fresh anxiety

phillip got a new motorcycle. new because the cooler, classier vespa i got him for his birthday was a little bit illegal in the sense that it had neither a license nor the possibility of getting one. it's the thought that counts supposedly. i still think pink suited him, but at least we were able to trade the old one for a shinier, more legal one. when i insisted he get on his bike so i could take pictures, he insisted that the shots have a "milk motif." so there you go -- phillip's motorcycle milk pictures:

child brides

the world vision report continues to rock my face off every week. this week, my favorite story concerned a young girl in india that had the spirit to tell her parents no when they tried to marry her at 12. the fact that this a story at all - a girl speaking her mind - is still quite sad, but it is such an encouraging step towards girls speaking out for themselves. as a result, her insistence has drawn much local and international attention so that her community and surrounding others have since not had any other young girls marry. in many cases parents are not being cruel but are instead simply following custom. by merely speaking out, by asking to continue her education, rehka saved herself and now so many others. sometimes that's all it takes.

wouldn't it be great if more girls spoke out for themselves against teen marriage, against going into prostitution. some young girls simply don't realize that they do have a choice, that they have the right to say no. here in thailand especially a girl will go to work in a brothel if her parents tell her because she thinks she is respecting them. there are other situations of manipulation or violence in which a girl may not have a choice, but how amazing would it be if more girls could recognize the situations in which they have the power to say no.

education life for

i just signed on (technically as there was no actual signing) for another year with education for life. most of you are thinking, wow, that's great she's helping people in thailand. what does she do again? i originally came here as a fundraiser but quickly realized that the programs and administration needed an overhaul before we could have the wherewithal to accept donations and grow. i mainly do long term bainstorming and program development while the staff does all the administration, planning and actual work. here's a little of what we've been doing:

• according to statistics, thailand has a pretty encouraging number of children in primary and even secondary schools. what these numbers don't tell you is that children in thailand still suffer from lack of access and incentives to go to school. many parents keep children home to work, some children are completely ignored because they are orphaned or undocumented immingrants and lots are simply very poor. i have been contacting children's homes and other organizations trying to survey what's being done and best practices.
  
• we are currently managing 3 programs while working to launch new ones soon. the water project installed water filters in 63 area schools to provide clean drinking water. the bikes project gace children bikes to help them get to school. the scholarship program, the founding initiative of the organization, gives 2000 baht a year ($60 USD) to deserving students to help them pay for expenses necessary to attend school.
• ELF (don't ask me why it's not EFL, i haven't even asked because ELF sounds so much cuter) was founded about 10 years ago. while the scholarships given to children since then definitely helped over 1,000 children to stay in school, there was no relationship component to the programs. the money would be given and then no further contact was initiatied, leaving many children not knowing why we are giving them the scholarships or why we believe in them so much. we have started doing events with the girls to promote careers, safe sex and general well-being. our pilot project for an afterschool program will begin next month and will hopefully take our aid from being merely sustaining to transformative.
• we've extended our scholarship program to a small group of students in high school and even college. we also want to be realistic and have alternatives for students that couldn't or shouldn't go on to university. we will also be doing... da da da duh... career counseling. okay, so aid programs aren't always sexy, but providing basic social services and connecting girls to existing government resources is a logical next step for us that will go a long way in helping girls plan their futures.
  
• outreach. i re-did the website, started a blog and a monthly newsletter to better tell people who we are and what we're doing.
  

work has been good but slow. getting used to the pace of life in phayao has been the most difficult thing for me (not phillip, he's zen about most everything). i'm the person who has to do power yoga because regular yoga is too boring. life in phayao isn't just even yoga -- it's tai chi when you're stoned. but things are slowly moving forward and there are so many great reasons to stay here; the programs are just taking off and the girls are just starting to be engaged in what we're doing. change the world. educate a girl.

food, inc.

i really want to see this documentary. i also really want someone to start making organic oreos.

oh yeah, i'm rich, too

i want to clarify a few things about the last post:

1) i include myself among the rich. i'm educated; i'm very lucky to have the people and opportunities around me that i do; and i have lots of nice stuff. if my ipod broke, i would bemoan its loss and insist that i needed to replace it like i would need to re-attach a severed finger. this is how much i like my stuff. i'm saying that feeling gulity and trying to weigh every single one of my purchases against buying food for the hungry (or judging others for not doing so) is probably not the best way to go about making decisions and living life. there are more economic arguments for consumerism (creates jobs) versus aid (creates dependency), anyway. but having said that, i think it is still important that we don't collect all this stuff and assume it imparts us with any sort of value. it's just stuff.

