Dear Friends and Family,

As you all are aware from NPR or the Seattle PI or CNN or wherever your news comes from, last Tuesday evening, the sun set on Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s government and at midnight that very same evening tanks rolled through the wide, usually crowded streets of Bangkok. News agencies (esp. western) were switched off, staff posed for pictures with tanks in foreground before being escorted away from their former employment at the Prime Minister’s office, and by sunrise the Thai constitution had been suspended, the Parliament unemployed, and a new regime was in charge of Thailand. A military regime headed by one General Sonthi Boonyaratglin.

I had permission to play hooky on Wednesday, still don’t have a news source at home, and missed the first day of reporting on this event.

On Thursday morning, I calmly switched on my computer and didn’t fail to immediately notice Google’s first news story regarding a coup in Thailand (coincidentally from the Seattle PI). I gasped - out loud and loudly. I avidly soaked in the gist, planned further reading, and next continued my routine checking of e-mail, discovering a good two dozen e-mail messages in my inbox. Several friends had not heard of my move from Bangkok to Daegu and were worried… but as you all know, while a scrap of my heart remains in Bangkok (or in my memories of), I’m safely away. My parents were vastly relieved that I was safely in Korea. So was I, mostly, although there was a part of me that was sorry to have missed, by weeks, the big Thai news story of the last 14 years. As this was a bloodless coup and as Thailand appears to be operating fairly normally, it would’ve been a fascinating political case study and I would’ve enjoyed observing and talking to Thais about this. Sadly, despite sharing a continent and even similar woes of democracies eclipsed by the maneuvers of militaries, Koreans and Thais do not particularly relate. Not to say that Koreans weren’t interested. They were. As the week drifted on, those who knew that I had been in Bangkok gingerly broached the subject with me. And when I took a few minutes from my routinely scheduled Bangkok pictures to discuss the Thai change in government, I found some students well informed of recent events.

Listen, really, something had to be done about Thaksin. A Thai Billionaire originally elected in 2002, Thaksin had managed to do some good by rural farmers and by his home town of Chang Mai, but his government was also plagued by constant corruption at the highest levels and he became very unpopular with the people. Especially in Bangkok. This last April 2006, Thaksin won re-election by reasons that bordered on fowl and has since faced accusations of lacking ruling legitimacy. Undaunted, Thaksin’s plan appeared to be to bluster his way through yet another scandal until he was called to a meeting with King Rama IX, who rarely dabbles in Thai politics and is all the more powerful for it. Not a day after that meeting, Thaksin announced his resignation for the “sake of national unity” and his self-appointment as “Care-Taker Prime Minister” until parliament selected a successor. He also promised another election in October. Problem solved. Yes?

Uh. No. Almost immediately, Thaksin started backing away from the promises he made in his dramatic speech. Within days of my arrival in June, a panel made big news by reporting that there was enough damning evidence for the Constitution Court to dissolve Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai party. This didn't much dent Thaksin - who continued rhetorical back-peddling on the promised elections while causing fresh scandals on a regular basis by resuming his “normal” pre-election behavior. I recall with perfect clarity that one of the first stories I read in the Bangkok Post with the sun shining through the windows of the Wendy House café was that Thaksin had resumed his before-the-election prime ministerial radio show – and this had been added to the tally of actions that demonstrated that Thaksin had no intention of giving up power quietly nor easily. During my sporadic intake of news, I found that the Bangkok Post was reliable for its anti-Thaksin articles… corruption charges regarding hotel properties, problems with radical Islamists in the South, and a US DOJ investigative report (they do that?) regarding severe irregularities in connection with Thai acquisition of airport scanners from the US. Through all of this, Thaksin appeared to ignore the political brouhaha as much as possible and continue in his role as Prime Minister – oops, I mean Caretaker Prime Minister. Towards the end of my stay, I missed switching Skytrains due to absorption in a description of the previous day’s Thaksin antics re: a foiled bombing and one of the last articles I read before departing Bangkok was that Thaksin was on his way to tour economic development sites in the North – i.e. to Chang Mai. I must confess that while I never did establish a solid understanding regarding the governing of Thailand, Thaksin and Thai politics appeared quite chaotic to me.

Of course, I didn’t just derive my understanding of Thai politics from the paper. Although I was keen to learn how Thais viewed their political system, I respectfully never brought up politics. Happily, sometimes politics were brought up for me. I never heard any Thai say anything overtly negative about George W. Bush nor the US – with the exception of annoying Canadian Bushy-Bearded man…! Anyway, upon occasion, tuk tuk drivers or students or vendors made passing unfavorable Thaksin comments. One day in early July, one of my fellow teachers, not famous for his tact, and I by virtue of my proximity, had a very interesting conversation with one of our intermediate students: a gentlemen in his mid-20s, whom we called Tee. My fellow teacher asked Tee what he thought about Thaksin:

“Oh, he very bad. We Thais don’t like him at all.” Tee replied.

My fellow teacher nodded. “In Chang Mai they don’t like him either.”

“We Thais hope that he will soon go.” Tee added.

That was enough to unleash my curiosity. “Tee, do you like another political party? Who do you want to see replace Thaksin?”

“I don’t really like politicians and political parties. Our King is a really good man. I’d like to see him rule.”

“But Tee, the King is busy being the King. How can he be King and Prime Minister at the same time?” I asked.

Tee loftily informed me that the King could do anything he wanted to do. “He is King.” said Tee.

As I had understood that the King wasn’t actively involved in politics, I was very surprised by this conversation. I took Tee’s opinion seriously because he is by no means dumb – although my fellow teacher said and I couldn’t help but agree that Tee’s solution to the Thai political situation seemed naïve.

At that point in early July, all I knew about the King was that there were pictures of him everywhere, that I could be imprisoned for insulting him (happily, I never felt the urge – let alone in front of a police officer that spoke English), that His Highness was an avid dog fan, and that he had just celebrated his 60th year on the Thai throne. I imagined him a Thai version of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth. I hope that you all, gentle friends and family, will not make that same mistake. To do so would be to miss the key component to the success of this military coup: the tacit or stronger backing of the constitutional monarch, King Bhumipol Adulyadej. Officially known as King Rama IX, he is current longest reigning monarch in the world, is loved and respected, worshipped really, and is very much a unifying force of Thailand. And while he generally observes the Thai “democratic” government from the sidelines, when he speaks, the whole country listens. Apparently there was a military coup in the 1990s where after His Highness summoned the unpopular leader of the coup to a royal audience broadcast on live TV. That day the King managed to gently "politically vaporize" the general, who was soon replaced. Although the King is not currently in good health, the mere fact that the current general has not be summoned to crawl on his knees to the King on live television is a good sign for the general.

You may well ask: what was my initial reaction to the coup d'état? As I am not thoroughly-versed in Thai history, I was greatly surprised by the method (military coup) but was unsympathetic that Thaksin had gone and unsurprised that the King had tacitly backed the coup, and that Thai people appeared unfazed, happy even, to see Thaksin go. For a few seconds, I was even a bit envious that a thoroughly corrupt leader could be quickly and cleanly deposed. Of course, I was mentally deposing another deserving leader! But then I began to picture what I was envying: tanks occupying government buildings, suspension of a constitution, no free press coupled with military propaganda, important decisions in the hands of one powerful man, and remembered that although I do not believe that we, the people of the United States, have the right to impose democracy on others and although I believe that our own democracy is seriously flawed, I do believe in the right of citizens to make the decisions on behalf of themselves. So I can only hope that this general lives up to his word to hold elections that involve free choices for the people. Although I hate agreeing with the Bush administration on anything, I’m honest enough to agree with their cautious stance. On balance, I do not find snatching a corrupt leader adequate compensation for the death of yet another Thai fledgling democracy. I fervently wish better for friendly, beautiful, fast-paced, intriguing, wonderful Thailand.

Sadly,

Laura

PS: Note the flags in today’s pic: the flag of Thailand is the white, red and blue striped one while hanging opposite is the King’s (personal) flag which is yellow with a large, complicated crest in its heart. These flags decorate the Thai Parliament Building, which sits next to the Bangkok throne hall(s) and teak mansion that I previously mentioned. That entire complex of Thai governmental buildings, old and new, abuts the King’s residence and I presume, the Thai head of government’s (prime minister or general?) office and quarters.

Dear Family and Friends,

Last night, I peeled grapes at dinner.

I mention this in response to several inquiries about what I’ve been eating here in Daegu.
After a full 15 days and counting, I must confess that I recognize little of what I catch with metal chopsticks, test to ensure that the food will stay in my grasp, and then lift towards my mouth.

Rather surprisingly considering my family history, I am not at all familiar with Korean food - although I fancy myself better equipped than most to deal with the unidentifiable foreign food. As I was carefully reared by my mother’s gourmet family, at a young age (probably mostly to be special), I learned to use chopsticks and eat a plethora of Asian foods that cannot readily be identified. Upon rare occasion during visits to New Jersey, I was fed Korean foods and I just decided that I should like both seaweed and kimchi – and I do like them to this day. I’ve also learned to eat more spicy food than average (by US standards) and I do not so far find Korea as dangerous from a hot/spicy angle as Thailand, where I recently developed strong diligence in regard to hot/spicy foods. And I strongly suspect that in Korea, my lacking a sense of smell must be deemed an advantage.

