Respect for Caregivers

It’s been exactly a year since I last took a turn on the exhausting daytime caregiving shift. I’m still in awe of these women’s energy. I’m talking not only about the three women who continue to show up day after day and cheerfully meet Jip’s needs, but also about Jip herself, who goes nonstop from dawn to way past dusk.

Yesterday was Thailand’s (and most of the world’s) Labor Day. It’s not a national holiday, but everyone in this class-conscious society understands who should get the day off and who shouldn’t. At our household the understanding is that I’ll take care of Jip on May 1st unless somebody really wants the overtime. Last year that meant a 24-hour shift; this year I was relieved at 8pm.

And I needed relief. Jip kept me hopping with explanations of new techniques that the caregivers have perfected. I thought I had kept up with these breakthroughs simply by being around during the day on weekends, but of course it’s one thing to watch and another thing to do. We fell behind schedule and stayed there as Jip busily brushed, flossed, lathered, and dried her way through the morning and deep into the afternoon.

We skipped the resting time that normally follows lunch, mostly because lunch didn’t happen until nearly 4pm. When the night caregiver showed up to find that we still hadn’t completed Jip’s exercises, she just smiled and got ready to take over. Jip praised my efforts and said she was renewing my contract. I was just glad I had the weekend to recover.

Strunk and White Anniversary

The Elements of Style has reached its 50th birthday. Last week a friend sent an e-mail followed by one of those quotes that people sometimes use as signatures after their messages. Hers said,

“If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they're happy." -- Dorothy Parker

I smiled at the quote, having come of age with Strunk and White, and having given away dozens of copies to young writers when I was teaching school.

But now I find that to my dismay that not everybody puts the little book on quite such a high pedestal as I have been used to doing. Or perhaps that the world has moved on.

The guest bloggers in a New York Times piece marking the anniversary say that The Elements of Style takes its own rules too seriously, and foists on readers the idea that there is such a thing as the one best style.

I continue to defend the book, especially for happy young readers, who often don’t know enough writing rules to be able to break them on purpose. For such writers Strunk and White serve as a sort of home base. Comfort food.

What Dorothy Parker probably knew and these bloggers have apparently forgotten is that we all start off wanting to be told what to do. After we finish going through puberty, or worshipping our coach/scoutmaster/pastor, or skimming the Lonely Planet Guide to whatever country we’re planning to visit, then we slowly branch out on our own. If our independence leads to mixed results, we can always return to our mentors.

State of Emergency Lifted

Today the Thai government announced an end to the 12-day ban on large gatherings, and to the detention of people suspected of inciting last week’s protests. The opposition had compared the prime minister’s tactics to those of Thailand’s nastier neighbors. The country’s former standing as a rising star in Asia has been tarnished more than ever.

In the past week several people have e-mailed me to ask what’s really going on with all the red and yellow shirts. Or as Jip says, why can’t people just start wearing orange and move on? I came across an analysis of the situation, written several weeks ago by a Thai academic. The writer oversimplifies the many-layered problems here, and below I’ve condensed his words further because some of what he wrote is already dated. But at least he offers a foundation for understanding the current stalemate:

We are faced with at least two major conflicts:

Conflict of goals: One side (Red shirt) wants a strong government that can deliver on policy promises; the other side (Yellow shirt) wants a weak government, because they think government is corrupt.

Conflict of means: One side (Red) believes that political conflict should be decided by election. The other side (Yellow) believes that the elections themselves are corrupted by money and by local influence.

… The Red is made up of rural-lower class, peasants and others who have benefited from the populist policies of the governments. The Yellow is urban-middle class who dislikes government corruption and doesn’t need the populist policies, but wants fairer deals in business and economics.

… The most recent election resulted in roughly 14-16 million for the Thaksin/Red side, 10-12 million for the Democrat Party/Yellow side. Red is popular in the North (Thaksin's area) and Northeast (poor and in need of development), while Yellow is popular in Bangkok and the South (high political awareness and the traditional Democrat's stronghold).

His sobering conclusion:

What these conditions imply is that violence could spread and civil war is not out of the question. Normally what evolves is either conflict between two groups of people and then the state machine intervenes, or conflict between two sides of the military and the people intervene. This time, however, people are divided and the state apparatus is also divided, therefore the prognosis is potentially quite dangerous.

Australian Inspection Tour

My trip down under succeeded as a scouting mission. The only downside was watching Thailand fall apart all week. Our good friend Margot happily helped me think through whether it would make sense for Jip to make the journey to Perth some day.

Jip’s favorite foods are available there. Handicap access isn’t an issue. It should be easy to find a time when the weather will cooperate. I even know now where we could hire local caregivers who speak Thai.

So that left the question of what would we do in Australia that Jip would enjoy, and that would be any different from the full and unvarying Bangkok routine that Jip would probably insist on following? Well, during this past week Margot and I beach walked, bird watched, crab netted, wine tasted, and souvenir shopped.

