La Gon Carpe Diem Fall 2010!

To our Carpe Diem family of 3 months: we wish you continued learning, increasing tolerance, unending passion, continuous questioning, the strength to fight oppression, the ability to smile in the face of adversary, the ability to digest your food til you die, solid nights of sleep and, of course, good hair days...Goodbye Carpe Diem SE Asia '10! We'll miss you!

Final words

Hello to everyone out there for the last time!

We've finally reached the end of this crazy journey. Here's a quick recap of the last few weeks:

After the elephant village, the group headed up to Vang Vieng To do a kayaking trip to Vientienne. It was a lot of fun and just about everyone ( with the exception of Charley and Camille who were talking about the differences between fall an winter coats and not paying any attention) got dunked at least once in the rapids.

From Vietienne we left in two groups to fly to Siem Reap in Cambodia. Several of us got really lucky and get to wake up at 4:30 a.m. to catch our flight! jk none of us felt that lucky at all to tell you the truth. We flew into a ridiculously hot day in Siem Reap (Cambodia is by far the hottest country we have visited). We were lucky enough to be in the city during the water festival and got to see some really cool cultural stuff like the boat races. We also went to go visit Angkor Wat which was another really amazing cultural experience for everyone.

From Siem Reap we headed over to Battambang to volunteer with an organization called Ptea Teuk Dong which helps trafficked girls start their lives over and reintegrate into society. While we were there we helped to put a new roof over their restaurant and dig and put in a drainage system so the compound doesn't flood during the wet season. We also had a great Thanksgiving complete with pie (and some other tasty but unidentifiable Asian desserts).

After our week of volunteering we went to Phnom Pehn for a little R&R and a chance to learn a bit more about the Khmer Rouge and the Genocide that occurred in Cambodia not too long ago at S.21 and the Killing Fields.

From there we headed south to the beaches of Sihanoukville to embark on out scuba certification and spent a night on a dive boat finishing our courses. With only 3 days left until we arrive back to the States we are all trying to make the most out of the sunshine and the last leg of the trip.

See you soon!

After a short comfy ride we found ourselves nestled amongst the gradually rising and descending hilltops along the outskirts of Luang Prabang to partake in Shangri Lao, our next expedition. After debriefing the previous night as to what the program entailed and the schedule we would be following, various vague ideas & expectations began to take root in each one of us as the sleek lush pamphlets made their way into curious hands.

"Relive the footsteps of an historic French explorer of the 19th century following tranquil streams and passing through dense jungle, in an original and authentic style whilst staying in luxury tents with breathtaking views."

Sleeping on these notions, a cautious excitement gave way into the following morning as we set off to wait what was to follow. Coming to a halt we scurried around to grab our bags and make our way to the camp. Stone steps marked our path as we tried to soak all that our initial gaze fell upon. For a few brief moments, everything fell into the background as our attention was cast onto the strong gentle movements of a group of elephants.

After loading our packs onto the elephants, we began our short trek through the jungle to our campsite. During our trek we got to know our two guides, Pat and Mongon. Once we arrived at the campsite (and after we ate lunch), we began to help set up our tents. Well, we tried to help set up our tents. In actuality, we kind of just held the tent poles until our guides needed them.

After setting up our tents, Pat told us to change into clothes that we could get wet and dirty. Yes, we were bathing elephants! No better way to relax after trekking through the jungle.

The first step to bathing an elephant is to mount the elephant. This consists of telling the elephant to lift her front right leg (the Elephant camp only employs females as males are known to be too aggressive in captivity). Then you step up on her knee while gripping the top of her ear. After that, you simply (or not so simply) pull yourself up onto the elephants back. Of course, sometimes you get lucky and get the elephant that can lie down on the ground so you don't have to try your luck in clambering up the elephant.

After mounting the elephant, we rode her down into the pond, then scrubbed away all of the dirt and grime with a scrub brush that we received from the elephant's mahout.

