Carrying the Torch

Call me sentimental, but I like this idea: by taking a public health job, I’m contributing in a small way to things Jip had planned to do after getting her master’s degree in public health. She had always seen herself returning to work in the north, with the hill tribes. But early on in her studies, she was diagnosed with this disease and life took a different direction.

I was her editor back then. Papers she wrote about health statistics passed through my hands before they were turned in, as did applications she filled out before being allowed to do research on human subjects. Now all that vocabulary comes flooding back as I work on similar documents.

Another bonus: I stay current on all the latest threats. Take bird flu. Jip has been telling me for the past year that I should avoid eating chicken and eggs. I’ve been nodding in that way that husbands do, then going ahead and doing what I’ve always done.

I thought the problem was being hyped, especially here, because of the recent visit by the Secretary of Health and Human Services, and the heads of the CDC and WHO (in the photo below, they’re all in the front row, while I’m the guy in the back on the right, staring at the rising helium balloons). Then every day this week we get fresh reports about H5N1 being found in a new species or on a new continent. Maybe it can’t hurt to change my diet, following Jip’s lead yet again.

Job

My vacation ended voluntarily this month. Now I brave the Bangkok commute for about an hour each way, taking sky train, motorcycle taxi, van, bus, or boat.

I’m the writer/editor for the CDC’s Global AIDS Program. Over here the CDC collaborates with the Thai Ministry of Public Health on preventing, caring for, and monitoring a handful of infectious diseases. Mostly the focus is on HIV, TB, and lately, bird flu. About 15 Americans and 150 Thais share an office.

Most of the day I’m at a computer, dealing with reports and scientific abstracts. In the background I hear the sounds of Thai language floating between cubicles. I teach informally, about things like participles and passives and plurals. In time they may add “records manager” to my title.

It’s one of the few times in my life when I haven’t worked in formal education. My contract lasts one year. For the moment this work is fun and social. I miss having kids around, but I don’t miss some of the silliness that happens in schools among adults.

Khao Yai National Park

In July Thailand’s best-known national park joined the list of the 800+ World Heritage sites. This honor, given by UNESCO, goes to “cultural and natural heritage around the world considered to be of outstanding value to humanity.” The U.S. claims about twenty World Heritage sites, including a dozen of the most famous national parks and the Statue of Liberty.

During Greg’s visit he and I figured we’d better have a look at Khao Yai to see why it was in the same league as Yellowstone and Olympic. We got there by sky train, motorcycle, bus, songthaew, and pickup truck, in that order.

All we knew before arriving was that hikers were encouraged to wear special socks to keep the leeches off. Nobody told us about the massive spiders that like to build their webs across the paths. Or about the pileated gibbons.

Luckily, we caught a ride on the last leg of our journey with a researcher who a) knew quite a lot about the pileated gibbons, b) was free to have dinner with us, and c) didn’t mind driving us to the trailhead the next morning.

Before the day was over we knew why Khao Yai is considered so special. We heard the songs of the gibbons as dawn broke. We trekked past some seriously big trees. Just as we thought the trail was taking us through yet another jungle habitat to the land of despair, we emerged at a gorgeous grassland, where the park has set up a wildlife watching tower.

Now that he is back in Seattle, Greg has posted pictures of this trip to the Internet. Click here to see how we looked on our travels, as well as several shots of our fancy apartment in Bangkok.

Sundays at Home

Sundays have become more social. We’ve started hosting a small meditation group in the morning (about the same time that Quaker Meeting for worship used to begin back in Seattle). Or somebody phones about dropping by in the afternoon.

Jip tolerates having the extra people around. At least, she appears to be enjoying herself while they’re here. Tonight one of her oldest friends, who has been away from Thailand during the time we’ve been here, came over and brought along her parents. Jip smiled throughout the entire visit, but as soon as they left she announced that she was through hosting for a while.

So we’ll see what happens this coming Sunday. It’s also a day when I learn more about the week gone by. Jip often tires before I get home from work, which means sometimes I don’t discover small changes in routine or little bits of news until it’s my turn to be caregiver.

She has mostly been in good spirits lately. It hasn’t seemed to bother her that I’m gone for longer each day than I was before this job started. But maybe the anti-visitor talk means she isn’t handling the change in routine as well as I first thought.

Small Town

Of all the transitions Jip and I have made lately, the biggest is probably the switch from city to megacity. Bangkok is dense. It’s not Hong Kong, but compared to Seattle things are much more vertical and shoulder-to-shoulder. I feel it especially during commutes, when people spill in and out of the sky train, and on sidewalks, where everybody and everything is much closer to me than I’m used to.