I consider myself quite lucky because the school is willing to spare the trouble and expense to feed me breakfast, lunch and dinner; however, the caveat to this luck is that meals are served at the school cafeteria. Although the school is a block from my apartment, I haven’t yet taken them up on breakfast, which is served an hour and a half before I am required to clock in. However, when the bell chimes after 4th period, I willingly follow students and faculty members in the rush to the cafeteria. We teachers walk to the head of the long student line, and help ourselves to a metal plate, a long-handled soup spoon, and metal chopsticks. We then walk to one of the two flat, metal tables and serve ourselves the requisite kimchi and rice, and one or two side dishes, a soup, a main course, and a packaged item.

To elaborate: a myriad of items can be considered side dishes. Sometimes there will be recognizable stir-fried noodles or steamed broccoli and mushrooms or pickled vegetables but there are a lot of times when I simply cannot begin to recognize what I’m eating. I find the soups generally under-flavored and over-salted and I keep threatening to not eat them; however, everyday, my co-teacher (who quite likes the soups), entices me into trying “today’s really good soup.” The other day there was a very special and quite delicious mudfish (?) soup, today the soup was filled with green vegetables & was spiced nicely, and last night at dinner, we mixed pickled vegetables into udon noodle soup, which rendered it surprisingly good. Main courses are often fried and thankfully not plentiful: fried chicken or bony, bony fish or fried egg or well, other items that I cannot now recall. And I suppose that the packaged item is intended as dessert: we’ve had orange juice, a variety of yogurts, and one day, I could swear I was eating a frozen, packaged persimmon – unfortunately, I ate the evidence and tossed its packaging.

The Taegu Foreign Language School cafeteria is like most cafeterias: students love to complain about it. They complain about it in class and they wrote an article about the problems in the pending school English language magazine. Personally, especially compared to cafeterias in the States, I don’t find the food bad nutritionally or quality-wise (although the meat can be dodgy) and I’ve taken an informal staff survey that seems to confirm this impression. The cafeteria room itself is filled with the clamor of conversation and the heavy clanking of metal trays against meal surfaces – and noisy to the extreme. If is ambitious, one can converse over the din, just don’t expect to catch every word. And distraction from one’s meal involves a certain amount of risk – due to the precise coordination requirements of metal chopsticks. After the meal is over, we proceed into another line where we toss plastics or foil or napkins into garbage pails, we scrape our unfinished food into large metal funnels (with collection garbage cans underneath), we then place our trays on the counter by the washerwomen, we drop our spoons into a designated pail and our chopsticks into another designated pail. The meal finale is walking over to large “water” tea kettles filled with a cold roasted corn (?) tea, pour a measure of the tea into a small metal cup, down it in a single gulp, discard the cup into a plastic basket and exit. Koreans don’t drink during their meals.

I elaborate on the cafeteria because that is where I’m doing the majority of interesting Korean food consumption. I fend for myself for breakfast, which now always involves coffee or tea and a piece of fruit, with yogurt or toast or an omelet. I do not yet add rice to my omelets as the Koreans do but the other day I scrambled an egg and found that shrimp sauce much enhanced the flavor – so I suppose it only a matter of time before my omelets acquire a Korean flair. As for dinner, if I work late (and this is me, of course I sometimes work late), I’m swept up in the 6:20 pm faculty expedition to the cafeteria for dinner, which is lovely and devoid of students and their noise. I also sometimes prepare my own dinner; the first dinner I prepared was a Thai green curry that turned out pretty good despite several substitutions.

It didn’t take me long to find a personal gastronomic Achilles heel: a chain of bakeries called Paris Baguette. On my first food shopping foray, I wandered in and found myself purchasing a loaf “mocha cream bread” and some honey butter to accompany it, only to find that the “cream” portion of the bread was carefully hidden between the slices, a disgusting butter/frosting/yucky filling that could happily be scraped off of each slice. That bad experience didn’t at all deter me and I was back in a less than respectable amount of time to discover the same loaf sans the yucky cream. I’ve returned to Paris Baguette several times since – my most recent purchase was peanut butter, which was surprisingly good on a corner store purchase that resembled crumpets but turned out to have a subtle, sweet bean curd in the center (arguably the Korean version of a hybrid crumpet and Pop Tart).

Sadly, I am not finding the grocery stores near me as heavenly as Gourmet Market in Bangkok. My new grocery stores are currently a crowded mass of majority unrecognizable Korean ingredients, every aisle seems to have a lady advertising certain wares in voluble tones, and it is rather picky of me but sometimes I’m not happy to recognize items such as live eels or frozen whole pig legs (with hoof) and one night a blue-green jellyfish sent me scurrying to the cash register without fulfilling my intended purchase of chicken meat. Also, I cannot find a lime to save my soul and because I was desperate, I ended up using what I now know is white ginseng in place of ginger (although I discovered ginger today).

I’ve read that 2-persons are preferred in Korean restaurants and there is so little English here that I am rather petrified regarding eating out by myself. I must get over this. Soon. Anyway, I’ve so far only had 3 restaurant meals: sushi with a Canadian lady that I met while walking across the street, and chicken fried rice that was fried for a bunch of us Western teachers by a waiter in a sunken almost-wok at the table, and a wonderful new teacher welcome meal of all TFLHS English faculty at a place that I had already heard several accolades about called Sea House. Sea House is a buffet restaurant: clean, spacious, western chairs, tables, napkins + forks, wine in glass cabinets, and fantastic food. I enjoyed sushi, noodles, a crab salad, fruit, pickled side dishes, chicken sate and goodness knows what else. Every morsel was delicious although I briefly burned with mortification when I realized that I missed and even started talking while someone was giving a welcoming speech about me - in English - so I didn’t have much of an excuse except that there was no “attention” and not even everyone was looking the speaker’s way. *sigh*

Anyway, back to grape peeling. Last night I was glued to my desk proof-reading the student English magazine (not an easy job – it took me in excess of 4 hours). I took a break when dinner was served and picked up some extra deep purple, globular grapes to return with me to my desk for dessert. However, during dinner, my left-side dinner companion startled me by demonstrating her grape peeling technique. “We peel our grapes in Korea because of bad skin.” What the (#(*(*w#??? I wasn’t sure if this meant that grape skins were bad for the skin (i.e. one’s health and beauty – ever a Korean concern) or if there was a pesticide problem. I was informed by my right-side dinner companion, who is from Shanghai, China, that the Chinese also peel their grapes. When in Rome… so instead of having a nice dessert at my desk, I had a full tummy and sticky, grape juice covered fingers and had to thoroughly wash before resuming my work. Later, I found out that grape peeling is indeed due to pesticide-laden grape skins and that there is a technique for slipping grapes from their skin with your teeth. Oh, dear. I may have to buy a bunch of grapes and practice.

In sum, overall, I’m doing ok with the food – but I have a lot to learn and more to experience. And I haven’t a clue what I’m eating so every meal is an adventure.

Bon Appetite! --Laura

PS: Naturally, I’ve made a few laughable mistakes: I had one Jonah day when I forgot my morning coffee and at lunch, I dropped a bright orange noodle down the front of my white pants. Wiping the vivid evidence of my chopstick error with toilet paper did not help but rushing home and changing did.

But my biggest mistakes was bragging to a class of students that I do fine with chopsticks. And I can – so what is the problem? The problem is that they line up near the faculty table for lunch and find observing me adequate entertainment while they wait. But I hate being on a figurative stage with metal chopsticks in my hand. One day I tried to cheat by using the spoon and was actually goaded into demonstrating my chopstick ability by a giggly student. I gave a competent performance and simultaneously promised myself to never again tell the students anything about myself that they can verify!

Dear Friends and Family,

Please don’t take this the wrong way – but I do not in any way regret pulling myself out of Seattle and there are few places that I’d prefer to now be than in Daegu, Republic of Korea. And yet there always was going to be a day when I woke up missing parts of my old life – I pretty much figured that this would happen about two months into this adventure. And sure enough, I diagnosed the beginning of my case of culture shock during my first weekend in Daegu.

Please return with me to the second day of September, just after my first day of “teaching” where I only needed to shadow my jet-lagged co-teacher and smile a lot. That first Friday, I returned to an apartment devoid of sheets & towels (but lots of other nice items that had been provided), my clothes in suitcases, no food, a really hard bed, needing to rearrange my furniture, no coffee, no idea where I was in relation to the rest of the city, and worst of all, both the power on my iPod + my computer were way down. I was also a bit panicky at the news that I’d be planning my own curriculum. So as I pulled myself into wakefulness on that first Saturday morning, I immediately began contemplating my priorities and decided to first tackle the living concerns (food and apartment) and then see what I could do about the rest. My kind Korean guide had offered to help me on Sunday but that was his sole day off that week and while I was grateful to have his phone number in case I got myself into trouble, I was also extremely loathe to make any request that might disturb his day off.

My first excursion was to E-Mart: a humungous, 3-story store that forcefully reminded me of Fred Meyer. There I spent $37 on a single sheet (that turned out deformed but usable) and I had a hard time locating towels without large words embroidered across them but departed nonetheless satisfied that I had the bare necessities. I hauled my purchases the mile and a half to the apartment and rearranged it into my home. For the first time in 10 weeks, I was no longer living out of suitcases. Hooray!

Well, hooray, except that I had been discouraged on the US to Korean power conversion for my computer. I was disappointed but not wholly unsurprised that neither E-Mart nor the subsequent electronic stores that I visited could help. It was a genuine great effort for the electronic salespeople to advise me in English to visit “Home Plus.” (English was the problem, not the recommendation). I thanked all while internally grimacing because finding E-Mart had been a struggle and the location of Home Plus in this city of 2.5 million was a complete mystery. And I desperately wanted my computer!!!!!!!!! Frustration began to well up inside me but was tamped down with every determined footfall on the way back to my studio.