A mahout is the elephant’s keeper and constant friend. The word mahout is of Indian origin. The bond shared by an elephant and her mahout is very deep. Some elephants will only respond to a single mahout, as was the case with Mae Kham, my elephant. At dinner, we got to know all of our elephants and their mahouts as well as the rest of the camp staff. Over the course of our stay, we learned more about the mahouts and became friends with them.

During our stay at Shangri Lao, we enjoyed more quality time feeding, caring for, riding, and playing with the elephants. We went on treks and explored caves. Our group tried our hand at net fishing. It's fortunate that we had other dinner plans because the four little fish we caught would never have fed our group. On our final night, we enjoyed a farewell barbecue. After packing up camp and spending a night of relaxation at the lodge, we spent our final morning harvesting sugar cane to feed to our elephants as a goodbye present.


Doing our best to squeeze into the back of a pickup truck, all 15 of us (including guides) drove an extremely uncomfortable 20 minutes back to Luang Prabang. Then, we immediately loaded onto two spacious minibuses for our six hour ride to Vang Vieng. During the drive, a few people got carsick.

The next morning we woke up early for a day of kayaking. It was an exciting day in which pretty much everyone flipped their kayak on a whitewater rapid. The only kayak that didn't flip consisted of Charley and Camille who used the time honored technique of not paying attention and talking about Winter coats to avoid being capsized by the rapids. When we arrived at the take-out point we loaded into a song thaew for along drive to the capitol of Laos, Vientiane...

some visuals

Dont forget to check our Flickr Photostream from time to time!

Pu Khao de Laos!

Laos has baguettes.

That is the first thing that, on behalf of everyone, must be said about our visit to the second country in our exciting itinerary: LAOS.

After a 6 hour van ride, an overnight stay at the border, a river crossing, another 6 hour van ride, and a much lighter bag of dramamine, we finally arrived in Luang Nam Tha, a town that looks like what would happen if Southeast Asian culture and a Western film had a love child, ready to begin our first activity: Trekking. Luang Nam Tha itself seemed to be a pretty popular gateway for travelers like ourselves looking to rough it for a few days in the jungle, and functioned as a very nice transition from all the comforts of urban Chiang Mai to the rugged mountainous terrain of the Laotion jungle.

And it is most definitely a jungle. Thick vined trees, staircases made of interwoven roots, mossy riversides and damp tropical floors decorated our hike as we stumbled and tripped our way Indiana Jones-style down the supposedly well-traveled path. The 12 of us, a big sweaty panting mess, were all the more impressed by our five flip-flop clad tour guides who, despite keeping the same (if not particularly fast) pace as us and carrying just as much baggage, seemed hardly phased by the hike at all. That night, we all learned valuable lessons in packing the bare essentials. Alex, having forgotten his toothbrush, resorted to using a toothpaste covered tampon. Jackie meanwhile, in an allergy induced haze, ran out of kleenex and began systematically ripping pages out of Lizzie's book to blow her nose ("Don't worry guys, it was just the acknowledgments. Nobody reads that shit anyway!").

Returning to Luang Nam Tha a little worse for wear, we boarded a bus for Luang Prabang. Six bags of Lays sweet basil potato chips, one extremely questionable chicken skewer, and nine harrowing hours later, we arrived at the cozy, culturally rich city of Luang Prabang. The city itself is a UNESCO World Heritage site, and these past 2 days have been crammed to the brim with temple visits and night market shopping sprees. A certain student in the group managed to spend a total of 300,000 kip in about 45 minutes. I won't name any names...except that it starts with a B and ends in "en".

To return to the original statement, Laos has baguettes, and there's no place that this is more apparent than Luang Prabang. The streets are lined with stands selling fresh chicken sandwiches, nutella sandwiches, and chicken AND nutella sandwiches (yes, chicken and nutella sandwiches are an option). One can't walk too far without running into a bakery or pastry store, or hearing the greeting "Sabaidee Madame!" The colonists are long gone, but their culture has mixed in interesting ways with Laotian culture.

