Busy busy

So I finally got my story assignment today. I will be going to Phuket Town (about an hour away) to a blind Thai massage place. Thai massage is an ancient practice that requires special training. Thailand is not particularly handicap-friendly, so many blind people have taken up the massaging profession. The place I'll be at is (according to what we've been told) entirely staffed by blind masseurs. Some of them (or maybe all) live above the shop.

I'm a little worried about the story because I won't have the translator with me most of the time. The translator will come for the first day and when I do the video interview. Otherwise, I'll probably be on my own. Since the masseurs can't see people, they depend on their other senses to help them interact. I don't speak Thai, so they cannot really use their hearing to figure out what is going on. And I cannot use my body language and motions to communicate, which is what I've been depending on for talking with native speakers. So it's definitely going to be a challenge. At the same time, though, it's the ultimate fly-on-the-wall situation for me to take photos!

All but two of the people in the group went out to start their stories today...I was one of the two that had to stay back. They hadn't established contacts/access as of this morning, so I wasn't able to start yet. I spent the day learning how to use the HD video camera, eating lunch in town, and shopping in town. I got a new shoulder bag and a wrap-around skirt with elephants on it, $6 each! It started pouring as we were walking back from town, so Kendrick and I spent some time sitting under and awning and talking. I'm pretty happy I didn't have to go out today because that meant I had the day off before I start working hard. It also gave me extra time to mull over the story.

A translator, Miriem, teaches Abby how to properly wear a scarf.

We have since gotten in contact with the manager of the place and I will be going tomorrow. I am getting really nervous because the logistics of me getting to and from Phuket Town are all up in the air. I'll be going with a translator, but he/she might not stay with me the whole time. Then I'll probably have to find my way to the bus station (possibly in a tuk-tuk) and take a 2 hour bus ride back. I might stay late and catch a ride back with some group members who are arriving at the Phuket airport around 12:20am. Or I might stay overnight, which I really would rather not do. I didn't think I'd have one of the stories that requires an overnight stay, so I'm not sure how I feel about it. It's a completely foreign place, public transportation is not very organized, and I don't speak the language. But I guess I'll just have to put on a brave face and jump right in.

The people that went out for their stories are all back now. I don't want to give away too much about the stories so that you all can enjoy the finished products, but I'll tell a little. My roommate, Selket, is working with the elephant trainers. She said she ate some real traditional (and weird) food with the trainer and his family (Thai people offer food as a sign of respect and maybe be offended if you refuse or don't eat it). Julie is working with Burmese immigrants and came back with lychee fruit (yummm). Grace is doing something with birds and got a huge hanging bird's nest. Phil left this morning and won't be back for another three days or so; his story focuses on a village built in the middle of the water. Abby didn't go out today, but she has to wear a full head covering for her Muslim-focused story tomorrow. Zack is working on Muay Thai, or Thai Kickboxing. There are a few others, but I'll leave them for surprise!

Things are a bit disorganized because we have to schedule vans and translators for the students that need to go out. There are only 6 or 7 translators and 12 different stories going on at once. So for the past few hours, they've been trying to figure out how it's all going to work tomorrow. That's why I don't get much of a choice in how long I stay in Phuket. It depends on the budget, who else is doing a story near Phuket, when I need to be there, when other people need to be elsewhere, when we can get the translator, etc. It's a bit hectic.

Right now I am really tired, but I'm sure the people who were out working all day are even more exhausted. I didn't get much sleep last night because my roommate sort of disappeared. She left the room around midnight while I was in the shower and still wasn't there when I got back around 1:30. So Kendrick and I searched the whole resort, then woke up Grace and Julie, then woke up Nacho and Eileen. It ended up being a six-person search party until about 3:30am. We combed the entire beach and resort. I was about to go to sleep and hope for the best when she walked into the room. She had walked down to the beach and accidentally fell asleep. I'm still not sure what she was doing there all alone, but I was just happy she was okay. We went to sleep at 4am and woke up at 7.

The weather was a little more uncomfortable today. It was so humid that my body ached. Now it's been raining for a while, which thankfully cooled everything down. It's making me very tired though. I've come to accept the constant moistness and sweating. I go through 2 shirts a day because I just feel gross half way through. Despite the weather...this is still a beautiful, wonderful place to be.

Yesterday was a really busy day. We started with some more language lessons. Then we went to a restaurant on the naval base and ate some good Thai food. Jinda (one of the coaches) taught me the correct way to eat Thai food...you hold the fork in your left hand and the spoon in your right hand, then use the fork to sort of shovel food onto the spoon. Each spoonful should have a good combination of rice and meat and veggies, or whatever else is in the dish. After lunch, we toured a pier where fishermen unload their boats. K.I.Asia, the organization we are working with, built a repair shop for the fishermen to repair their long-tail boats. It is part of their initiative to help locals and revive the local economy. I even went on one of the boats (docked)!

The restaurant at the Naval Base.

Charissa steps onto a long-tail boat.

Next we went to the Sea Turtle Conservation Center at Phang-nga Naval Base. The sea turtles are endangered, so the Thailand government set up a conservation center right on the naval base. They bring in new turtles every 15 days and release them after a year in captivity. They release about 10,000 turtles into the wild each year. I got to hold a 3-month-old tiny turtle and a 1-year-old medium turtle. I practiced speaking to the turtle raisers through the translators, which was really fun.


After the turtles, we drove to a government building where the local leader welcomed us and thanked us for our work. Then they drove us to a spot on the road that overlooked the Andaman Sea and one of the translators told me about the dead bodies he saw on the shore the day of the tsunami. I talked a lot with the translators, which was awesome. We also went to a beach a few kilometers from the resort and a translator told me it was the worst hit area in Phang-nga. The buildings were very spread out and there were big open spots of land where no one had rebuilt yet.

Kendrick and Julie get soaked!

The last stop of the day was a monument for the tsunami. After the waters washed back to the sea, a police boat was found 2km from the sea, just washed up in a field. It was HUGE and incredible that it could be carried that far. We climbed up a macgyvered rope ladder on a tree to get up on the boat and it felt really special to be a part of it. It was a really great way to commemorate the tsunami.


After the day of touring, we came back to the resort, had one more meeting about language, and then free time. I went straight down to the pool which was the perfect temperature. I ended up staying by the pool for about 6 hours, just chatting and laughing with friends and drinking tropical drinks. We made friends with the two bartenders, En and Auy (I have no idea if I spelled those correctly, but that's how it sounds). I practiced counting in Thai and managed to count all the way to 31 by myself! The bartenders got a kick out of it. Selket went behind the bar and made her own shot for all of us, which the bartenders then named the Selket Cocktail. I wonder if that will be on the menu someday...haha. After that, we all waded in the ocean. Then I went back and showered, and that is when the search party began.

So all in all, yesterday was a great day! I will post photos another time...I'm just too tired to do it right now. It's 9pm and we're supposed to be having a meeting now, but Pat isn't here yet. I just woke up from a nap and now I'm groggy. I'm going to go to bed extra early tonight, hence the lack of pictures.

Okay, meeting is done. I'm taking a van to Phuket at 8am tomorrow, and the van will pick me up again at 5pm.

A bat just flew around the room! And I saw an elephant standing around near the road yesterday.