A Long Overdue UPDATE!! and Happy Thanksgiving to All!

Whew! So much has happened since my last entry! Where to start?! WELL, I guess I'll just start...at the beginning!

I quit. Yep, I'm done. As of 19 November 2008 (which happens to be my birthday!), (and yes, I've adjusted to the way the rest of the world writes the date...makes more sense really) I no longer work at the resort. I originally wanted to stay for exactly a year just for my own sense of accomplishment (my contract was open eneded)...which means that 7 January would have been my last day....but then realized that our annual bonus is given out on 31 January, so I should at least wait until then....but then that means that I can't put my 30 day notice in before getting the bonus (because its quite a subjective bonus scale), which means I would put my notice in on 1 February, and thus my last day would have been 2 March...which when I'm feeling done NOW, 3 more months for a bonus that could potentially amount to peanuts seems way too long to wait!

So my next option was, do I really care about making it exactly a year? My contract was open ended, so that didn't have to be a consideration. Bali has been calling my name ever since I read Eat, Pray, Love when I first arrived here. I've been dreaming about kicking back and relaxing there before going home....finding some amazing little place for $10 a night to just chill out at for a month or two...dedicate my time there to being a writer...catch up on all the blog topics that I have yet to write about...and turn this blog into a book! Then I remembered that my aunt Marie & uncle & cousins will be there for Christmas!! So that was that! Decision made!

I put my 30 day notice in on 1 November to allow myself time to explore the lush mountainous regions of Northern Thailand during the first two weeks of December before heading to Bali. But here comes the hiccup. Management had originally approved my vacation with my Dad and Jean, scheduled to be from 18 Nov to 26 Nov...but suddenly two days after putting my notice in, I received an email on 3 Nov that said they were only going to approve the first 2 days of the vacation, and that occupancy was too high to approve the rest. (Given the history of the way they operate, I am SURE that me leaving right before busy season had NOTHING to do with their change of mind...NOT!).

So my choices were, have Dad & Jean fly all the way over to Asia to see me but tell them that I had to work, OR have my last day be 17 Nov so that I may enjoy the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to explore Asia with them. Except for the fact that by leaving before working a full 30 days from when I put my notice in means that I will be out having them pay for my flight home...ouch...it was an easy decision. One of my favorite mantras I use when traveling is this: As the years go by, I will always remember the amazing memories I've had, never the money I've saved.

So along came 18 November, and I was off for Bangkok to be reunited with Dad & Jean. (Lots to say about my last day of work...all the tearful good-byes to the amazing people that I have met...that last minute regrets, such as "Why the heck am I leaving a steady paying job in the midst of the economical climate of the day?!"...packing up my entire life into little boxes, again...) ...and then there we were, Dad & Jean & I, all together in the lobby of their hotel, as if not even a day since we last saw each other had passed.

We had an amazing three days in Bangkok (which would take me another hour or two to write about, so maybe once I'm chillin' in Bali)....an amazing two days in which they stayed at the resort and I was lucky enough to still be allowed to stay in my room...and then three days ago, we flew to Cambodia and were blessed enough to witness one of the most architectural and artistic wonders of the world, an 800 year old temple called Angkor Wat. Google it!

So yesterday was the day of loving goodbyes, full of gratitude for the amazing time we had together...but not without a glitch. If you've been reading the news, you are aware that political protestors have taken over the Bangkok airport and it has resultantly been shut down. Dad and Jean have continued their travels to Vietnam, but I was meant to return to Bangkok, and then head up north to start my adventures up there...But I'm still here in Siam Reap, Cambodia...No flying to Bangkok for me.

We all went to the airport together with the expectation of catching our respective flights...but then headed back into town together, to find me a hotel. That was yesterday. So here I am today, 26 November 2008, Thanksgiving Day in America, and I am by myself, stuck in Cambodia...and FULL of gratitude of a whole different kind.... Not only of the harvest, and the abundance of food that I have had access to throughout my entire life, but of the endless list of other blessings that fill my life....the ability to travel and learn from other cultures, to see amazing sights literally all over the globe, for my heart to be filled with endless love from my family and friends, to have money in my pocket and a desire for adventure pumping through my veins, my health, to be safe, to be warm, to have clothes..that are clean, to have a roof over my head everywhere I go, to have a bottle of clean water in my beautiful purse, to have food in my belly...and to know that in a few hours I'll have some more, to have confidence in my talents that wherever I end up, I'll be just fine...

So as I end this entry, I want all of you reading this to know that I wish you the very best for a day of deep gratitude for all of the blessings you have in your life, on this day of Thanksgiving. :-)

And for me, instead of eating turkey & pumpkin pie, I'm about to head out of this little internet cafe, along this busy, dusty Cambodian street, full of motorbikes darting this way and that... to figure out, where the heck to catch a bus, to wherever the heck I decide to go next!! Sending love to you all...bye for now!

Talking with Don...post movie date

I must say, simply, Don is a really nice guy. Our date night at the movies has come and gone, and the “Hi Jody!” and “Hi Don!”’s haven’t missed a beat.
“Hi Jody!” “Hi Don!”...Without fail, every time I walk into the cafeteria, his joyful greeting is as reliable as a fine Swiss watch. Its amazing how much our smiles communicate, given that our words often fall short of full understanding. For example:

I walk into the cafeteria for breakfast the other day. It was around 8am. And the conversation went something like this:
“Hi Jody!”
“Hi Don!”
“How are you today, Jody?!”
“I’m great Don! Thanks! How are you?!”
...We stand there. We exchange smiles. We fidget awkwardly, as I attempt to keep a hard boiled egg from rolling off my plate. I think of something else to say...
“What time did you get to work this morning, Don?”
Don replies,“At 11.”
“Hmm. No. What time you start work today?” (I thought perhaps if I use simple verb tenses, it might help him to better understand me.)
Don replies, “At 11.”
Hmm, I thought to myself, maybe he really did start at 11. "Did you sleep here last night?"
"No!" As he laughs at me for thinking such a silly thought.
"Don, you arrive today, what time?" (Maybe shaking up the word order a bit would help.)
"Jody, 11!"
“Hmm. No, right now it is 8. What time you arrive today?” (I was impressed at my ability to carry on without losing it.)
With a big smile, Don replies, “Oh! 10.”
I barely hold back breaking out into full hearted laughter and instead, fall back on my charade skills…
I point to my watch. “What time…” I point at the ground. “…today…” I point to him, “…you…” and then pretend I’m him riding on a motorbike. I then ‘park’ it and get off as I point to the ground again. “…come here, to work, today?”
Drum roll please…..Don replies, “Oh! I start 7 today!”
Victory!!

With that, we exchanged smiles of pride from our accomplishment of achieving full understanding of our morning greeting. (This of course doesn’t always happen. On the days that I don't have time to act out my sentences via charades, we generally exchange our morning greetings, both of us saying a few things as we nod in agreement...yet quite evidently without either of us understanding anything.) Being that I had to be at work in a mere 45 minutes (and I need 10 minutes to eat my eggs and at least 8 minutes to get from the cafeteria to my desk), I didn’t feel I had time to embark on another sentence. So we exchanged our final smiles as I put another hard boiled egg on my plate and he walked back into the kitchen.

And, example #2:
But first, a little side note... It doesn't matter if you are a Thai living in Thailand, or some other nationality eating at a Thai restaurant anywhere else in the world, everyone loves the dish, Phad Thai. For those of you not in the 'know,' its basically a bunch of thin rice noodles, fried up with a great blend of veggies and spices, a bit of chicken or perhaps tofu, maybe some egg, and garnished with herbs and peanuts. Well, the staff here at the resort are no exception; everyone loves Phad Thai. Ironically, for some unknown reason it is only served once a month here in the staff cafeteria (while all the other random noodle dishes seem to be endlessly served as if they're always yesterday's leftovers...and they probably are).

But here is the even bigger unknown point: on the day that Phad Thai is served in the cafeteria, we apparently hire outside staff to come in and prepare it. They set up their big frying pots outside on the patio and are there for hours, frying up batch after batch.

So its Phad Thai day. I'm sitting in the cafeteria, eating my Phad Thai, and Don walks over.
"Hi Jody!"
"Hi Don!"
"Do you like Phad Thai?!"
"Yes I do Don! Thanks! But I have a question for you. Why don't we make Phad Thai here, in our own kitchen?"
"Yes, I make Phad Thai," Don replies.
"No. Why no Phad Thai, you (as I point to him) in kitchen here (as I point back to the main cafeteria kitchen)?"
"Phad Thai once month here."
I love this...and continue on, as my determined self must do, this time trying even more simplified sentence structuring...
"Yes. Understand. Once month but me confused. Why we no make here? (as I repeat...) Make (as I motion like I'm cooking) here (as I point again back to the kitchen)?"
"No, no make here," as he shakes his head, no.
I think of a new question, "Phad Thai hard to make?"
"No, not hard make," Don replies.
But I quickly start running out of steam..
"You make here?" I ask.
"Yes. Here next month," Don replies.
Okay, that's it. "Ah, good! Next month!" I realized it was time for me to give up because I couldn't hold back my laughter any longer. So I smile instead. As we both nod affectionately, Don turns around and walks back into the kitchen...to continue making the other entree of the day, which of course, is not Phad Thai.

And last but not least, one of my favorites...
"Hi Don! When is your birthday?"
"Next year."

Out on a Date...with a Thai!

Part of the luxury of working here at the resort is that I am provided with a place to stay (a modest room in the staff housing building) and three meals a day (which are served in the staff 'canteen'). When I first took the job, I had my sights set high, thinking I was going to be able to dine on the same extraordinarily healthy 'spa cuisine' that is served to the guests at the resort. WRONG. The food in the canteen is typical Thai fare, which in my opinion, has some good aspects and some bad...I've never exactly been one of those people who LOVES Thai food. (All of you Thai cuisine aficionados reading this, I can already imagine the aghast look on your face after reading this. Sorry! That’s just the way I feel!) The food is prepared in a typical cafeteria style manner.... massive amounts of food cooked in gargantuan pots, and frying pans filled with way more grease than I would ever use in my own kitchen throughout my entire lifetime…sitting all day under heat lamps. So as I walk into the canteen each day, I usually think to myself, ‘thank God for the salad bar.’

Anyway, so here I am, day after day, walking into the staff canteen and doing my best to create a healthy meal and a pleasant eating experience for myself. I used to take my meals upstairs onto the roof, to be able to enjoy a quiet and peaceful meal outside…until I was told about the rule that no food is to be taken outside of the canteen. (Crazy, huh?! Here I am living amongst the beauty of the sunshine and warmth of the tropics, and yet I literally have to fight to find time in my day to get outside. Trust me, my colleagues and I tried to fight this one but there are so many, in my opinion, ridiculous rules around here for us staff that it’s hard to create a proposal to change each one of them! We are just happy that the gym isn’t locked up twice a day anymore and it’s actually open from 6am to 9pm now.)