My second excursion was to explore the neighborhood. Now able to live, I was in full exploration mode and at best, hoping for a map of the city. The sunshine was warm and autumnal golden, only a few fluffy cotton ball clouds marred the blue sky, the streets puffed dust with every step, and I met a Canadian lady while crossing the street. She introduced herself (I had been reticent), she had lived in Daegu some years previous and had returned just last week and decided to explore my University neighborhood which has apparently changed much but was then and appeared now to be a good part of the city to hang out. I acted cool on receiving the news that I was living near a University. We walked through the streets that wind through the mid-section of the main, gridded streets, ambled through a fresh produce market, walked past my first coffee shop (aptly named “Sleepless in Seattle”!), and then she and I had lunch at sushi place that turned out to be rather pricey (around $8 which may turn out pricey for Korea but seemed in the acceptable range to me). We got along well but didn’t seem to have a lot in common so we exchanged e-mails and parted after she inquired about which bus number went downtown. She was lead to the bus stop and pointed to #305. We said good-bye and I continued on my way. I did not find a map but did manage to pick up ingredients for a green curry for dinner.

After satisfactorily proving that my Thai cooking classes were worth every Baht, I pulled out my Korean Lonely Planet and re-read the very brief section on Daegu. The book helpfully mentioned that Daegu has Tourist Information booths around the city and provided the name of the subway stop for the train station. Ok, here was information I could work with. After some thought, I decided to take that #305 downtown bus and use the same technique that had worked well in Bangkok: take the public transportation to and from the same spot in order to explore. The bus would give me a look around the city and with any luck, it would take me past a subway stop and I could then try the subway to a Tourist Information booth, which must have something helpful in English. I had heard that there was a Starbucks and a Seattle’s Best downtown and I put my computer’s power cord in my purse to re-tackle that pressing problem. I really wanted to write and listen to music and I kept having to tell myself not to call my kind Korean guide, reminding myself that not having a computer does not constitute an emergency and promising myself that Monday was soon enough to deal with the computer problem, if I couldn’t solve it on my own. I had also gleaned the name of a big Daegu bookstore from LP and figured that would be worth checking out for teaching books, reasoning that a majority of Westerners in Daegu are teachers.

And guess what? This exploration worked better than I dreamed it would! Getting on the bus was easy, coincidentally it passed the famous Home Plus on its way downtown, and it passed several subway stops so eventually I picked a point and got off the bus. My Korean guide had thought that I might find a map at a convenience store chain called FamilyMart so I unsuccessfully searched one of those before walking down granite steps into the subway station. I obtained a ticket, rode one train line, changed trains at the Interchange station, successfully acquired a large, free map at the train station tourist information booth, then re-boarded the subway and found the Kyobo bookstore. I found the best English selection in town eclectic and disappointingly small in all areas except for affordable paperback classics. And English books are pricey – at least double what we pay in the States. I was glad that I had brought my own reads. But there was a small section of teaching books so I bought myself a nice Cambridge resource on curriculum planning. But the best part of the bookstore visit by far was the second floor Starbucks where I joyfully picked out a bag of beans and a French press.

Things were looking up.

I retraced my steps to the subway, to the bus. I got off at the Home Plus stop and walked into another completely huge store. I wandered, wide-eyed for a bit before making my way down to the electronics section. Holding my power cord and using the best simple language I own, I explained my dilemma to a gentleman. He listened sympathetically, examined my power cable and lead me to a wall of converters. He couldn’t find what I needed and I was a bit too close to having a tantrum at the unfairness of life when the gentleman did something very surprising. He told me to wait, he’d give me the right cord. I wasn’t sure that I had heard him right and paced the surge protector and shower aisle (was it my anxious frame of mind or does that seem like a bad combo to you?) until he returned. He had unplugged the US part of the cord and substituted a Korean one – and this looked to be the perfect, perfect solution. I was so excited, I could’ve been a jumping for joy Toyota commercial. I thanked him and then asked him how much. He reiterated that it was a gift. I hugged my new, working, Korean computer power source to my chest and said “thank you.” I wished I could do something more: write a letter to his manager (I would’ve left out why I was so pleased with his customer service) or at least thank him in his language – but Korean was completely out of my grasp and all I could is summon my gratitude into my eyes, look at him directly and give him the sincerest thanks that I could manage.

As the sun set that Sunday in Daegu, my computer and iPod were both re-charging while I ate leftover green curry on Korean noodles and contemplated my happiness… and my dare I say, culture shock?

While I do not truly regret going to Thailand first, I’m now having the oddest reaction to South Korea. Apparently a usual reaction for someone in my shoes is a cultural “honeymoon period” where everything is new and exciting and adventurous and fun, followed by inevitable culture shock and frustration caused by the difficulties in living in a foreign country. And then the foreigner starts comparing and longing for her/his home country and then some adjust and some do not. Hmm…

Well, through no fault of its own, Daegu did not get much of a honeymoon from me… while it is new and different, I’ve been hard-pressed to dig up adventurous spirit that accompanied me on my first foray on the Bangkok Skytrain, or up to the top story of Angkor Wat, or on the North-bound train to Chang Mai. I’m still compelled to explore but the joy is missing. And interestingly, I’m not comparing Daegu to Seattle, I’m comparing Daegu to Bangkok. And Daegu, despite its residence in a further-developed country, is not usually winning. You may recall that originally, I went to Bangkok because it was a readily accessible city with lots of English and I had thought that this would prepare me for living in a less accessible city such as Daegu. Well, in actuality, in some ways it did. For example, if I had come directly from Seattle to Daegu, I would’ve never been able to navigate the city as I had done. As absurd as it sounds, the exploration that I did that Sunday took a certain amount of skill and more than a little courage. I had developed both in Bangkok and was able to reap the results in Daegu.

But what I failed to anticipate is how much I’d miss Thailand. I miss knowing the cultural does and don’ts and the ability to say “thank you.” I’m petrified of offending here in Korea and of course, any Korean language is coming slowly (although thanks to some skilled, determined teachers, I’m close to having “hello” & “thank you” down). And oddly, I’m longing for Thai food. Notice that I said that the first meal that I cooked was green curry… and the next meal became Tom Yum Gung soup. Then I went looking for coconut milk at E-Mart and when I couldn’t find it nor limes nor green papaya nor mango nor ginger, I had a spate of longing for Bangkok – and Gourmet Market. A few days later, my kind Korean guide offered to swing by a “Western” store and laughed and told me “no” when I wondered if they would have Thai cooking ingredients. I don’t think he knows what to make of my missing Thailand… and frankly neither do I.

However, I’ve contemplated this a lot more since that Sunday plate of leftover curry and I have come up with a much more complicated explanation about why I miss Bangkok. I do miss aspects of the city: the way that it caters to tourists, i.e. its accessibility to English speakers, its varied beauties (architectural, its greenery, its fashions), Wendy House (both its friendliness & ease of being looked after), its possibilities for yummy Thai food, and its wonderful shopping. But what I truly miss is the camaraderie of our CELTA class and the company that it yielded – something that I have not yet found in Korea. I’ve had to mentally force myself back to recall how long it took me to become comfortable in Bangkok and remember that my bubbly happiness in Bangkok started after the CELTA. I’ve come to realize that knowing how to conduct myself in Daegu will come with time…

But what I have not yet figured out how to recapture is the wonder that I felt upon arriving in Bangkok… remember my amazement as I walked into the Pantip? It is only natural, I suppose, for one to tire of always asking questions and for a change, want easy answers.

So I’m slowly talking my frustrated self into why Korea is going to occupy a different place in my heart: I’m already learning a lot about the culture, I am going to learn (hopefully more than some of) the language, I’m going to travel, and I have a golden opportunity to assess myself and my future. And I truly like my co-workers, adore my apartment, and enjoy my students. Soon I’ll have Internet access in my apartment and I already have a school vacation coming up and the question to answer: shall I go somewhere or shall I stay? So I say again that there are few places that I’d prefer to now be than in Daegu, Republic of Korea. But being here isn’t currently as easy as it sounds.

No worries - I’m slowly recapturing my “Will to do, the Soul to dare…”

Love,

Laura

Daegu, Republic of Korea (aka South Korea)

Dear Friends and Family,

I adore my living situation. And for once, I’ll attempt to use pictures over words to tell you all about my cozy apartment…


The building… my window is drawn all the way back, sandwiched between the other two floors, on the side closest to us.


The building stair …


The ladies selected pink and green paisley for my bed… which grew on me surprisingly quickly!


The facilities… the kitchen is on the left. It has a good-sized window that affords me views of the street. My favorite time of day is when the setting sun casts patches of gold down the street… The kitchen has a stainless sink, a 3-burner gas stove, cabinet space, a washing machine, a drying rack hung from the ceiling, and an old school desk which works v. well for counter space. I find this kitchen fairly congenial for cooking and have discovered the secret to dish-washing: only own 1 plate, several bowls and a few pans. One is forced to wash dishes often and there are never many dishes to wash.

The bathroom is on the right. I cannot like the arrangement of combination shower stall + bathroom – but my bathroom is clean (even now), it has a nice bit of storage and I seem to have mastered not wetting the TP nor towels. For days I rebelled in wearing the plastic flip flops that the ladies kindly provided for me – but in the end, I succumbed to good sense as having wet feet for the entirety of one’s morning is not pleasant.

