The Sphere Effect

It’s only been a little over a week and I am already getting whinging from certain people that I haven’t kept this blog up-to-date. My apologies!! Geez…

It has been a major festival in Chiang Mai, and we have been exhilerated and terrified by the many and varied activities going on, including the lighting of fire balloons, the making of flower floats, the watching of parades, and the near death experiences of being too near too many fireworks that any crazy Thai person chooses to let off near an unsuspecting passerby.

Apart from that, I have had a most interesting week. A week ago I met up with a guy I knew from High School (Nick) who stayed in our hostel, and together, with our guide Pong and Kath, we took our motorbikes out for a two day ride to some hot springs up in the mountains. On the way we stopped at an elephant camp and watched some elephants doing some very strange things, including dancing, painting pictures and playing soccer.

We then went on an elephant trek through some glorious countryside and then made our way up through the countryside to a lovely campside next to some hot springs in the mountains. After returning the next day - we dumped Kath back at the orphanage, and then Nick and I went white water rafting for a few days up in the jungle. Awesome experience, well worth it for anyone thinking of going to Thailand. It was certainly a bit of adventure travel, and adventure eating, although I would like to stress that I did NOT eat turtle as certain other people on the trip did!

Now I am back in Chiang Mai getting myself ready to come back to Australia on Monday. I am very excited and I’m quite sure I will probably be on my knees kissing the ground as I get back into the sweet, sweet country of my youth for the first time in 20 months.

As an update on the orphanage, the number of children there was bumped up to four a couple of days ago with the arrival for a new three year old girl Hannah. They are expecting another three children next week, so it is now well and truly on it’s way to becoming a much bigger orphanage…

I am just now adding a few more photos into the Thailand folder on my gallery, and expect to add a lot more when Nick comes back on Sunday night as I didn’t take my camera, and expect to steal a lot of his photos. He he….

See you soon!!

Not having a car is a very difficult thing, and you don’t realise just what a sense of freedom it gives you until you once again are provided with a set of wheels, in my current case with TWO wheels. Yes (mum and dad don’t read this next bit), Kath and I have been rediscovering our freedom and independence in Chiang Mai, on a pair of 125cc motorbikes. They are small, and have a max speed of 80kph, but oh it feels soooo good to be able to go exactly where I want to go, when I want to go.

I hate buses, and I’m sick of public transport. I love the wind in my hair, and the speed under my feet. I’m sold, and have to hire myself a bike when I get back to Perth!

We have found a Thai couple to be houseparents in the orphanage, and Kath and I have moved out into a hostel. We have still been returning on a daily basis, but feel that there are a little too many hands now, so we are staying away a bit more. We went to an english school for Thai children on Saturday, and it was an amazing experience. Absolutely loved working with the children and the couple who have a real vision for that area.

I have started putting some of my Thailand pics up on the gallery but there aren’t that many there yet - feel free to have sticky beak if you are interested.

After a lot of thought and prayer, I have come to the conclusion that I will definately be working with MSF next year. Now that I have committed myself to this course, I feel a lot more at peace in my spirit. I don’t know how many contracts I will do with MSF, as my preference in the long run would be to work with a christian organisation, but I feel that this is a good organisation and that I can give and receive a lot from my work with them.

MSF are running a welcome training session for three days while I am in Sydney, which is all very good timing so I will be attending that course while in Sydney.

In less that four weeks, I will be home in Perth. I can’t wait!!

It is interesting sometimes to see the way that God works, when we do not know he is working!

I am still struggling with what I am going to do next year - I am still thinking that MSF is probably going to be the way that I go, but I would like to have a little more assurance that it is the best thing for me.

The only real assurance that I have felt in the last week, is that I should go to Chiang Mai - so I booked my ticket last week to come and join Kath up in the north of Thailand. And this is where we see God’s hand at work, arranging things in advance, and making sure that his purposes are achieved. Kath has been volunteering in a new and very small orphanage in Chiang Mai. They currently have two small babies (Josiah - 7 weeks, and Samuel - 3 months) and a gorgeous little 3 year old girl - Esther. There were two Thai nannies working here, particularly looking after the two babies, and they both quit on Friday.

I arrived on Saturday and together, Kath (who arrived last Monday), another volunteer Jess, and I have been looking after the children since then. The people who run the orphanage are trying to find some new nannies, but they are fortunate that they have the volunteers here already and able to step into the gap.