So lately, I have begrudgingly obeyed. I have eaten my meals in the pea green painted canteen, amongst the cacophony of conversation, the blaring television with who knows what going on (its in Thai of course), and my body shivering due to the blasting air conditioning. I could sit at one of the two tiny outside patio tables adjacent to the cafeteria…and when I do, each bite of my food is accompanied by a fresh breath… of smoke. The smokers, of course, have been granted use of this space. (Just one of the many ironies of life, isn’t it? Here I am at this ‘5 Star HEALTH Resort’ and who gets granted the FRESH AIR in which to enjoy their meals? The SMOKERS.)

Anyway, I still usually walk in with my typical Jody exuberance and give a big smile to the cooks. There is this one young guy who on a good day might say hello. I must be invisible to the older guy though because he has not acknowledged my presence once in the, let me guess, 739 times that I’ve walked into that cafeteria over these past 9 months. The older woman smiles back at me I’d say about 50% of the time, and the other half of the time, she seems to be too busy to smile. But a few months back, they hired a new guy. Since he started, everyday I walk in now, I am greeted with, ‘Hi Jody! How are you?!’ Don makes my day.

When he says his name, it kind of sounds like Don. I’m sure its not actually ‘Don,’ given that the Thai language uses more foreign sounds when pronouncing their words than I ever knew could even exist. So sometimes, I kind of mumble it…or change the intonation a bit…in hopes of masking the fact that I really am not sure if I’m saying it right at all. But that’s the best this English speaking girl can do. So until he corrects me, that’s what I’ll call him. “I’m great, thanks Don! How are you?!”

Don has become quite observant of my preferences. He now daily goes out of his way to serve up some sort of vegetarian alternative to the main course of the day and walks over to my table to personally serve it to me. I give him a big smile as I thank him and tell him he is wonderful. He then responds with this little childlike, shy gleaming grin as he turns away and walks back into the kitchen. (That’s one thing about the Thais, and perhaps Asians in general…my experience of them is that they are very shy. They avoid direct questions. There is a lot of bowing and smiling and superficial conversation. To this outspoken American, it’s a way of interacting that I find rather slow and unengaging…yet intriguingly challenging. Part of my enjoyment of living amongst a foreign culture is experiencing and learning other ways of being. It’s a great practice to get outside of my own belief systems about the way things ‘should’ be, and instead see an entire culture of people who live in another way. Its easy to say that ‘my way’ is better…simply because I am more familiar and comfortable with it. But that’s the great thing about travel…our belief systems of life are always challenged and resultantly, expanded.)

So the daily dread that I’ve felt when walking past the greasy options for my sustenance day after day in the canteen has now been mitigated by this much welcomed new joyful presence. “Hi Jody!” “Hi Don!” Don now makes a habit of walking around from behind the kitchen side of the food counter in order to chat with me face to face about my day. At dinner time especially, he likes to ask, “Jody, where you go?” I started to realize that this was perhaps his way of asking, “Jody, wherever you are going, may I come with you?” I’ve been practicing not being my outspoken self, and just going along as, not the leader, but the follower of the conversation.

One day he asked, “Jody, you go out to dinner?” (…which I knew likely meant, ‘Jody, we go out to dinner together?’) This particular day, after having spoken to clients hour after hour for my entire day, I really needed to just enjoy an evening without conversation, (especially without conversation in which multiple attempts are usually necessary for a simple sentence be understood). So unfortunately for him, it was the worst day he could have chosen to finally ask me out. ‘Oh, how mean of me’…. ‘oh, how cold hearted’…. I can’t even imagine how much energy he has spent over the past weeks to build up his confidence to this point. But hey, I’ve always been told that men like it when a woman plays hard to get. So without even intentionally playing the game, I replied, “Yes, I am. So I see you tomorrow!” And I smiled and walked away…

But Don, he’s a persistent one. The next day, he walked around from the back side of the kitchen counter and asked, “Jody, you like movie? You heard of funny movie in town, about rap singer who now be monk? You like to go?!” “Well, sure Don. That sounds great!” His smile had a gleam of the innocence of a twelve year old boy, full of pride for finally finding the courage to ask the girl he fancies out on a date and hearing her say ‘yes.’ (But my guess is that Don is about in his mid to late 20’s.) It was a bit of a struggle to make sure we both understood what the plan was for meeting up, but I think we succeeded.
So a few hours later, I met up with Don out in front of the movie theater (which is located by the way, on the top floor of this huge, three-story, sadly materialism-glutinous-pushing ‘mall,’ reminiscent of all the other gargantuan shopping malls that litter the landscape of every city in the western world…and are now leaching their way into Asia as well…). “Hi Don!” Hi Jody!” We exchanged some light pleasantries and walked into the theater.

Wow! How fun to be in a movie theater! It felt like I had suddenly been transported back home! (Except for the fact that I couldn’t read any of the advertisements that were flashing across the screen since they were in Thai….except that I could recognize the Pepsi symbol of course…and the Toyota one…and that worldly symbol of the golden arches….) But everything else was the same…. the big room filled with rows of comfy seats…people leaning back chomping away on popcorn. We weren’t sure if there were going to be English subtitles, but I didn’t really care. I was on a date with a Thai guy in Thailand…that was entertaining enough for me!

Right in the middle of our small talk, Don suddenly stands up and tells me to stand up too. And then I notice that everyone else is standing up as well. ‘Hmm, interesting.’ The next two or three minutes there is a tribute to the life of their King played on the screen…photos of him as a young boy in school, of his family, of he and his young wife, of him shaking hands with presumably significant people….and the crowd is singing the national anthem. ‘Cool,’ I thought. (The immense amount of devotion and respect that the Thai people have for their King is ubiquitous throughout the country. Coming from a country where presently every home in America is being inundated with advertisements bashing our top political figures, I find this extraordinarily impressive.) Then the movie starts….and yes! There are English subtitles! Don and I look at each other and smile.

I could go into the details of the movie… about the young Thai boy deciding to leave his rap band life to pursue living life as a monk…and finding himself being swept away by the wind, ripping to shreds his orange robe and sweeping away all of his belongings….and landing him in a village that was being bombarded by flying boulders due to the bad guy who keeps blowing up the mountain to extract its precious metals lying deep inside…and the monk trying to bring joy to the villagers by conducting his sermons as if singing a rap song… But, I’ll just leave it at that. The most humorous part of the movie for me was actually reading the English subtitles and realizing that whomever wrote them wasn’t exactly a fluent English speaker! For example: “Big mountain go boom! Hurt house hole roof!”

So the movie ends. We walk out together. Small talk ensues. I ask him if he is hungry. He says no. (‘Hmm, that kind of kills what normally happens next,’ I thought to myself.) He says he has to go to the hospital to get his stitches out, (he cut himself at work last week) and as he pulls his keys out of his pocket, he asks me if I want to come with him. I happened to have rented a motorbike for the week so I simply answer, “I have my own motorbike today.” “Oh, okay. Bye.” …and then Don walks away…and that is the end of our date.

I’m left standing there amongst the hoards of shoppers in the mall, by myself. It was the funniest feeling. I don’t think I’ve ever had an interaction with someone end so abruptly! I couldn’t help but stand there for a minute and kind of laugh! The next day happened to be my day off so it was like my Friday night and yet suddenly, I was out in town, standing by myself, without any plans. I called Monica. She was already in bed. I called Nadine. Her phone was off and thus was likely already asleep. I called Katrina. She didn’t answer. They’re basically all the friends I have here but they all had to work in the morning. So there I was in the mall, on a ‘Friday’ night, standing there suddenly by myself. What did I do? That is a question I find myself grappling with almost every day off. In town there are shops and there are restaurants…and that’s about it. So, I found some interesting Thai snacks to munch on and then, just walked home.

Some of you might be thinking, ‘That’s it?!’ Yep, that’s it.

The Entrepreneurial Spirit is Alive and Well in Thailand

In this time of the American economic crisis (translated to mean = Americans are finally getting smacked in the face with the truth of a most basic law of economics which is that one cannot continue to overspend on meaningless stuff which they actually cannot afford without one day realizing they must pay the bill), the looming $700 billion government bailout (translated to mean = you and me digging into our own pockets to bail out the greedy bankers and corrupt politicians), and the Presidential Debates (translated to mean = a practiced and scripted performance of ego versus rhetoric, which hardly even touches on the original purpose of discovering who is really best suited for the job)….I can’t help but be deeply impressed with the entrepreneurial spirit of the Thais. Unemployment rate spikes. Loss of jobs. No jobs available…. These statements don’t seem to bother many of the Thais. I have loved observing how many of them just go out there and create their own job. For example….

Have a car? Make a big poster with all the most famous tourist spots around town on it, including the airport and then put a sign on your dash that says, “Taxi.” Have a motorbike? Well, now you’re a motorbike taxi driver. Don’t want to be a taxi driver because you prefer a more culinary focused career? Build a storage box on your motorbike and sell any kind of snacks that you could possible think of from it, such as eggs that you bought at the store and hardboiled, fresh roasted peanuts, or a huge range of homemade snacks you bought in bulk at some mysterious outlet (because everyone seems to have the exact same ones). Build a mini bar-b-que instead and drive around selling some grilled chicken or fish balls on a stick. (Don’t ask me exactly what’s in a fish ball. From my basic biology class, I certainly don’t recall that fish have balls, per se. All I know is, they’re in the shape of a ball and stink like fish).

Alternatively, build a contraption that holds ice and sell fresh fruit, ice cream bars, or perhaps you’d like to make and sell the most popular salad in Thailand, Som tum (fresh unripe papaya with shredded carrots, green beans, and tomatoes garnished with peanuts, dried shrimp, fish sauce, lemon juice, and a bit of some mystery sugary sauce for a splash of sweetness to balance the sour of the lemon juice…I love it!)... make it fresh right there on your cart for the enjoyment of the locals and tourists alike!

Don’t have a motorbike? No problem, a regular ole’ bicycle will do just fine. (You’ll just miss out on your potential customers whom are sunbathing on the beach…. But that is fine; there are plenty of hungry customers walking around town that you can target.) Speaking of walking, don’t have a motorbike nor a bicycle? No problem, just tie a basket on each end of a stick, carry it over your shoulders, fill the baskets with local tropical fruit, freshly grilled corn, fried bananas, hard boiled eggs, roasted peanuts… whatever snack suits your fancy, and sell that! Feeling lazy and don’t really want to have to move around? No problem. Just spread out a blanket on a busy sidewalk, buy some sunglasses, ties, jewelry, or any various apparel at some bulk outlet store, display it artfully on your blanket, and sell it to passer-buyers at at least a 300% mark up. Now we’re talking!

