I will be studying abroad from January 1st to Mid-May 2010 at Thammasat University in Bangkok, Thailand. I hope this blog helps me communicate and stay in touch with everyone back home, and saves me from having to tell each person the exact same story of what I did while I am abroad.
Since originally Lop Buri was planned to be a weekend trip and there wasn't much to do when we got there we headed back to bkk the same night and I read about a crocodile farm that was near by when I got back so the next morning which was a Monday we had off for a Buddhist holiday I headed to Farm Joh Rai Kay (Crocodile Farm in Thai). We took a local air conditioned bus that was 24 baht (80 cents) for about an hour and a half and then hopped in a 8 baht taxi to get to the front door of the farm. The farm is located in Samut Prakan which is southeast of Bangkok and it is the largest crocodile farm in the world housing more than 100,000 crocodiles or so they say. There were crocodile shows, elephant shows, and an array of different animals there. So besides the crocodile part of the farm the rest was a pretty bad zoo. They also sold all kinds of crocodile products there meat, jewelery, leather handbags and wallets they found a way to use every part of a croc for profit. Being the biggest farm in the world they export the crocodiles all around the world as well as leather goods. It was definitely worth a visit because it was so close but I probably would not recommend this place to anyone unless they really enjoy seeing thousands of crocodiles just laying around.
I played with this monkey for a while, he was like a little baby
Since we got back early from Lop Buri there was no time for sleep since 3 hours later was the US vs. Canada olypic hockey game for the gold. About 8 of us headed over to Khao San Rd. (the backpacker street in Bkk) at 3 am so we would be there for the 3:30 am start of the game. There were only 2 americans in the entire pub another exchange student and myself. And it was funny to hear a Canadian guys explanation as to why there weren't more americans he said "how would Americans be here in Bangkok, Americans don't travel." The more that I think about it the guy was right since I have been in Thailand I have ran into people from all around the world but usually the only Americans I run into are other exchnage students or people visiting the exchange students or the occasional ones on trips to different islands. It is kind of sad to see how people from other countries take months off at a time to travel the world to see what is out there and how Americans just stay in America because they are content with their surroundings and would never think of traveling around a country like Thailand. Anyways back to the Olympics as most of you know the match did not end in favor of the US and going to watch the match jsut to see how crazy the Canadians got after they won in overtime made the all-nighter worth it. Except for the fact that I got back aroudn 6:30 am and saw the sunrise after spending the entire day in Lop Buri and would be going to the crocodile farm after a little nap.
Five of us decided to go to Lop Buri for a weekend, because of all the stories we heard from the others about swimming monkeys that they had there and markets over railroad tracks that would move off when a train came be and then re-set up. But unfortuantely none of us did our research and Lop Buri was not where all the others went and the stories we heard were not from there. So instead of a weekend trip we made it into a day trip once we got there, and it was defintely worth going to see. There were ruins, monkeys, temples, monkeys, and more monkeys oh and food.
There were dead birds all around the ruins but i never found out why...maybe there was something in the air
Hand-written menu defintely a bad choice picking this place to eat
People donate certain foods and leave then at a designated feeding place two times per day so that the monkeys do not attack humans for food as often.
Monkey casually reading. And no caption needed for the other guy.
Today a lady named Pi Maa from the office of international affairs organized a cooking class at her house followed by a trip to Sanam Chandra Palace.
Everyone in my building met downstairs in the lobby around 8 am, but of course according to Thai time that meant our buses actually left at 9:30 am. We were first taken to a market where all the ingredients that we would use to make food later were purchased. It was interesting to see fresh coconut milk being made and the enormous amount of ingredients in take to make one simple Thai dish from scratch. Everyone grabbed some breakfast at the market and then we headed over to Pi Maa’s house to actually make lunch. Once we got there we all picked up little stuff to do cut up fruits, peal mushrooms, chop vegetables, make sticky rice, etc… then we all had the opportunity to make our own batches of Pad Thai. Pi Maa has a curry paste factory in her backyard and she provides the royal family all of their paste for their food (so it’s good) and we used it to make Tom Yum a really spicy soup with an array of different vegetables in it. For dessert we had mango sticky rice which is just a mango on type of sticky rice but very good. After we were all stuffed with food we sat around for a while and then got on mini buses to go to Sanam Chandra Palace.
Sanam Chandra Palace was built in the early 1900’s before the Brahman shrine; it was built by the prince who later became King Rama VI as both a vacation retreat and what would be his residence during his pilgrimage. It is a beautiful place, we fed fishes in the water and walked around its not very big and we were done with it in about an hour. We then got back on the buses to head back to Bangkok; unfortunately the bus I was on took a longer to get back than the other. Our tire blew out, and not that it is relevant but our FEMALE freaked out and called a pit crew to come rescue us off the road but before they got there me and Bruno a guy from France figured out how to use the funky not very safe jack and changed the tire ourselves. We finally made it back home and called it a day.