On the far right hangs a piece of silk that I purchased in Cambodia. I’ve never been over-inclined towards the hanging fabric on my walls (usually my Mum’s inclination) but as I traveled with my corrupting textile-o-phile friend, silk grew on me. This piece is half green, half orange/gold and all beautiful. When my friend and I purchased our pieces, the silk reeked of the Cambodian old market so the sales lady suggested that we wash it with shampoo. I’m hoping that it no longer stinks as I haven’t yet found someone in Korea to act as my nose….


Koreans traditionally eat at ground-level and probably succeed in actually hiding their laundry under their tables (sorry)… I occasionally eat or type on the floor although generally I move my short-legged table to the bed and prop myself against the wall. The apartment floor rises from the doorway because there is a winter floor heating system, which I’ll apparently be very grateful for but I've had to now teach myself to not trip every time I walk through my doorway. The rack is golf-themed, not my favorite look, and the brown cabinet on the right is intended for shoes…

And we have now gone full circle. Although arguably modest by US standards, my abode is clean, perfectly comfortable, and happily sized in order to discourage me from buying filling it with stuff. V. good. --L

Dear Family and Friends,

I have a confession to make: I’m finding this new identity of “Laura Drumm, High School Teacher” rather surreal. Honestly, I picture teachers as smart, well-educated, nurturing, hard-working, and well, older. LOL! The rational adult in me realizes that I’m both old and qualified but the last vestiges of my Peter Pan mentality keep popping up to marvel at this new me. I show up to work in a school that vaguely resembles my old high school, I hang out in a teacher faculty room, I plan lessons, and I get to cut in line in the cafeteria (far and away the best part of being a teacher). Amusingly, I’ve already had an instance when a student called out “teacher” and I turned the other direction to figure out where the teacher was. There was no one behind me so I recovered and went to answer the student’s question. (Wrinkle nose). Oh.

Now before you get over-sympathetic that I walked into a classroom just after my time in Korea surpassed the 24 hour mark, please let me assure you that that was where I fully expected to be. My contract commenced on September 1, 2006, and I had read of instances where teachers arrived in Korea, were taken directly from the airport to the school, were handed a textbook and shoved into their classroom. I actually brain-stormed a few first day activities and was profoundly grateful that they were not necessary. My native co-teacher, who has been at our Daegu Foreign Language High School for 3 years, actually arrived at school more jet-lagged than I and he was the unlucky teacher both responsible for the classes and having me “observe” him that first day. He and I are the only native teachers at the school, we work with 12 classes over the period of a week and the plan was for me to observe/work with him during that first week and then divide the students into 2 classes of 15 for the course of the semester. Talk about an easy first week for me!

The signs regarding the conditions of this job were all very positive: I took to my Korean teaching guide immediately (frankly, I’m afraid that his English and understanding of US culture is better than mine). I agreed with what he told me about the philosophy of the school and they were giving me the time to observe an experienced teacher before taking over classes. I was warmly welcomed by every member of the teaching staff and administration. My apartment was everything promised and the school had taken a touching amount of extra trouble to supply me with blankets (amusingly, I later found the brand name of one blanket to be Laura), pillows, and thoughtful kitchen and bathroom basics – which all exceeded the call of duty. And my co-teacher is all that I could wish for: he is a good teacher, genuinely wants what is best for the students, and has been ever-so gracious in guiding me. He is British, excessively witty and excellent company – which makes working and accompanying him at school a true pleasure. Although his drawing skills when it comes to curly hair leave a lot to be desired (believe you me), his ability to create a comfortable conversational English class is enviable. I have a lot to learn from him.

Our first Friday class is second period and just as class time approached, we walked to what is labeled the “English Only Zone” classroom. We slid back the classroom door, walked in and as the students noticed me an “ooooh” went across the room. The bell rang and my co-teacher prompted “captain?” and a student stood up and called “Attention, bow.” All the students bowed their heads and said “good morning, sir” and my co-teacher smiled broadly in response and said “and ma’am? I’ve brought you my sister and she’ll introduce herself.” I duly did just that, that time and the next 11 in addition, generally telling the students that my name was Laura, eliciting where they thought I came from (there were a surprising number of guesses for Canada), and asking if they had heard of Seattle. I was impressed by their grasp on Seattle’s location and that they generally associated Seattle with “Sleepless in Seattle” or baseball (Ichiro?), and rain. I always added Boeing and/or Microsoft (but left it open to my co-teacher to throw in Bill Gates – who appears to be more famous than Microsoft) and my face always lit up when the students guessed coffee. Especially that first morning as there had been one plane ride, two mornings, and only a few good hours of sleep between me and my last cup of coffee. I hadn’t even glimpsed an opportunity for coffee, let alone a Starbucks, since arriving in Daegu and I was suffering cruelly. Oh, coffee… Anyway, I tried to be an unobtrusive classroom observer but instead I found myself an occasional participant (more and more as the “observation” week went on) and an excellent “realia” example for the adjective “curly.” (CELTA definition of realia: real life item in classroom to illustrate concept).

When not in a classroom, I spend time at my desk in the faculty room which houses me and about 30 other teachers. I’m not sure why my desk is at the opposite end of the room from my co-teacher and Korean guide teacher (practicalities, some sort of protocol?) but my next-desk neighbor is a genial gentlemen who teachers grammar. He told me that he’d have lots of questions for me and I groaned and laughed (seriously, I still cannot really define or explain it) and have been teasing him with “no grammar questions before 10 am.” I intend to move this time back until it becomes “no grammar questions before midnight.” Wish me luck. I do actually intend to acquire a tutor-recommended grammar book and work my way through it as this is a major personal deficiency. Although during the CELTA, I learned that our 4 non-native English speakers put us native speakers to shame in the grammar arena. At least I’m not alone.

As my introductory week went on, I was disconcerted to find that I had become a hot topic of conversation at school. The students began asking other teachers about me (which I learned when the teachers would pose the same questions to me). And in class, the students began “guessing” that I was from Seattle (forget the US) and sometimes called me instead of my co-teacher in the classroom. I’ve now had many complements such as pretty and young and perky (this always makes me worried as this is a usual first, not last impression, of me). But my favorite complement by far was being likened to Brittany Spears. Ok, in the States, this is an insult. But coming from a Korean teenager, this is a complement and I thanked her and then laughed and said that I couldn’t wait to be married to Kevin Federline (all the while thinking “that piece of scum”). I’ve been interviewed for two class “news” projects and promised to help review an English application to a Japanese college. I’ve been told that the students are excited to be in my first class and one student was sad when my first class ended. Talk about a warm reception. I’d be less than human to be anything but flattered by the attention but I’m also hoping that it’ll soon die away.

Anyway, I’ve now been in Korea for 10 days. I’m keeping myself fairly occupied with work and attempting to set-up a life in the most foreign country I’ve yet been to. I’ve now purchased sheets and towels, arranged my apartment, obtained an alien card (I hate that term when used in the US and am no more fond of it here in Korea), can plug my computer in (a major accomplishment that you can sure I’ll brag about another day), and found myself a Starbucks where I didn’t blink at the expense of a French press and ground coffee. I’ve taught my first class, obtained the assignment of co-teaching reading comprehension with a Korean teacher (excellent opportunity to read those classics I never got around to: The Little Prince, My Antonia…), and I am already desperate for some basic lessons in Korean. In other words, me being me, I have a lot more to tell you. Some other day. I also owe a few good friends some quality e-mails. Bear with me.

From the bottom of my heart I can assure you that I miss you all - but that it is good to be almost-settled here, in Daegu, in South Korea.

Laura Drumm, High School English Teacher

(Wait! WHO????)

Dear Friends and Family,

The odds were always pretty favorable that I’d commit to a year in South Korea. There is a strong demand for native English speaker teachers (especially females), I like seasons and hiking amongst fir trees, I felt a pull towards the origin of my aunts, I could pretty much live anywhere to achieve my goal of living within a different society, and reportedly the ability to save money (more travel!) is higher in Korea. But there are reasons why Korea tends to pay its native teachers better: while the country has achieved phenomenal economic success, the cultural rules of the country run deep and are reputed difficult for Westerners to function in. I had been warned, on numerous occasions, that the patriarchal male system remains firmly intact thanks to the culture’s deep-rooted attachment to Confucianism, that there were many miscommunication problems between employer and employee, that Westerners feel very isolated, that Korean culture can be harsh, and worst of all, that there were many unscrupulous employers in Korea and that recourse for a Westerner under Korean law is limited. Although I had also been assured that with the right situation, teaching in Korea is utterly worth it.

I came to view my decision on where to teach as a gamble and truly, any situation besides staying snuggled in Seattle was a risk. But what I did do is my best to mitigate the chances of placing myself in a bad situation. I obtained the CELTA, I read up on teaching in Korea, I carefully contemplated what I had discovered about myself as a teacher in Bangkok, and I vigilantly examined the conditions proposed by each job offer that I received. In the end, I selected the contract to teach at Daegu Foreign Language High School based on working conditions: number of teaching hours, that I’d be teaching at a public school (v. good job in Korea), I was told that I could act on my own ideas regarding teaching the curriculum, and I hoped that high schoolers would be advanced and motivated students.

There. Decision made.

But I was very scared. What if the job had been misrepresented to me? What were the implications that I was running late (due to Visa problems)? What if my living situation was not favorable? What if I had immediate problems with the boss? What if… What if… what if… what if…? So much for my goal of quieting fears – my fears had returned, were perched on my shoulders, and they spoke me every time my thoughts strayed from Thailand to Korea. I know myself to be a bad gambler and so even the knowledge that I had done my best to mitigate the risks was cold comfort.

