were trying to rip us off. I tried in my most diplomatic fashion to argue about the price, but they refused to budge. In the meantime, everyone had handed over their passports along with the inflated fees. I didn’t want to make everyone else wait, so I conceded and handed mine over as well. It turns out it wasn’t even an actual immigration office, it was just made to look like one and I’m sure the tuk-tuk drivers got a cut for taking us there and telling us it was where we had to go for our visas. In retrospect we should have wondered why they were making us get a Cambodian visa before we even cleared Thai customs when Cambodia issues visas on arrival. Anyway, something we have had to say way too often, at least when you get ripped off here it only costs you 20 bucks. But, when you don’t make dollars, instead you make baht like we do, it stings a bit more. Oh well, lesson learned, and at least we got our visas.

After we had made it across the Thai border and were walking up to the Cambodian immigration office we were approached by a government official. He was actually well-dressed and had a lanyard and badge to show his officialness. He told us that since we already had our visas we could skip the booth in the front because they would make us pay more, so to proceed straight through immigration and on the other side to find the free government shuttle that would take us to the bus station in town. So I guess this is what they meant by cleaning up the border. Cambodia really needs tourism dollars so it makes sense that they would have a government official there to help tourists.

Once we made it through the border we saw a sign for the free shuttle stop and the dude from before was over there talking to some other people so he told us to sit and wait. A bus pulled up shortly and a bunch of people poured on so he told us that one was already booked but there would be another one in about 10 minutes. So we waited and got on the next one and he hopped on with us and we were the only people on it. The ride over was only a few minutes but we still didn’t make it until 5:05 and the last bus left for Siem Reap at 5. He asked around for us but the busses were all gone for the day. He showed us the posted flat rates for taxis from the transit station and he got taxis for us at the set rates. Really it only cost us about $8 each for a 2 hour taxi ride and it would have been 3 hours on the bus, so probably worth it in the end. Vince and I still only had baht so he took us over to a currency exchange before we headed out.

Soon after we left Poipet we stopped at a gas station to fill up. Luckily it was still light out because we were still on edge about everything that was going on so we were hawkishly watching our bags that were in the trunks of the cabs where the gas tanks oddly were. Everything seemed to be fine there though. As I finally did the calculation of how much the baht I gave them would be in dollars and what that should be in riel I figured out that they took about a 15% commission on my currency exchange, granted I’m going to get an overly unfavorable rate for baht, but that was still way too much. Also, the whole barely missing the last bus because he made us take the later shuttle was really shady. Maybe he was just dressed to look like a government official, or maybe he actually was an official that was just taking some off the top, which is very likely. He even had the balls to ask for a tip after he put us in the cabs. Bold. It’s much easier to pick up these things in retrospect than in the confusion of the moment. Yeah, there should have been some warning signs, but these were pretty elaborate scams that they were pulling and, again, at least it didn’t end up costing us very much. It was one hustle after another since we had made it to that border crossing, not the best way to start off our trip.

However, we did make it to Siem Reap safely and met up with Tricia’s friend Jordan who had just flown in from London to join us. We went out and had a good diner and a couple drinks and it was all good again. The next morning after breakfast Josh noticed that his debit card was missing. He went back to the hotel and checked his bags to find that some cords to his electronics (but not the actual electronics) were missing and his backup cash. The $3000 that he had in his bank account had already been cleared out. The rest of us checked our stuff and nothing was missing from anyone else’s bags, nor did they appear like anyone had gone through them. We’ll never know for sure but the best theory that we came up with then was that they got into his stuff when we were stopped for gas. They probably didn’t touch the stuff in the other taxi because we had a straight on view of their trunk from our cab. Tricia and I had our bags in the trunk right next to his but maybe his was just next to the tank so the only one accessible out of view? Given all the other problems we had in Poipet it was a reasonable assumption that something had happened there.

Without any mention from him, though, at some point his missing cords reappeared and he didn’t have to replace them. Also, he never mentioned his bags looking rifled through the night before or when we got ready in the morning and if they were in such a hurry they probably wouldn’t have put everything back perfectly, nor did he notice the missing debit card at dinner the night before. It took us a couple of weeks traveling with it before we figured it out, but he is a compulsive liar and a crazy person. So, it’s quite possible that he just lost it and didn’t want to fess up when he found his other things that he thought were missing.

Regardless, that border crossing was terrible and there aren’t many Westerners going across there so they probably take as much advantage of them as they can when there are some around. Don’t worry though, Cambodia quickly redeemed itself.

What Poipet actually looks like

The border crossing at Poipet

Saving the Planet. Earth, You’re Welcome.

