5 Nights In Bangkok and a Moken Village

Hello one and all-
Completed our student ran free travel which we spent exploring the vast complexities of Bangkok. It was a little hard getting used to the city life, which was far more hectic than Chiang Mia. Regardless the city was great. Spent one of the days doing a cooking course which varied with 10 courses and a trip to the market to know what we were using. And with all the travel and work, Team Seasia had a date night; which included dinner and a movie (James Bond). But don't worry, thats where the date ended. After a few more days exploring Bangkok we bused down to Ranong to start work with the Mirror Foundation on the Moken People's Island of Koh Payam. The Moken People are known as "Sea Gypsies" and have been ocean dwelling people for several hundred years. But know with the world changing they have settled on some small Thia islands, although not very welcome. With our time with them we worked on several projects including building a housing shelter for their power generator, laying a cement foundation around the well making it easier to bathe, dug a huge pond which will soon become a fish farm, and finally help lay a huge cement foundation around another town building. All in all we kept very busy and enjoyed our time with them, and they informed us we are welcome anytime. And with that we leave you to go S.C.UB.A.!!!!!!!!!
So until next time....

IWP and Home Sweet Home

Welcome back faithful readers, hope all who read this are doing as well as Team Seasia. After our adventures in Chiang Mia, the troop set off for IWP, a women's justice center located in Mae Rim. There we learned much about Buddhism, eachother, and our inner being; deep stuff. There was a tight schedule of meditation of various sorts throughout the day; from sitting mediation, to walking meditation, to yoga. It was a little hard on the group at first, but it started to grow on us, and some of us are still doing it after the justice center. We had some wonderful teachers that taught a great deal about the different types of Buddhism, as well as meditation techniques that were both calming and frustrating. After the IWP we embarked on our most immersed expiriece yet; homestays with families that spoke absolutely no english, which it turns out dramatically increased our thai. Living with the families was an incredible expirience, it really gave us a sense of thai life style that we would have never had otherwise. Team Seasia's morale is high, although living with families made the team miss being back in familiar homes; regardless it was one of the most memorable expiriences on the trip. Next up on the agenda is free travel picked by US!! so look out team leaders...muahahaha.
Much love,
your adventurers on the other side

Fun Fun at Pun Pun (and in Chiang Mai)

Greetings,
apologies on the lateness of this message as well. A week and a half or so ago, seasia traveled to Pun Pun organic farm to learn about organic farming (obviously). There we learned from nightly slideshows the importance of seed saving and the ease of earthen building.
We did a variety of different tasks every day. One day we made compost, a mixture of manure, old straw, banana leaves, and EM (a multipurpose substance that is incredibly easy to make, you just take fruit or old food and cover it in sugar then leave it for 2 weeks et voila! You either have yourself a delicious drink or something to pour on your compost to boost its ability to help the plants it will be put on... end of tangent). We watched videos on the importance of variety in food and how horrible monocropping is. It was very inspiring. Team Seasia is definitely going to return to the states with a bigger awareness on the importance of shopping organic.
We also learned about earthen building. It's so sad that people spend 30+ years of their lives saving up to buy a house when all you need is dirt, rice husk, and water. So easy. With just a little bit of effort you can build your very own earthen home, exactly as you want your home to be for ridiculously inexpensive costs. We watched a slideshow with different photos showing examples of the countless posibilities for earthen building.
With minds filled with hope for the future we headed back to Chiang Mai where we started our language and massage schools. However, we lost 1/4 of our Seasia team on the second day back. Something that was incredibly difficult to deal with and accept. His presence is sorely missed by all of us. We managed to try and start up our normal routine again, definitely with a missing presense. In the morning from 10-12 we studied Thai. Afternoons from 1-4:30 we studied Nerve Touch Massage, a technique designed by the famous Mamma Lek. It's incredible how quickly we were all able to pick up on language and massage. After a short 5 afternoons we got our certificates in Thai Massage. And our notebooks fill up more and more daily with information that helps us speak Thai to locals. We're going to have much more time to practice when we're staying with our homestays, which we're all looking forward to.
Now off to our afternoon session at the International Women's Partnership for Peace and Justice. To talk about our country's victory. Yay Obama!!