Tomorrow we leave for our Elephant trek. It seems like we have some exciting and potentially thought-provoking experiences ahead that go far beyond just cleaning out poop...but that's all I'll say for now!

Until next time,

Camille, Lizzie, and the rest of the SE Asia gang!

Chiang Mai

Greetings from Southeast Asia!

The past week was spent in the beautiful city of Chiang Mai, Thailand. We spent the week taking a variety of classes: thai cooking, jewelery making, Muay Thai (well we wanted to try it, but to keep a long story short, it was an epic fail). Our first night in Chiang Mai landed on Camille's birthday, so to celebrate some of us went out to a karaoke bar, but it wasn't so much of a bar. There were different rooms, which each had a theme (underwater, graveyard, jail cell, etc.), and the one we choose was "bed room." We also happened to be in Chiang Mai for Halloween, so we all dressed up (cats, hippies, ourselves) and went out dancing for the night. We also completed our last week of Thai class. As a finale we learned the popular Thai pop song, Duu Ter Tum by Jobbunjob. It is one of my favorite songs now.

The Thai cooking course was an amazing experience. We each got to pick our own appetizer, stir fry, noodles, curry and curry paste. Also, we each received a cook book at the end, so we have the option to cook dishes we missed out on in class. It was really nice knowing the AMAZING food I was eating was made by me, except now my family will probably make me cook all of our meals once they find out.

Some of us also attended an event called Monk Chat. We went to a Wat (temple) and simply just found the monk chat sign, went inside, approached the monks who were sitting behind tables, and asked them questions. Most talked about Buddhism, others asked more about our culture in the US, or just life.

On our last day, some of us also did a jewelery making class. We chose to either make a pendent or a ring. We first drew a design, then manipulated our piece of silver, cutting out our designs with a saw. Sawing was difficult-I actually broke the saw blade twice! Oops! Everyone's jewelery turned out beautiful though, two people made pendents, while the rest chose rings.

We have finally now crossed the border into Laos. I was saddened to leave Thailand, but envisioning our adventures quickly returned me to excitement. Already today we took a six hour public bus ride through the mountains in Northern Laos, some of the most beautiful scenery I have seen to date. I am excited to see what Laos has in store for all of us!

SEIZE THE DAY!-

Olivia

...(edits by Alejandro... because I dislike writing)

Silent Fall

May all beings be happy...
May all beings be free...
May all beings have access to and ipods and facebook during vows of silence.

(This last affirmation being our group's request to modernize Buddhist practice).

We just finished our 5 day intro to Buddhism and meditation retreat which ended in a full day of nobel silence. Nobel silence redefines silence as inadequately quiet, requiring abstinence from speaking, reading, writing, or attempts at non-verbal communication, such as body language, peace signs, or smoke signals for help. As many who have attempted noble silence before may attest, nobel silence is not quiet at all. Instead, it amplifies the noise inside our head, prompting an optimal mental state for mediation and, for many, intense self-reflection.

To ease the intensity, the retreat center chef cooked organic Thai vegetarian cuisine that would drive any Top chef judge into silence--mushroom stews, green papaya salads, tofu coconut curries, tapioca and corn deserts drizzled with sweetened coconut milk. Nearly all of the ingredients were harvested from the organic garden sprouting around the facility grounds. The bamboo and earthen huts were literally perched over the irrigation canals of a rice paddy, leaving us to feel like we were growing like grains of rice, emerging from the mud, sprouting towards the heavens, flowering with ancient wisdom with each meditation, and more appropriately for us, enduring a sickle's worth of leg pain after attempting the lotus position for a day.

Everyone departed in various states or relaxation or anticipation of mattresses to come. Stay tuned for student tales!

The Real Bpra-Te:t Thai

Hello family and friends! If you read the title, you just learned the Thai word for Thailand! But before you lucky readers learn more Thai, let's go back a couple weeks.

