Anniversary

Today marks a year since our arrival in Bangkok. Immigrants, I find, almost always remember the day they first passed through customs. It is a kind of birthday, I suppose.

I confess that when we first came I thought it might be a short stay, that Jip wasn’t really going the right direction, that Thailand wasn’t necessarily going to improve her health any. But recently I watched her harness up in the standing frame for the first time since we’ve been here (it took me a few days to piece it all back together) and I thought, my god, she’s stronger than she was THREE years ago, let alone the day we showed up here. It really is remarkable how her physical health has steadied, and perhaps even made some gains, in this weather, which we’d been told so long to avoid.

We’ve been to see a doctor exactly twice over the year, once to simply introduce ourselves to a general practitioner, the second time to fix yet another hyponatremia episode. Granted, that second trip was a serious event, requiring a couple nights in the hospital, but even so, it was much simpler to deal with in Bangkok than it would have been in the States. And Jip has shown zero interest in visiting a neurologist, even though I’m told that there are several good ones in town, some who even have experience with her condition. A few folks have speculated that there is an Asian version of the disease, which for all we know prefers hot conditions to what we lived with in Seattle.

Thailand has also steadied me. My blood pressure is likely lower than it’s been for some time, certainly lower than during the fast and furious days just before and after we flew here. The pace then was pretty quick, as we emptied a house and looked for an apartment, at the same time that we were combining so many goodbyes with so many introductions. Today, the same nice place we’ve lived in all along here still serves us well, as do the same two young women, who still come every twelve hours, six days a week, to take care of Jip.

Training: Chugging Along

Jip’s standing frame arrived this week, so she’s ready to get vertical again. Exercise is already a high priority for her, sometimes taking up two or three hours of the afternoon. Adding this old friend to her arsenal of equipment will probably increase her appetite even more.

Look over these pics of her doing some trunk twisting on the edge of the bed. Even though she still doesn’t have complete control over those muscles, her balance is pretty good. I hardly needed to support her at all.


















My exercise routine is also changing slightly. I have a new running partner, in the tradition of the early morning weekend club that supported me in countless ways when we lived in Seattle. This guy is more serious than I am, and seems to handle the climate better, but we each manage to get what we need out of the arrangement.

He meets me at the corner shortly before 6am, at which point he’s already run for twenty minutes. Then we run to a large park, where we do a lap together. Then I rest for 11 minutes (his stopwatch) while he does another lap. Finally we run back to our place, I quit, and he continues on home for another twenty minutes. Everybody wins!

Stuffed

Speaking of taking football seriously, our British neighbors were frantic when I popped ‘round to watch England vs. Paraguay the other night. “Can you believe this?” he said, pointing at images of the king on nearly every television channel. She said, “We’ve been stuffed.”

We had no choice but to speedwalk to a nearby pub, The Black Swan, where a satellite dish was picking up the action. An international mix of fellow fans there agreed on one thing: England’s play was rubbish.

The good news is that every World Cup game since then has been broadcast live on regular TV, start to finish. The bad news, for Thailand, is that this month will not go down in history as the country’s most productive.

All the news media are dominated by coverage of the results. Gambling is apparently outrunning prostitution and illegal drugs as contributors to the gross domestic product. And bedtimes are not being respected—the last game of the day here begins at 2am Bangkok time.

I’m a good case in point. While blearily waiting for my second bus the other morning, I hopped on the wrong one, and proceeded to find myself on a highway going right back the way I had just come. I got to work an hour late.

Bangkok Masters Football Tournament, brought to you by Tesco Lotus

A special tournament for older soccer players was Organized, with a capital “O,” by the British Chamber of Commerce. When I signed up, I anticipated seeing some of the same faces that I had grown to have some sympathy with during the regular season, which ended recently. I’m talking about the greyhairs.

A few of those players were around, but most of the participants were strangers. Not surprising, considering that many had flown in to play this tourney. And not just flown from Chiang Mai or Phuket: our first match, in the morning, was against a team from Brunei. Before playing Malaysians in the afternoon, we watched Singaporeans go head to head with Australians.