It is such a big job. I have watched my friends struggle with their new babies and I was aware of what a full-time job it was, but having two small babies under three months of age, one of them who never stops crying, is very difficult. In addition, not having the bond between a mother and child which perhaps helps in those times when the baby is crying at 4am, ensures that it is a very difficult job.

I must admit that I feel a bit helpless, and that most of the night-time feeding (ok all of it so far) has been done mostly by Kath and by Jess. I am now getting to see Kath in full-on worker mode, and she is fantastic. She never stops…..

I am finding that I really hate travelling on my own, so I’m really relieved to be out of Bangkok, and here in Chiang Mai with friends. I miss Banda Aceh all ready, and the friends that I made there . I really do hope to go back there at some time in the near future.

As far as Hati’s moped is concerned, I have been advised that they were buying the bike on the weekend, but haven’t been in touch with them since. As soon as I get some pics, I’ll put them up here.

I’ll keep you updated as to how I go with the babies. Anyone who knows me well will know that I am not very good with babies… It’s a great learning experience…

I can’t believe I only have one day left in Banda Aceh. I am not ready to leave at all, but find that I have to as my visa is shortly going to expire.

They say it takes quite a few weeks before you really start to enjoy somewhere, and I can relate to that - it’s only in the last few days that I have really started to get a feel for this city and it’s capabilities. Now I am starting to get to know the people and I am really sad to be going. I could come back again in about a week’s time, but I feel that for now, my time here is up. There is still a possibility that I could return in January/February but that is a decision I have yet to make.

So I’m off on Wednesday. I will spend a night in Medan in Indonesia, and on Thursday I’ll make my way to Bangkok, Thailand. I don’t really have too many plans for Thailand except to take it as it comes. I have decided that I will head straight up to Chiang Mai in the north of Thailand to meet up with Kath and to help out in an Orphanage where she will be working. From then on, it really is just a case of seeing what I can do. I’d rather be helping somewhere rather than just travelling around, although I’d love to do a bit of that as well.

I have been reflecting on what I have done over the last few weeks, and I don’t really feel like I have achieved very much. I have mostly been learning from an incredible group of people, and I think I have gained much more than I have given. I have been able to do some IT work for them, which I hope will be useful for them into the future, and I have been providing some training over the last couple of days which I hope will be useful.

I have also managed to corrupt some of the children by teaching them to speak with an Australian (strine) accent. I now have a four year old and a nine year old walking around saying things like, “Oi!” and “Noiiiiiice”. They are doing quite well with the “G’day Mate” and the “Ow ya garn” is also progressing quite nicely. I think their parents will want to kill me before I leave.

I emailed around a few days ago to try and raise some money to buy a moped for a young Acehness woman and her family. She has suffered greatly from the Tsunami and afterwards, and they are living well below the poverty line, as her husband is only paid around $5 a week. We have some work lined up for the husband, but unfortunately they have no way for him to get to work - there is no public transport and he has no money currently for private transport.

So I am raising money for a moped, so that he can start working for a reasonable wage. I have done pretty well so far, but I am still short by a couple of hundred dollars. If anyone else would like to contribute to this very worthy project, please let me know.

I’ll be home in just under six weeks! Starting to feel little waves of excitement vibrating through my tummy now …. it’s been a long time!

A week on finds me flat on my back in bed with a nasty bout of ’something most traveller’s catch within the first week of a tropical country’ or so I am told. Actually I spent some time on Saturday morning gloating over how healthy I was feeling and how I had gotten over the hill of the first week without getting sick.

So after the last couple of days of fever, chills, aches, pains and other symptoms which I could but won’t mention, I am slowly coming around and starting back on the slippery slope to healthiness.

Last week I managed to catch up with Michael, a friend I had met in India earlier this year. He invited me away with a group of friends to an island off the coast of Aceh - Sabang. Eager for every new chance to see something new, and to meet new people, I eagerly accepted! But unfortunately had to leave early on Saturday due to horrible sick feeling in stomach… the rest was history.

But more about last week. I am working with a small Indonesian Foundation, whose goal is to provide employment to the local Acehnese people. The foundation has managed many projects since the tsunami, and currently runs several different businesses including handbag manufacturing, quilt manufacturing, card manufacturing, jewellery making, training centres, internet services, micro-finance, plus sponsorship of orphans and many other projects as they come up.