I have always considered myself an environmentalist (although you’d be pretty hard-pressed to find anyone these days who is openly anti-environment). I’m a vegetarian, I take my reusable bags when I go shopping, I lay off the A/C as much as tolerable even in the Phoenix summer, etc. so I feel like I have been doing my part. But, even without making a concerted effort my current Thai lifestyle has made my ecological footprint shrink drastically. It’s eye-opening in that it has made me feel like any slight modifications I had made to my American lifestyle were trivial. Also, it has shown me how easy it is to adapt to bigger changes that can have a greater impact for the environment and I sincerely hope that I will continue them at least to some extent when I get back to the US. Additionally, it just exemplifies how all the small “green” changes that are proliferating the Western world are not nearly enough, and that bigger lifestyle changes need to be undertaken in order for any real environmental impact to be made (not that I am under any sort of illusion that such a thing will happen). Don’t get me wrong, I definitely realize that the developing world has its own share of environmental atrocities, it’s just not what I am focussing on here. Anyway, enough soapbox talk really I just want to share how eco-friendly my life is now, so here you go:

• I walk or take public transportation just about everywhere (like I am going to attempt to drive here)
• Cold showers-I was actually worried about not having hot water before I came here but now I can totally live without hot showers. Sometimes it is a bit on the cold side and it will take me a while to ease into the water. There have even been times when the water was cold enough to necessitate a bidet shower and there were even a couple of times I resorted to heating some water in my kettle and mixing with a bucket of tap temp water and taking a bucket shower. Desperate times call for desperate measures…
• Also, the cold showers make the time I spend in the shower much less. Although, they are a more frequent occurence here due to the ridiculous humidity.
• Again not by any choice I have made, just because of the way things are here, but I have drastically cut back on my use of paper products. Mostly when it comes to napkins and toilet paper. Mostly because of the severe lack of them here. Also, they are the same thing here. It’s impossible to explain the difference between a napkin and TP to a Thai student because they are completely interchangeable here and 1-ply, ultra-thin and tiny.
• I always hand wash the 4 dishes that I own, I don’t think I have even seen a dishwasher here anywhere (in my bathroom sink since that is my only sink).
• I hang dry my clothes. Dryers are few and far between here and there isn’t one in my building.
• I only cook in my rice cooker since I don’t have a kitchen or anything. I got really sick of not having a fridge though so I had to break down and buy a mini-fridge just for the sake of my produce and to have cold beverages.
• I barely even use my A/C even now in the steamy heat of summer and I unplug my powerstrip before I leave everyday. My electricity is really expensive here so this is just an effort to cut down on that bill as much as possible.
• I eat local and organic. I buy all the produce which makes up most of my diet from the person that grew said produce. And, for the most part, my food is whole when I buy it instead of being processed and full of chemicals.

Like I said above, most of these things aren’t due to any conscious decision I have made to try to be environmentally friendly, it’s just that the lifestyle is so much more conducive to making a small ecological impact that it’s almost hard not to be green here.

My bathroom/laundry room/kitchen sink

The rest of my "kitchen" and part of my living room.

Ode to BKK

I get why some people who vacation in Thailand aren’t that into Bangkok. As far as things to see here there is so much natural beauty that Thailand has to offer it is hard to justify spending much time in an overcrowded megalopolis. However, as a foreigner living in the area I adore it and here are a few reasons why. First, the food-it has all the wonderfulness of Thai food from street vendors to nice restaurants. The Indian food is also awesome and probably better than just about any I’ve had in the states. Then there’s all the Western food options. I kind of hate that I want to eat Western food when I’m here, but all I cook at home is curry because I only have a rice cooker and the only thing I eat at school is the cabbage and morning glory vegetable option, occasionally with tofu, that they serve there. So, sometimes I just want something else. There is an awesome bagel place run by a dude from New York.  I have recently found a legit Mexican place that has 2 for 1 margaritas for happy hour. And they have an amazing chili-infused tequila margarita that might be my favorite ever. There is just about every food option you could ever want. So, it’s really nice to have all those options when I need it.

The same goes for the shopping here. I can find just about anything I want within the Central Bangkok area. Sometimes you pay a lot for things that are foreign, but at least they are available if it’s worth it to you. Everything else is super cheap.  DVDs are less than $3 and you can get just about anything-tv series, movies that are in the theaters, whatever. The weekend market has so, so much awesome stuff for ridiculously low prices even without factoring conversion rates.

Public transportation may not be cohesive, but it works well for the most part. It’s pretty much the only way I get around while I’m here and it works for me. It’s really crowded but it’s totally manageable because the Thai people are generally super polite and laid back. I was in awe the first time I took the skytrain-people line up to get on the train to the sides of the doors so there is room for people to get off first (yes, actual lines). They wait for everyone else to get off before they file in and once it is full they will just wait for the next one instead of pushing their way on. It was the polar opposite of what goes on in the subways of Beijing and Shanghai, which were the only other large Asian cities that I had taken public transportation in previously. Granted pretty much anything is a picture of civility in comparison to China where they have people whose entire job is to push people into the already filled to capacity subway trains like sardines, but even beyond that it is still more organized and civilized than any I’ve been on anywhere in the world.