2) as for the term engaged, i did not mean "do as i do." no way. please, stay where you are and send me money instead. engagement will look different for everyone. my brother brought up that the obamas give away so little to charity, but that's not the point. the point is i think it's safe to say that the obamas are meaningfully engaged with the problems of this world. giving is a part of that, but there is also knowledge and outreach and writing checks and activism and just plain paying attention to the news. did you know, for instance, that it is more likely for a girl growing up in south africa to be raped than to get an education? i just think that knowledge, the power of that tragic statisitc, compels us to treasure our lives, to pray for those girls and to be aware that education is a privilege.

3) i singled out american materialism because my friend and i are both americans and were discussing mainly people we know back home. there are lots of rich countries and rich people within poor countries that i think should be engaged in the same way.

4) this is not a guilt trip. i'm just trying to implore people that wherever they are they can and should be a part of the world around them. my grandmother volunteers at an animal shelter. my mom substitute teaches at a jail. that is the world around them. as for the larger world, they can be engaged through prayer or writing senators or watching the news or whatever. just saying that i am so impressed by so many people and their contributions that make sense for who they are. i singled out people who buy stuff for dogs because i hate dogs -- not my calling. i just basically realized that for so long i have been trying to label purchases as ethical or not while at the same time realizing it really wasn't about the amount -- amounts are relative. after talking myself in circles, i realized that by engaging the world around me, i'm not simply collecting stuff for myself. i now think about what i need, about how my money reflects my values. i won't buy conflict diamonds, but i will spend more for organic milk. i will buy TOMS, but i won't buy manolos (unless they're deeply discounted...). and if my ass looks good in a $200 pair of jeans, you better believe i'm buying them. your purchases, like your time, should be a reflection of what you care about. time spent engaging the world will only make you more compassionate and more able to make informed choices. that's what i think anyway.

it's freeing to me and i hope to you, too.

the rich are different from you and me

in bangkok recently i was having dinner with a friend working with the poor and oppressed. we got to talking about our distaste for american materialism and how it distances americans from the world at large. at a certain point, doesn't it seem like the stuff we buy becomes almost unethical? let's face it, the american dream is unbiblical; god does not desire for us to work independently towards comfort and success and retire in our pile of stuff. non-christians get this too. the stuff we accumulate insulates us from the suffering of others and makes the realities of the world- war, death, disease- seem more remote. but where to begin? it's not that buying a porsche is unethical, but it's tempting to brand it as such when that $80,000 could otherwise provide clean water for thousands of africans. but really, those comparisons are moot. if i buy gum, sure, that money could have gone to the poor, but the gum company employs people, etc. i have friends that completely disavow labels and materialism and try to live as ascetically and humbly as possible. i have other friends that insist they have worked hard for their wealth and they deserve to spend it as they see fit. how do you reconcile the two?

i've struggled with this for years traveling to and from places i've worked in developing countries back to my life amongst wealth and privilege in texas and never really come to a satisfactory answer. all i know is that it doesn't quite sit right with me that there is such a disparity, an injustice, between what i see overseas and what i witness at home. but how do you determine what is just and what is excess? it obviously is not as easy as blame the rich (by the way, if you are reading this from the US, you are the rich). the rich drive economies, provide jobs, fund important social and charitable functions, and i suppose they're people too. and as for the poor it isn't that they are simply "so happy and have so little." i hear this often from people in the states and it's true to a degree, but it makes me want to throw up. sure, poor people are happy, but they aren't merely happy savages. the poor people i know are often tired, hungry and beaten down and desperately want their kids to be able to go to school and have access to healthcare. yes, people who are poor have the capacity for happiness, but why does this surprise us so much? i think americans confuse happiness with resiliency. the poor can be happy or sad, but most of all they continue on despite hardships because they must.

if you are rich or super rich or spend or don't spend what truly matters is that you engage suffering and poverty. are you meaningfully engaged in the reality that life is tortured and difficult for the majority of the world? are you engaged in the fight for social justice? can you empathize with the poor? to be sure there is poverty in america- emotional, spiritual and financial. and i'm not condemning people that don't live as i do, but simply hoping that no matter where anyone is, they are engaging the world around them. i can't say that spending x amount of money on a car is a sin or condemn anyone for it, but if you have little regard for others, i'm pretty sure you're going to hell. just kidding. expenses are relative- i get that. as much as i am tempted to vilify american consumerism, i am guilty of it. but i would encourage anyone, no matter how much they have or how much they deny themselves, to become engaged in their world through knowledge, relationships, donations or volunteerism, be it local or foreign.