Turns out this event was a pretty big deal. A slick 40-page brochure, meal coupons, and commemorative shirts (splashed with names of several big corporate sponsors) were handed to everyone who registered. An all-star team of ex-English professional stars put on a clinic in the morning, played an exhibition in the afternoon, and keynoted at the evening banquet.

It’s amazing how seriously people take their football in these parts. Who needs the World Cup? when you have over-35s willing to pay for plane fare, hotels, entry fees, and perhaps a couple nights’ worth of booze and wom…

…wait … I think I get it now.

Hush Comes Over the Crowds

Something was wrong as I came out of the movies a few nights ago. Bangkok was silent. This never happens.

Soon I arrived at a corner to find a dozen police. Two more cops blocked the stairway leading to the sky train. Any other week, I might have suspected a murder investigation. That corner houses a shrine that Bangkokians take very seriously. A few months back, when a deranged guy tried to destroy the shrine with a hammer, some nearby maintenance men destroyed him with a shovel.

But on this night I figured the quiet was the result of police redirecting traffic to accommodate a visiting monarch. Rather than wait to catch a glimpse of a royal Rolls, I walked home, enjoying the rare stillness along the normally busy road.

Not long before, when Murph was still in town, the king’s celebration produced another atypical calm. We assembled along the river to watch a practice session of the 52 royal boats, rowed by over 2,000 boatmen, who lift their paddles into the air like wings after every stroke. This ancient ceremony is relatively rare these days; it has happened only 14 times in my lifetime.

For the practice, the river was closed to other traffic, meaning that the usual mixture of tugboats and ferries and long-tailed power boats were all sidelined for the afternoon. Murph and I marveled at being able to hear the water lapping at the bank. Usually, like in most of the rest of the city, traffic noise there drowns out most natural sounds.

Our viewing spot happened to be the place where Jip trained as a nurse, many years ago. The current batch of students sold tickets and set out chairs along the water, as a fundraiser. It was fun to look at them and imagine Jip as she was then. She also enjoyed hearing us tell her afterwards about where we were. Based on her reactions to our descriptions, I gather it hasn’t changed much in the meantime.

Big Anniversary

King Bhumibol is the focus of a nationwide gala. Thailand is in holiday mode, big-time. I can’t think what the equivalent would be in the States. Probably what’s happening here this week simply couldn’t happen there at this moment in history. In a nutshell, the celebration is about unanimity.

Everyone agrees that the king is a great guy. And because as of yesterday he had been on the throne for sixty years, making him the longest-serving monarch on the planet, everyone feels drawn to hit the streets, or to put on a yellow shirt, or at least to light a candle, in his honor.

Granted, I’m not reading the Thai press, or following the many commemorative events with the perspective of a native. So if there are critics out there who feel that this massive party is too much, I probably wouldn’t know about them. But on the surface, the depth of feeling seems genuine. A Thai woman at work told me, “If anything happened to the king, I would cry for three months.” From what I’ve seen, she speaks for millions.

So, for a few more days, the fireworks and barge processions and exhibits and banquets for royals from 25 other countries will continue, and the traffic will snarl, and the regular street vendors will be forbidden on the sidewalks. And then when it’s all over, even though the political situation in Thailand is as messy as it is in most places in the world, moving forward will be a little bit easier. The glow from this week’s events should last a long time.

Comfort from Home

My sister Murph came to visit, bearing gifts. It happened to be my birthday, so I made out well. But Jip really scored. She had put together a request list of provisions that are difficult to get here. Murph succeeded on every count.

For the record, here was Jip’s inventory: dried blueberries (a staple at breakfast, but very expensive in Bangkok), colorful cotton socks (Jip still claims her feet are cold, and that locally made socks won’t warm them up), a collection of hairdresser’s capes that don’t smell like plastic (the better to keep her comfortable at tooth brushing time), brown rice crackers (you’d think they’d be easy to find here, but the Thai brands are flavored with things Jip doesn’t like), and, as a bonus, a just-published book by my cousin’s husband that Jip is enjoying having read to her (Miracles on the Water, by Tom Nagorski, Hyperion).

Then there was an envelope full of cash, provided by a very generous aunt, which allowed Murph and me to live large on an island while she got over jet lag. Normally we’d have opted for the bungalow-with-a-fan accommodations. Our bigger expense account led us to a VIP room on an isolated beach, where we had the very fine restaurant to ourselves.