And exiting Thailand was a pain. It was 10:30 pm when I arrived at Bangkok International, earlier than my flight check-in started and so I was forced to stand for 40 minutes leaning against my suitcase cart, I got lost on the way to a far counter to pay for my excess baggage weight, I had decided to redeem the tourist tax (which was barely worth the headache), and I had read about but had forgotten the 500 THB exit fee that Thailand charges exiting foreigners, which necessitated a run to the cash machine. I had just a little Thai money left and coupled that with my tourist tax money to buy a few cans of coconut cream and some yellow curry but then I found myself thirsty and unable to afford bottled water (which was 5 times the usual price).

I was the only Westerner on the plane but I did get an entire 3-seat airplane row to myself. Not long after we were in the air, I made myself as comfortable as possible, took a melatonin and sleepily endured the normal airplane sleeping discomfort, the seemingly constant announcements to fasten our seatbelts and that the flight attendants kept waking me to check under my blanket to ensure I was buckled in. I was not destined to get a lot of sleep during the 6 hour flight and nor did I. The sun was above the horizon throwing sparkles on the water as we approached Korea from the South Sea (aka East China Sea) but the land was covered by clouds and our decent into Daegu offered me the first glimpse of Korea.

My first impression was of a lot of tall green hills surrounding a city that had a remarkable number of white, uniform apartment buildings that from the air resembled cave stalagmites up-side-down.

Customs and collecting baggage was easy. Withdrawing money from an ATM was easy. Finding a taxi driver was easy as I had a note in Korean to give to the driver. (I felt a bit like Paddington Bear – with a note around my neck saying please look after this bear, he has a dozen suitcases and likes marmalade.). The driver’s ability to find the school administration building in which I was directed to wait at was not impressive but I sat in the back seat looking genuinely helpless, smiled a lot and provided him with a phone number to call. I arrived at the Daegu Metropolitan School District Headquarters just before 10 in the morning and had four or five hours to kill before the Korean native-speaker-supervisor who was expecting me returned from orientation with 35 other native teacher in tow. I just didn’t have it in me to take myself exploring and so I was sweetly provided with a computer for entertainment and instant coffee. At lunch, one of the ladies ordered “black noodles” and she ordered the same for me. I had wandered away to use the facilities at 2:30 when the bus arrived and spilled a crowd of newly minted Daegu “native English” speaking teachers, all with suitcases or backpacks. I was greeted warmly by the supervisor and slotted myself into the activities, truly a euphemism for wandering around, not quite sure where we were supposed to be. I spoke with a few of the other teachers but again, I just didn’t have in me to do my friendly “hi, I’m Laura” routine. We were eventually gathered into a large meeting room and soon Korean school employers began arriving to attend a welcome, this is “their agreement” meeting (with us politely listening and not understanding a word of the Korean) and then take us to our new homes and schools.

I immediately liked the man who came to fetch me – again, while I shall badly want to describe the people that I’m meeting here, for the time-being, I’m going to follow the same practice as I did with the CELTA and this blog: I’m going to stick to as necessary nice descriptions and skip the negative. Oh, I’ll likely slip up and start using nicknames as I did before but for now I must remember that I’m here for a year, that Korea can be a cultural mine field for Westerners (even if they do not keep a blog), and that finding my blog within Google is scarily easy. So let’s suffice to say that the man that fetched me was nice and unfailingly courteous, even when he met my suitcases. And this is saying something, no?

He drove me and another teacher (who lived in the same apartment building as me when I first arrived and sometimes teaches a city-wide gifted class that is held at my school) to my apartment. We tugged the suitcases to the third floor and the kind sir dug out a key, patiently waited while I took my first look at the place (it met or exceeded my expectations), noticed that my wardrobe was unsteady and helped level it before taking me to the school. He told me that it is a five minute walk to school, but it is less than a block away so I laughed and told him that it was more like a 5 second walk. I was avid to see my new work place but exhaustion was also seeping along my limbs and I could feel grit and oils from my unwashed face beginning to run. My guide had inquired if I was hungry several times and I finally cottoned on to ask if he was hungry and he told me that the school serves dinner at 6:20. Well, I could eat, of course. We first walked to the faculty room and I was introduced around, I did a lot of smiling and knew that I would not retain a single name or what he/she taught and I barely caught the faces. Oh, I was tired. I knew that this was going to be a problem on the morrow but just couldn’t deal with it then. Of course now everyone knows my name and face while I’m still… learning.

We then walked with a group of other teachers to the cafeteria. I followed my guide: I picked up a rectangular metal tray with 5 small circular dishes indented into it, two metal chopsticks, and a spoon. I walked over to the food line and helped myself to kimchi (always the first dish served) and rice and some other dishes that I must confess that I now cannot recall and that I certainly cannot name. I liked the food and acquitted myself well with the chopsticks but I had a horribly embarrassing moment: you see, I can tell when my face gets to must-wash stage because it upsets my eyes. My face needed a good wash but I was not comfortable enough to do so. So there I was at dinner and I took a bite of something hot and the combination of the spicy food + grit from my face was too much for my eyes. Tears flowed down my faced and I had been given no napkin. I gesticulated for a few moments before finally someone pointed out toilet paper on a near by table. I turned away to wipe my eyes and take a deep breath, than sat down and profusely apologized. Ooooohhhhh! Not, not a good first impression!

Not long after that, my guide inquired if I should like to head to my apartment. He would’ve walked me but that was quite unnecessary so I took myself back to the apartment, washed my face, and was asleep minutes after my iPod promised to wake me for my first day on the job in the morning.

Daegu Foreign Language High School here I come!

Laura

Dear Family and Friends,

Bangkok good-byes began with Noi, one of my favorite W House ladies, the one who bestowed my laptop’s name of “Baby,” the one who sheltered Baby while I was in Cambodia, the one who advised regarding the cheaper post office, the one who laughed at my pestle and mortar, and the one who hugged me tightly and told me that “they’d await my return.” Ahh… The good-byes continued when my traveling friend and my ex-pat friend and I met at Food Court restaurant. One had pizza, one had Singaporean noodles, I had Tandori tofu (I ordered what looked good) and a dessert of fried rice balls (I tasted but didn’t really like) served with tamarind ice cream (v. nice). We then took my last journey on the Skytrain, whence I hugged my expat friend, ran to my room, sped-finished thank you cards to W House girls, changed into jeans, and zipped my suitcases. I tugged them down the stairs and final good-byes commenced. I smiled with and hugged the giggly food girls who were so wonderful and then I said a grateful and respectful good-bye to Wendy – who I am positive had waited to see me off. Wendy called for my cab while I said a fond, fond farewell to Bo, who had patiently taught me all the Thai I knew, who had encouraged me to try her dinners so I’d have an idea about genuine Thai food, and who has the best smile in Bangkok. And I said an easier farewell to my traveling companion, whom I’m certain I will see again. Suddenly, my suitcases were in the trunk of the cab and I was turning to watch my friends, lit by the W House sign in the soi, wave as we pulled away. How could I not be sad?

Bangkok will always hold a special place in my heart – and it is no exaggeration to say that a great part of this is because the people at Wendy House are special.

It was not “my” driver that took me to the airport – he sent another and the other wasn’t able to tell me why. As we traversed the darkened Bangkok streets, flat drops splattered the car and created white & red refractions all over us. We were stuck in traffic and I was alone with my turbulent thoughts until I pulled out my journal… naturally that was when the driver managed to pull away from the traffic and my writing got ragged for a few blocks until we got re-stuck and the driver glanced at me and said “same, same.” I sympathetically agreed.

Yet honestly, I was preoccupied with the ghosts gathered in the my mind’s eye: me in my “cowgirl outfit” (dubbed so by one of my Thai students) sitting at the Ratchadamari bar with beer and the boys, the uncertain me pulling my heavy suitcases into my new, hot-pink blanketed room at the top of W House. Me, in shorts, staring for the first time at the Skytrain map or signing myself into a teaching practice group under the florescent ECC classroom lighting, or laughing with my Siem Reap friend over the cement dust scattered all over the classroom. My close CELTA friend and I giggling at the day’s events over Soya noodles and coconut juice, my traveling friend and I edging stair by stair down the to steep Wat Arun, my “smiley” smile as I worked with students from the front of a classroom, the literal camera flashes from our student party on the final day of CELTA, the gold, peaceful forever reclining Buddha touching the ceiling of Wat Pho, the accidental splashes of the powerful Chao Phraya on my face. Singing down the flooded streets of Chang Mai, stiff, dust-laden hair from the “natural air conditioning” of Theara’s Cambodian tuk tuk, my frolicking friend’s smiling face pressed against the glass as I typed on Baby at the W House window. I feel that I am the same Laura that you all know – but how can I not have acquired additional sensitivities from my Southeast Asian experiences? How can I not cry inside at the hunger in Cambodia? How can I not listen for Buddhist temple bells? How can I not have acquired a certain amount of confidence derived from experience in front of classroom or in making travel arrangements or in exploring a town when I don’t speak a word of their language? How can I not?

And of course, the answer is that I have acquired all of this and more. I feel as if I’ve switched from existence to living. But Bangkok was a suspension, a pause, while Korea and (I pray) the answers to the questions that I departed the States with, await. Time will tell.

This is my last blog entry from Thailand.

Love,

Laura

Dear Friends and Family,

On Tuesday morning in Gmail, I found a wistful comment from a friend who said that while she was enjoying my travels via this blog, she found that she missed the, shall we say, livelier me. I read the e-mail and contemplated her comments as I set about errand-running on my final full day in Bangkok.