Our food choices aren’t that different than they were before; we still speak lots of English; being surrounded by many cultures is nothing new. But being among many millions every day means things are a little more impersonal than we were used to.

That’s why one set of connections in Chiang Mai made a big impression on me. I had searched my college website before going, and discovered three other alumni, all from graduating classes in the 1950s. A few days before my visit, I emailed them, suggesting we chat.

I didn’t hear back right away. But someone else up there, the head of a local language school, suggested out of the blue that I “really should meet this older guy I know, name of Ed.” I said, “His last name wouldn’t be ‘Rose,’ by any chance?”

Of course it was. And of course his wife taught at that same language school. And of course the secretary had their phone number, and he was at home, and happy to have lunch with me, and would have never checked the old email address I had used to write him.

A few other people I spoke to that weekend also knew Ed, all for different reasons. He’s not especially famous -- Chiang Mai is just that kind of place. He does have one claim to fame, though. It turns out one of Ed’s interests was raising Siamese cats. After lunch, he pulled out of his wallet a set of Thai postage stamps. “These were my babies,” he said proudly.

Going North

Last month I spent a couple days in Chiang Mai, the northern Thai city where Jip has fond memories and we have several pals. The idea was to look for reasons to move there some day. I found several.

The top one is that despite being the second largest town in the kingdom, Chiang Mai’s population is literally fifty times smaller than Bangkok’s. Right away I found fewer degrees of separation between people. In a pattern familiar to me from living in Seattle, folks who have similar interests seem likely to know each other in Chiang Mai.

In forty-eight hours I had about a dozen good talks with old friends or friends of friends. Everyone was sold on our coming there – sometimes because they like us, but always because they like their lives there. Most people talked about quality of life: Chiang Mai offers sports, dining, friendship, and health care opportunities that compare favorably with Bangkok’s, but without the smog and traffic.

Making ends meet might be a bigger challenge up there, but with some creativity and lead time it wouldn’t be impossible. And there are non-financial perks: one can get anywhere in town on a bicycle. We could be in the mountains in minutes by car. I even went for a run outdoors for the first time in three months.

Jip supports my explorations. Going up there meant I was away from her for the longest period since we arrived in Thailand, but things went fine with her and the caregivers. Probably I’ll return to Chiang Mai every couple of months for a few days each trip, in order to expand the network and double check that the docs will be good enough. Perhaps we’ll become northerners in a year or so.

Greg Visits From Seattle

Our good friend Greg is in town for a week. His presence is a fine gift for both Jip and me, made possible by his generous wife, children and employer, who realistically are giving him up for nearly two weeks, when you figure in jet lag.

He and I are bopping around town as if it had been our home for years -- shopping in little markets, going to the cinema, eating on the street, taking the canal taxis. By showing him around, I'm finding out how much I've learned about the city in three months. Next week I start a regular 9-to-5, so this time also feels like the last week of summer vacation.

Greg's sense is that Jip is much stronger, more alert, easier to understand, and generally in a better space than when he last saw her. I value his comparison, because he had very regular contact with her in Seattle. At least once a week, he would drop by to help Jip stretch her lower body. When she heard him walk in the door two days ago, her first words were, “Grab a leg!”

A Night at the Opera

The Hungarian State Opera was in town for a special festival of the arts. They put on Rigoletto. I had to go. Who knows when might be my next chance to hear Verdi?

At first the scene in the lobby fit the stereotype. The men sported tuxes; the gowns on the women ranged from silk to sequins to nothing more than a slip. I heard any number of European and Asian languages spoken. The sandwiches for sale at the concessions had no crusts.

But just before the curtain was to go up, several officials literally rolled out a red carpet. A fleet of Mercedes pulled up outside the front, where nobody had been allowed to drive. Out stepped the princess. Everyone else stood at their seats as she walked to her own special armchair, dead center of the VIP section. She had to sit all by herself.

After the performance, and after the presentation (“by order of Her Royal Highness”) to the singers of lovely bouquets, we all waited for the Mercedes to pull away before exiting our own seats.

Apparently the princess is a well-known patron of both western and Thai classical music. We may run into each other again.

Seen in a Bangkok Park

Better to leave them at home where you can keep an eye on them.

Reconnecting

Jip’s interest in attending the Siam Society talk the other night gives me hope that she’ll also begin wanting to see more people from her past. So far visitors have been a low priority. Not that we've had many. Usually, a guest is a problem rather than an opportunity for her.

The exceptions are family (although she told her mother to go home after three days) and people from the really old days. A gang of nurses Jip had worked with in '84 and '85 dropped by one afternoon. Jip happily listened to them, ate in front of them, showed them how she does her exercises.