the have nots will always blame the haves and the haves will always spend money on unnecessary stuff for their dogs (don't get me started), but so long as the rich are meaningfully engaged in the lives of the poor and have an understanding that they are still connected to the world of human suffering, i suppose they can buy clothes for their dogs. just because you live in america and have a comfortable life does not mean that you're not accountable for the well-being of the poor or that you are too far removed from the oppression, diseases and famines of the world. you are human. you can thank your lucky stars that you were not born a woman in iran or a boy in the congo or anyone in burma. with that gratitude that comes something much stronger than noblesse oblige or even guilt: a common humanity.
photo

happy birthday to me

i turned 26 today. in thai/buddhist (not sure of the distinction) tradition, 25 is a very auspicious year. whenever i would tell a thai my age, they would smile and say "oh, this is a very big year for you." 25 for me was definitely eventful: graduated grad school, got married in india, moved to thailand, got hit by a bomb and the rest of it kind of tapered off. let's hope 26 is as much fun as 25 but with less protests.

my sister left for the US today, and i'm so sad to see her go. in other news, while at the beach in thailand you can expect to get, oh, say, 500 mosquito bites. well i got one in the middle of my freaking forehead and now i look like this:

mortifying. my grandmother thought i was wearing a bindi for my birthday. nope, gram, just a disfiguring scar from a relaxing week at mosquito beach. hopefully this is not a bad omen for 26... also, please do not forward this picture to anyone. and wrinkly foreheads run in my family, alright? i should show you pictures of my brother as a baby.

happy blogiversary

i started this blog one year ago today. what began as a project for my environment and society class in dehradun, india has become an international sensation! okay not really, but at least my mother knows i'm still alive. which is really the point.

snorkel report

yesterday we got a boat like this
and spent the day going to jewel-colored bays like this
feeding monkeys like this forward little bugger (sat in katie's lap which she found cute and i found horrifying)
walking on deserted beachesand snorkeling with so many fish i was afraid i would swallow one.
good day.

koh phi phi

phuket

i'm excited about being at the beach. not so much in our hotel room, but the beaches at kata are nice. i especially love it when it rains at the beach. and i found a place with sweet potato fries; i haven't had a sweet potato since the states and it was a joyous reunion. the beach rocks.

emmanuel children's home, delhi

this video is from my first trip to india in 2004 to work at emmanuel children's home in delhi. a friend on the trip made this video and just sent it to me. so many faces i remember that i wish i had names for. their smiles are absolutely beautiful.

burma border

my sister made a visa run (expat talk for renewed her visa) to burma yesterday and phillip went with her. i need to keep my thai visa so i stayed on the mae sai side for a few hours, wandering aimlessly:

• bought an opium pot. cause, you know, might come in handy for the mad opium parties.
  
• bought a kilo of plums so delicious and juicy i had to eat them with my head hanging out the car window the whole ride back.*
• bought a coke in a glass bottle at a cafe, glad for once to not be polluting with more plastic (they give out 2-3 plastic bags in thailand when you purchase anything) and also eager to sit down and enjoy it. the guy poured the coke in a plastic bag and gave me a straw (sorry ocean island of plastic the size of texas) and wouldn't let me sit down. i kept moving along dejectedly with my coke in a bag that will probably someday kill a poor sea turtle.
  
• watched some burmese kids hop over the fence on their side of the border to go swimming in a filthy muddy river on the thai side. they were so happy it made me happy. i think it was partly because of the swimming and partly cause they were naked in public. wouldn't we all be happier if we could be naked in public?
• proceeded open mouthed and horrified to watch bored thai border patrolmen pick up their REAL LIVE HANDGUNS and mimic SHOOTING the street kids as the kids ran around to get away from loitering charges. why is it that i seem to be the only person responsible enough in any situation to say "please put that down it's not a toy."
• another patrolman in camo had his rifle in one hand and his handgun in another while his girlfriend (i suppose) sat next to him with her hand on his arm like they were in a notorious BIG video. my belief that policemen are incompetent and unhelpful remains unshaken.
• okay what i really bought the opium pot for was decoration; nate on oprah says you should buy things on trips to incorporate into your home decor. our home decor will one day be "opium den chic."
  

*i don't recommend eating a kilo of plums on your own. got real sick.

dahlias

i used to think that peonies were my favorite flower, but i was wrong because i hadn't yet become acquainted with dahlias. we went to mae fah luang gardens in chiang rai today and they were spectacular as usual. i mean, seriously. have you ever seen a better flower than this? no. you haven't.