For as many people as there are that live here it’s very much built up instead of out. I live about 18 miles from Bangkok and I am in the very farthest outskirt suburb. Quite the accomplishment considering the metro area has a population 3 times the size of the entire state of Arizona and yet Phoenix metro sprawls for over 100 miles. It has adapted to its massive growing pains well, still preserving its own culture even with a massive influx of foreigners. It’s an almost seamless blend of wats and nightmarkets sandwhiched in between skyscrapers and parking garages.

I love that every part of the city I go to is like a completely different place. Its’ like New York or San Francisco in that way. You get off the train and the place you arrive is not at all like the place you got on. It also rivals large US cities in its multi-culturalism and it embraces it. So many of the things that I love about Thailand-wats, all the bright colors everywhere, the people, night markets, massages-are all here in full force.

Finally, I really can’t think of any other city of this size with a more perfect location-in a couple of hours travel time (acceptable for a weekend trip) are some of the most beautiful places on the planet running the gamut from gorgeous tropical islands to rainforests. As far as the one I have been to on my weekend trips-Koh Chang, Kanchanaburi, Lopburi, Ayuttaya-they are all are amazing and they are all so different from one another.

I haven’t even mentioned all the fun stuff there is to do there or all the awesome things to see, but you get the idea. I am really lucky I live so close to such an awesome city, it’s just about the only thing that makes living in Samphran tolerable.

Committment to Fitness

Since I have gotten settled into Samphran I have been trying to go running most days.  I worked at it until I was up to 4k and I ran in the (4k) Fun Run in the Bangkok Half Marathon with the other teachers from my school and a few from my program, which was at the end of Feb. And I have kept up with running about 4k 4-5 times a week since then. Obviously, this has been really great as a means of exercise and such but it has also allowed me to witness some cultural idiosyncrasies that I may not have otherwise. As I have mentioned before Thai people aren’t really into exercise, to put it mildly. They gawk when I run because they are confused about what I am doing and it even freaks out all the stray dogs in my hood. There were a couple of incidents with extra creepy gawkers and stray dogs that made me decide to forego running outside and just suck up the cost and join a gym. Also, it’s nice to not have to run in the muggy, humid heat that pervades the area, although the gym isn’t a huge improvement in that respect.

So, what is the gym like in a country where people hate working out? Well, it seems to basically just be a status thing. People mostly just hang out and chit-chat, and any actual working out that goes on is very half-assed. It’s like people think that just being a member of the gym means you are into “fitness” (as they say) or at least you can tell people that you are going to work out. I in no way consider myself to be a runner, I just run as much as I can force myself to in order to try to get in better shape. But, I’m not in good shape and I don’t think I’ve ever run more than 35 minutes straight. And yet, I can way outrun every person I have ever seen on a treadmill in that gym. Plus, the gawking is even worse in the gym because they can just come stand next to or behind me while I’m on the treadmill and watch, mystified, and check out how fast I’m going and for how long I have been running. It’s unbelievably irritating. I HATE being watched while I run. I’m super sweaty and red-faced and super self-conscious about it so the people standing around watching me run is a true test of my patience.

When they aren’t distracted by gawking at the foreigner some people will actually use the machines…sort of. They will hop on and walk slower than I do normally for 10-15 minutes then hop off. They might do some stretches too, but that’s it. Seriously. What is the point? I have seen people sitting on the weight benches talking  but it is very rare to see anyone actually lifting weights or using the strength training equipment. Also, here are a few other things that I have seen at the gym only in Thailand:

• Texting while on the treadmill
• Talking on a cell phone while on the treadmill
• Wearing one of those metallic “sweat suits” while working out (if you actually worked out hard enough to sweat with out that then you would burn calories which is how you actually lose weight)
• Taking a smoke break from your workout
• Eating an ice cream cone while changing in the locker room (I wish I was joking)

It isn’t just at the place I go to either. There is a larger, fancier and more expensive gym down the road that another American teacher used to go to. He had a membership there and he was a serious runner so he would actually run fast and he would go for about an hour and a half everyday. I say he used to go there because they revoked his membership because there were too many complaints from other members about the noise of the treadmill. Sorry, but the other “fitness buffs” aren’t able to carry on a conversation over the sound of you working out so hard so you aren’t welcome at this gym anymore. For reals.

I’m pretty sure this means that there is not Thai word for fitness.

Post race with my fellow 4k-ers.