Again, if you are desiring a more culinary focused pursuit, find a bank that closes at 5pm and then use the sidewalk in front of it to set up a full fare restaurant, fully stocked with a bar-b-que and ice boxes to keep the drinks and salad fixings cool, and open it for business starting right after the bank closes with your friends and family. With the enticing scents emanating from the bar-b-que, you’ll be sure to even get folks driving by to stop in for a bite!

Can’t find a patch of sidewalk to run your restaurant? No problem! Just use the front room of your house. Or for that matter, sell whatever you want from your house! Be a mini department store, a mini mini-mart, or even a hair salon…or a massage parlor, or a laundromat, or an alterations shop, or… Perhaps you’d prefer to work on the beach? No problem! Just set up your business in the sand under a nice big umbrella to allow for some shade for you and your customers….massages on the beach are a big hit. But hey, you could just buy a bunch of lawn chairs, lay them out nicely each morning, and then charge all the tourists on the beach to use them…meanwhile, set up a little mini-restaurant to sell snacks to your customers as they lounge away the day, willing to pay almost any price for a little snack delivered directly to their lawn chair….Doesn’t that sound nice right now?....Ahhhh….

Now, if you’re really organized, contact a few hundred other like minded entrepreneurs, approach the owner of an empty field near town, or a parking lot, or a street that doesn’t need to be used after 5pm, and set up a weekly or even nightly market, which then becomes a highlighted evening event for all. Locals and tourists alike! Set up an area with table and chairs to allow customers to enjoy a place to sit down as they eat their freshly prepared dinner with their friends and family, and then provide an endless array of items to peruse after dinner….such as knock off sunglasses, illegally copied CDs & DVDs for $5, men’s clothes, women’s clothes, lingerie (hey, why not?), shoes, postcards and mini-buddhas for the tourists, cheap house wares for the locals… If you run a farm, bring all of your meat and produce to sell, which then will allow everyone in town access to fresh, locally grown food to buy on a nightly basis. This will eliminate the need for huge, sterile, chain grocery stores spread all over town, (think: most every town in America, which sell primarily processed food in boxes or that has been picked weeks earlier and then sat for days in crates as its delivered thousands of miles away from where it was originally grown). This also makes grocery shopping a fun, evening event for the whole family, (instead of just another errand to somehow fit in).

The entrepreneurial spirit isn’t only found in the lower class… Another idea is to open up an elegant spa that you originally intended as a weekend resort for all of your wealthy friends around Thailand…but then your sharp entrepreneurial mind asks the question, “Why limit my target market to only Thais? Why not include people from all around the globe?” For your work force, hire locals, (which expect to get paid an extremely small salary…in Western terms that is) but charge extremely high prices (because hey, you’re clients probably wont look at the price much anyway). And then Voila! There you have it….an extremely well run spa with guests from all around the world, and Naturopathic Doctors who are willing to leave their home country and fly half way around the world to work at the spa! Because hey, why not?! (Then write a blog about it so everyone at home can live vicariously through the stories!) More to come!

You Can Now Call Me and Leave a VMX!

Get this. So, I have this thing called Skype on my computer, that I know some of you are, and some of you are not familiar with. To make sure we're all operating under the same knowledge base, let me explain that it allows me to use my laptop as a telephone...to call another computer or to even call a regular phone....for pennies a minute. Amazing! For those of you who also have Skype and also have a camera on your computer, then we even get to see each other when we talk....just like how it was predicted in those space age movies about the future. (Apparently, the future is NOW!) When I call computer to computer, it costs me nothing. Its FREE! When I call from my computer to a phone, wherever that phone may be, I pay something like 2 cents a minute....so an hour phone call to anywhere around the world would cost me around $1.20.

But get this! I just signed up for their newest subscription offer, and listen to this: I get unlimited calls to land lines and cell phones anywhere in the US for $6/month! But wait! There's more! AND I have a phone number! With a 206 area code! (my ole' Seattle code, of course.) That any of you can call anytime! AND leave a voice mail message for me that I can listen to once I come back to my laptop! All this for just $5.99/month! What a deal! (Imagine some cheesy advertising music playing in the background...while some guy is screaming about what a great deal this is....) So yes, that means that RIGHT NOW, at this very moment, you can call me at: 206-905-9631 and leave a message so that I can hear all of your guys' lovely voices! So cool, huh?! Now talking to you live would be even more exciting of course, but unfortunately, I am usually awake when most of you are asleep and vice versa...so I've been finding it challenging to fit time in for all of my 'Skype dates.' So this solves that!

It's my day off so of course I'm headed to the beach....and am so excited to have voice mail messages to listen to now so please call anytime! Man, this internet thing...what a trip! :-)

A Note From Paradise! (part 7 of 7): My Honeymoon with...

Wow. After rereading the past six entries about my experience here on Koh Tao, I am really blown away. I am acutely aware what a blessing it is for me to be able to be here… that my time here is but just a dream for most people in this world...three weeks to relax and be surrounded by the beauty of a tropical island…for just dollars a day. I feel such a depth of gratitude that words to fully express my appreciation don’t even exist. I am on a romantic tropical island…yet I am here by myself.

This brings me to a point I want to mention. Part of the reason why this glorious time is even possible for me is because I am single…and don’t have any kids. I am thinking of all my married friends, whom are mom’s and dad’s, reading this as you turn green with envy. But I would like to make a point…we all make choices in our lives, which open doors while at the same time, close others. I have chosen to not get married (yet!!), and to not have kids (yet?). Thus, I have the money and the freedom to spend such glorious alone time here on this little island paradise. I also have very flexible standards of living that I am comfortable in…a tent in the jungle that I share with cockroaches and spiders, to luxurious 5-star resorts. So what is on the opposite side of this coin? Well, let me tell you. I haven’t mentioned all the ants that I have befriended in my bathroom, and I can’t tell you how many nights in the past 20 years that I have been sad about being single....let me tell you: Yes, I love 'grabbing life by the horns' and experiencing all of my many adventures...but having all of these amazing adventures without someone by my side to share them with (except for my beloved time with Rick!)....well, it just gets damn old.

At first, I wondered if being on this romantic island by myself… with its sensual sunsets, its aphrodisiac scents, its honeymoon suites… was going to be irritating for me. The couples walking hand in hand on the beach, chatting and laughing as they lay next to each other in the sand, sharing a glass of wine at sunset, lets not even mention what they do after dark…Usually, these are sights that can get me all riled up….and sad…and lonely…and pitiful. But I’m very glad to say that the only time it actually bugged me was, funny enough, when I saw all the ‘couples’ hanging out together while I was snorkeling (explained back in part 5)!

But hey, there are lots of cute men here too…so maybe one of them is single? Well lets see, on about day 7, one of them joined me for lunch. Late 20’s, blond, from Switzerland, traveling by himself …seemed like a really nice guy. So we decided to have dinner together that night. He liked chatting with me…but apparently also as much as with the two Austrian girls who were sitting at the table next to us. “Jody! Do you mind if they join us?!” So I say, “Well gee. That sounds wonderful.” But of course what I really meant was, “Are you an idiot?”

Then there was the perfectly sculpted, lusciously tanned skinned, dazzling green-eyed, wonder man. I noticed him one day as he was getting out of the water after snorkeling. I made a quick scan of the surroundings for any signs indicating I should abort my mission….a ring on his wedding finger, anyone on the beach he may be looking up at whom was wearing a bikini…Nope, all was in the clear. I wasted no time. I grabbed my snorkel and headed into the water. As I casually flipped my hair around, to tie it back in preparation for snorkeling of course, I smiled at him and simply asked, “How was it?” He looked at me kind of funny so perhaps he didn’t hear me. I tried to make myself more clear, “How was the snorkeling today?” “Oh, sorry. Me no speak Engleash.” …I have never cared so much about the French I studied back in high school in my entire life, until that moment. We exchanged smiles, made some awkward hand gestures about how big the fish are, and then I put my tail between my legs so to speak and swam out into the sea.

Then there was the cute massage guy. I must admit, the Thai men are generally not my type. But this guy is really cute and sweet. I started adopting a routine that every afternoon after my daily snorkel, I would get a massage from him, and then we would give each other language lessons for a while….I teaching him English and he teaching me Thai, of course. Well, each night, it seems like he was asking me if I wanted to join him for dinner. (Not speaking each other’s language certainly makes flirting challenging….smiling and smiling and smiling, without words with clear understanding, gets old after a while…) But, I had made some friends and always had dinner plans with them. (Toots and Angela from Germany, and the Swiss guy funny enough.) However, they were going to be leaving soon…and I knew I had plenty of time here, or so I thought….so I was just going to see if an opportunity to have dinner with him would come up once they left. This went on for I’d say at least about five or six days.

Well, the very night that Toots and Angela from Germany and the Swiss guy left, I headed over for my daily indulgence of being massaged for an hour from the cute local guy (did I mention it was in a beautiful hut…on the beach…for $9?!), and then the endless flirting session. Oh whoops, I mean, language lessons. But it looks like I was too late…

When I arrived, there was some other American girl sitting there with her Thai-English dictionary teaching him English. Apparently, she wasn’t aware that I was the English teacher, and thank you very much, but I was in no need of a substitute teacher today. I sat down and introduced myself and joined in. Apparently, she was only teaching him English but didn’t know a word of Thai. So I started to chat with my Thai friends…“Sabai dee mai? Khun bai nai wanee? Wanee dee mai?” Then I looked at my cute friend and impressed him even more, “Neung song sahm see hah hok jet pbad gow sip.” Since she didn’t speak a word of Thai, it didn’t concern me in the least bit that my complex sounding sentence was simply me counting to ten. I just wanted to make sure she knew who was boss…or so I thought….

As the no-longer-a-flirting-session-but-language-lesson-competition went on, I soon realized that no matter how much Thai I showed off with, I was clearly in second place…The story goes like this: Apparently this lady, Mindy is her name, was here three months ago…and she and the massage guy hit it off. (His name is Jaran by the way…or perhaps more like Jahrun, or Jaaruhn, or Chalun….You see, the Thai’s don’t use these same letters that I’m sitting here typing with. They have an entirely different alphabet…with entirely different sounds than are used in our language….So to write his name using these letters is simply my attempt at trying to match the sound that is produced when he says his name.) So Mindy and, lets say Jaran, hung out for days back in April and even ended up traveling around Thailand together for a week or so. Well, Mindy is a teacher in California and was on spring break, so she had to eventually head back home. But now she is on summer break and arrived back here on Koh Tao to do some more traveling with Jaran. Long story short, I quickly accepted my place in this triangle and have enjoyed the past week hanging out with Jaran AND Mindy, who both left today to do some more traveling around Thailand.