At a small island not far from Perth, people are visitors, birds are permanent residents, and the hourly boat can easily handle wheelchairs. Margot and I walked above the island’s beaches along a wooden boardwalk that passes right next to nests made by gulls, terns, pelicans, and even penguins. Jip would love that place.

In an estuary near Margot’s place we waded knee-deep and netted lots of crabs. Jip could sit on the dock and listen to us squeal each time we pulled one out of the water.

If Jip went to Australia we’d most likely skip the wine tasting and the souvenir shopping. We might not have time for those things anyway. Her routine would take up most of the morning. Margot, who is 80 but has more energy than most people half her age, goes to bed right after dinner (“I like my sleep”).

Looks like all Jip and I need to do is book tickets.

Quieter?

Back in Bangkok after a week in Australia, I find that the government has extended the state of emergency declared last weekend. Early Friday morning, a machine gun ambush left in intensive care the guy who founded the yellow shirt movement (the group that shut down two governments and two airports in the last few years). This guy and his followers played no role in the most recent protests.

I had thought things might be quieter than this. My neighbors had e-mailed me, saying that the city seemed deserted. Indeed, last week’s roadblocks are gone, as are the soldiers brought in to break them up.

Clearly the standoff between Thailand’s competing factions is far from over. Lots of rural and urban poor, led from abroad by Thaksin, still resent the way that the middle class, military, and monarchists and managed to take over last December without a vote. A year before that, candidates favored by today’s red shirts had handily won an election.

Among the demands of the red shirts, who suspended their street protests Tuesday, is the prosecution of the ambushed yellow shirt leader for his role in the airport closures.

Jip’s caregivers laughingly reported that they had heard the sounds of the demonstrations from our balcony, and that when their shifts were over they had had no choice but to return home by taxi—buses weren’t running for a few days. The guard downstairs was maybe a bit more candid when I asked him how he’d been lately. “Songkran was no fun this year,” he said.

Bangkok Viewed from Down Under

Distressing images from Thailand continue to lead the evening news in Australia. The stories here focus on the midair u-turn made by Australia’s prime minister when he learned en route that the summit meeting he planned to attend had been canceled.

What I see, looking at the TV footage, is that the latest clashes between protesters and army happened just a few minutes from our place. Even though Jip and her caregivers assure me that they’re not affected, it’s difficult to watch these events from afar.

Perth is lovely, and our good friend has been a great host for the past few days. Yet in many ways I'd rather be back in Thailand at the moment.

Big Face Loss

The Thai government suffered a major embarrassment this weekend when protesters shut down a summit meeting that was to have gathered leaders from around the region. This meeting had already been canceled once before out of the fear that it would be interrupted.

Three nights ago, the same group of demonstrators, most commonly called the red shirts, blocked key intersections around town, snarling traffic for hours. I got several phone calls at work from people who urged me to avoid my usual route home. They said the mob wasn’t violent, just inconvenient. After staying at the office a little later than usual, I took an alternate way and found the streets nearly empty. Word had gotten around.

The stated goal of the protesters is the “return of democracy to the people.” That phrase seems to really mean the return of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who has been living in exile since being ousted in a coup over two and a half years ago. He visited Thailand briefly last year, but took off again when it seemed the courts were about to find him guilty on corruption charges. For the past few days he has been rallying his supporters via videophone.

On Friday afternoon I headed from work to the airport for a previously scheduled vacation in Perth, Australia. Our office was among the few that didn’t have the day off. Thursday evening, thinking it could encourage people to celebrate rather than protest, the government had declared that Thai New Year would start one day earlier than planned.

Many roads remain blocked, but highways to the airport were clear. I confess that while waiting in a slow check-in line, I glanced around now and then to be sure there were no red shirts preparing to shut down outgoing flights. (The yellow shirts, supporters of the current government, did just that about four months ago.)

But it appears the red shirts had their sights set on the summit meeting rather than the airport. Watching the news here in Australia, I feel discouraged that Thailand remains so divided and directionless regarding its political future. Both groups of protesters during the past six months have been good at talking about what they don’t want, but it’s unclear to me what they do want, other than simply to hold power.

Reason Number 788 Why We’ve Got a Pretty Sweet Deal Going Here

I’ve been sent to the provinces for work reasons twice in the past two weeks. My job description rarely includes responsibilities outside Bangkok: in three years, I can count the number of trips on one hand.

Each time, I’ve had a spare hour or two between meetings, or while waiting for transportation back to the big city. My hosts could have found me a quiet corner where I could do some reading or plug in a laptop computer. But they never have.

Instead, they’ve always steered me to nearby massage shops. Further proof that this country has its priorities in the right order.

Mango and Sticky Rice Season

Our reward for putting up with the hottest weather of the year is the best fruit of the year. Mangoes, rambutans, mangosteens, and longans, are just a few of the delicious possibilities that start showing up in the markets around now. I noticed some good-looking mangoes for sale on the streets about ten days ago.