Continuing Grievances About the Armpit

It’s not just the creepy pervert stalker working next door to my apartment building that makes Samphran terrible, there are many additional factors contributing to its awfulness. I obviously don’t drive here, which means I do a lot of walking. The bus stop/taxi stand for the area is a mile walk from where I live so I have to walk there at least to get pretty much anywhere. Taxis don’t really come down my street, but there is a motorcycle taxi stand across from the mansion. However, the motorcycle taxis are much more expensive than anything else (a ride to the bus stop is more than twice as much as the actual 1-2 hour-long public bus ride all the way to Bangkok). It’s nice that it’s there in case I need to go somewhere after dark when walking anywhere is way too unsafe or if time is an issue, but usually I just walk. But walking here is made very difficult because the street is pretty narrow-barely wide enough for 2 vehicles to pass each other if they are small-and there are no sidewalks. So the people driving down the road get pretty aggro about us walking and taking up precious road space especially when they want to pass each other. And the sides of the road are just dusty dirt piles covered in garbage with the occasional snake or frog carcass. Plus, no matter which way you go there is some sort of sewage-filled industrial waste cesspool steaming in the musty heat. There aren’t even words to describe the smell.

In addition to all the things that make walking around town difficult, there are some extra obstacles when it comes to running. Thai people are really not into walking anywhere, let alone running, let alone as exercise. So I get even more discomforting stares than normal whenever I go running in the neighborhood, which is something I try to do just about everyday (what else am I going to do around here anyway?). Instead of just getting, “What is that white girl doing here?” stares, I also get, “…and what is she running from?” gawking. The stray dogs that are everywhere, who are normally lazy and harmless, get all riled up when they see someone running by, understandable since they are also probably very confused with the whole running thing. Some are okay with it, but some run after me like they are in attack mode. I’ve definitely had a few close calls with them nipping at me and I know of a few people who have actually been bitten by stray dogs. They get especially vicious and protective of their territory from sunset on so you really don’t want to cross paths with any after that time at night. That translates into running in the daylight hours when it is extra hot and miserable. The humidity is really what makes running outside here the suck. I will take running in the Arizona summer over running in the humidity of Thailand any day.

I really detest the humidity, especially when it comes to trying to working out in it, unfortunately it is inescapable. I was eventually able to find a gym to join in the next town over that is a short and cheap bus ride away. It’s pretty basic, similar to a rec center in the US, but it has everything I need. It is not nearly as cool as I would like-they barely have the A/C going and it is still way too humid, but it is much more tolerable than what goes on outside. It does actually cost more per month (in dollars) than a big, nice fitness center in the states would be, though, so that sucks. And all the Thai people that have memberships there seem to use it more as a place to hang out because they really aren’t into exercise, and I still get the gawking even though I am using a treadmill for its specific purpose. But it’s well worth it to not have to deal with the weather conditions or risk life and limb in the hood.

In addition to the stray dogs on the prowl after sunset there are also foes of the human variety. There are predatory criminals that tend to prey on foreigners because they think that those victims will be less able and/or likely to report the crime, which is unfortunately fairly accurate. Another foreign teacher from my school was mugged a couple of years ago. Yet another one had her purse grabbed by someone driving by on a motorbike and she was dragged along for a ways and injured pretty badly in addition to the theft of her belongings. A guy in my office who is pretty well-built and his over 6 foot tall friend were almost mugged at knife point until his Thai wife came out and scared them off. These are all things that have happened in recent years to the white foreign teachers at my school, which isn’t more than 20 people at any given time. So the area is a bit dangerous, but you just have to be cautious about it. My building is secure-there is a security guard every night when the office is closed and the building as well as the premesis are locked up and you need to scan your fingerprint to get in the building. I don’t go out by myself after 6 pm when it gets dark and I don’t go out at all after 9 or so. It is easy to be carefree here because 99% of the people here are unbelievably kind so you feel like nothing bad will ever happen. But as long as you make an effort to be smart and conscientious in your behaviour everything will be fine.

In regards to the town itself, it’s pretty dirty, disgusting really. It is pretty much the outermost industrial suburb of Bangkok. It is a very poor community amidst broken down factories and pig farms. The “canals” running through the town are a mixture of raw sewage, industrial waste and garbage. And the water doesn’t really move it just sits stagnant, steaming in the hot and muggy weather all day long. The air has all the pollution you would expect on the outskirts of a giant metropolis plus a ton of extra smoke from the daily garbage fires.

Also there is garbage everywhere. Every road has a field that has been turned into a makeshift dump and is now just a ginormous pile of garbage. There is a ton of trash of all kinds littered along the side of every street and every sidewalk, on the few main roads that actually have a sidewalk. And in a complete juxtaposition of the other sidewalks in the country that are swept constantly, the ones here are swept never and neither are the roads. So now they are so covered in dusty dirt (and probably ash from all the garbage fires) that it is usually more like walking on a dirt path than pavement. You can’t even see the pavement in some places because the layer of dirt is so thick.

The school is definitely the nicest part of the town, and campus is kept very clean. It is right on the main road which is a 6 land highway that runs from Bangkok to Nakhon Pathom (the capital city of the province that I live in). It is lined with run down old buildings. But behind the fanciful row of buildings there isn’t much, just shacks and dilapidated apartment buildings and factories. So there is really nothing to do here, but even if there was I wouldn’t want to go there anyway.