A few days later, a Thai friend from her UW years came over, somebody who's been a huge help in finding caregivers and giving me advice. Jip's first words were, "You can talk to John." So that's what happened, for about ten minutes, until Jip made it clear that the visit was over.

I’ve learned the hard way that not allowing Jip power over her time can backfire. But I’d love it if she slowly began to find more pleasure in having company, or going out. My big dream is a trip south (four hours by car) to visit her 95-year-old grandmother. That is a reunion I’d love to watch.

In Seattle we were surrounded by many friends, but as Jip’s main caregiver I didn’t see other people as often as I would have liked. Now I have more freedom, but I know fewer people. It was nice to hang out this weekend with our old pal Marty, who passed through on her way back to the States from a trip to Tibet. Jip wasn’t feeling too social, but I probably talked more in one afternoon than I had throughout the previous ten weeks combined. If you happen to pass this way, you might get an earful.

Check Out This Headline: Jip Asks to Go Out on the Town!

We’ve been here ten weeks. Jip has left the apartment exactly once. I’ve proposed excursions. She has usually replied that she is too busy.

I figured that her routine was giving her comfort, so I stopped asking so often. Also, dust and smells often bother her. No shortage of those in this town.

Then she stunned me this morning. I casually said I was planning to go to a lecture at the nearby Siam Society. She casually said she wanted to join me. Like we do this every night.

I was simultaneously delighted, and worried that getting her there would be enough hassle that she would never want to go anywhere again.

But we made it there and back, despite bumpycrowdedstinky sidewalks and crossing Sukhumvit Rd. at rush hour and a sudden downpour on the way home. Bangkok has a long way to go before it is ADA compliant, but along the way several strangers were helpful to us. The lecture was fine, and Jip didn’t complain once. I can’t wait till the next outing.

CareGIVING

I’m awed by how our two caregivers keep on giving, twelve hours a day. On Sundays, when it’s my turn, I’m exhausted after about half that long. They don’t seem bothered by Jip’s randomness. Maybe it’s because they’ve never known her any other way, or maybe because Thais just let stuff roll off more easily.

Sometimes, from the other room, I’ll hear a caregiver and Jip giggling together, followed by Jip vigorously protesting something, followed by a long silence, and then back to giggling. (This disease is never boring. Maddening, yes … but never dull.)

I generally don’t step in to find out what the problem was. Jip’s relationships with her caregivers, and the solutions they evolve to problems, must and should be different from the ones she and I have worked out.

Luckily, she hasn’t shown the temper and hopelessness that upset us all so much two winters ago. Some people suggested back then that winter itself might be the problem … another reason why Thailand might be better than anyplace else we could be.

How’s my Thai Coming Along?

Well, I don’t dream in Thai yet.

But last weekend a well-dressed stranger fell into step with me on the street and asked me to donate to some suspicious-sounding cause. Without even having to think, I explained that I couldn’t, because I hadn’t won the lottery yet.

Now not only did this exchange happen quickly, but I am sure that this person understood me on the first try, because she let out a huge guffaw, and stopped following me.

More typically, I have to re-pronounce my words several times, because I’ve gotten the tone wrong. Finally the other people throw back their heads and say “Oh!” And then they re-re-pronounce the word, which of course to me sounds just like the first way I said it.

So How is Jip Really?

 

 

 

 

I rarely ask her how she’s doing. The answer might be different every few minutes. She’s not as clear about her likes and dislikes as she once was.

To me, her quality of life is better than when we lived in Seattle. She gets lots of attention, she still feels in charge of many parts of the day, and she's eating well. When she’s happy, she’s still got the greatest smile in the world.

Physically, she is doing no worse, which is a relief. I had been afraid that the heat and the strain of moving here might take a big toll. Emotionally, she goes up and down pretty fast.

There's no predicting what's going to worry her. Sometimes the apartment (or my mouth!) smells “stinky,” “dusty,” “fishy,” or “stale.” Other times she wakes up thinking about a Thai cult that she heard about before we arrived. At meals, she interrupts to remind me that I shouldn’t eat eggs or chicken in this land where bird flu was a problem last year. Then something funny will occur to her, and a big laugh will erupt out of nowhere.

Complicating the task of gauging Jip’s moods is her almost unintelligible speech. She can be talking for several minutes before I understand the big picture. Luckily, she keeps on talking almost all the time, sometimes even talking to herself when she is alone.

So is Jip any happier than she was in the States? Not really. Would she be any happier anywhere else? Probably not. Does she have a toothache? No she doesn’t! Let’s celebrate her non-toothache, and all the other things she ISN’T complaining about!