Every year the school I go to, Thammasat University harvest its own rice to cook later in the year in May for the new incoming students. We were told 10 exchange students could go to harvest the rice since we had to take the bus to the other campus 45 minutes away. It was first come - first serve for the sign up list, I didn’t think much of it and I signed up. I have to say it was a great experience but it was not what I expected at all. Harvesting rice is a very laborious task and I was extremely tired after chopping the stalks of rice out from the rice fields. I’m just happy they fed us after we provided labor to them free of charge… They had a fun little Thai band playing the whole time we were in the field too and the water buffalo that help harvest the rice were also roaming around while we were in the fields, here are some pictures:
Thai Politics is a very interesting subject and it is the one course I regret not taking while I am here. Some of you that keep up with the news might have heard about the building tension in Thailand leading up to February 26th. It is kind of a complicated situation but Thailand has two opposing parties the “yellow shirts” and the “red shirts.” The Yellow Shirts represent The People’s Alliance for Democracy, and The Red shirts represent The United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship.
Currently the Yellow Shirts are in control under the current Prime Minister Abhist and his supporters come from the wealthier parts of Thailand’s they want things to stay as is. Abhist is currently 45 years old and took office in December 2008 after the former Prime Minister Thaskin was deposed in the last military coup in Thailand in 2006.
Thaskin is supported by The Red Shirts and is now the reason for even more tension than usual in the Thai Political Arena. The Red Shirts want to get rid of what they this is not a true democratic government and this is why they are seeking a revolution. After Thaskin was ousted by the military coup in 2006 and he has had many charges filed against him while he has been in exile. The one charge that is relevant right now is how he used his power while being Prime Minister to illegally gain wealth, this charge led to 76 billion baht ($2.2 billion US) in his assets in Thailand to be frozen. On February 26th the Supreme Court of Thailand will hand down the verdict as to whether or not his assets will be releases or remain frozen or permanently seized.
This past weekend 3 pounds of explosives (C4) was found on the Supreme Court compound which happens to be 500 meters away from my school….. Also there were 2 separate grenade attack at a school (not my school) fortunately there were no casualties in any of the attempted attacks. Things might get a little crazy and security throughout the capital is going to be increased. I have already noticed more officers in uniform around school and I assume there will be even more by the end of next week. There is a protest planned for today, but often times The Red Shirts are more talk and less action, but they continually fight for what they want. As a result the added security will include the installation of about 250 security checkpoints throughout Bangkok and 4 to 5 thousand additional officers patrolling, and incorporating martial is a definite possibility if the situation warrants it.
There has been death threats in the past few days on everyone from the Prime Minister to all the Supreme Court Judges, they have all been offered safe houses and a few judges have asked to be relocated. The Red Shirts are seeking a revolution and if they do everything needed in order to achieve their goal there will be violence in Thailand not only in the coming days but weeks and months to follow. The king usually is able to calm tension down by making a speech because he is so respected by the people of Thailand but he has been ill since before I even arrived in Bangkok and continues to be hospitalized right across the river from school, and the last time he made a speech to the public was on his birthday after that no one in the public has seen him or heard his voice.
I live in an area that is not in danger by any means because all the violence if there is any will occur around the government building which surround my school, so if it gets bad on the streets I will just stay home from school=] I also have an extended break next weekend which might mean going somewhere away from all of the commotion, I want to experience the atmosphere surrounding the politics of Thailand but if I go away for a few days I am sure protest will continue the rest of the time I am in Thailand. All I can do now is stay away from any avoidable danger and stay informed about any new developments that affect me.
Over the weekend everyone was going to Pattaya, and I was tired of the whole beach thing so I decided I wanted to do something different. There was an e-mail we got about an “American Studies Club” having a camp over the weekend at a military camp it was very vague, and I did not know what I was signing up. I just figured the worst case scenario was that I would have wasted a weekend and 400 baht ($12 US for 3 days staying at the camp, meals, and activities) and missed the Chinese New Year celebration in Bangkok, but it actually ended up being one of the best weekends I have had in Thailand thus far. Last minute a lot of people decided to come to the camp instead of staying in Bangkok for the weekend so we had a total of 8 exchange students from my building that went to the camp.