So due to all the aforementioned negative aspects of the town I make sure to get out of town every weekend. The saving grace (I suppose) of Samphran is that its location on a heavily trafficked highway makes it relatively easy to get away from. For about 20 cents I can hop on a public bus and take it all the way to the skytrain public transit system in central Bangkok. Once in Bangkok you can get pretty much anywhere in the country (and the world for that matter) with relative ease. So about half of my weekends have been spent in Bangkok, which is an awesome city, and the rest of the time I’ve done weekend trips around central Thailand. I am actually really lucky to live so close to Bangkok. I really love it and it is rad that I get to go so often. Plus, it is really cheap to live in Samphran since it is such a poor community so I save up all my money during the week to afford my weekend and summer travels. Plus, my school treats me really well and pays me much more than I was expecting to get which is a bonus. And I get to teach science next school year starting in May and get paid even more for that, so that’s rad too.

Really, it’s not all bad. I do harbor a well-substantiated hatred for Samphran, but things could be much, much worse.

P.S. I took a few pictures of my street to put on this blog one afternoon when I was walking down to the farmer’s market about a mile away from my building. A motorcycle cab driver from the stand by me stopped and told me I should put my camera away and secure all my belongings so the wouldn’t get taken. At least I think that is what he was saying since he only spoke Thai. It was 4 in the afternoon, seriously it’s the hood, only with less development. Anyway, here’s the few pics I took before that.

The view from my patio at the mansion overlooking the crocodile grounds.

This used to be my walk to and from school, before the pervert ruined in it.

When I say piles of garbage all along the side of the road, I am not exagerrating. This isn’t even Garbage Row.

These are a couple of the houses on my street.

One of the toxic cesspools on my way to the market.

The factory on the other side of the elephant farm from my building.

This is the mansion I live in, it’s the nicest building around.

The Armpit of Thailand

I believe Tricia was actually the first one to refer to Samphran as the armpit of Thailand, but it really is the perfect descriptor for the place we live and I use it all the time. The weather is very armpit-like in nature, as is the smell (only much, much worse), but really the comparison is most accurate in the metaphorical sense. When I originally started writing a blog about the town a few weeks ago I was very optimistic and I started out with the good things about living here, but since then I have grown to completely despise it. There is still truth in the good things I came up with and I will include them also, eventually. However, a few things have changed over the last couple of weeks to justify my complete hatred of this town so I feel like that is where I should start.

First, I will start with the big one, the reason that it has taken me so long to write and post this blog. This is something that took me a while to even be okay talking about freely, especially on the internets. But, the most recent and decidedly worst of the incidents has made me realize that it is something I should make a big deal out of, because it is. And since when is something so bad that I am uncomfortable talking about it? That really isn’t my style. The fact that I wasn’t talking about it was just more evidence of how bad the situation was. Additionally, I don’t want people, especially my family who are the biggest readers of this, to worry, so please don’t. I tried to keep this PG-13, but you should probably stop reading now if you don’t want the graphic details.

The best way to reach the boys’ school from the mansion I live in is by walking through the elephant zoo that is practically my backyard. It is not the shortest route, just highly preferable to the more direct route down a street that functions as a garbage dump. In addition to the disgusting sights and smells of the dumping grounds on both sides of the road, sometimes they will be burning the garbage so that as an added bonus I can smell like garbage fire the rest of the day. The elephant zoo doesn’t smell great, of course, just not nearly as terrible and it is not really only an extra 5-10 minutes of walking time. Plus, we would walk past the elephants (including an adorable little baby) every morning. It worked out great for the first 2 months of school.

Then one morning there was a man standing on the sidewalk opposite of us masturbating. Not trying to hide in the bushes or anything, just standing on the sidewalk near the entrance facing the road leading to the zoo, and us, incidentally, shirt up, junk out, going to town. It was horrifying. There were a couple of minutes of silent walking before either of us could even say anything, then there was finally a muttering of, “Was he…?” “Yeah….”. I mentioned it to a couple of the men in my office who have been here for several years and they said that it had happened to another farang (and blonde) female teacher once before. It sucked a lot but we figured it was just a one time thing and there wasn’t much we could do about it since we couldn’t report it to police, at least on our own, and even if we did we wouldn’t be able to give any sort of accurate description. So we just wrote it off as a one time thing. Well, one week later he was at it again. At least this time he was sort of tucked back into the bushes, but he was still facing us and making sure we could see him. And I think I saw him running over there out of the corner of my eye right before Tricia spotted him, but I wasn’t paying close attention since I just thought it was a worker going about his business. We weren’t sure what to do about it at this point, but we figured we would have to change our route on Fridays since that was when he seemed to be lurking around. Well, we didn’t even make it to that point. On the next Tuesday he was there again and this time he was really close to us-about 10 feet away. It. Was. Awful. There just really aren’t words. Tricia yelled and we ran to the other side of the street. There were people within earshot, but nobody seemed to react or care at all. At that point we decided we would just have to start walking down Garbage Row, because walking through a garbage dump everyday is preferable to ever seeing that piece of shit again.