Bangkok was a great way to release the angst of the Mokken Village. Great shopping, (bargaining is the name of the game) and hot showers (OH MY GOD!) We even spent one night at the Lava Club night club where we drank tons of M150 (Redbull, our nonalchoholic alternative) and danced the night away with British Columbian studs and ladyboys and all sorts of exotic people! We left Bangkok about a week ago and survived the 16 hour sleeper train to get to our homestays 30 minutes outside of Chiang Mai.

Right now we’re kickin’ it in Mae Rim, a sleepy northern district with comfy rural villages and 3 internet cafes (that have made a whole lot of profit this last week) and an immesasurably nice group of friendly Thai folk kind enough to take us weary foreigners in! The days here look pretty slow on paper, but they’re exhausting nonetheless. We wake up with the chickens at sunrise and eat breakfast with our lovely Thai families (Khrop Khrua Thai). For some of us, breakfast (gin khaao dtok chao) is a full 4 course meal: chicken soups and sticky rice and grasshoppers and worms (luckily not for all of us) and a whole mess of delicious (occasionally fishy) entrees. For others, every meal is shared by the family, with all members SHARING THE SAME BOWL OF SOUP AND THE SAME GLASS OF WATER. Didn’t mean to type it in capitals, but Charley feels that the caps are appropriate.

A week of Thai classes has left us with a surprisingly decent Thai vocabulary. Everyday I have a little bit more to say to my Thai family. Yesterday we had a great big laugh about how ridiculous I sounded 6 days ago.

Thai family: Khun yaak gin khaao mai? (You want to eat meal?)
Ben: Pom chuu Ben. (my name is ben)
Thai family: Rao ruu. Ben, gin khaao? (We know. Ben eat?)
Ben: Pom chuu Ben!

It’s amazing how quickly you can pick up a language like Thai when you are forced to speak it right after you learn it.

Besides a community of English speaking people, the rest of the conditions are incredibly tolerable. Showers without hot water, toilets without seat, homes without central air conditioning, bikes without brakes (this one was a little harder to manage on downhill streets). All these things have become a typical way of life for us. A couple people visit the X Center on occasion, which is a tourist-friendly 'extreme' sports center several miles down (on bikes, a good 20 minute trip) and tried some pseudo-American cuisine, complete with Dave n’ Buster’s-quality pizza and burgers and chicken nuggets. I sometimes attend these excursions, I’ll admit, but the adaptation to Thai rural life has otherwise been relatively smooth here. For the most part, Thai food is the name of the game, and I know I am not the only one who goes to sleep thinking about the next day's breakfast.

Probably the most distinct part of Mae Rim is how cozy it is. Everyone, from the 8 year old kids to the 68 year old farmers, takes a motorbike when he or she wants to go out. Going out often means going to the farm for a day’s work (something I can proudly say I did) or to a neighbor’s house for beer or noodles. Rarely do the villagers even venture out past the main street to Chiang Mai.

Lately things have picked up quite a bit. Olivia’s house is a virtual cooking school/petting zoo. One can learn to make delicious sticky rice and coconut snacks, allow beetles to crawl on his arms, even hold a rooster high into the air while singing the prideland theme from lion king!We’ve also discovered, through the wonderful generosity of Jackie and Alex’s homestay mama Pii Laa, the taste sensation sweeping the Thai nation that is Rotee. Here’s how they make it:

1: put a crepe like puff pastry on a wide black cooking surface with (canoli?) oil.
2: (personal preferance) once it has reached a light brown, craqck an egg into the concoction.
3: after the dish has reached a delicious golden brown (personal preferance again, but you’d be crazy to forget this step) slice up some bananas into the newly fluffy pastry and fold the sides to make a thick square pie.
4: Slice into 25 or so pieces, and (oh my lord) POUR CONDENSED MILK ON TOP AHH!
5: enjoy.