Well, for Corn’s sake, I have been quite serious, have I not? I think this has a lot to do with the fact that I’m keeping my own company these days and that I’ve spent a lot time contemplating not-so-easy to answer questions such as where I want to teach, what I value in my own life, Thai culture, as well as worrying about how I am going to do in Korea, or… well, anyway, the list goes on. Since the middle of the night taxi ride from Bangkok International to the Davis Hotel, I’ve kept my eyes propped wide open every minute of every day and I’ve been filling my brain and senses with as many observations and details as possible. This blog is laden with my experiences and observations, although it does not contain half of what I’ve seen or could tell of (scary thought). So part of my brain was preoccupied searching for Bridget stories when I committed to buying two items from a street vendor, opened my wallet, and realized that I needed to go to the ATM. I was embarrassed that I had bargained her down without having money to pay for my purchases (one was unplanned) and I conveyed this as best I could to the vendor (who actually lowered her price thinking I was walking away!) and hurried to the ATM at the BTS station.

Out came that day’s funds and while I re-commenced digging for Bridget stories, I also decided to purchase my Skytrain ticket right then to create a short cut between the ATM and the street vendor. I couldn’t think of a notable Bridget moment past the CELTA, barring the one-woman-karaoke through Chang Mai. Anyway, ticket in hand, I walked through the in-gates and then walked through out-gates and the machine kept my ticket. I made an indignant sound and said to the Thai security guard: “it ate my ticket! I haven’t used it yet!” The guard half-smiled as he listened to my protestations and finally (probably because it was easier), he sent me to the ticket booth, where a lady issued me a hand-written ticket. The guard then opened the manual gate to let me through – but I shook my hand at him and said “no… thank you. I’ll be right back.” He looked puzzled as I hurried down the stairs to my vendor and completed my purchases. She was very happy I had returned.

I then re-walked up the same stairs, looked ruefully at the guard, who grinned at me, exaggeratedly let me through the gate, and then immediately got on his radio. I don’t know what he said, obviously, but as I arrived at the BTS platform, 3 guards simultaneously turned to look at me. Internally I groaned but outside I gave them a sweet smile all while wondering how I manage to be so… me… while others go through life with such elegance and ease. Hmmm…

The Skytrain arrived, I boarded, sat down and began reading a newspaper. I am very at ease in the Skytrain and I was so interested in the machinations of the current Thai “Caretaker” Prime Minister that I forgot to switch trains. Ok, now, this day was beginning to look a little… hexed. I got off at the next station and waited for what felt like an hour to return to the “Siiiiam, Interchange Station.” I resumed full functionality after happily receiving my Korean Visa. Bad and good things come in 3s: 3 not-quite-Bridget stories in 30 minutes, 3 stamped visas: Thai, Cambodian, and Korean. [smile]

The almost amusing, almost well-traveled,

--Laura

PS: Speaking of Bridget, who is always concerned about her weight, the Korean Embassy is near a few Westernized department stores and I must confess that I’m getting sick of everything I have to wear – especially the items that look as if I’ve worn them a lot (i.e. my white shirts). The problem with me shopping in Thailand is that the majority of Thai ladies are tiny and exquisitely dressed – and they have the shops and the street vendors to enable this. Sadly, on Thai terms, I am really fat. Upon rare occasion, you can find items in bigger (“tourist”) sizes and the one time I actually considered buying an outfit, it was obvious that even the tourist size wouldn’t fit me. Well, maybe someday (today’s picture is to remind me of someday). Anyway, I went through one Western department store near the embassy looking for items in my size and came up empty-handed. While I congratulated myself on not having to resist the temptation of buying something, I also bemoaned that I could not buy anything. Of course, later that day I went to another department store and found 4 items that fit me – the new stock in Espirit is v. cute – and I did buy 1 item. I happily announced to my friend that evening “I found that fat lady’s department” – although of course, there is no such thing. My friend thinks that there will be in a few years (the Thai diet is shifting to a lot more sugar than is healthy).

PS II: While I may not be “Laura Drumm, already a legend…” by some estimations, I am remarkably similar to a Thai pop star by the name of Suri. I was highly flattered! Check this out: http://www.suriclub.com/suri_home.php

Dear Family and Friends,

I have a favorite cab driver: I don’t know his name, but I long ago noticed his slightly battered, aging yellow and green painted Toyota taxi parked parallel in the W House soi, with him, weathered face, arms crossed, fully relaxed against the car, awaiting his regular morning customers (?) or a fare from an emerging customer on the soi (?). His cab has tropical fish stickers affixed on the front passenger side window – utterly incongruous even on a Bangkok cab. This driver over-charged me to go to the train station when I purchased my train ticket to Chang Mai (60 THB – about a $1 – I wasn’t truly unhappy with this) but we agreed to metering when he drove me to Vertigo and thereafter. From the choppy English discussions that we had, he respected that I was a teacher (although I’m positive he found me careless of time and money) while I became convinced that he was a hard worker and I always tried to talk him into driving me when I needed a cab (which wasn’t often, actually).

I was very grateful for the association that he and I had built on my last Tuesday in Bangkok. I didn’t require him first thing that morning when I walked down the Jim Thompson tourist-stand-laden soi to find an already-decided upon amusing gift for my father and I was thrilled to finally discover a bell ala Doi Suthep. I don’t know why those bells touched me but I had utterly regretted not buying a bell that day. My bell wasn’t as musical as the one at Doi Suthep but I love it nonetheless. Next, I successfully returned to the Korean embassy to collect my Visa and went shopping at the Jim Thompson store in the posh Siam Paragon mall (I wanted a scarf but couldn’t find one that suited me).

After a quick lunch, I showed my cab driver the address to Korean airlines, he consulted a friend via mobile phone and then drove me to the Bangkok headquarters of Korean Airlines, where I fulfilled my reservation and purchased a direct, one-way plane ticket from Bangkok to Daegu. I had been advised by my recruiter in Seoul that this flight couldn’t be done and was grinning ear to ear when I emerged from the building, ticket in hand. I dreaded the energy and expense of traveling from Seoul to Daegu and was relieved to eliminate that concern (one down, dozens to go!). My driver then returned me to W House where I packed items into a bag and then my cab driver drove me to the cavernous Thai post office, where one postal worker placed everything into a surprisingly small box (grimace) and charged me 27 THB ($.50) and while another lewdly smiled at me while he processed the box, some cards and charged me a lot more than 27 THB to airmail items to the States. My driver returned me to W House. So by 3:15 pm, I had finished my long list of things to do plus I had secured a ride to the airport at 9:30 pm the following evening for less than half the price I had paid to arrive at the Davis. I was packed and pleased – my plane didn’t depart ‘til 1:30 am on Thursday morning so I had one more (stolen day) in Bangkok.

My traveling friend and I celebrated over plates of noodles and iced coffee that night – and planned to have fancier dinner with a third the following night.

I spent my last morning in Bangkok on the Chao Phraya Express to Bangkok’s China Town. I had been there once before for dinner with a few CELTA boys and a few of our students but I had read that it was a must-see in Bangkok and went to take a better look. However, I must confess that I had developed sight-seeing fatigue and the marvels of Chinese-speaking crowds as well as the towering piles of low-priced merchandise such as earrings, watches, Hello Kitty merchandise, fruit, roasted chestnuts, fried pig skins, barrels of rice, already-prepared food steaming on street vendor tables were enjoyable but not heart-gladdening nor even amazing. At first, I followed the LP advised walking tour of the place, took some pictures but then strayed when I began avoiding rain by ducking under a mostly marquee-covered market, discovered some chocolate-mint flavored tim tams at a drug store (hooray!), and risked the purchase and consumption of a hum-bow. I pressed my face against glass to view a few of the famous gold stores lining that main street of China town before I began making my way South to the train station and the MRT stop to return to Siam Square, where I bought a few small gifts for W House friends and took a bit of a nap – knowing that sleep wouldn’t be good that night and not knowing what I was going to find in Korea the next morning.

I then practiced a few extravagances: I had a 30 minute foot reflexology message where the masseuse marveled at my tight calves and my flexibility. She kept saying “Wow” and while I kept getting alarmed: was this a good “wow” or a bad “wow”? And then I had a pedicure. I had never had a pedicure until a kind friend treated me to one in the States on the morning of my departure and in Bangkok I proceeded to make up for lost time by having 3 more - which combined, including tips, may have equaled the expense of my friend’s kind gift. And I discovered what I dubbed “the fat lady” section at the Tokyo department store and splurged on a new silk shrug + white cami to prepare myself for my new job. I drove the sales clerk there mad – I tried the top on, declined to buy it and then returned later to purchase it but ended buying it at a different cash register, which necessitated a lot of odd paperwork. I returned to W House and commenced with the inevitable, bittersweet good-byes. --L

Dear Friends and Family,

Well, nothing about obtaining entry into Korea had so far been easy – so visiting the Korean Embassy utterly fulfilled my expectations: it was located in a district that wasn’t on my map of Bangkok and after over an hour of purposeful yet futile striding through the ever-heating mid-afternoon, I ultimately found that the directions that I had been given were accurate but far from complete. When I arrived at the embassy, no doubt bright red and sweaty, my paperwork was efficiently processed but there was a problem – I hadn’t brought enough money to cover the charge for the Visa. I had called to inquire how much to bring but couldn’t reach anyone in the know – and my best guess was 200 THB short (~$5) short. I inquired if I could pay the remainder when I picked the Visa up. No. Did they accept credit cards? Nope. Instead, the lady gave me a big smile and informed me that there was an International ATM at the department store a good half mile away. My entire body drooped at this news as the Visa desk closed in 10 minutes. But the lady kindly offered to wait until I returned so I alternately ran or swiftly walked through the humidity, over uneven brick sidewalks, through the mid-afternoon sunshine, breathing hot dust while noticing little beyond my quest for $5. I extracted the cash and hot-footed (pun intended) it to the embassy picturing the German movie Run Lola Run (I could’ve been Lola except she’s way cooler than I) – my hair flying, sweat running. Anyway, I made it to the embassy, where I conspicuously walked across the long lobby, handed the lady my money, received the promise of a Visa on the morrow, and was directed to the ladies room. In the mirror of the ladies room, I discovered gray/black streaks all over my chest from my “silver” necklace and concluded that this was not my best moment. But I had made it and secured the promise of a Visa for the morrow, which was good because time was tight and I had my eye on a flight that departed on Wednesday.

