I'm a millionaire in Laos!

We spent the past few days in Nong Khai, Thailand staying in a guest house that is on the banks of the MaeKong River. From my room I could see across the river into Laos. Our guest house was so pleasant with friendly employees and a beautiful garden with hammocks and tables and chairs. If we didn't have plans moving us onward I think we could have happily stayed there a few more days as it was so pleasant.

Food Adventure- Deep Fried Frogs

At the night market in Udon Thani there were these stalls that had boiled bugs on them. There were cockroaches, worms, locusts, frogs, and beetles. I wanted to try one and I told my dad that I would try one if he did, my dad didn't want to so I just went ahead and tried some. I looked at all of my options and chose frogs. The stall owner got a little dish full of frogs and put them in a bag and sprayed it with some sort of sauce. I chose a frog and bit off one of its legs. It was crunchy with a touch of salt, but no other flavor. It wasn't bad, but I wasn't ready to eat its head so I just finished the legs and was done. Once I had tried it and not died the rest of my family tried it. They barely took a nibble out of the frogs legs (don't be fooled by the pictures). Once we were all done we found a trash can and threw them away.

Me with a frog leg in my mouth

Me taking a bite of a frog

Sam pretending to take a big bite 

a pile of frogs

Jenna with a frog

Market in Udon Thani [BY JENNA]

Last night we went to an outdoor market.  We got some really good chicken on a stick and some really good pork on a stick.  We tried lots of different foods including deep fried frogs.  They were crunchy like potato chips, but I didn't like them.  We got some waffles, some with cream inside that were really good, some chocolate chips, and my mom got almond waffle.  My dad got pad thai for dinner. 

We looked at lots of shops.  I got a purple scarf and three sets of earrings.  My brothers all got soccer shirts.  I wanted to take a taxi back to our hotel because my feet were really tired.  Instead we walked because it wasn't very far. We stopped by 7-11 and I got a root beer to drink.

Fish cooking.

Seth looking at a bunch of bugs.

Squid on a stick.

This is me standing in front of my dad.

Bugs. Ewwww.

Me by deep fried frogs.

My Office Today - 2012-12-29

Yes, this "office" (in Nong Khai, Thailand) is as awesome as the picture. Nong Khai is in Northern Thailand on the Mekong River. Across the river is Laos.

$4 Soccer Jersey

Price in the US and Europe: $80+

Price in Thailand: $4

No that was not a typo, this was a four dollar Barcelona soccer jersey. We were just wandering though a market, and we saw this little stall that sold soccer jerseys. We decided to check the prices just for fun. When we found out the jerseys were around $5 apiece, we bought 3 for the boys. The funny thing is, we saw a jersey that was almost identical to this one in Europe. Only in Europe, the jersey was around 80 bucks.

Food Adventure - Dragon Fruit

A whole bunch of dragon fruit

This is not our first food adventure, but it's the first one I'm making a post out of. Hit the "read more" to read the rest of it.

Christmas

I wasn't that excited for Christmas, we would have to carry everything we got and so I assumed we wouldn't get much. On Christmas morning Joe woke up at 7:30 and wouldn't let us keep sleeping, so we were dragged downstairs where we opened presents. On Christmas Eve we made stockings out of lunch bags and wrapping paper. Anyway we went downstairs and they were full of candy! We opened our presents and it took less then five minutes. We got mostly clothes and candy so we couldn't really play with them and so we played wii. For Christmas dinner we were invited over to a neighbors house.  The dinner was delicious and after we played on the Anklung, and Indonesian instrument. We played a few songs and may I just say that our family is not that musical. After that we had dessert, a salted apple caramel cake and that was really good. After that we headed home and packed for the next days twelve hour train ride.

Our Christmas breakfast, heart shaped waffles

Us with our stockings and the tree

the anklungs

The Glamour of World Travel

It is the day after Christmas and we are on a 10 hour train ride to the north part of Thailand. We had hoped to get an overnight train, but they were all sold out during the holidays. So we ended up in an all day train in 2nd class. Of course it left in the morning which required us to leave "home" at 5:45 this morning. We arrived at the train station with plenty of time to spare so we got to sit on the not so comfy waiting room chairs. The good part is we were right next to a Dunkin Donuts stand so the kids got high nutrition donuts for breakfast!