I have been living in a luxury guest house, most recently with a couple from Newcastle in Australia (Dan and Jo) and with Louise who is from California. Louise is here for a short while as she and her husband Roy are marketing the hand bag products made by the Acehnese in the USA. I could write a lot more about this, but she has a web site which says a lot more.

http://www.laga-handbags.com/

There are a couple of stories on this website - particularly Hanna’s story, which are really interesting, particularly since I now know and work with Hanna. She is lovely!

There are also lots of really nice handbags on the site, so if anyone in Perth or Sydney is interested let me know … I can hook you up , and it will help people in need in Banda Aceh.

As for me personally, my main projects while I am here include re-writing databases so that they are a little more useful, creating new ones, training people in some computer skills, and helping set up some new projects. It’s all very interesting, but I still don’t know what I’ll be doing at the end. I’ll just wait and see.

Just a quick note to let everyone know that I’m here in Banda Aceh! I had a really good trip, slept quite well, watched a couple of movies etc etc.

I am staying in a really nice guesthouse with the people I will be working with. Much better than I expected, although the bathroom doesn’t really match the rest of the place. It’s a squat toilet and a trough of dirty water which you pour into the squat toilet to flush it. I’ve also just been told that to shower, I must pour water from the dirty trough over myself. I am assured that it’s quite clean, but I haven’t been able to steel myself to take the plunge yet. Therefore I am actually quite dirty… but have gotten used to that after being a scummy backpacker for the last four weeks. May have to give it a go this evening before bed… fingers crossed all goes well.

I did my first ‘Tsunami Tour’ last night. I had a very good tour guide, and was given a lot of very interesting information. I am quite shocked at the lack of progress that has been made over the last 20 months. The water came in about 5km from the shoreline, and although most of the debris has now been cleared, the water has not properly receded. The ground has sunk several metres and the shoreline is now around a km further inland. In addition, the water is still sitting in stagnant pools in at least another couple of kilometres.

I’ll write a bit more about this later, but I thought I’d let you know that I’m here, and that all is well…

Oh, one other thing. I am staying in a building with a satellite comms tower in the front yard. We have mega broadband, so I’m available on email, msn and skype, but not mobile phone. I’m going to go and get an Indonesia SIM in a bit, so hopefully will be contactable then.

Bless…

Oh… I have started to put up some of my pics from Eastern Europe, but there are so many and it’s hard to choose. Also I can’t be bothered with captions, so you’ll just have to make up a story about where we might be.

To get there, just click on the gallery, (above this) and then click on the Eastern Europe Gallery. Take what you like!

We’ve just hit London again, and we’re utterly exhausted (heaven knows why, as we haven’t really done anything much).

Oh! Yes we have…. A couple of days ago we were in Slovenia, and we had a marvellous time hiking around the mountains all day long, and white water rafting down a river that I can’t spell or pronounce, so I’m not going to try.

It was pretty miserable weather over the last couple of days so we took it easy pretty much every day (actually went a bit stir crazy sitting inside - I’m sure if we were Irish we would have been out and about in it, but we’re not - we’re made of sugar and we melt if we go in the rain).

On the way back to Budapesssht yesterday, we learned that there had been riots there the night before. A bit apprehensive, we did a bit of digging and find that the people there have now actually got some proof that the Prime Minister (who is a left over communist from the old regime and did some terrible things) has actually rigged the elections to be in power. I would be furious too, and I’m quite sure that if I was Hungarian I would be up there protesting as well. They estimate that there will be approx 1.6 million protesting on Saturday - wouldn’t that be something to see!! We did get a couple of pics of the protests (but only from afar, so it’s ok mum!)

We also heard yesterday about the Coup in Thailand, which is a bit worrying as Kath will be there in about ten days, and I will be there in about four weeks. I guess both of us will soon be moving around in some of the more dangerous areas of the world, which has always concerned me, but is something we will have to get used to. Working in the Humanitarian Sector generally means working in the areas where we are told not to go!

So our Eastern Europe holiday is over . We made some lovely, lovely friends, some of which I hope we will keep for a long time (Leah Anne, I cried this morning after we left you!)