I don’t know if I can ever go back to french crepes.

Between going to internet cafes, eating delicious ROTEE, studying paasaa Thai, and hanging out with homestay families, there is certainly a lot of time to ponder. One can’t help but be humbled by the rural lifestyle. The lack of easy communication, the early-to-bed, early-to-rise sleep schedule, the unbelievably hospitable people, the difficulty of transportation (for us without cars or motorcycles) - all of it calms the soul and allows for great introspection. One can only wonder what 10 days at a Buddhist monestary will contribute to our self-exploration. We're gonna be soooo spiritual when we get back to the states! Spiritual and fat if they don't stop feeding us sticky rice.

Missing you crazy falang (meaning foreign or guava, depending on context) westerners with your strange western ways,
Ben, Charley, and the SE Asia crew!

Images Maak Maak

Check out our SE Asia Carpe Diem semester album on Flickr!

It's a hard knock week

Ahh, sweet mysterious of the Mokken Village we have uncovered thee! Upon arriving to the Mokken bay tinted with broken red bull bottles and climbing inside the Village Cheif’s house, nothing more than a living room sized shack with open windows and harsh, unshaven bamboo branches, we quickly and abruptly came to a single conscious realization: We aren’t in America anymore.

Different problems arose quickly for different people. What will heal these bug bites? How does one shower with a bucket? Why is there no toilet paper to wipe my tuchus?

Yet amongst the myriad of cultural shocks and physical dillemas, none could count the Mokken’s treatment of us as anything but a comfort. A relief for some, and a shock for others, the Mokken’s certainly did not act as one would expect. While we may have thought our purpose in the dispossessed refugee camp was to supply labor, we found that our services were only half as efficient as the villagers, who put up the infrastructure of the community center that we funded in little under a day. One could not help but feel that, when we were finally allowed to hammer nails into the carefully laid boards of the community center floor (and what a pile of bent nails we left) that our efforts were less helpful and more to feel like we helped. In the same way we desired to feel the joy of contribution, the Mokken’s wished to hold the prize of ownership. Unlike many of their houses, which the Thai government built without the Mokken’s needs or wants in mind, the Mokken’s wanted their community center to contain within it the craft, labor, and pride of Mokken culture.

This left most of us with 3 hour work days and immense free time, so we were happy to oblige.

After leaving the Mokken village, filled with mixed feelings about our laborious if not limited contributions, our difficult living conditions and our comparatively luxurious treatment, a trip to a nearby beach and actually mattress covered beds with real running showers was more than a welcomed holiday. It was paradise. -Ben Greene

A picture of the dock outside of our sleeping quarters at the Mokken village at low tide.

The conditions at the Mokken village were in stark contrast to the well-resourced surroundings of the ashram where we conduted our orientation. The Mokken people traditionally lived at sea on self-made fishing vessels, small boats that look like large canoes tents on top. In fact, the first Mokken sea vessels were carved out of solitary large trees akin to the construction of Native American dugouts. The Mokken traveled up and down the coasts of South Asia, following good weather and better fishing. Though completely nomadic, the Mokken were (and still are) community oriented, spending all of their lives at sea grouping, dispersing, and regrouping. The leader of the Mokken village told us, “[The Mokken] only came to shore to deliver a baby or to weather a bad storm, where they would climb up into a large strong tree.” The Mokken have a tough time with the concept of personal possessions, know how to read subtle clues in nature and, more than anything, love the sea.

Modern society, with political drawn boundaries on our oceans, fishing licenses, natural park regulations, and coastal development rights have put an end to the traditional Mokken way of life. Approximately 30 years ago the Mokken started to settle in the beautiful islands on the southern coast of Burma and off the west coast of Thailand. They built stilt houses made of sturdy branches and thatched roofs. The floors, also made of branches, were placed just a few inches above the level of high tide, so occasionally a higher than normal tide washes over the floor of the house. In fact, a full moon tide during our stay in the village washed over the floor, causing us to move our sleeping bags into a missionary-built church standing about one foot higher. Though the islands are breathtaking, the Mokken are squeezing out their existence in an area few people would even consider camping at over a weekend. Freshwater is collected from the rain and stored and cisterns, the toilets empty directly onto the ground (low tide) or into the water (high tide) below, the waste-strewn paths between houses are covered knee deep by the tide, and much of their food must be caught daily.