Jip decided to stick to some adage she learned in childhood about mangoes not being ready until April 1st. But I couldn’t hold off that long. Probably they’ll only be around for about ten weeks. Assuming I take a day off now and then, that means I’ll only eat about fifty servings of sticky rice and mangoes before they’re gone. No time to lose!

Giving Blood

Yesterday I gave blood for the first time in Thailand. I used to be a regular in Seattle. For whatever reason I hadn’t gotten into the habit here. Then last week at work we got an e-mail asking for donations of blood type O, which I share with most of the people in the States, but which I’m told is relatively uncommon in Asia.

The smooth process at the donation center, which made Seattle’s system look amateurish by comparison, impressed me. And the place was packed. Afterwards, someone explained that it’s a popular activity among Buddhists, who see giving blood as a way of making merit. Perhaps that explains why, in addition to offering donors the usual cookies and juice, the center handed all of us a Jatukham medal when we were finished.

HHH

Long before returning to live in Thailand, I’d been told to check out the local chapter of the Hash House Harriers. I thought of it a non-competitive group of sports-minded people who like mixing entertainment and exercise. Their self-description is a “drinking club with a running problem.”

Until three days ago, I’d never joined them on their Saturday afternoon outings, mostly because soccer has taken up enough of my weekend free time. But over the years here, running has become increasingly important to me, so I e-mailed the contact listed on the website last week. He was planning to drive out to the starting point for that week’s run. We arranged to meet up.

“You look too fit to be a hasher,” he said when I got in the car. I admit I was surprised to see a number of beer bellies when we joined the others. My presence also seemed to bring down the average age considerably. But thanks to a clever system for making sure everyone starts and finishes around the same time (a “hare” goes out ahead and marks a trail, complete with several false lefts and rights, causing the front runners to cover much more mileage than the folks at the back), fitness and age don’t really matter much.

What does really matter to this group isn’t entirely clear to me yet. At first glance, the brand of humor and the post-run beverage of choice would be right at home in most college fraternities. But as my website contact pointed out while we drove, everyone takes something different from the group. For me the fun came in spending an hour or so following back alleys and cutting through forests that otherwise I would never have seen. The hasher’s Thailand is not the tourist’s Thailand. My first hash won’t be my last.

Party Animal

I said I’d be home late because I was going to one of the very occasional gatherings of people in Thailand who also graduated from my college. Jip said, “What time are we leaving?”

Not wanting to put her off (it’s so rare that she’s interested in an outing)—but double-checking so that we didn’t end up leaving as soon as we arrived at the party—I reminded her that she wouldn’t know anyone. “No problem,” she said, “You can tell me about them before we get there.”

When the host greeted her by name, Jip was instantly at home, sticking out her hand and asking after his wife. She remembered her name from the short briefing I’d given her in the taxi. Jip was equally smiley with a handful of other people who approached us. One of them, a visiting professor from the college whose presence in town was the official excuse for the get-together, turned out to know a former neighbor of ours in Seattle. Pretty soon Jip was off to the races, trading stories about the neighbor and sounding as if she had known this professor for years.

I suspect that what attracts Jip to an event like this, or to the reunion last year of her college classmates, has more to do with the way she sees herself than with the people she is likely to encounter there. She may feel that she belongs to an educated layer of society that is different from the one her caregivers come from.

That sort of class consciousness is very common in Thailand, although it never seemed obvious in Jip when we lived here before. Nowadays, it’s not unusual to hear small prejudices and politically incorrect comments slip out of her. Like many people with a chronic disease, she has less and less use for the filter that keeps most of us from telling others what we’re really thinking.

After spending so much time with the same three women every week, and grumbling about the kinds of things they find interesting to talk to each other about, maybe Jip is simply starved for more intellectual conversation. Which would also explain why lately she’s been anxious have people come to read to her… in English only.

Shoulder Pain: Update

Yesterday marked the third Saturday in a row when Chutima has visited our apartment and worked on Jip's shoulder. During the nearly three years we’ve known this woman, she has given Jip massage a few times. But we never thought of what she did as accupresure. Jip has now decided that she qualifies.

Whatever you call it, the complaints about pain are way down. Jip’s pitching arm, recently too stiff to throw, is once again tossing strikes when she does her daily ball throwing exercises at the standing frame. After our two failed attempts to get her some relief, I was afraid we were going to have to declare “strike three” on our search for a solution to her shoulder woes.

Musical Barometer

During this season it’s too hot to go very far on foot. People in Thailand are much more likely to take a taxi or a tuk-tuk than to walk. But when I am caught out on the hot streets in March, April, and May, I take comfort in the hum of the cicadas. The rise and fall of their song reminds me that some day the rains will return.

Jip swears that their volume corresponds with the barometric pressure. For several years, the tightness of her legs has been a reliable way to predict the weather. So when the cicada noise gets loud enough to drown out normal conversation, and Jip’s legs began to feel jumpy, we know it won’t be long before the rumble of thunder comes our way.