Do you see the lesson here? The lesson that I see is that, this month is not about me having a romantic, tropical island fling. This month, exactly as I intended it to be, is about me unwinding, letting go of residual stress of med school that has still been hanging around, resting my body, rejuvenating my mind…I’ve decided to call it: My Honeymoon with Myself. Throughout my trip here, I’ve been reading my fabulous Aunt Mary’s book, The Gift of Our Compulsions (which refers to not just the obvious ones but also a compulsion to over-think, over-work, over-struggle, over-stay-busy…). It’s all about learning to live peacefully within our own mind, regardless of what is going on on the outside. Today is my last full day here and I just finished the last page this morning at breakfast…such perfect timing. It has been my most perfect companion. Each day I have transformed old thoughts of struggle, into compassion and love for myself….So you see, the perfect title for my time here is: My Honeymoon with Myself.

And so now, for one last time before I leave tomorrow, I’m off to go nourish my body with some scrumptious delights at the beachside restaurant, be dazzled by the glorious sights of life in the sea, and then enjoy a nap in my ocean view hammock. Thank you for sharing my month long journey in paradise with me…Of course, more to come later on as my journey living and working in Thailand continues. Bye for now. ☺

A Note From Paradise! (part 6 of 7): What about the Turtles on ‘Turtle Island?!’

“You are on ‘Turtle Island’ Jody! Tell us about all the wondrous TURTLES!!!” Well, I wish I could. A very sad thing about reality here is, guess what life from is not visible in the waters around ‘Turtle Island?’ Yep, you guessed it: turtles. To get a name like ‘Turtle Island,’ of course at one time there were hundreds of them frolicking around these waters. Well, turtles aren’t to be seen anywhere around the island anymore…not a one.


The influx of tourists over the last 20 years has made life here impossible for them. They’ve either been killed or scared away. Too many boats and all the people moving around in the sea send them away in search of more peaceful surroundings. Furthermore, all the action on the beaches deprives the turtles of the necessary peaceful areas in the sand in which to lay their eggs. And then there are the effects of toxins in the water and the prevalent use of my favorite friend: plastic (not!)…


On a good note, I have been very impressed with how many, ‘What You Can Do to Preserve the Reef,’ posters I have seen around, listing simple ecofriendly tips for travelers, such as: Avoid the use of plastic products and bags (nearly 90% of marine debris is plastic, which does NOT biodegrade; it just breaks apart into tiny pieces which the fish don’t realize is poison as they nibble away on it); Don’t throw your butts on the ground! (the filters in cigarettes are made of plastic and other toxins so when they make their way into the sea, fish and turtles mistake them for food and then unable to digest it, they die; not to mention the other toxins dissipating into the sea poisoning even more marine life); Buy locally made goods to support the livelihood of the locals (ie, avoid shopping at the ever pervasive 7-11’s on every corner…yes, even here in Thailand…I just read there are 3800 here in this little country); Dispose of trash properly (every year 6 million TONS of trash is deposited in our oceans, and 80% originates as litter which ends up there simply from being propelled from land via wind and water runoff; consequently, 100,000 marine animals such as dolphins, whales, seals, and turtles choke or become entangled every year)… This is Bad News people!!! PLEASE do your part to prevent this, even from where you live, today.


There is a wonderful collaboration amongst the many dive shops on the island to spread environmental awareness to all of their customers. Donation boxes abound for tourists to give towards the local’s efforts to preserve the reef. They are raising money to build a BioRock, an electronic reef structure that uses low voltage current to cause minerals to dissolve out of seawater. (Optimal conditions are thrown out of balance by the pollution and sewage that is dumped into the sea from all over the world.) This creates more optimal growth conditions; coral, sponges, and clams have been shown to grow 3-5 times faster when in close proximity to the BioRock structure. Growth has also been shown to be enhanced in areas with decreased water quality. For more info on this fabulous project, go to: www.MarineConservationKohTao.com


I’d like to take this moment to say YOORAH!! for the many worldwide efforts to preserve this wondrous, breath-taking beautiful planet that serves as home to ALL of us. What small positive difference can you make today?…Thank you!!!

A Note From Paradise! (part 5 of 7): Swimming Amongst the Tropical Fish!

…Now onto describe the tropical fish! From the second I step foot into the ocean, I have swarms of fish circling around me. The ones at the beach are always the silver stripped mid-sized ones. Apparently, they are the smartest ones in the ‘school’… They have figured out that if, instead of darting away in fear from these big blobs of life clamoring around in their home, they actually befriend these clumsy, finless, buffoons, and swim close to them in the shallow water, they will be able to enjoy little nuggets of tasty delights thrown directly at them! One tip I learned the other day, from first hand experience nonetheless, was that I must be careful to not stand in the shallow water too long unless I have some of my own little nuggets to share with them, or else they start nibbling on me!

So I quickly swim past the smart kids and head out to see whom else I can meet. First of all, when I think of tropical fish, what comes to mind is all of those brilliantly colored little ones that I see swimming around in a fish tank in the lobby of some fancy restaurant. I had no idea that ‘tropical fish,’ in their vibrant reds, blues, and greens could be as big as salmon! I kid you not! Then, I even saw a school of these guys…about 20 of them swimming along next to me staring me down, asking each other if they should dart away or if it was cool to just stare at this strange beast for a while…Luck for me, they chose the later.

I have seen many ‘schools’ of fish in my days of snorkeling but today took my breath away. As I swam up to a school of my favorite dark-and-light-silver-stripped,-with-a-bit-of-yellow-on-the-top,-about-6-inches-long ones, I stopped just to watch them for a while. They seemed as interested in me as I was in them. One-by-one they would swim directly straight towards my mask and we would make eye contact for a moment, as if introducing ourselves, before he (or she? or are all fish ‘its?’) swam away to give the next guy a turn. Before I knew it, I wasn’t just looking at a school of fish, but I was entirely engulfed by them….I spun around and there were hundreds of them; to my left; to my right; underneath me…As they swam about, the sunlight shining down on them created the appearance of a field of sparkling diamonds. Wow. I was in such awe… I just stayed there for ages, floating, and floating, and floating...amongst a sea of tropical fish. Before my mind could decide that it had found its new home and that I was never going to leave the presence of this magical life in the sea, I swam on.

Ahead of me was another school of fish but these guys were tadpole size. Instead of the outer boundaries of their ‘school’ morphing into a range of circular shapes (such as resembling a whale, to fool any potential predators that that is exactly what they were, camouflaging the reality of their perfect little snack sized body), these little guys were packed together like a freight train moving along in front of me. I literally stopped, as if waiting at a railroad crossing, before swimming onward. I waited…and waited…and waited….I started to count the seconds!…25 seconds…35 seconds…45 seconds…I started to wonder if this freight train of tadpoles even had a caboose!! Amazingly, an end appeared and the lights turned from red to green, the barriers were lifted, and I swam on.

As I looked straight down, it seemed that the ‘floor’ was moving. But then I realized that once again, I was witnessing one of the largest schools of fish I had ever seen. They were sand colored so without a close focus, it literally looked like the ground was vibrating with movement. In actuality, it was hundreds of fish all swimming along together, forming a blanket covering the ocean floor.

Then there are the brilliant yellow butterfly fish that flit about all day long, except at about 5pm. Apparently ‘Couple’s Hour’ is around then…because every day that I snorkel at that time, I see pairs of these guys just floating lovingly next to each other…not trying to dart here or there, not nibbling on the coral…just admiring each other as they float motionless. When I first saw this, I felt like I was invading their privacy and wanted to say, “ Oh, pardon me.” But when they didn’t seem to mind, I decided to join in…so I just stop and float along with them for a while whenever I see this. But then one day, when my self-pity voice seemingly had a lot to say, as I floated along with my butterfly fish couple like a third wheel, it told me “Geez Jody, here you are on a romantic tropical island…by yourself, yet even the yellow colored fish in the sea can get a date. Where’s yours?!” Hmm, maybe if I ‘hang’ around long enough, these guys will split up and I could catch one on the rebound…

Anyway, then there are the little, fluorescent blue ones that are so bright I have to wonder where in their body they store their battery pack….and the little black ones that look like they crashed into a rock and now their face is shaped like a box... and the ones that float around looking like ghosts with their black outline and translucent bodies…and the brightly colored polka dotted ones…and ones that have so many colors going in so many directions they resemble a piece of modern art…and the little 3 inch long squid scrambling around with all their many legs…and the ones that dart about chasing each other like little kids playing tag on the playground…and the Crocodile-Needle fish that are as scary looking as their name suggests and can often be up to two or three feet long (yet I have been assured both times that I’ve asked that they are harmless… but then I read in a fish book that they have caused fatalities to fisherman that scare them at night with their bright lights…hmm…)… and then there are the elegant white, yellow, and black ‘ladies’ that strut around with their long, elegant, white ‘scarf’ extending from the top of their head to beyond the end of their body, with it swaying here and there as they shimmer by…and then…and then…and then…

To be swimming along so peacefully as a visitor in this vibrant underworld takes my breath away everyday. So let me take a moment to put a plug in…for those of you whom have never gone snorkeling or scuba diving, I strong suggest you make a point of doing so sometime in your lifetime. It’s like visiting another planet, vibrantly alive with hundreds of different, colorful, and exciting life forms…that come in so many various shapes, and sizes…incomparable to any life form seen here above sea level….yet, its not another planet; it’s life right here on earth.

All of this wonder and amazement is visible to me within seconds of stepping off this beach that I have been blessed to be at for the last two weeks. At times, I dive down deep below the surface and pretend I am at home; that I am just one of the many creatures that live in the sea. It’s trippy to look up at the surface of the ocean and watch the ripples from the underside. Yesterday, the water was so crystal clear blue that at times, I literally forgot I was immersed in the sea… I seriously had the thought jump into my mind a few times when admiring a fish, ‘Wow, he is floating in thin air.’ Furthermore, it was a perfect day for snorkeling…The sun was beaming down through the surface of the water which made absolutely everything sparkle. I became witness to the most organic laser light show in the world, fueled by nothing more than the light of the sun and the vibrant colors of sea life.

So here I am, in this very moment, looking down upon the sea from the deck of my little bungalow, exposing to all of you the wonders of its treasures that lie beneath while swinging in this hammock…and I’m realizing, ‘What am I doing up here, in air? It’s time to go dive down, into the sea!’ So more stories to come tomorrow…Bye for now!

A Note From Paradise! (part 4 of 7): The Exquisite Coral!