Navigating boundaries

We took an overnight bus to Ranong, departing from the primary Bangkok bus station, a fun multi-tiered maze of tasty eateries and shopping stands that make bus stations in the United States look like dirty shopping mall parking garages. After buying some last minute supplies and slurping down some spicy noodles, we boarded the overnight bus to Ranong. We arrived 8 hours later, sleep-deprived and disorientated, and made our way to the boat dock outside of the Ranong Custom’s house.

The boat dock and port at Ranong is an experience in itself. Ranong is only four miles from the Burmese border and the dock has the feel of a marine version of a run-down border town on stilts: traditional Thai fishing boats outfitted with loud two-stroke engines crisscross the intercoastal; fisherman from Burma, Thailand, and Malaysia (and perhaps further) smoke hand-rolled cigarettes while preparing their enormous aquamarine and bright orange fishing vessels for work; women en route to town from the surrounding island villages to purchase food staples donned umbrellas to protect themselves from the blistering sun. The busy scene was both beautiful and an intense depiction of survival, of finding food and sustaining oneself on dwindling ocean resources.

Our group passed our bags Chicago fire house style down to one of the large Thai fishing boats, inches away from the standing water on the boat floor. We took a breathe of the diesel-laden air and made our way to the Mokken village at sea.

From the Lily Pad to the Sea

Our group endured the brutal 15 hour plane ride with turbulence, a 3 hour layover in Hong Kong, followed by a 2 hour plane ride, then a 2 hour bus ride to gratefully arrive at the idyllic Wongsanit Ashram on the far outskirts of Bangkok. The Ashram has made for a perfect landing to Thailand: clean and spacious meditation halls provide prime space for our orientation meetings, while rain on the metal roofs and the symphony of geckos, frogs, and toads in the lilypad-filled ponds below our trees houses make rest and relaxation come naturally. Best of all, the staff at the ashram have provided us with more than sustenance for our long days of orientation. The kitchen food arrangements are ones that could make the cover of a Conde Naste Traveler Magazine: Tom Yam soup with fresh caught seafood, homemade rice noodles, garden-harvested vegetable salads, pad thai and glass noodle salads, fried fish, mangos, mangosteen and rambutans. We suggested to skip the rest of the itinerary to stay at the ashram and eat, but alas, adventure, service, and tuk-tuks await....Tomorrow we depart for Bangkok and the Mokken Sea Village with high spirits and healthy bodies.

...And They're OFF!

Team SE ASIA came together seamlessly, and will be embarking over the Pacific in only 2 short hours. Look for more from the group members themselves in a couple of days!

WELCOME!

Sawadeecap or Sawadeecah (for the females)!

With less than a week remaining before we depart for our semester in Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia, we feel an overwhelming excitement to meet you and begin our adventure together! As we sit at the Carpe Diem Headquarters in Portland trying to finish our final preparations, and hear the rush of the cool rain on the roof, we can’t help but daydream about hearing tropical downpours on roofs across SE Asia.

This is our first entry of our story together. This blog will be a great way for you to keep in touch with family and friends over the course of our journey. Over the course of our adventure, we will be rotating a designated blogger of the week, giving each of you a chance to share your experiences online. Be sure to inform your fam and friends of the link!

Be excited! The next few months are sure to be filled with lots of amazing food, beautiful scenery, and lots of opportunity to explore personal growth through our group dynamic. As you make your own final preparations and pack your backpack (remember less is more), you might have some questions, feel free to email us!

Until next week,

Alex and Jackie