Other Korea preparations included jettisoning luggage weight. A standard problem with flying Asian airlines is that they weigh both your check in and your carryon luggage – and they charge you a lot of your excesses. I’m simply too fond of books to be a light-weight packer; however, the airline had informed me that each kilo would cost me 500 THB (~$15). Oh dear. At SeaTac, I had re-arrange my suitcases on the sidewalk to barely meet the Northwest Airlines requirements before checking my luggage. What hope, really what hope, did I have of being reasonable on an Asian airline? Frankly? No hope. Nonetheless, I decided that I would trim as much as possible and expect to pay extra. And I managed to part with a respectable amount: I sold a few books and parted with liquids and clothing – mostly casual Thai travel clothing and an Isaac Mizrahi sweater that I wore only once for a quick trip downstairs at W House, where I was informed by a very funny British boy that I looked like an escapee from Sesame Street. The boys were quite vigilant during the CELTA and you may congratulate any of them (if you ever meet one) - they never failed to notice nor discuss if something had gone wrong with my outfit or if I managed to get sunburned. [roll eyes] I always find it amusing when men say that only women gossip.

Also, I made a final run to Gourmet Market and picked up Thai key Thai ingredients that I could carry and that I conjectured could not be reproduced in my Korean-kitchen-to-be: red and green curry pastes, shrimp paste, tamarind sauce. Every purchase was carefully assessed on the criteria of necessity, quality, and weight. I also called the Bai Pai cooking school – my late-June cooking class and requested the delivery of a small pestle and mortar. When it was delivered the next day, I laughingly explained to my friend Noi at the front desk of W House that the beautiful, heavy, spice-grinding pestle and mortars were half the reason that I had decided to come to Bangkok. She and I joked about this – every request I made could be tied to the pestle and mortar. “Noi, could I get my room key?” “Oh, you want to visit your pestle?”

Evening came along with a plate of noodles and some “lemon water” at my favorite restaurant (me sadly musing “This is the last Pad Thai I’m going to have in Bangkok!” – but it wasn’t!). And long after bedtime, I was organizing, packing and writing. My list of things to do was very long.

Affectionately,

Laura


PS: This advertisement can be found while riding the MRT subway – it made me laugh every time I rode the Bangkok MRT! It is for True Online – a communications company that offers wireless Internet, of course. Isn’t the ad weird? Oh, no Thai would find it odd and it probably works for this reason. But for us Seattleites… ah, well, the Space Needle is ok. But the WaMu Building image is not normally considered famous or recognizable enough to be international advertising quality – and when did it acquire that fascinating spike on its top??? And checkout the Statue of Liberty, the Golden Gate bridge, the Empire State Building… and does anyone know what that building to the right of the WaMu building is? I could swear I’ve seen it somewhere… is it Chinese???? Interesting. V. interesting.

Dear Friends and Family,

Isn’t today’s picture a lovely example of Italian Renaissance architecture crossed with Neo-Classical architecture? Very reminiscent of the St. Peter’s in Rome… St. Paul’s in London… even the Washington DC Capitol Building… wouldn’t you say? A simply smashing model of the European sensibilities in… wait, Bangkok? Thailand? Asia?

This is the “Ananda Samakhom Throne Hall” (at least it has a Thai name), which stands on the Dusit Palace grounds – the Dusit grounds being a complex of gorgeous royal residences, gardens, and official buildings. This particular throne hall was commissioned by King Rama V, who laid its cornerstone on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of his ascension to the Siamese throne. Through my museum visits and reading, I’ve begun to believe that the Rama Kings were a rather handy lot… a subject in which I long to write on but intend to research a bit more. I must be mindful that the Kings could sound useful to me at this point because my most influential sources have been museums - funded by the various Kings. Hmmm… fishy. Anyway, if all Thai Rama Kings have been useful, then it is fair to say that King Rama V, aka King Chulalongkorn, was the most constructive of kings during his 41 years on the throne. Amongst his many notable achievements, he was the first Thai King to visit Europe on his own steamship (how else should a King globe-trot?) in the late 19th century. I’ve seen a few merry pictures of him with royalty: my, that croquet game with the British lords looked fun and I love how the Swedish Queen towered over him in another. Anyway, the time of Rama V’s reign coincided with when European powers were still doing their damnedest to colonize any or all of the continent to bring civilization to Asian peoples (not to mention wealth to the Europeans) and when Asia was a political mine field (ok, not much has changed on that front). Understanding the time in which King Chulalongkorn lived seems key to understanding an important part of Thai history – and to understanding the Ananda Throne Hall. Naturally, his majesty would be inspired by the sites that he took in during his two Europe steamboat tours – and also desirous of impressing the encroaching Europeans with Thai abilities. Nothing I’ve yet read has taken this latter exact tact – but the building tells the tale.

My friend and I made an early start that last Sunday morning in Bangkok as the palace grounds that we hoped to visit are extensive and we wanted to see as much as possible on our last Sunday in Bangkok. My friend and I disembarked from the usual Chao Phraya Express and utilized every ounce of our navigation skills (combination map + instinct + reading signs) to arrive at the palace grounds. On the way, we passed a long row of gorgeous flower stalls with orchids and other lush plants as well as a number of fish stalls with revolting live eels. Surprisingly, the eels made me want to retch and I quickly realized that for me, the only thing more repulsive than dead meat is meat that is still alive and slithering out of its plastic bucket. Truly. Yuck. Anyway, the sign that we had reached the Southern tip of our intended destination was the above-pictured Ananda Throne Hall – which I was duly impressed and excited by. What can I say? Once an Italian-o-phile, always an Italian-o-phile. (And I soon may a drastic revival as it has been over two months since I’ve had a decent plate of pasta.)

The day had already warmed beyond comfortable and locating the entrance was a mite tricky. My friend and I were already on the downward slope to crankiness when we were told at the entrance to the Vimanmek Mansion that we would need to leave our bags and cameras in a locker - which we had to pay extra for. I believe that my photography skills have improved and I have also begun using my camera in lieu of taking notes – and I was equally displeased to be deprived of it as well as that we were forced to stow our items - and pay for the privilege. Yet our money was handed to the locker authority, our bags got tucked in, and we walked to the entrance of palace which was crowded with other tourists. It was then that we recalled that there would be a poor-quality mandatory tour (our guidebooks had warned us) – we weren’t excited by this either. We passed guards armed with machine guns, walked up metal carpeted staircase and were immediately sent back down the stairs to take our shoes off and put them on concealed shelving. We obeyed but were even less pleased – where were the signs for the shoes? Well, the signs were there but small and accompanied by another sign that announced that the palace isn’t responsible for lost shoes, capped off by the sign that we may not carry our shoes either. Hrrumph. Don’t get me wrong, I respect the Thai’s protecting their royal treasures but that morning, their precautions grated. The English tour began just as we returned, shoeless, so we followed a crowd of about 30 into the mansion.

I forgot my irritation almost immediately because Vimanmek Mansion is amazing. Considered the largest goldenwood teakwood mansion in the world, the palace is a beautiful confluence of Thai materials, Thai sensibilities and European architecture. It has a rather fascinating history too. The mansion had been an innocent royal residence in “Chuthathuj Rachathan at Koh Sri Chang” – wherever the dickens that is – when in 1900, it was carefully dismantled and rebuilt on the Dusit Garden grounds in Bangkok that his majesty had purchased with his personal fortune. King Rama V resided at Vimanmek until the completion of another palace in 1906, when the mansion was closed. However, a queen consort used it in the mid-1920s, King Rama VII renovated it for the heck of it in the 1930s, and then it was turned into a storage place of the Bureau of the Royal Household. During WWII, the mansion/storage facility was actually hit by a Japanese WWII bomb but the damage was repaired and the criminal use of the mansion as a warehouse continued until the current Queen, Sirikit, “discovered” the mansion in 1982 and “asked permission of His Majesty the King (Rama IX) to renovate the mansion for use as a museum to commemorate King Rama V” on the “auspicious occasion of the Bicentennial Anniversary of Bangkok.” Precise, interesting language, that: the queen asked permission of her husband to renovate. But she was absolutely right; apparently queens of Thailand can be handy as well.

Vimanmek has somewhere in the order of 80 rooms, and the teak is smooth, oft times painted v. prettily, and it exudes artistic ability, is gracious, and is lavish without being intimidating. The “L” shaped portion of the building is three stories high and is capped off with a four story, large octagonal almost-turret served as the King’s quarters from 1901 to 1906, while the King built himself another fine residence. Frankly, I don’t know why he bothered: the architecture is gorgeous and I was busily planning my own scaled down version of the mansion as we toured the various available rooms. Our guide’s English was not especially comprehensible and I found it schadenfreude amusing to watch him labor to say the tour lines that he had learned. There wasn’t time or space (due to large number of bodies burdened with stinky breath) (obviously the stinky breath didn’t bother me) to get a quality look at the royal Rama V treasures or the rooms that presented them. And forget answering any questions we might have. Yet again, the palace is beautiful so it was worth every ounce of steam that issued from my ears. And more.