As far as train rides go, I'm afraid this is one that we will laugh at later but not particularly enjoy at the time. I have never been on such a bumpy train before. It's almost like the wheels aren't round. That makes doing most anything (sleeping, walking, using a squat toilet, writing, reading, typing) a little difficult. Even watching out the windows isn't ideal because they look like they haven't been washed in years! The train stops at random times (not at a station) and then starts again a few minutes later. One stop was for longer and all sorts of people came on the train selling food and drinks. it was really kind of funny because there were so many of them walking up and down the aisles trying to sell their items. The only seats that were available are aisle seats and we are spread out throughout the car. One man was kind enough to switch Jenna seats so she could sit next to me.

Now don't get this wrong, I am not complaining, it's just all part of the travel experience. But some experiences are more pleasant than others!

(3 hours later). I'm afraid the experience is just beginning! An official just came into our car and gave some announcement (in Thai of course) and everyone seemed very interested in what he was saying. I had no clue what was going on until the nice man who switched seats with Jenna translated for me. We will be getting off the train in one hour and transferring to a bus for the remainder of our journey. Apparently there is a problem with the track up ahead.

(Many hours later). We made it to the train station via the bus and we arrived only a little more than an hour late. Our hotel wasn't far from the station but we decided to take a taxi instead of finding the hotel on our own in the dark. The drivers said they knew where the hotel was located but then took us to the wrong hotel. Eventually we made it to the right hotel. This is the glamour of world travel!

Waiting to get on the train

On the train

Now we are on a bus

Joe and Rich in the back of a taxi

My Office Today - 2012-12-26

This is my office today. It is the day after Christmas and I am on a train heading North from Bangkok, Thailand to Udonthani near the border with Laos. I am providing my own Internet via my mobile hotspot. This technology still amazes me.

Merry Christmas

We are celebrating Christmas in Thailand this year.  It is hot and sunny outside, much different from the cold and snow that we usually have on Christmas.  But no matter what the weather, Christmas is a wonderful time of year.  We enjoyed the Christmas church service on Sunday with all the beautiful music.  We met so many wonderful people at church and one family invited us over for dinner later tonight.  For Christmas Eve we  had a delicious Thai dinner.  So far Thai food has been my favorite!  Maybe that will have to become a new family Christmas tradition for us.  Since we don't have Christmas stockings, we made our own out of lunch bags and wrapping paper.  They seemed to work as they were filled with treats on Christmas morning.

Church signs around the world

When we go to church, we always try to remember to take a picture of the sign at the front of the church.  Even though it is in different languages in different places it is easy to find the sign.  This is like a trophy saying that we made it to church that day.

Dresden

Florence

La Spezia

Chennai

Hyderabad

Bangkok

We made it to Thailand!

We enjoyed India, but it was hard traveling there and we left emotionally, mentally and physically tired.   We arrived in Thailand and had a place to stay for a few days with a friend that Rich's family has known for the past 35 years, the Poulsons.   They have lived here in Thailand for the past 20 years and had their driver pick us up from the airport.  What a nice feeling it was to have someone meet us instead of immediately having to figure things out on our own.   On the way to their home from the airport I asked the kids if they noticed anything different from the roads in India.  Quick responses were:  no cows,  no dogs, no pedestrians, no honking horns, no people sweeping the streets, no overloaded vehicles or motorcycles.  The traffic seemed so orderly with the cars all staying in their own lanes.  It's not quite as entertaining as watching out the windows in India.

Mailing a Package and Buying a SIM Card in Thailand

There are posts elsewhere on this blog about difficulties we've had mailing packages and buying SIM cards. This post is about our attempts to do both things in Thailand.

India's last laugh!

We woke up at 4:14 this morning, finished packing our bags and left our hotel room at 4:45. We went downstairs to check out of the hotel to find some of the hotel staff sleeping in the small lobby of the hotel. They woke up, put their sleeping mats away, checked us out and then went outside and woke up the driver who was sleeping in the car. We loaded up all our luggage and all squeezed in the car for the 10 minute ride to the airport. When we were almost to the airport our driver was signaled to pull over for a routine security check. I couldn't understand everything that was said, but it seems that our driver did not have a license with him and the registration on the car was not current. After much conversation the driver was asked to get out of the car and it seems that he received a heated lecture by one of the officers. We started to wonder if we needed to find alternate transportation to get us the rest of the way to the airport. We could see it up ahead, but it was further than we wanted to walk with all of our stuff. Finally the driver came back and said we needed to pay a fine of 100R (about $1.85) because there were too many people in the car. We paid the fine and then the driver took us the rest of the way to the airport. When we got out of the car we all laughed because all over India we have seen every type of transportation imaginable packed with people (and I mean really packed) and we got a fine for having two to many people in the car on the way to the airport.