The 8 of us walked and took the ferry to our campus (Tha Prachan) and then took a shuttle to the other Thammasat campus (Rangsit) to meet up with all the Thai students that we would be going to camp with. The Rangsit campus of Thammasat is very nice compared to the campus I am at because the Tha Prachan campus was built a long time ago and has a lot of historic significance in Thailand while the Rangsit campus was built recently. All programs from my campus are being moved to the Rangsit campus slowly, and now there are mostly only older students at the school I go to. Anyways we got on the bus and a few hours later we arrived at Chulachumklao Military Academy around 9 pm which is when we all got to eat the dinner that was provided by the camp (it was actually good unlike your typical camp food). We then got to all meet each other and learn traditional Thai dances similar to the Macarena in the States.
We broke up into teams and made team names (I felt like I was in middle school again and at camp) after a few more activities we called it a night. The next morning we had to wake up at 7am to start one looooooooooong day. We took showers in a community bathroom but they weren’t actual showers just a little pool of water in the middle of a room with little containers to use to scoop water out with and shower. It was surprisingly refreshing. We then had a huge breakfast and headed to what they called a 2 hour “Walk Rally” on the poster advertising the camp, but it actually was a 4 hour long team building event that taught us how to learn from each other. One thing that is very clear in Thailand is that there is no sense of safety anywhere, so participating in everyday activities always involves risks because there are rules and regulations for show but no safety precautions are enforced.
Anyways during the walk rally we were told that we had to fit into nature so we had to put black paint over our bodies and then walk through trails with random fireworks going off while we were running through them and random little fires in our way at the beginning of the course. We had to crawl through a pipe and the crawl under barbed wire face up while is was a couple of inches away from our faces, the rest of obstacles were typical of any camp (rope climbing, getting everyone on a team over a point without touching certain things, etc……).
At the beginning of the rally each team was given a metal container with around 6 eggs, instant noodles, rice, 2 cans of sardines and 1 bottle of water per person. So we had to cook our lunch on a fire we came across on the trail, it was interesting to see how the meal was cooked using nothing but a metal container and water which yielded cooked rice, hard - boiled eggs, noodles with egg, and sardines. All the Thai sergeants would give us advice on how to get through the rest of the course by working together but it was always in Thai and not everything could be translated so it was difficult to understand what they were trying to say at times. About 4 hours after we started we were finally done with the trail and the obstacles along the way. We then had another lunch waiting for us, after eating we went zip-lining off a tower and then we headed over to the shooting range. They explained safety features and how to use the different guns all in Thai….so the rest of us just had to hope for the best. I got to shoot a few rounds on 2 pistols a 38mm and a 45mm, and the shot a round with a rifle. We then headed back to our rooms (which there were 2 of total one for all the girls and one for all the guys with mattresses and pillows laid out side by side in a long room). We all showered and then got ready for dinner it was the eve of the Chinese New Year so they had a special dinner with examples of tradition Thai dance from different parts of the countries and then there was a talent show where every team had to have a 5 minute show, followed by karaoke. The dinner ended around midnight and everyone showered and then we all sat around till 3 in the morning playing Thai card games and talking. We were supposed to wake up at 8am for a 9am breakfast the following morning but no one was able to get up until 9am, everyone had a quick breakfast and then we headed to the military museum which was pretty interesting. Then it was time for Thai traditional games, so we were in our teams again and learned traditional Thai “backyard” games and the losing team always had to do an embarrassing Thai dance…. Another way Thailand differs form the States is that there is no sense of competition it truly is about having fun instead. We had a kayak race as the finale of the games competition and then zip-lined above the water, went paddle boating to look at the scenery and then went back to the rooms to pack up and get onto the buses to head back to Bangkok. The weekend was a lot of fun, and I learned many things about Thai culture that I did not know before. I got to meet Thai students one on one in a different atmosphere than a classroom where they could actually be themselves, which allowed me to also learn a lot about their everyday lives and where they had come from. I am glad I choose to go to the camp, I met a lot of people during it that I am sure I will continue to talk too.
Since originally Lop Buri was planned to be a weekend trip and there wasn't much to do when we got there we headed back to bkk the same night and I read about a crocodile farm that was near by when I got back so the next morning which was a Monday we had off for a Buddhist holiday I headed to Farm Joh Rai Kay (Crocodile Farm in Thai). We took a local air conditioned bus that was 24 baht (80 cents) for about an hour and a half and then hopped in a 8 baht taxi to get to the front door of the farm. The farm is located in Samut Prakan which is southeast of Bangkok and it is the largest crocodile farm in the world housing more than 100,000 crocodiles or so they say. There were crocodile shows, elephant shows, and an array of different animals there. So besides the crocodile part of the farm the rest was a pretty bad zoo. They also sold all kinds of crocodile products there meat, jewelery, leather handbags and wallets they found a way to use every part of a croc for profit. Being the biggest farm in the world they export the crocodiles all around the world as well as leather goods. It was definitely worth a visit because it was so close but I probably would not recommend this place to anyone unless they really enjoy seeing thousands of crocodiles just laying around.
