The Final Chapter

Oh my little blog, how I have abandoned you this semester. Have you missed me these past four (!!!) months?? I'm sorry to have left you hanging for so long; here's what's been happening since we last connected. School has been over for a few weeks now. The day after school ended, I turned 27, and the day after THAT, I did a bit of traveling trough the south and in Malaysia. But now I'm back in Bangkok, and fly home in exactly one week. The one word I can think of to describe how I feel about it all is "bittersweet."

Things About Going Home I Am Amped About: - seeing family and friends - staying in my actual house - eating loads of American food (helloooo Chipotle and Chopt) - Thanksgiving and Christmas - driving a car - being able to flush toilet paper - SWEATER WEATHER - being able to communicate with everyone around me - free TV (thanks mom and dad) - real delicious home cooked meals (BIG thanks mom) - going for a run without fear of heat stroke or getting hit by a car

Things About Thailand That I Will Miss: - super cheap eveything - wai-ing people and saying sawatdee kaaaa (I may just keep this up) - getting an awesome massage for under $10 whenever the mood strikes - fresh fruit all over the damn place and the SMOOTHIES!! Passionfruit and pineapple smoothies, you are my kryptonite. - wearing flip flops every damn day - practicing my Thai skills on the reg - having every second of every day be a cultural experience - commuting via motorsai - the beaches <3333 - my adorable students and my coteachers, and all the new friends I've made - all the super friendly Thai people - hopping on a plane and spending the weekend in a different country

It's sort of a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation. But while I have loved (and sometimes hated, let's be honest) life in Thailand, and the country will always hold a special place in my heart, it's nearly time to close this chapter in my life and move onto the next challenge. And so, Thailand, I say to you, "Khob khun mak ka, and sawatdee ka."

1,000!

1,000 views! Wowza! Never thought I would hit this milestone, so thanks to all the readers out there! You guyz rool.

Live Through a Coup? Check.

Disclaimer: I am not an expert in Thai politics; this is merely a summary of the current state of affairs as I understand it as a foreigner living in Thailand. This is not my fight, so I do not endorse either side. I am a mere observer. 

As I write this, it's Friday around noon, and I'm at home, not at school. Why? Because yesterday around 5 PM, the Thai military announced it was taking over the government. A coup! How exciting. But how does this affect me personally? Well, there's a countrywide curfew in place from 10 PM - 5 AM, and they closed all of the schools until Sunday. So uh, thanks for the 3 day weekend? In Salaya, life goes on as usual. I am safe, and my friends who live in Bangkok are safe as well. As a political science major, it's a pretty interesting time to be living here.

If you're new to Thai politics, you may be wondering, "WHOA GUY, what do you mean there's a COUP? What the deuce is going on?!" To answer that, let's back up a little, to when I was brand new to Thailand. Almost the entire time that I've been here (6 out of the 7 months), there have been anti-government protests (the yellow shirts) going on, mostly in Bangkok. They believe the government, led by now-ousted Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, is corrupt (read more in detail -- older articles but decent background info: PolicyMic, CNN). Her brother is Thaksin Shinawatra, a business tycoon and former PM who is in self-imposed exile abroad because he was found guilty of corruption charges. This is a very simplified version of what's going on from a farang, but essentially the Bangkok elite have accused the Shinawatras and their political party of buying votes (among other abuses) in the rural provinces (especially the northeast) of Thailand, which is where they get all of their support. They are protesting the corruption, and they want to set up a new government.

Meanwhile, the pro-government supporters (the red shirts) have their own counter-protests, and so for months now they have been demonstrating back and forth trying to change the government. Usually, the protests are peaceful, but there have been incidents where it has turned violent and people have died. Then, earlier this month, Yingluck was ousted from her post by a court ruling, and a caretaker PM stepped in. This past Tuesday, we woke up and found out that the military had imposed martial law overnight, claiming that it was necessary to "restore order" and it was not a coup. That lasted about 2.5 days, as yesterday afternoon, they announced that this was in fact a coup, and the military had taken over the government.

Not long after I found out about the coup, I went to dinner with my next door neighbor, who is an officer in the Thai navy (another story for another time). The dude likes to talk, and he couldn't stop talking about the coup, understandably. What was interesting was his perspective on it, especially as part of the Thai military. He said that the coup was a good thing, that the military guys are very smart and "will fix everything." He said that the problem was the "uneducated" people who were corrupt and accepted money from Thaksin. "The educated people know better, but the uneducated people do not think, they do not know." He also said that coups were normal in Thailand (?!?!), which actually isn't too far from the truth, since the last one was in 2006. The US State Department and other Western countries are issuing statements condemning the coup and its effect on democracy, but this naval officer, a highly educated Thai person, was in support of the coup, and firmly believes it will help solve the country's problems, and prevent a civil war. Just goes to show that there are always going to be widely different opinions on how to go about solving crises. It remains to be seen where this coup will lead the country, but I'll be here, watching and listening.

Popping In

Can you just "pop in" to your own blog? I think you can. Anyway, I'm doing just that so I inform all of you loyal readers (hi Dad) that I'm working on posts about the rest of my G.S.E.A.S. and about being back at school! Which just started! Yeah! In the meantime, here's a terrifying owl in Bangkok:

Feels Like I Only Go Backwards

It's been exactly 3 months (and one day) since I arrived in Thailand. Everything I've read about culture shock says that this is around the time when the initial honeymoon feeling wears off, and the shock really begins. For me though, I think it came in reverse. I spent probably the first month and a half in Thailand really frustrated and overwhelmed. Since I arrived a few days late, I felt like I had to play catch-up to my fellow teachers. Though they had only been here a couple days longer than me, they had already made friends, explored Bangkok some, and were picking up the language. I felt like a huge fish out of water. In retrospect, I think I was still pretty stressed from my whole "stuff getting stolen" ordeal and being thrown into the middle of orientation didn't help much.

When we finally got to Salaya, it wasn't much better. Just trying to get groceries was a huge undertaking, and my normal comforts and stress relievers were nowhere in sight. I consider myself a pretty adaptable and patient person, but this was challenging me like nothing else before. There were a lot of tearful days where I thought to myself, "Holy shit, did I just make the biggest mistake of my life? What the hell am I doing here?! I am clearly more of Western European gal."  If you had told me 3 or 4 years ago that I would make the decision to move to Asia for a year, I would have laughed so hard and said, "Yeah, okay, and then I'll become pope after that." Asia had never interested me as much as Europe, so when Thailand wasn't fitting perfectly, I thought maybe my year-plus-long plan to move here had been a dream or a delusion. Though there were good days or moments that validated the move, they didn't come around as often as I might have liked.

Fast forward to Month 3, and I am finally feeling more comfortable here. The smells don't bother me as much, I can navigate the market and buy food, and Thai sounds much more like a language as opposed to just gibberish, not to mention I can catch a word here and there!  Sure, there are some days where all I want is a huge bowl of guacamole and a Fenway Frank, but the the homesickness is not nearly so acute.

Though three months doesn't seem like that much, especially since my contract is for a year, we are only about six weeks away from the end of the semester (and summer vacation!!). The six-month teachers are winding down their stay here, while I feel like I am just hitting my stride. At one month, I was afraid of being honest when someone asked me, "So, do you like Thailand?" But ask me now, and I can say that though it took a while and the relationship is still complicated, I do.