So the next day, on Wednesday, we started walking the other route. On Thursday, he showed up, standing in a pile of garbage, jerking off. Once again, he was really close to us. This time only a few feet away. I yelled and we hurried off as soon as we spotted him, but as we did he started moaning louder. He was so close we could hear him, graphically, and not just the moaning. As terrible as it may be to read, witnessing it was exponentially worse. Not only is there a voyeuristic pervert working at the zoo we live next to, he had now taken to following us. He must have watched us walk out of our back gate, go the other way and then decided to follow us.

We definitely had to tell somebody, but it was going to be difficult.  We decided to go to our boss, the head honcho of the English Center and the foreign teachers, since she usually takes care of most living-related things for us. Her English is pretty good, but we sometimes have difficultly communicating with her, and since she is an old, probably Catholic lady, masturbating may not be in her English vocabulary. So we decided to first tell this guy BJ who is a Filipino teacher that works in her office. His English is generally good and he can speak some Thai so we thought he could help us to try to explain the situation to her. He seemed to get it and also seemed somewhat concerned so the 3 of us went in to Ms. Majuri’s office. They kind of got what was going on. Tricia had to show the hand motion to really get the point across. While they did show some concern, they weren’t really compelled to action. Ms. Majuri’s  first response was, “There’s probably something wrong with him.” Of course there is, this is not normal behavior, but that doesn’t make it excusable. I really don’t understand that sort of response to this type of thing. She did sort of mention reporting it to the zoo or maybe even the police, but neither of those things ever happened. She wanted to know if we had a picture of him since our description wasn’t very helpful, but, of course, we did not. So, she asked BJ to walk with us the next day, following behind us to try to take a picture of him.

He went with us the next day but he walked alongside us and there was a guy who works at the mansion that was sitting in his truck parked on the side of the road through the dumpsite and there were some workers dropping off more trash or something. Anyway, with all those other people around, of course he wasn’t going to show up to do his thing. Yet BJ still asked us if every man he saw was the guy. At least we didn’t have to see him that day and ever since then we have been going out the front gate and walking the long way around. That way is really pedestrian-unfriendly and it’s at least a mile and a half walk each way, but well worth it not to see that dude again, and, luckily, we haven’t seen him since switching to that route.

So I guess we have found a resolution to the problem, although I feel like there should be a better one than we just have to avoid him. The lack of action or reaction by people here bothers me quite a bit. I really wish they had tried to track him down and do something more about it, but that just isn’t how things work here. A couple of the men in our office that are actually friendly to us have shown genuine concern, probably because they have similar ideals to us in regards to the unacceptable nature of it and since they have lived here for so long they are also empathetic to the tribulations of life as a foreigner here. The unfortunate thing about that, however, is even though they understand it, they still tell us there really isn’t much we can do. That trying to get the police or even the zoo to do anything about it is futile, so our best defense would be to try to humiliate him. They also suggested trying to take a picture of him (which is the last thing I want to do, or want to have on my camera), or gesture to him that he has a small penis (which the girl that it happened to before did that actually made it stop, according to them), and they taught me how to say ‘tiny dick’ in Thai in case I wanted to yell that at him. So basically just avoiding the situation is the best option we have.

So there’s that. Just the first on my list of things I hate about Samphran. But this is long enough for now, so I will leave the rest of my grievances for another day.

White Man’s Burden

As far as being a minority goes I have it pretty good, especially compared to where I come from.  However, it is a really strange situation for me, which is only exacerbated by the wide range of experiences I have related being white here. I am such an oddity that I may as well be in a zoo the way I am stared at and they way people deal with me around here. Everyone is segregated here too, which is disconcerting. And there are definitely times I am discriminated against because of the way I look. There are times that it really sucks, but most of the time it’s tolerable.

It’s definitely the most notable here in Samphran. The only white people in this city, or for miles around for that matter, are the foreign teachers at my school. So that makes about 20 total, most of whom are 40+-year-old men. Other than us 5 American girls there are only 2 other white women here and they are both around 50. So the 5 of us, especially together, are a really big deal. It’s not just blatant staring that we attract, either. People always honk and wave as they drive by us anytime we walk anywhere. Not in a creepy way, in more of an overly friendly “Woah, what are YOU doing here?” kind of way. I think there are probably a lot of people around here who have never actually seen a blond-haired, pasty-skinned girl in the flesh before so they are transfixed. I often have people trying to touch me, just on the hand or arm or something, just to see what my skin feels like. One of my students even saw a hair on my shirt one day, so he kindly picked it off…and then he put it in his notebook and kept it. And this is one of the rich kids in the English Program who, at least through his teachers over the years, has had plenty of contact with white people.