…So after ‘breakfast,’ it’s often about noon, which is the heat of the day. Going to the beach would be a very hot and potentially burning option…so I usually opt to head back to swing in the shade of my hammock and read. I’m reading my fabulous Aunt Mary’s book, The Gift of Our Compulsions. She teaches the most brilliant approach to living peacefully within our bodies and minds that I have ever come across… (but I’m trying to stay on task, so more about that later).

As I sway in my hammock, I periodically close my eyes and visualize letting go of the stress I have been carrying around in my body for who knows how many years….the tightness in my neck and shoulders, the knot in my shoulder blades that burns now and then, the ache in my low back, the tension in my belly… Now some of you may be thinking, ‘Geez Jody, its not like you’ve been a soldier at war.’ Yes, you are correct. I have not been living my life on a battlefield. But I’m not interested in living my life comparing myself to others. Each person’s experience of life is made up of an exquisitely unique string of events that shape one’s perspective of absolutely everything one encounters. Also, one’s insides rarely match that which shows on the outside, so we rarely know the truth of another’s experience in reality anyway. And lastly, one’s experience of ‘easy’ might be another’s experience of ‘hard,’ and vice versa…. So what good is comparing anything to anyone, anyway? (Hmm, did that sound defensive? Perhaps it was a bit of my own self-doubt coming out…or that voice so common in our society that says, ‘You don’t deserve that, given the many people less fortunate then you in the world.’…Yah, that makes sense. So lets just all make sure we don’t enjoy life too much.)

Interesting…the word ‘digression’ just came to mind. That’s seems a bit strange, doesn’t it? I wonder where that came from? Hmm… Anyway, as I was saying. I spend the early afternoon swaying in my hammock, reading, watching, napping… By about 2 pm, my body is ready to move. I stroll down the stairs until my feet land in the sand, spit into my snorkel mask and rinse it in the sea, (a fabulous tip from my brilliant Grandfather Irving to keep my mask from fogging up, taught to me during our many precious years vacationing together in Hawaii throughout my childhood), and then jump in and off I go, to explore the beauty of life in the sea!

The coral is stunning! So many different shapes and sizes… The huge round balls covered entirely with little squiggly, colorful lines creating the appearance of a gigantic brain; the bright green, circular ‘platters,’ stretching 6 feet in diameter with every inch of their surface covered by ‘fingers’ that stick straight up; the purple ‘cauliflower’ heads that range from tiny to gargantuan; the various shapes that look like a furry terry cloth bathrobe that has been thrown into a pile on the floor; the piles of ‘deer antlers’ with their sharp projections pointing in every which way; the humble ‘plants’ with broad, flat ‘leaves’ that curve around a single united core; the ‘flower bouquets’ with their intricately designed ‘flowers.’… And the vista of it all together!

When I first leave the beach, I see a flat expanse of various shapes and colors. But then as I continue to swim out, I come to a point where I suddenly feel like I’ve just peeked over the edge of a ten-story building and down below is an entire city of life! Big, multicolored boulders standing tall like proud castles; stunning coral that fans out from a vertical edge like a perplexing piece of modern art; barren parts of white sand acting like the city’s central park; bright green ‘branches’ that are stacked on top of each other and branch out, resembling a magnificent bonsai tree; the green splatter that looks like it was created by being shot out of a paint gun… The amazing thing about coral is that to the untrained eye, it just looks like colored rocks. Not true!! Coral is ALIVE! When you look closely at one of these magnificent pieces of life, you realize that its actually covered in thousands of tiny spores, pulsating with life. (It is not to be touched however, because the transfer of bacteria from human touch can actually kill it.)…But that’s just the coral!

Other various life forms abound!…Vibrantly colored ‘clams’ somehow buried deep into the coral so that the only part that comes into view is their fluorescent colored ‘lips’ opening and closing upon the surface of the coral; the one to two foot long, jumbo sized ‘hot dogs’ in their various colors and textures that basically look exactly like huge terds, but are fondly known as sea cucumbers; edges of ‘buildings’ decorated with these tiny bright red, bright blue, and bright green fuzzy balls, seemingly with 2 little black ‘eyes’ (reminiscent of those fuzzy ended pencils with eye balls amongst their frizz) that suddenly somehow retract and disappear into the rock when I come close; the ‘floating spider webs’ that just hang around as if Spiderman had just cast his net out creating them (I’m told its plankton); individual pieces of deep purple colored ‘spaghetti,’ all sticking straight up from the base of a rock floating back and forth in unison like Bob Marley’s dreadlocks, swaying to the beat of their favorite song, “What a Glorious Day in the Sea;” …but that’s not even the half of it! Let me tell you about all the tropical fish!

…But as you all well know by now, I am very empathetic to those of you with short attention spans and I think this entry is getting a bit long. So I will delight you with the rest of this amazing experience, in my next entry…Until then!

A Note From Paradise! (part 3 of 7): A Day in the Life

…So, what do I do each day, here in paradise? Well, let me tell you…

I open my eyes in the morning whenever my body deems it to be the appropriate time…on some mornings its at 10 am, after 12 hours of sleep, and on some days its at 6 am, which is the perfect time to see the sunrise. I roll out of bed, open the door and then flop into the hammock on my deck and watch the goings on out in the sea. The sun has been sparkling on the water every morning for the last two weeks, except for my first two days here when it was lightly cloudy with warm rain. I watch the waves crash against the rocks, the birds soar through the bay, the trees dance in the wind. I then close my eyes and meditate for an hour… “Jody, you do what? Meditate?” Let me digress….

Meditation has slowly become more popular in the past few decades. It certainly isn’t anything new given the fact that it has been a part of numerous world religions since the dawn of time. I wanted to digress and explain myself because this word ‘meditation’ likely means something different to each one of you reading this, similar to that of the word ‘God’ and its many interpretations. So what does ‘meditation’ mean to me? It simply means being still for an hour with my eyes closed. I watch sensations that arise in my body without reacting to them, (such as a fly landing on my nose, or a strand of hair tickling my neck… which is a practice for reducing reactions to the bigger things in life) and I focus my attention on my breath. With as busy as our minds and bodies are from day to day….talking to him, listening to her, running here, driving there, planning this, organizing that, starting the project, finishing the project, emailing this, faxing that, text-messaging dad, skype-ing mom, making a mess, cleaning the house, changing this, fixing that, cooking food, eating meals, buying garbage, throwing away garbage, working, working, and working some more…I’ve realized that my mind and body are hungry to BE STILL!…which is the whole purpose of my time off here!

Well let me tell you, lassoing the focus of my mind to simply focus on my breath for an hour is no easy task….If I get a few solid minutes without thoughts floating in, its been a good session. Thus the majority of my time is actually spent watching how busy my mind likes to be, and then countless times throughout the hour, kindly refocusing my attention on my breath. ‘Breath in. Breath out. Breath in. Breath out. Breath in…’ Try it for yourself right now and see how long you can keep your focus solely on your breath…and then try again… By the end of the hour, my body has let go of various pockets of tightness and a calm sense of ease washes over me. It’s a great way to start the day.

Anyway, thanks for reading my digression. Back to my day in paradise… After meditating, I head down the curvy path, passing the fragrant plumeria tree, the vibrant red hibiscus plant, and countless other flowering bundles of joy to the beachside restaurant for ‘breakfast.’ Why the ‘parentheses’, you might ask? Well, let me tell you a bit about my experience of the food in Thailand…



In Thailand, lunch usually consists of rice, vegetables, and then chicken, pork, fish, or perhaps some squid. Dinner usually consists of rice, vegetables, and then chicken, pork, fish, or perhaps some squid. Or you could also have some chicken with your rice, and some vegetables on the side. I prefer to have vegetables with my chicken, and some rice on the side. I almost forgot another option, which is chicken-vegetable SOUP, which is usually served with rice. Then of course, there is also the pork with vegetables and NOODLES option as well. As for ‘breakfast,’ rice with vegetables along with some fish ball soup seems to be the most popular option…. at least at the cafeteria at my work, anyway.…So thus my reasoning for writing, ‘breakfast.’


All of you Thai food lovers out there, I can hear your cries of protest!! “How dare you simplify and minimize how glorious the Thai cuisine is?!” Ok, Ok. I must say, I absolutely love the use of all the fresh herbs…basil, ginger, lemon grass….and the freshness of everything, having likely been picked locally that very same day. But in my defense, I just want to remind you that everything I write about my experience here in Thailand is simply that….one single woman’s experience.

Speaking of being single….Well actually, let me save that for my next entry. Back to my day in paradise. (See why meditation is a good idea for me?! It’s hard for me to even keep my focus on something as glorious as describing what I do each day in paradise!) Actually, I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but I’ve just changed my mind again… I think this entry is long enough and that perhaps its time to take a dip in the ocean. (I can’t help it! I was born changing my mind. I’m quite sure that in the first few minutes of my life, I was thinking to myself, “I’m hungry. No, I think I need a nap. I’m confused. I think I’ll cry. Actually no, I’d just like some milk…) Needless to say, I’ll save the next part for tomorrow! I’m off to the beach!

A Note From Paradise! (part 2 of 7): Lovely Tanote Bay on Koh Tao

…The island’s population, as you would suspect from a beautiful tropical island with crystal clear water, is concentrated around the beaches. The center of the island is lush, rocky, and hilly. Infrastructure is still pretty basic but 75% of the island now has 24-hour electricity. Many of the beaches are only accessible by 4 wheel drives along one of the few overland roads, and if by chance you are venturing onto one of these ‘roads,’ you better hang on….The roads are unpaved, have huge ruts, and are probably about as steep as the hills of San Francisco… and unless you get lucky enough to sit inside the cab of the pick-up-truck taxi, you’re sitting in the back, with just your neighbor to hold on to.

Before arriving, I researched different islands, different cities, different beaches…With my love for the water, being on the beach was a must. I wanted a place rather remote but not totally isolated. I wanted a little bit of variety in the daily goings-on, but not much necessary. I wanted a place where my money could be comfortably stretched out for a month. I wanted to stay far away from the party-going, music-blaring, back-packer scene (very common throughout Asia and if I ended up near a place like this, I would need a vacation after my vacation to catch up on lost sleep). I wanted a quiet beach, but with enough people around to have someone to talk to. With how amazing the snorkeling is purported to be here in Thailand, I definitely wanted to experience swimming with the colorful coral and the endless schools of tropical fish....Koh Tao fit all of the above criteria…perfectly.

Of the ten or so different beaches around the island…some with only one isolated accommodation on the beach versus others packed with numerous back-packer targeted audiences…I found just the right one, Ao Tanote, or as we would say in English, Tanote Bay.

