Number 26

I am safely back in Chiang Mai, and it feels good. This was written Wednesday night and posted Thursday.

It’s Wednesday night and I won’t be able to send this until I get back to Chiang Mai tomorrow night at the earliest, but I thought I’d write while the thoughts are fresh in my mind. This morning, all the people I helped with their papers presented. They all did well.
The students also did some presentations and they did a really good job. These are really good people who want nothing more then to help others. Normally my reaction to that would include some suspicion about their ulterior motives but in this case it’s just not there. The Malaysian kids, who I found really fun, gave Don and me a goodie basket as a gift for whatever it was we did for them. It was a bunch of things from their school including a t-shirt, key chain, book mark etc. Each and every student from each country came up to me this morning and had their picture taken with me. They also each individually thanked me, particularly for their new names. They’re great kids and I’ll miss them.

This afternoon I was invited to join the Lao professors for a sight seeing trip to the ancient city. (which might actually be called the old city) It’s about 20 minutes away in any other city but it took an hour of fighting traffic to get there by cab. The traffic is horrendous all day long and then at rush hour it gets significantly worse. We were left off at an old church and followed some people inside to see it. When we walked in there was a wedding going on. A full on Mass with tuxedos and gowns and everything. The Lao are Buddhist and were fascinated by the service. We weren’t asked to leave, but we were asked not to take flash photos. The church was huge and we weren’t very close to the ceremony but still..

From there we went to a park which purports to be in honor of the guy who said “the pen is, mightier then the sword”. It was relatively interesting and the Lao took about 1000 photos of each other in front of anything they could find. They insisted that I get into the photos most of the time. It’s strange. The Thai’s embraced me from the moment I got to Chiang Mai unconditionally. The Vietnamese did the same here in the Philippines. And today, the Lao professors (not the ones who live here but the ones who came to the conference from Vientiane), who I had only spoken with a few times because they’re so shy, treated me like I was one of them. I’m not used to people liking me and it’s kinda fun.

So now I’m packed and anxious to return to Paradise tomorrow. The air here is really polluted and the streets are never calm or quiet. Plus the food is bland and unlike Thailand, the average person on the street seems unhappy or mad. But I’m glad I came, I’m glad I was able to make a small contribution to the conference and now I’m glad I’m leaving.

Fun facts about Manila.

1) The previously mentioned Shakey’s Pizza places. (which seem to be everywhere and for the most part are open 24 hours)
2) The most popular food at Wendy’s is, by far, their fried chicken which comes with a side of spaghetti.
3) In the 7-11 they sell two pieces of bread wrapped in cellophane. It’s a swirl bread like you see in the US that has white bread and pumpernickel, except this has white bread and bright purple bread.
4) The police drive as badly, or worse, then everyone else and they do it on motorcycles. They weave in and out of traffic, pull right in front of cars to change lanes and don’t seem to care.
5) It is not unusual to see people, in uniforms that appear to be some sort of police or Federal something, carrying automatic weapons or sawed off shotguns.

Anyway, I’ll send this when I can. Nut, who knows my “sign-off’ line emailed me and said I could end today’s entry with it being another good day in Chiang Mai. He also said I have to go to a gay bar with him as payment for changing my ticket to go back early….