So then there’s the whole segregation thing. This is really something I deal with specifically at work. Again, it doesn’t really affect me negatively, it’s just weird. My office that I actually use in the English Language Center has only western teachers. I guess the Filipino and Chinese teachers and Thai teachers probably have separate offices somewhere, but I don’t know where. Or they may not really even have offices for all I know. We also have separate uniforms to wear in case there is any confusion about who is who. The foreign teachers mansion is primarily for western and Chinese teachers (although a few Filipino teacher choose to live there because of the proximity), and then there is a separate mansion that is only for the Filipino teachers to live in. The reasoning behind that is that they get paid less so they get nicer accommodations, which sort of makes sense but the whole pay-scale determined by your nationality thing doesn’t quite so much. Logically, for practical purposes, and although I hate to admit it, I guess it works, but it is still very unsettling at the surface level.

On to the issue of discrimination. This is a tough one, mostly because it is really difficult to tell when you are actually being discriminated against and when you just assume you are. There are definitely different prices whether you are Thai or farang, so Thai numbers were one of the first things I taught myself to help alleviate that as much as possible. However, most things are negotiable so you never really know how good of a deal you are getting. But, everything is so cheap here that no matter what you never really get screwed on a deal. As an example, the last time I went to Kanchanaburi, a popular town with backpackers, when we got to the bus station Tricia and I started talking to a songtao driver to take us to our hotel. We told him where we were staying and his first response was 100 Baht. I turned to her and said, “It’s not that far.” So he immediately jumped in with, “OK, 2o Baht.” An 80% drop in 5 seconds, he was clearly trying to see just how farang we were. And, while I don’t have to pay any rent for the place I live in, I am way overcharged for utilities. The rate we are charged is double what I have seen in Bangkok which should be exactly the same. Sometimes the bill will double for seemingly no reason and I try to ask them about it, but they don’t speak English so the end result is that I pay whatever the bill says. It sucks, but for the most part it isn’t a huge problem. The worst is that I live in the ghetto so, unfortunately there are some nefarious people here and they like to target foreigners since they figure we can’t really report them or do anything about it. And for the most part they are right about that. So that actually makes this a pretty unsafe place to live in that sense, but I’m smart about it so no cause for worry. More on that in my blog about Samphran.

Overall, it’s fine. There are definitely both positives and negatives about it. Plus, it’s part of the cultural experience, I suppose. And I guess it builds character. But, I really won’t mind when I can blend in with the crowd again. Seriously, though, for someone who spent the last couple of years with red, yellow, and/or pink hair to feel far more conspicuous now should tell you something about how much of an issue it actually is.

My Thai Obsessions/Ways I Am Thai Now

• I sweep my floor everyday. Sometimes several times a day.
• I take my shoes off and leave them outside of my apartment, my flip flops at least. I wouldn’t want to track stuff onto my super clean floors.
• I frequently find myself paying to use bathrooms I would never think of using in the states.
• I use white-out all the time.
• I eat an unquantifiable amount of fruit. My need for it is constant.
• Fruit shakes. They get their own recognition because they are that awesome.
• I start to sweat and my mouth is tingly and/or numb before I realize that my food is indeed spicy.
• I take rides from strangers all the time. I will gladly hop in the back of a pickup truck or on the back of a motorbike when a passerby stops to offer me a ride.
• I stole this from DeeDee’s list of a similar nature because it is so true: white kids just aren’t that cute anymore.
• I text while riding on the back of a motorbike. Who needs to hold on? They weave in and out of traffic at high speeds all day long, they totally know what they’re doing.
• I ride sidesaddle on the back of a motorbike when wearing a dress. Again, there is no need to hold on and I am a lady.
• If I eat at home, it’s made in a rice cooker.
• I eat from food stalls more often than actual restaurants.
• I have been to 7-11 more in the last 4 months than the entire rest of my life.
• I am more surprised when I don’t find tiny ants in my food than when I do.
• Whenever I see one of the tiny ants, which happens several times a day, on my bed or my computer screen, or my wall,or me,  I simply squash it with my finger and continue on.
• An actual shower that is separate from the rest of the bathroom is an unnecesary luxury.
• Baby powder is my most important accessory. All day everyday.
• 100 Baht (3 USD) is overpaying for a DVD.
• I can’t even remember the last time I wore a pair of heels.
• I stare at white people. Especially if I see them in my town. What could they possibly be doing here?
• I never wait for anyone else to get their food before I start eating.
• I have no expectation of getting “good service” at a restaurant. Or service at all, really.

Thai Obsessions

Menthol-they snort it constantly. Everyone carries around little inhaler vials of it and they use them every chance they get. I understand if you have a cold or something, but I don’t really understand the constant need for it. It’s to the point that Halls makes candy here. It looks just like a cough drop only it comes in more flavors and has way more sugar than a cough drop. I don’t get it.