I arrived here at Ao Tanote on July 6th. Today is July 18th. At this moment, I am on my little deck of my little bungalow, swinging in my little hammock, looking out at the beautiful sights of this bay...I see the sparkling blue ocean, the shiny white sand beach, the swaying palm trees, a few dive boats anchored in the bay…. The ocean breeze is tickling my face and is a welcomed gift to balance out the heat of the glorious sunshine. My bungalow sits up nestled into the hillside, about a one minute walk down an artistically curved path to the beach. I’d say it takes me about 10 minutes, if that, to walk from one end of the beach to the other. (Albeit, ‘beach walking’ speed.) Proud boulders sit like bookends at each end, extending out from the beach along the seashore until they disappear around the curve of the island.

There are 5 different accommodation options on this beach, all sporting relatively similar little bungalow style accommodation, two dive schools, and a little massage shack on the beach (as I mentioned in my previous entry, an hour long massage from the cute local boy will cost you a whooping $9…I’ve had one almost everyday)….and that’s it. No town. No shops. No dance clubs. Each place has its own quaint little beachside restaurant, which allows for a nice variety when going out for dinner each night…which if I splurge and buy the ‘expensive items,’ will cost me about $10.

So what do I do each day you might ask? Well, let me tell you! …in my next entry…

A Note From Paradise! (part 1 of 7): Discovering the Tropical Island of Koh Tao

July 18, 2008
Blue skies for as far as the eye can see...The glistening ocean dancing in the wind...Patches of clear blue water acting as little windows into the glorious colors of the underworld...Brightly colored fishing boats decorating the sea...Monumental boulders rising up from the sea extending up the steep hillsides, decorated by lush greenery of the local flora...Swaying palm trees dancing throughout the hillsides...The glorious fragrance of the plumeria trees...The vibrant red of the hibiscus flowers...The luscious taste of the freshly fallen papayas….This is what is in my field of vision at this very moment.

Lovely little Koh Tao, also known as ‘Turtle Island,’ is a tropical island off the east coast of Thailand. It's claim to fame is scuba diving similar to that found at the Great Barrier Reef. For my month off, I was looking for the idyllic place to slow down, let go, and completely unwind from too many years of pushing myself through exhaustion….and, I can confidently say, I found it. I have been staying in a little hillside bungalow at a beach called Tanote Bay…which, get this, I’m paying a whooping $11 a night for! Unbelievable! It’s a pay-each-day system here so every morning when I walk down the windy cement path, decorated with flowers singing in their bright colors about how beautiful they are, I always shake my head in joyful disbelief.

Tiny Koh Tao measures just 21 square kilometers and has a fulltime population of only 5500. It’s basically just this little tropical island, way out on its own, in the middle of the Gulf of Thailand. Given its physical isolation, its history lays claim to a chequered past and has been a favorite hideout for pirates, a lay-over point for weary fisherman, and even a detention center for political prisoners. The descendants of the original inmates still make up a large part of the local community…. but the vibe on the island is so laid back that apparently the locals have let go of their inherited criminal ways and, from my perspective, have become smart business people instead. I think they’ve realized the answer to the question, ‘Why be a criminal when one could be even wealthier from running a legal business instead?’

Any sort of business that caters to the flocks of white people who arrive from all over the world with fat wallets and a, Why-not-buy-it?-I’m-on-vacation! mentality, is likely to thrive here…a fruit stand selling the fruit that grows in your back yard, a souvenir shop, a street side restaurant, shacks on the beach, a taxi service with your own car...or boat for that matter, local snacks that you sell from your basket as you walk along the streets, knock-off sunglasses and random nick-knacks that you sell from atop your blanket under a tree, a massage stand from your collapsible table you’ve set up in the shade…With just the slightest bit of entrepreneurial spirit, from what it seems to me, most locals could create their own revenue stream. (Albeit, I have not tried to start a business here myself so this is just one outsider’s perspective.)

When you are operating from a small island with few competitors, you can pretty much charge any price you want. Furthermore, when your clients come from countries where salaries are at the minimum 10-20 times as great as the typical salaries here in Thailand, you could charge prices that would be considered obscene to any of the locals…(and would actually still be pricing things way under what us tourists would deem expensive….which I’d say only about half have figured out.) Speaking of, I’m going to take a break and go get my daily, hour-long massage on the beach….for $9. So, more to come tomorrow!

Sitting At Starbucks...

July 2, 2008
Exactly 6 months ago tomorrow, being July 3rd 2008, I boarded a plane in Seattle, which carried me half way across the globe to my new home country of Thailand. For those of you closely following my adventures, you know that its been quite an exotic, educational, exciting, exhilarating, eye opening (wow, that’s a lot of adjectives that start with ‘e’…wasn’t even trying), challenging, growing, and quite the once-in-a-lifetime experience. I almost threw in the towel, as they say, a few weeks ago but here I am, still here. Not feeling well really shook me up and made me feel that I needed to head home. As with everything in life, I made it through that time, and now I’m out the other end and proud to say, I’m still here.

Albeit, I’ve asked for a few weeks off….27 days to be exact. I am using a 50/50 combination of vacation time and unpaid leave. My boss is extremely appreciative of the work I do and gladly granted me the time off. (I feel very blessed!) It’s the low season here so it’s the ideal time to take time off. As of the day after tomorrow, I’m jumping on a 6 hour train and heading down to one of the picturesque southern islands. (Think: San Juan Islands yet in the tropics…swaying palm trees, clear blue water, pearly white sand beaches, amazing snorkeling, and cozy beach side bungalows for dollars a day…ahhh.)

But, I’m not on the train yet. My time off was officially supposed to start as of yesterday but my co-worker Monica had a horrible bout of food poisoning last week. (Not even from the local food though! She accidentally drank some of her own out-dated soy milk…yikes! She ended up spending a night in our local hospital to rehydrate herself with fluids via an IV.) Needless to say, doing our job of being ‘wellness’ experts is a bit challenging when you’re not feeling so well yourself! Thank goodness, she is almost back to feeling 100% but I took her clients for her yesterday and then went in this morning to save her from an energy sucking client she was scheduled to see at 10am. (A mother who is here with her 26 year old daughter. I met them on their first day and listened to the mother tell me how unwell her daughter is, as her daughter sat there not even able to get in a word for herself. As the mom continued to speak for her daughter for about an hour, the mother then tells me, “She needs to be more independent!”…gee, maybe allowing her to speak for herself would be a good start, I thought to myself. There was no point in actually verbalizing this thought because anything I did try to say seemed to just bounce around on the walls like a little rubber bouncy ball that eventually just ended up ignored in some corner somewhere, forever to be forgotten.) Anyway, needless to say, I knew that if Monica had to see her, she might wish she was back in bed sick with food poisoning again….so I came into to save her. Murphy’s law…I set my alarm, put my uniform on, went into work…and the crazy lady had cancelled the appointment.

That was this morning. Then I went to the gym. Took a nap. And now…I’m sitting at Starbucks. When I first arrived here in my town of Hua Hin and discovered that there were two Starbucks here, I thought to myself, ‘Well, if I ever get homesick, I could come hang out at Starbucks, drink coffee, and work on my computer.’ And here it is, exactly 6 months into my life here, and the time has arrived. I’m drinking an Americano (the most apropos of choices of course), in the same white-mug-with-Starbucks-logo mug I would using be if at home, sitting at Starbucks, working on my computer. And this is hilarious…its raining. I kid you not. I’m sitting at Starbucks in Thailand, drinking coffee, and its raining.

The rainy season has arrived and will be around for the next few months, which means it rains for at least an hour or so almost everyday (and sometimes accompanied by the most earth shaking thunder I’ve ever heard!!). But today, Seattle weather is in full bloom. I woke up to clouds, and they haven’t budged all day. Now of course, there is one thing that’s a switch…. At first, I was sitting inside in the exact same cozy brown chairs and little wood table that I would be sitting at if at home….but the air conditioning was on so strong that I got TOO COLD TO STAY INSIDE….so I had to COME OUTSIDE TO WARM UP. “I don’t think we’re in Seattle anymore, Toto!”

So as I sit here in my shorts and flip flops in the rain, I am being entertained by the events in the street in front of me. I am watching all the locals driving on their motorbikes, (the main source of transportation here; if you drive a car, you better get out of the way...) holding umbrellas as they drive. They somehow manage to do so without the umbrellas flipping inside-out from the wind. I’m very impressed.

What else? Well, tomorrow I’ll pack, do a few other odds-and-ends things and then head south. More to come from the pristine islands of Thailand over the next month! Until then!

Swimming in A Sea of Plastic Bags

After writing one of my previous entries, in which I was talking about all the chemicals that we ‘swim’ in on a daily basis, I was inspired to write this next entry…I was watching world news on the BBC the other morning and there was a story about how the amount of plastic waste build up has become such a huge global problem. They showed video clips from countries all around the world of landfills overflowing with towering mountains of plastic waste. One major city in Africa completely flooded after a rainstorm due to plastic bags blocking up the sewer drains…. And kudos to them! This city has now outlawed plastic bags. One of the things about life that really discourages me is the impetus for major change usually only comes after major problems arise.

Case in point, I am flabbergasted every time I go to the store, see people that buy something that is already in a bag, albeit without handles, and then…get a bag for it?? How difficult is it to carry the item ‘all the way’ to the car in its own bag? Why the heck do we need a bag for the bag? And then there are the people who walk up to the check stand, carrying their own big bag or purse to buy maybe 2 or 3 things, and then get a plastic bag to put their items in. Excuse me, can’t it just be put in the bag they already have? Do people not realize how much waste is produced on a daily basis across the world? Do people ever think about where it ends up?

Well, let me tell you…I was taking a nice dip in the ocean last week and something brushed against my leg. It was a frickin’ plastic bag. This bag could of come from America. Maybe it was one that anyone reading this used and then threw away. The news story shared that land is so cheap outside of the US that much garbage from America is now being shipped overseas. Heaven forbid the biggest waste producing country in the world has to live next to their own waste. It certainly makes much more sense to spend millions of dollars on gas to fuel a barge to pollute its way across the ocean carrying all of this American waste to some other 'more deserving' country.

I made the transition a few years ago to always use my own bags, but it certainly didn’t happen overnight. I thought about it for many months, about how I should really stop using all these bags. Then I finally kept canvas bags permanently in my trunk…and always walked into the store forgetting them. And now I have finally made it to the point that sometimes I wont even buy things unless I have my own bags. I also keep silverware in my glove box, but the same transition steps occurred until I remembered them regularly and thus could avoid using plastic silverware every time I eat take-out. That reminds me of another thing that happened last week...when I was swimming, I noticed this starkly white shell in the sand. "Hmm. Interesting." Picked it up and gee, of course it was starkly white...it was a plastic spoon.