I leave tomorrow morning for Banda Aceh in Indonesia. This is where the holidays stop and the work starts. Please pray for me, as I am very, very nervous and a little apprehensive about what lies ahead. I’ll let you know how I go.

It’s a hard life, but somebody has to do it!….

I spent the last week with Kath on a sailboat, sailing around the Dalmatian Coast of Croatia (in actual fact, I think this may be where Dalmations come from as there are lots of cute dalmations on all of the postcards… never saw any in real life though, although there are cats EVERYWHERE)

I definately recommend a Sail Croatia week to anyone who wants to spend a week sitting in the sunshine and doing nothing except sun-tanning, reading and swimming… oh and eating. Food was awesome. Don’t recommend it to anyone who is claustrophobic though, the cabins were a tad on the small side. We couldn’t both stand in there at the same time, and the ensuite bathroom was something to be experienced.

We had an awesome group of people though - you expect to meet a couple of nice people on every tour you embark on, but it’s rare to find that you really, really like every single person you are travelling with. There were 20 of us, and I really like all of them. I have said goodbye to some already, and the rest of the goodbyes will be tonight - I think there could be tears, or at least lots of promises to write!

I am slowly converting everyone I meet over to the fantastic new drink of Champagne and Red Bull - seriously, it’s worth a try! If you don’t like champagne (as I don’t) just add a touch of red bull - and whammo! Instant good night - and NO HANGOVER! (Apparently if you add a shot of vodka it’s called a ‘Liquid Cocaine’ - we tried that and I don’t recommend it. Nasty aftertaste, and definately reduces the whammo effect!)

Things I will remember about this last trip….

Listening to poo conversations between the doctors, nurses and weirdo people on the trip - and watching poo floating by in the water, and being nibbled at by fish, just after being served up a lovely fish dinner!

Taking over several bars with just us, and creating the broken glass dance (to add to the pop up sprinkler, shopping trolley, and sour milk dance). Oh and also the sea legs dance.

Playing endless games of arsehole with way too many people and changing the rules every single hand.

Red bull!

Actually managing to get into the water from the lowest part of the boat, and having everyone jump off the boat at the exact same time from all different levels.

Dancing the night away in Split (hope to do that again tonight)

Sitting at the front of the boat during the Gale Force 5 winds and laughing hysterically into the wind.

Watching the sun set in many different places - Dubrovnich and… some place from the top of a tower - my memory is like sieve.

The people, the people, the people. To all of you - You are the BEST!! You get listed here for posterity!

Claire, Suzy, Kylie, Belinda, Lord Drew, Aidey, Adam, Sarah, Kath, Aleisha, Tracey, James, Lucinda, Shelley, Kate, Rory, Chloe and Suzie.

Mwa ha!

Alrighty then. Now we are back in Split and will meet up with a lot of people from our Eastern Trekkers tour. We have already found Jen and Leah Anne, and will be joining them tonight before going out for another night of final partying with some of our boat people. Then off to Slovenia tomorrow and then back to Budapessht.

Sometimes I think I should have my head smacked. I have a problem with dates sometimes… I admit it. Just ask my sister. Once we were in Mexico City, and we were supposed to leave on a particular day, and we turned up at the airport a day late. We had absolutely no idea what day of the week it was.

Well… I’ve done it again! Twice!!

I booked our flight from Budapest to London the day AFTER I am supposed to leave London for Indonesia, and today we turned up for our Sailing Trip around Croatia a day early. Had to carry our backpacks all around Split trying to find accommodation for another night, because we couldn’t bare to walk all the way back up the hill to our ‘lovely’ hostel of last night. (The bathrooms were truly spectacular - none of the toilets in the girls toilet either closed or locked, and the girls showers were connected to the boys bathroom by a balcony. Modesty? What modesty?)

So anyway, we wandered a little around Split lugging our huge backpacks with us, and couldn’t find anywhere (every building looks the same in Split). Then (after a small prayer) we were approached by a Croatian Man who asked us if we were looking for accommodation and took us back to a lovely little apartment in his girlfriend’s flat. Truly lovely, very cheap and we are very happy and satisfied. We have spent the afternoon wandering around Split, doing some shopping and drinking on the sidewalk across from the beach. So it’s not so bad after all.

Sometimes I wonder why my friends put up with me ……