Sugar-I can’t believe how hard it is to find anything sugar-free here, including coffee. The constant lack of sugar-free drink choices drives me crazy.

Fish-It’s in everything and in every form. Candy, gum, coffee, cosmetics, ”vegetarian” food. I honestly believe that 85-90% of products here are either fish flavored, made with fish sauce, or contain fish collagen. I really hate it. And I hate fish more than ever.

Meat-I actually thought that being in such a strongly Buddhist country would be highly advantageous for my vegetarian diet. Apparently they aren’t really that kind of Buddhist here. There is so, so much meat in the food, in every imaginable form. And most people don’t really seem to get the vegetarian thing. And vegan? That went out the door quickly after arrival. During the week when I make food at home I usually have an easy enough time cooking vegan food, but the lunch provided at school, not so much. The vegetables probably aren’t even vegetarian.

Straws-You get straws given to you anytime you buy anything drinkable-soda, a bottle of water, vodka, whatever-you are going to get a plastic straw in your bag for each beverage you purchase, sometimes several.

Plastic Bags-everything comes in a plastic bag. And there are special plastic bags that have a hole in the bottom so basically they just function as a strap for your beverage. Sometimes, in an inspired fusion of this obsession and the previous one, they will just pour a beverage directly into a plastic bag with a straw in it. No need for cups here. The handle of the bag makes carrying your drink much more convenient, especially on another obsession-the motorbike.

Angry Birds-I know people all over the world are obsessed with it but they have really taken it to a whole new level. There is every sort of Angry Bird merchandise anyone could ever want and you can find it everywhere. I have even seen people who have wrapped their entire vehicles with an Angry Birds decal.

Winnie the Pooh-Once again, Winnie the Pooh everything everywhere. Even, and perhaps even especially, for adults. Why this cartoon is the one they have chosen to get out of control with I have no idea.

Same same-they say it constantly. Or, “Same same, but different”. Some of my students even seem to think it is actually correct English. I’m sure you can glean the meaning. My favorite usage I’ve heard of it was when I saw a Thai man holding a monkey talking to a white lady holding a baby and he said, “monkey, baby, same same.” 

Sweeping-they sweep all day, everyday. Mostly the floors inside and in front of shops and such, but they also sweep the sidewalks and roads around my campus all the time. Also the outdoor floors and hallways of the buildings. There is a woman working at the building where my main office is as a sweeper who just sweeps the one small building all day long. She sweeps upstairs, then she sweeps downstairs, then she goes back upstairs and starts again. And I don’t ever see her just sitting around. She must sweep the entire building 10 times a day. I almost feel like they just wanted to give these people something to do so that they have a job.

These next few are more specific to my students, although they may apply to other realms of Thai people as well, I have mostly seen them manifested in my students.

Uniforms-my students have at least 4 that they rotate through on an undiscernable schedule-normal, casual, sports day, and scouting. The teachers also have uniforms that involve a different shirt for each day of the week, with different colors and styles for the foreign teachers and the Thai teachers. Plus, other random uniform options that pop up occasionally.

Scouts-It seems like they have scouting activities at least once a week as a class and they all wear their scouting uniforms on those days, as do all the Thai teachers. I can’t really figure out what they are doing with all that scouting time though.

Coloring and decorating-they really love it. Even my boys love to draw little hearts and flowers and such all over their assignments. They decorate EVERYTHING. And if you give them some sort of assignment that involves drawing and/or coloring, not only will they take the entire class period to do it, it won’t be nearly enough time and they will be on the verge of tears when you make them stop and hand it in because they haven’t perfected it yet.

White Out-part of the whole making everything pretty ideal, they don’t cross things out or scribble them out EVER. They all have white-out on them at all times, especially the flat roll on kind.

Death-they think it’s hilarious and almost every cartoon or drawing they make involves death if at all possible, and really they can incorporate it into anything. And along the same line is blood and gore-also ever-present in their drawings.

Swearing-I think this is part of just being kids, but also because English isn’t their first language swear words just don’t carry the same weight so they use them constantly, even when they are writing. They really, really want to make me swear and they definitely come close. And they want me to teach them new swear words that they don’t know. Naughty, naughty Thai children.

OMB-Oh My Buddha. Surprising that they have adapted this one considering how much respect everyone has for Buddha, so they must not realize the connotation.

555(++)-it’s the Thai version of lol. 5 is pronounced “ha” in Thai so it’s hahaha. Usually written by itself, but sometime with a plus or two if it is super funny.

Poop-something else they love to talk and write about. Completely understandable with the 11 and 12-year-old boys, but the 15-year-old girls are probably most obsessed with it. I can’t even count how many stories I have read from them that take place in some sort of Wonder Toilet Land, with talking poop and food made of poop and on and on.

K-pop-obsessed isn’t even the right word. It’s taking over the world.