A good time had by all!

Just What the Doctor Ordered

We had a few issues this week with the people who help Jip out. And the rainy season seems to have suddenly begun in earnest, so her legs are feeling stiffer than usual. And the pace picked up at my job. And I stayed up too late one night watching a movie that turned out not to be worth it. Long story short, Friday afternoon came and I was dragging.

Of course, some weeks are bound to go that way. That’s why the world has pubs, I suppose, and shopping malls, and karaoke.

What I did Friday evening to put the week behind me was walk ten minutes from the office to a nondescript storefront, where four matronly women wearing lab coats looked up as I pushed through the door. “Massage?” they asked. “Please,” I said. Soon I had changed into a pair of cotton pajamas and was lying on one of the dozen mattresses spread around the open room.

I had first heard about this place from a colleague at CDC. She had arrived ahead of me and was two mattresses away. “Make sure you tell them you want two hours,” she mumbled, before apparently slipping off to sleep.

The woman who worked on me had probably acquired her strong hands by harvesting rice in an upcountry village. She and her fellow lab coats laughed as they worked, gossiped about who was passing by outside, and commented on the action in a soap opera that was blaring from a TV.

Of course I have other massage options in Bangkok. At this place, clothing was not optional. It was free of candles and incense. The only decoration in the room was a set of Buddha images on the top shelf of a bookcase by the desk. But my cares wouldn’t have melted any faster in a fancier setting. The price, with a generous tip, came to under ten dollars.

Chiang Mai III

The last two times I went to the north, I was upfront about looking for a job. My approach during this sequel was less direct. I asked people at health-related organizations if they had considered teaming up with the CDC. I reasoned that if a small collaboration grew and took off, then they would have to hire me to manage it.

I know, I know, you’re thinking, “he’s dreaming WHAT?” I agree, the “information interview” strategy will take a long time to bear fruit, assuming it ever does. But I’m not in any hurry. Jip rarely talks about wanting to move to Chiang Mai anymore, having settled into her Bangkok schedule.

Also, salaries that would support caregivers and our other special needs are rare in Chiang Mai. I visited a former housemate of mine from the refugee camp days, who now lives there. She says she can afford a cool teak house and a new baby mostly because her husband works in Bangkok and commutes home on weekends.

Speaking of commuting, one potential collaborator I called on pointed out that considering Bangkok’s traffic jams, he could probably get to CDC faster by plane and cab from Chiang Mai than I get there via my daily combination of sky train, shared van, and motorcycle taxi.

So who knows where we’ll be living and working at this time next year? I’d still like to find a way to take advantage of Chiang Mai’s cooler weather, higher hills, and emptier roads. But if it takes us a while to pull it off, then as the Thais say, “mai pen rai” (never mind, don’t worry about it)!

Going Abroad

Shortly after walking across the border into Cambodia, I was approached by a man on a motorcycle who wondered if I wanted to visit the chicken farm. I must have given him a look that said, “Why on Earth?” because he elaborated: “You know, lay-dee!” First time I’d heard that term for that kind of place. I decided to pass up the offer.

Soon I found myself in a shared taxi, heading for the town where I planned to spend the night, about 50 kilometers inside the country. Nobody in this taxi was especially comfortable. There were eight of us inside, roughly 25 more in the back of the pickup, and one guy sitting on the hood. When road got bumpy, our “navigator” kept from being bounced off and into a ditch by holding on tighter to the windshield wiper.
Although it was my first time inside the country, Cambodia triggered lots of memories from our time in the refugee camp, which was sited minutes from the border. Certain smells transported me instantly: smoke from fires set by villagers in their fields, stagnant water, curry pastes in the markets. I also began to remember parts of the language that had long been buried. After a day or so I even started to figure out what people were talking about.

And I picked up right where I left off with a pair of American friends who had also worked in the camp. These two had followed the refugees back home when the camps closed in the early ‘90s. We spent our evenings having those endless conversations people have when they’ve hardly seen each other for twenty years. We didn’t manage to solve all of the world’s problems, but we did decide that most of the world’s politicians could have learned something from listening in on what we discussed.

(Billboard outside Mongkol Borei: The words on the sign say, "We no longer need weapons.")