Please, people, if everyone just took tiny steps we would dramatically reduce this problem. Here is just a small list of easy steps you can take, today: #1-Please say no to a bag if you don’t really need it. Buy some reusable bags and keep them in your trunk until you start getting in the habit of using them. Or, just keep all those plastic bags you have stuffed in some drawer in your kitchen in your trunk and use them. #2-Take only one or two paper napkins from the dispenser when eating out. Is a two inch stack really necessary? #3- Contact the companies you do business with and request that all communication be via email only…monthly statements, bills, insurance info…If you hold any stock, you can even request to have all that bulky quarterly company earnings stuff and proxy material sent all electronically. #4- Buy recycled materials over non anytime you can. #5-Reduce your use of plastic bottles. You can buy a simple seven layer carbon water filter that takes about 30 seconds to screw into your kitchen faucet. There is a doc I went to school with who sells a great one on his website:

http://www.healthegoods.com/waterfilterbathshowercountertop.htm

...These are just a few examples of many simple steps you can do to reduce your contribution to our world’s waste burden. Please, say NO to unnecessary waste.

Plastic waste is just one ‘small’ source of waste. I recently read a story about how residues of pharmaceutical drugs are being found in city water. Do you realize what that means? It means that millions of people are taking drugs→ urinating residues of them into the toilet→ the sewage is seeping into our city water→ and then we cook our vegetables, clean our clothes, and bath in this ‘clean’ water. That’s a nice thought, isn’t it?

Another food for thought for you all…when you choose non-manufactured thus non-packaged foods at the store, not only are you avoiding creating waste by eventually throwing the packaging away, but your are also saving an immense amount of energy by choosing foods that haven’t been through an energy sucking, chemical ridden manufacturing plant. There’s a thought.

For an excellent story on how big this waste and energy problem really is, please make time to watch the following link:

www.thestoryofstuff.com.

Thank you to those of you who will truly take this info to heart. The next time you go on a tropical vacation and take a dip in the ocean, maybe you’ll be able to avoid swimming amongst a sea of garbage and plastic bags.

Jody's Big Adventure in Bangkok, (Day 2 & 3)

April 14, 2008

We met in the lobby of the elegant Oriental hotel at 10am. Arlene was a bit tardy because she was late coming back from the gym. Little did she know that to get to the hotel’s gym, guests were transported in one of the hotel’s elegant riverboats across the river to the other bank. So Dan and I relaxed and people watched in the lobby, enjoying a cup of tea.

Arlene arrived and we were off, Dan our fearless leader leading the way. We headed to the public boat taxi station and jumped aboard. I had no idea there was so much water in Bangkok! The Chao Phraya River is about 400 meters wide and winds all the way through downtown, with major public transport stops all along its edge. An endless maze of smaller canals extends out from the main river source, seemingly creating as many water ways as there are regular streets. Our boat is packed with people standing up, similar to a morning rush hour scene on a subway, with mobs of people exiting and entering at each stop. Eventually, we join the ranks of the ‘exiting mobs’ and jump off.

We are headed to The Grand Palace. Being the photo junkie that I am, I’m still shaking my head as to how it was possible that I arrived in Bangkok without my camera…and furthermore, that I did not think about buying a disposable camera. I guess that is testament to how awe struck I was by the sites…

The Grand Palace was built in 1782 under the direction of King Rama I. All 218,000 square meters are walled in by a cement fortress. Within the walled compound lies government administration halls, the residence quarters for the royal family, and most spectacularly, numerous temples, including the renown Temple of the Emerald Buddha. This site is one of the most revered sites in Thailand for paying respect to the Lord Buddha and His Teachings. And being that today was a national holiday, the temple was packed to the brim with Thais paying their respects. The Emerald Buddha is in fact carved from a block of green jade and was first discovered in 1434. He sits high up on an ornately decorated throne and is just a little over 1 foot tall. Even though this one foot tall Emerald Buddha is way above the rank of us ordinary people, He’s apparently a bit fashion conscious... He is only found wearing one of three outfits: one for summer, one for the rainy season, and one for winter. Apparently, on the three days each year in which He changes His attire, there is quite an ornate ceremony. Luckily, today was not one of the days for the-changing-of-the-clothes. It was already packed enough!

We stopped for lunch and then headed on to the very revered sight of Wat Pho, also known as The Temple of the Reclining Buddha. Dan has befriended one of the tour guides here. He is a wonderfully friendly Thai man who actually has grown up living at this very site, which he continues to call home today. He provided us with a wealth of knowledge, to say the least! ....This Wat, meaning ‘temple,’ is the largest temple in Bangkok and is also technically the oldest (its been remodeled), having been originally built about 200 years before Bangkok became Thailand’s capital. With the previous image of Buddha at a whopping 1-foot tall still in my mind, I was that much more blown away when I laid my eyes on this 46 METER LONG, GOLD PLATED RECLINING BUDDHA! That’s the length of half a football field!! His reclining position is designed to illustrate the last few moments of His life as He passes into nirvana. The feet and eyes are engraved with mother-of-pearl decoration, and the souls of the feet depict the 108 auspicious events in the life of Buddha. Along its edge are 108 bronze vases. For just a few Baht, we each purchased a bag of 108 coins...then as I dropped a coin in each of the vases, I said a prayer, focusing on every single person I love in my life as well as my own dreams. By the end of the line, I had tears in my eyes. With my love for the significance of numbers, I was even more moved when I reached the 108th vase and had exactly one coin left. (The norm is to be a bit over or a bit short on coins by the end of the line.) It was truly a moving experience.

However, in my ignorance of Buddhism, I truly felt embarrassed and ashamed to be there. The significance of this 46 meter long, gold plated Buddha is completely beyond my comprehension. The temple was packed with 100’s of Thai’s, likely from all over the country, bowing and paying their respects to one of their most revered relics in the history of Buddhism…and there I am, with my most profound thought being, ‘Wow, this is cool.’ By the end of our many hours together with our personal tour guide, learning about this site that he so reveres and having shared tears together along the way, I couldn't believe how close I felt to this man whom I will likely never see again. We all gave him a big hugs of gratitude, and then waved farewell as we walked away.

As we headed back toward the riverboat taxi station, in the middle of this loud and busy city, we came across a little narrow walk way that headed out to the river. Looking down its length, there seemed to be perhaps a market at the end. We decided to go check it out. It was so narrow, we had to walk single file. But we soon realized, it wasn’t a path. We were walking through people’s homes. To our right was a cement wall that had little makeshift tables and cupboards built into it. To our left was a line of little square shacks with living quarters set up inside. Amazingly, many of them were sporting flat screen tv’s and major sound system’s set up inside. The people were all smiling, happy, of all ages…young kids, to grandmas. Dan, our local tour guide, is luckily fluent in Thai so after realizing we weren’t on a public pathway, he kindly made friends with these people whom we had invited ourselves into their homes. I have no idea what they were saying, but I felt relieved when everyone started laughing. We soon continued on.

Back to the river we went. This time we jumped on one of the private canal tour boats, similar to the gondolas of Venice in shape but powered by a very unromantically loud, roaring engine. We spent the next two hours winding our way through the endless grid of these tiny waterways of Bangkok. Along the banks were mostly homes and the main source of transportation for these homeowners were their wooden boats. We passed through neighborhood after neighborhood, each with its own unique feel. Most of the homes any westerner would deem dilapidated, but this was likely not the opinion of the owners themselves. Third world countries know how to make do with much less than most of us could ever imagine, and they do so without the ridiculous pressure, so universal in western culture, to work more hours or get a better job just so we can go shopping and acquire more 'stuff'.

There were a few odd homes, built up tall with new construction and an elegantly designed fence around the perimeter, but they were certainly the exception to the rule. As for the water, the water quality was as you would expect for a river in the middle of a huge polluted city: black. Yet, the human body is incredibly adaptable, as was apparent by all the smiling and laughing children we passed playing in the water. (Mouth open wide in disbelief.) At one point, a toothless grinned older woman paddled her way over to our boat in attempts to sell us her goods…Her boat was packed with snacks, drinks, and a whole array of artsy nick-naks. After purchasing something out of courtesy, we moved on.

Next, we were stopped by a group of monks waving us down from the riverbank. We pulled up to buy a loaf of the bread that they were selling, by direction of our boat driver, and threw chunks of it into the river. Suddenly the entire surface of the water was transformed into a dense blanket of these big, fat, gray fish. Besides being awed by the mere number of them that seemingly appeared out of nowhere, my mouth was still wide open in disbelief from before, thinking to myself this time, ‘How does such disgustingly polluted water actually support life?’ It made me second guess ordering any fish for the rest of the trip, that’s for sure!

Our boat ride came to an end. Our driver dropped us off at our own private stop, at the bank of the Oriental Hotel. We took a table outside on the patio and quenched our thirst as we watched the ever-bustling river continue to serve as the main thoroughfare for a countless number of boats. Arlene and I felt deep gratitude towards Dan for our spectacular day of touring Bangkok. Being that Dan is a professional tour guide here, it would be hard to take him out to dinner to a place that he has never been to…but Arlene succeeded. One of the most famously elegant restaurants in Bangkok is a French restaurant on the top floor of The Oriental Hotel, called The Normandy. We each headed back to our respective rooms to change and met at 7pm, at The Normandy.

Elegance. That pretty much sums it up. Quaint elegance. Dan and Arlene picked the pre-set 7 course meal. Margot (who was busy working during the day but rejoined us for dinner) and I ordered Sea Bass. I had to start with the frog legs, just because I’ve never tried them before. (They taste like little chicken legs for anyone wondering.) We were all getting along fabulously, this quite random mix of us. Thanks to Arlene. Dan is her friend who lives in Bangkok. Margot was a fellow guest with Arlene at the resort last week. And I was the lucky Naturopath who was assigned to work with Arlene during her stay at the resort. We finish with the most decadent array of desserts I’ve ever seen…pistachio pie, chocolate tort, mocha madness cake, coconut delight…good thing my insulin bottle was full!

Speechless with gratitude, I said good-bye to Dan and Arlene. It was an amazing day, and I still can’t believe I got so lucky as to be invited to come along. I jumped in a taxi to head back to my hotel for a long night’s rest after my big day of Adventuring in Bangkok.


Day 3
------

The next morning, I had a gloriously lazy time. I slept late. Headed down to the 7th floor for my all-inclusive breakfast buffet…smoked salmon, fresh fruit, omelet bar…I felt like a queen. I then headed to the gym for a good sweat for an hour or so. Took a shower and then out to the balcony to take a snooze on the lawn chairs. Ahhh….such a nice change from my regular day off in my home town that I fondly refer to as the armpit of Thailand. I didn’t really want to leave….but once 3pm arrived, I figured it was time to go. I jumped on the skytrain to cruise through town and headed back to the minivan station where I jumped on for the 3hour trip back to Hua Hin.

And that is the end to my story, Jody’s Big Adventure in Bangkok.