When our tour was ungraciously expelled out the door, my friend and I fished out our shoes and walked to several near-by museums. King Rama V had built several houses similar in style to Vimanmek on the grounds of Dusit for the Queen Grandmother and several of his sisters (including one for the sister that was “in charge of the king’s meals because she was an expert on the culinary art.”). These little houses are gems unto themselves and now accommodate various museums: the current king’s photographs (I’m sorry to report that they didn’t look terribly special to me although we enjoyed insight in to the royal family), an “ancient cloth” museum (not so ancient - ~150 years old – nonetheless, my friend was v. excited), and the Royal Elephant museum. Each museum was rather small – which made them enjoyable, although with each visit we had to stow our bags in a (free) locker and remove our shoes. We broke for a lunch of green curry and iced coffee and then made our way to the throne halls.

Sometimes sights are remarkable for what is not said about them – and this was the case with the Abhisek Dusit Throne Hall. No source that I’ve read specified why; however, in 1903, King Rama V built a one-storey, wooden throne hall with intricate, Moorish-inspired decoration with perfectly melded touches of Victorian (i.e. stained glass patterns). The finished hall is a lovely and a fascinating meld of Thai + European + Moorish architecture - but I don’t think that the hall was ever used for much. Now it displays arts and crafts produced by a foundation that the current queen setup in support of traditional arts and crafts. There were some remarkably beautiful pieces on display: my friend adored intricately woven basket/handbags while I loved an unadorned, perfectly shaped jar and lid set. Our entrance into this hall was closely followed by 40 of the noisiest Thai elders, all clad in yellow-King shirts. Their behavior seemed to indicate that a museum “hush” is not a part of Thai culture. We stayed one stop ahead of the elders, smiled at a few curious about us but didn’t linger due to the noisy crowd.

Stepping into the afternoon heat was especially zapping at that point so we made our way to the big throne hall – only to be stopped at the gate because we needed to buy an additional ticket. So we dragged our feet back to a ticket booth, paid the 50 THB, and returned. We walked through the completely, un-Thai restrained hedge garden to the impressive dome building. We entered from a side and were pointed to lockers and admonished not to put our shoes in the locker – they must be placed on shelves. We rolled our eyes at this. But we were truly exasperated when we were informed that women in pants were not at all allowed in the thone room and loaned garish tropical print skirts. We knotted the “skirts” as best we could and walked up a grand marble, twisting staircase, noting the lack of air conditioning. The place was practically empty and all the more impressive for it – but it was jarring too. When I tipped my head back and began evaluating the murals painted into the smaller domes, I began to realize why I wouldn’t, couldn’t like this place. The murals were painted in grandiose Rubenesque, Italian style. I could see that the murals were supposed to reflect significant Thai events but the painted body shapes were utterly wrong and the Thai symbols were not quite right either. It was dreadful. We walked the large room, daylight streaming in from the majestic central dome, marveling at the reception area with gold-brocade couches, a throne area for the King, red velvet curtains, and un-Thai painted motifs including angels and we just shook our heads. It just felt wrong. The Thai ascetic is beautiful and rivals any ascetic developed in Europe (arguably it exceeds few – Bauhaus?!) and this tremendous, costly, Thai State building is empty of the pride and character of its people, not at all a representation of the wonders of Thailand. Although I picture Western royalty or government officials utterly at home in the Ananda Samakhom Throne Hall, the place made me… sad – even when placed in a historical context.

Drained of energy and spirit, we walked to the entrance and negotiated a taxi cab (“meter, yes?”) to Wendy House. Subsequently, I enjoyed one of the sweetest showers, ever. And then a nap. And I awoke to the reality that my tour-time in Bangkok has pretty much ended.

Fondly, --L

A few reasons why I love Thailand…

W House Girls (and friend) and their Kodak smiles…


The food – just looking at it can be a feast!


Artwork…and no Buddha in sight!


Serious warnings…


Views from the Chao Phraya…


The never-ending amazing temple (wat) art and architecture.


Scenes worth sharing. --L

Dear Family and Friends,

My last Saturday in Bangkok… during my last few days in Bangkok, my first thought upon blinking the sleep from my eyes was that “today is my last ____ in Bangkok and I want to ____.” Maybe our collective addiction to Starbucks would be lessoned if we all awoke with that sort of inspiration. Hmmm… then again probably not as my first thought upon the descent to the W House café was inevitably “how soon can I get that cuppa coffee?” Remarkably, despite the poverty, the confusion, the pollution, and the crowds, somewhere along the line I seemed to have lost a piece of my heart to the vigor, the smooth city transports (skytrain, subway), the gorgeous history, and the people (students, W House) of Bangkok. I truly didn’t want to stay… and yet as time drained away, I didn’t want to go. So yet here it was, my last weekend in Bangkok and I was greatly pleased to discover that my favorite traveling companion (a la Cambodia) was available on both weekend days to visit sites of Bangkok. We were well-matched traveling companions and it definitely helps to have similar ideas of what to see and how long we can endure them.

Bangkok has been referred to as the “Venice of the East” but I spent (let’s count ‘em) approximately 7 weeks in the city and I’ve now given up making sense of this statement and consider it a remnant of the past… if not just plain silly. Granted, Bangkok has the large Chao Phraya River which is vital to the city and in addition, several 19th century kings went out of their way to have a system of canals called the “Khlong” built to convey goods throughout the city. However, to me, the 21st century tourist, Bangkok doesn’t feel like a water-oriented city. All the more reason, perhaps, to avoid Damnoensaduak, a floating market which has deceased as a way of life; the remnants are now photographic fodder for tourists. Yet the image of gliding through a floating market proved irresistible and the tour ticket price wasn’t too high nor too low - but it quickly became apparent that the cost was higher than the tickets.

It is an unpleasant reality of Bangkok tourism that there are many shysters whose business is taking advantage of naïve tourists. Haunting cautionary tale: the Black Buddha (see 7/17). Another favorite scheme is to charge the tourists below cost for transportation and then collect commissions from shops. We were picked up by a minivan from the reputable hotel where we paid a tidy tour sum and yet still we were subjected to unnecessary stops. After an hour and a half drive to the outskirts of Bangkok, we first visited a palm sugar production “plant” – where the tourist tables and hawkers outnumbered the palm sugar producers with a 4/1 ratio. My friend and I visited the toilets. After our trip to the market, we were taken to a Cobra Farm and expected to pay 200 THB (~$5 – the price of 4 dinners at my favorite noodle place) to see cobras in cages and a cobra and a mongoose fight. Horrid. My friend and I and a nice Indian lady ended up at a smoky bar with tiny tinned coffees. Then we were taken to a “handcrafts” place where there were legitimate wood-carvers with chisels in hand carving out wood scenes. The handcraft place was a sterile air-conditioned nightmare where the majority of items were encased in plastic and no doubt if we had flipped them over, we would’ve read “Made in China” on the labels. Almost as revolting as cobras and mongooses. The final stop was a downtown Bangkok jewel show – at which my friend and I staged a revolt and we were quickly provided another van to return us to Siam Square – or better, W House.

Aggravation aside, the floating market was a great deal of fun. We were placed in and then driven around the Khlong in a yellow, long-tailed boat with a rather powerful engine. Houses floating and on stilts flashed by, residents walked the canal sidewalk, our wake watered potted plants bordering entryways. We passengers were sprayed a bit but my friend and I were utterly disgusted by the Singaporean couple in front of us that lit cigarettes and their smoke blew directly back into our faces (the man in front of me smoked 2 cigs in 10 minutes). Their cigarette butts ended up floating in the canal. Charming.

Happily, the market was charming. Another 150 THB and we were squeezed into a wooden boat oared by a middle-aged Thai woman wearing a straw hat. We were sitting ducks for souvenir floating market purchases – hats that looked calico prairie bonnets but doubled as fans, Thai characters on puppet strings, Buddha statuettes, spices, gold-and elephant silk purses. We found the fruit and flowers particularly appealing: ladies paddled around with wooden boats filled with bananas, some floated along while slicing melon or pineapple, another man had star fruit (rarely seen in Thailand, actually), green papayas and guavas, another lady had a boat filled with flowers. At one point, I paid 10 THB to try a Thai delicacy: Chinese black jelly on ice. It wasn’t horrible but I only consumed two inches of my cup. The traffic jams of tourist-heavy boats were true jams and our navigator cleverly maneuvered us out of one by going backward. The boat ride was over all to soon. My friend and I then walked the solid ground market perimeter market and at the end of our allotted time, my friend discovered cute cotton tops and bought a few – at a bargain (Western) and yet exorbitant price (Thai). I would’ve liked a similar top and matching skirt – the fabrics were gorgeous - but they would not fit. Apparently the enormous number of tourists visiting to Thailand are slim. My friend’s blouses were really darn pretty and she protested that while she may have paid too much, she had looked (and she had) and that they were unique. I assured her that they were very pretty and that she should be pleased. That worked. Sort-of.

After the commissioned stops, my friend and I were returned to W House, sweaty and irritable. When we walked through the doors, we were greeted with a “sawadeekah” from Noi at W House. She handed me “My Baby” (laptop) and a DHL envelope with a return address of Seoul, Korea. My Visa paperwork. It was definitely my last weekend in Bangkok.

Cheers! --Laura