On the Road Again

Speaking of going places, I took advantage of a couple quiet weeks at the office to slip away from Bangkok for two short trips. One was to Cambodia, my first time there, despite working on the border for nearly three years in the ‘80s. Completing that circle felt wonderful. The other journey was one more networking run to Chiang Mai.

Jip dealt with my absences quite well, I thought. When I called to check in, she didn’t ask, “When are you coming home?” as she might have done four or five months ago. Instead I heard about the latest meals (a new staple: yogurt made from goat’s milk), and about how her exercises were going.

But the day after I returned from Chiang Mai, a tantrum erupted suddenly, for no reason I could ever detect. And during the past few days she’s been more anxious than usual about what time I’ll return from work. So I’m hesitating before booking what I had hoped could be a few weeks’ trip to the States a few months from now. We’ll see.

Summer Palace

Chao and I had been biking near a house that he and some friends have rented, about an hour upriver, in the town of Bang Pa-In. It’s a great spot for weekend getaways: nothing to do except bicycle, or watch boats ferry people across, or fish off the balcony, or swim, or drink whiskey, or read in a hammock down below the house, or float in an inner tube, or catch freshwater shrimp, or walk down the street to a large royal estate with a long history.

The rental house ensemble of about 15 people is an eclectic mix of talents and backgrounds. I think I understood the conversation well enough to identify an architect, a public relations guy, a bar owner, and a couple of journalists. That’s what I could hear. What I could see were lots of tattoos, some spaghetti straps, a few very hip pairs of Elvis Costello glasses, and every variety of hair length, including an amazing set of dread locks that when un-turbaned hung down to the back of the guy’s knees.

They’re just now getting started on this adventure, but have signed up for a six-year deal, so amidst the snacking and sipping and listening to Sinatra, big plans were on the table: how to remodel, who has which rights, and so on. I’ll be interested to watch how this second residence influences Chao’s decision about whether to stay in Bangkok, or to move a few hours east, after he is married sometime later this year.

A few weeks earlier, as a tourist, I’d spent a pleasant Saturday strolling through the manicured grounds of the king’s Bang Pa-In palace. (I knew it was going to be a good trip when the hour-long train ride to get up there cost me 20 cents.) But my day at Chao’s palace was even nicer. Always go places with locals, is my motto.

Be Careful What You Wish For

After complaining about heat for much of this month, Saturday I found myself shivering. The weather was classic Seattle: endless gentle rain, along with fleece jacket temperatures. My hands even felt numb.

Of course, having water poured down my back during the annual Songkran festival didn’t help. Chao and I were bicycling on a back street, proud of ourselves for having avoided the mayhem of the main market, where a fire engine had been requisitioned to spray passersby.

But I still couldn’t escape my fate (perhaps I was very naughty with squirt guns in a past life?). As our bike ride was just 100 yards from its destination, an innocent-looking older man approached me, holding a silver bowl. As I pedaled past slowly, he soaked me with a gentle but thorough motion. The rain began not long afterward, before I could dry out.

Heating Up

Jip is having a pretty good summer. Before we moved here, we always assumed this time of year would be a problem. American doctors told us to avoid heat, saying it would likely make her worse. If anything, she has become stronger.

Recently she revived a set of trunk exercises that she hasn’t wanted to do since Seattle. She’s also been asking for the large “standing frame” that we left behind. It’s a device that allows her to get vertical and bear weight.

And while many people here manage this sticky weather by wearing as little as possible, Jip is still sporting long-sleeved shirts.

Meanwhile, I could use a good cool breeze off of Puget Sound about now. This month the sweat just pours off me. The worst is when I’ve been walking outdoors, then stop momentarily where the air is still, like at a covered market. Suddenly I sprout droplets. The Thais around me of course look like they just stepped out of a salon.

This month also makes me think I should take up a less physical sport—say, knitting. Evening soccer practice at the British Club is tolerable (though afterward, despite a shower, I still become a human waterfall while waiting for the SkyTrain).

But our weekly games on Saturday afternoons bring to mind the phrase “mad dogs and Englishmen.” During those full-sun contests, I definitely feel my age. So while Jip thrives in her native climate, I’m just trying to keep a respectable core body temperature. And changing my shirt three times a day.