Jody's Big Adventure in Bangkok, Day 1

(This entry is one I’m catching up on because it actually happened back in mid-April...)

April 13, 2008…one week has passed since my first visit to Bangkok and I’m already headed back. But this trip has nothing to do with stem cell therapy and everything to do with saying ‘yes’ to an invitation…..

Arlene is a red head from Canada with a wonderfully laid back personality. She arrived in my office on her first day of her 10 day stay at the resort. As I was talking with her upon her arrival, she just casually mentioned that she has a Canadian friend, 35 year old male, that I should meet. When her stay came to an end she says to me, “Hey, Dan and I are going out for dinner in Bangkok tonight and then tour the city tomorrow. You should come with us!” Amazingly, that day was my day off. What do I do? I accept the invitation, of course!

I had to do some finagling of my work schedule to make it work. I get off work every night at 6 and then work from 8-12 preceding my day off. Well, I was luckily done with guests by 4 on this day and had a pretty clear schedule the following half-day…so I was able to clear that and took off at 4. Yipee! That means two full days off!

Last week, for my meeting with the stem cell company, was the first time I had ever experienced Bangkok. I got a grasp for its enormity but really didn’t do any exploring. So I was very excited for this trip. Dan runs his own Thailand tour guide company so you could say, I knew I’d be getting a first class adventure hanging out with him and Arlene!

Now getting to Bangkok from Hua Hin is no easy task. After leaving work at 4, I had to pack my bag, get on a motor bike taxi to the mini-van station, wait for the mini-van to get full with passengers so that it would depart, and then ride 3 hours to the big city, as it dropped off and picked up passengers all along the way. Needless to say, I was a bit late for dinner.

(A quick cultural educational piece for you all: I was traveling on April 13th. Mid-April is the annual Thai Songkran festival, which is a huge vacation time for everyone in the country. April is the hottest month here so the festival consists of huge parades in all the towns…and days of people of all ages in every city in the country dousing all passer-byers with water. Some cities engage in this for just one day, while others for a week or more. So as I was on the motor bike headed to the mini-van place, I inevitably was doused with water. Yah, a 3 hour ride in a heavily air-conditioned van, in wet clothes, was really fun.)

Anyway, I finally arrive at the restaurant. The décor in this top rated restaurant was stunning. From the quiet alley it was located on, you would barely notice the place. The entrance was covered in lush vegetation giving me the feel that I was walking into the jungle. The path curved up a wooden staircase and lead me to the front desk, which also was barely recognizable by the way the jungle-like décor enveloped it. As the hostess walked me to the table, we passed elegant wooden art sculptures tucked away in little nooks, covered with more foliage. The restaurant had all these different rooms, all on different levels, with their own flare. Each room housed only about 5 tables so you felt quite cozy, yet you could see into all the other rooms.

Ah, after my long journey, I arrive at the table with my new friends. Joining them was another guest from the resort whom Arlene had met during her stay. Margot is a very intriguing woman who writes for National Geographic magazine. She is living at one of the most famous and elegant hotels in Bangkok, The Oriental, for the next few months working on uncovering a scandalous story about animal bone poaching. I wish I could give a more descript detail but I’m afraid I didn’t grasp all the elements…I just knew it was excitingly scandalous…involving world famous art dealers operating their business with horrifying dishonesty. Anyway, they had ordered Asian style (family style with a variety of community dishes) and so there were plenty of nibbles for me to enjoy. Then, Dan ordered dessert. What arrived was a scrumptious dessert array of what was so beautifully presented as art, I hesitated to even take a bite…but who are we kidding? With my love of desserts, I indulged.

From there Dan took us to Scirroco. Scirroco is an elegant bar on the rooftop of a 64 story skyscraper. I had no idea Bangkok was this big! Imagine a city that stretched from Seattle to Tacoma, with no water or mountains inhibiting its sprawl east or west so it could be just as wide as it was long. Welcome to Bangkok! Even with the 360 degree view from this place, there was no end in sight in any direction. The lights just went on and on and on. I’ve been to New York. With all of its surrounding water, it has limitations on its size. But Bangkok just goes on and on and on…I don’t think I’ve ever been in a city this big.

The rooftop holds a buffet restaurant with elegantly set white tablecloth covered tables, a music stage where a woman wearing a red dress which was blowing around elegantly in the wind was gracing the crowd with her singing, and the ever-changing-of-colors bar. But I just couldn’t stop looking at the view. Stunning. Unfortunately, it was already pretty late by the time we arrived so we didn’t last long but what a treat it was to see the view from this place.

As Arlene and Margot headed back to The Oriental Hotel (can you say: way, waaaay out of my price range), Dan used his tourist guide connections to get me into a fabulous hotel for about half its regular cost. So after our goodnights and see-you-in-the-mornings, I headed up to my posh room in The Majestic Grand Hotel. Paying $100 for my elegant room…what a luxurious treat. Furthermore, I couldn’t help but be touched by the fact that here I was, this single girl from Seattle living half-way around the world, hanging out with people I just met, in one of the biggest cities in the world! Very cool, I thought. So off to bed I went, to rest up for tomorrow, my full day of adventuring in this famous city of Bangkok. More to come!

Who Knows....

Do I know? Do you know? What do you think? What do I think? Go up or down? Go right or left? Should I stay or should I go? Stem cell or no stem cell? Stay home or go out? Go home or stay out? I DONT KNOW!!! All these questions keep stirring around in my head. 6 months is plenty...I have experienced so much. 6 months is nothing...there is so much more to experience. The stem cell procedure has lots of data and is well researched. The stem cell procedure is so new; no one has even heard about it....

....So just thought I'd let you all know the latest answer in my decision making processes is....I DON'T KNOW.

What I do know is that it's late and I'm headed to bed. Good night Jody!....which means to all of you on the other side of the globe in America, Good Morning!

A Day in the Life of Dr. Jody...

Got a 'memo' last night that I needed to arrive to work 30 minutes early today. (Okay, it was an 'email,' but for some reason I just felt like pretending it was the pre-email era of say 1983.) "Photo shoot with journalists." Okay. Whatever that means.

I arrived to work 30 minutes early and actually put a little make-up on (not part of this nature girl's normal daily routine but hey, why not). There were about 5 people in my office setting up lights, cameras...The hosts of some U.S. cable show called 'Spa Seekers' were visiting the resort for 3 days shooting a piece highlighting our resort...and I had been chosen to be their health consultant. What does that mean? That means that for the next 2 hours, I repeated the same 5 sentences of health advice over and over and over...with the camera to my right, to my left, focusing on the 2 young female hosts, focusing on me, focusing on my finger pointing at the brochure....Needless to say, any dreams I've ever had about becoming a famous movie star quickly evaporated into thin air when I quite swiftly learned how incredibly boring and monotonous it is to shoot probably what will end up being a 30 second clip! Anyway, it will air in the US on the Cable Vision channel in Jan '09....I suppose you could say it will be my 30 seconds of fame....Well no, I don't think so. That will be when I'm on Oprah talking about stem cell therapy...

Noon arrived. Lunch time. Headed out of my air conditioned office into the hot, humid air... that I truly love. (I have been cold in Seattle for years...sometimes even when the sun is out I was cold. Not here! The air warms me to my bones! I am sitting in my bedroom right now and its 80. I love it.) Anyway, walked the 3 minute stroll down the back alley that runs along the outer border of the resort into the staff cafeteria. Remember back in junior high, when you'd walk into the cafeteria and take a quick scan looking for perhaps 'the cool' table, or trying to decide which group of your friends to sit with? Well, when you walk into a cafeteria full of Thais speaking Thai, and then there is one little table of white skinned people speaking English, there really isn't much of a debate about where you're going to sit. I could sit at one of the two outside tables on the tiny little deck....with the smokers. So I got my food and went to have a seat at 'my' table.

My dear colleague Will was having a discussion about one of his morning patients. She fully acknowledged that she was obese and an alcoholic, that she wanted to do nothing about it, and that she was deeply happy with her life. Will stated what a load of bs that is because when one is a slave to an addiction, freedom and full contentment cannot coexist within that state of slavery. What followed was an excellent discussion. "There are many different levels to the human psyche," I said. "What if she was truly a slave in her earlier years and now she is free? Happiness is a relative thing. Perhaps being a slave was the most horrible experience she could ever dream of and now that she is free, she's elated. What was once just a dream, is now her reality." "But she doesn't see that she is not free. She is still a slave....now to her addiction." "Sure, she is an addict. But pain is also relative. Your pain, her pain, my pain... can never be measured apples to apples. The entirety of ones life's circumstances determine how one views life. It is never the event that is good or bad....only what each individual's take on it is real. Perfect example: movies. One person hates it. You love it.... it's always less about the movie than about how each person chooses to look at it. Such is true with everything in life.... Furthermore, defense mechanisms are powerful realities...so powerful that they can make people believe even the most absurd lies. Pain? What pain? I am blissfully happy....And so it is." The clock hit 12:50 and back to our little air conditioned offices we went.

Ring. Ring. "Jody, your next client is here." I walk down the hallway and greet, let's call her Susan (patient confidentiality...can't use real names). Susan has come to see me for a nutrition consultation. "I must lose 20 kilograms. I hate this (as she points to her body). Tell me what to eat. Tell me what to do for exercise. What tea should I drink? How do I get rid of cellulite? What massages should I get? How often? What else do I need to do? This body isn't me. I must lose 20 kilograms." I take a deep breath and assess the situation. The counseling side of me is coming up with a lot of ideas of how to proceed. Yet, I must realize that I have 50 minutes with this woman whom I will likely never see again. If she was a patient in MY practice, that would be one thing....I'd have much more time to work with the deeper issue at hand...of perhaps self hatred and fear. But in a ritzy resort, a lot of people wont be happy unless they, "just lose this weight!" Working here has been an excellent exercise in learning to work with patients where they are at. They have an agenda. I have an agenda. The art is finding out where the middle is....

With Susan, I just focused on answering her questions. "More fruits and vegetables is a good start. Here is a list of low and high sugar vegetables..." "Pumpkin is high sugar?! THAT is why I am fat! I eat pumpkin all the time!" "Well, Susan, 'high sugar' vegetables doesn't mean that you can never eat them. What it means is.....And as for this list of fruit, if you are having blood sugar level issues, you should probably limit your fruit intake to no more than 2-3 fruits a day." "Watermelon is on this list! I love watermelon! So I get to eat the whole watermelon as one fruit?!" "Well, actually sorry to make this confusing but no...." "My body doesn't feel good when I eat wheat so I only eat whole grain bread." "Well, Susan, 'whole grain' doesnt mean it doesnt contain wheat. 'Whole grain' just means that the wheat hasn't been refined...." Does anyone else see the humor in these basic, basic nutrition questions?!

It was a fun day. :-)