We are not quite sure who got the last laugh, India or us!

Just a day in India

I am going to describe our day yesterday which we have found to be very typical of our experience in India. I will warn you that this may be a long post. I have to back up one day to say that on Saturday the Internet went down in our apartment. Rich contacted the front desk and was told it would be back by 8:00pm. By 8:30 when it was still not back he contacted them again and was told someone was coming to fix it on Sunday morning. Without Internet we could not look up the time or address of church for Sunday and we were never successful in getting SIM cards for our cell phones in India so we couldn't even make any calls.

Sunday morning the Internet was working again and we found an afternoon service that we could attend. We booked a taxi online to get us to church and then another taxi to get us from church to the bus station. Since we would have to take all our luggages (yes, that is what they called them) with us we booked two cabs for each ride. We planned out how long it would take and then doubled that time and scheduled our pick ups accordingly.

We packed everything up and went outside about 10 minutes before the taxi's scheduled arrival time. We sat on the steps to wait amongst all the other people just standing around. It seems like there are people standing around everywhere in India. We just happen to stand out a little more so we get stared at when we just stand around. After waiting for 25 minutes with no taxi, Rich went back to the office to call. He was told one would be there in 10 minutes. Thirty minutes later, still no taxi so he went back to the office to call again. Finally one taxi came. We loaded all the luggages in the back and asked about the second taxi. The driver spoke limited English, but there was another man waiting outside too who was very helpful and spoke great English. He called the taxi company and we listened to his side of the conversation as he asked about the second taxi. We all started laughing when he said "what's that supposed to mean?" during his conversation. After getting off the phone he said the second taxi was on the way and would be there in 10 minutes. Anyway, Sam, Seth, Joe and I got in the taxi that was there to head to the church. The driver had the address and said he knew where it was.

We left the neighborhood and while turning onto the main road the driver either didn't notice the motorcycle there or just misjudged the space and the motorcycle scraped the side of the car. The motorcycle driver and the taxi driver had some words to say to each other and I am glad that I couldn't understand that conversation. But no one was hurt so we took off on our way. At this point all the extra time we had allowed was gone and church had all ready started.

We got to the neighborhood where the church was located and the driver pointed to a big church on the right and asked us if that was the church. I told him it wasn't the right church. He then pulled up to another church and once again I told him that is not the right one either. I showed him the address again and he looked confused. He pulled over and asked someone for help but the person he asked told us about yet another church. I had a "For Strength of Youth" card in my purse so I pulled it out and showed them the logo to see if they recognized it at all. No Luck. The driver called the cab company and I talked to them and they said they would look up the address and call back within 10 minutes. The driver got out of the car and asked several other people where the church was located.

The Church the taxi driver couldn't find.  

Our driver started to drive again pulling over at various churches and each time we said not this church. Some of them he had already stopped at previously. I guess he thought he would try all the churches again. As we drove around I suddenly saw the sign of our church and yelled to the driver to stop. I am so glad that our church has the same type of signs all over the world. Rich and Jenna were outside the church with a few other men trying to call the cab company to find us. By this time we were one hour late for church. We got out of the cab, unloaded all of our luggages and then Rich told us that church actually started one hour earlier than we thought. So we were 2 hours late. I sure hope we get some sort of blessings for trying to attend church.

At church we found so many friendly people. There was a baptism after church that we had time to stay stayed for before our next scheduled taxi.  Rich was asked to briefly speak. The congregation was very nonmusical. In fact during the singing, our family pretty much carried the tune. And if any of you have heard our family sing, you realize singing is not our strong point! We enjoyed meeting so many of the members while our kids enjoyed the chips and fruitcake after the baptism.

We decided to call and double check that the taxis to take us to the bus station could find the church. Again not an easy thing when we don't have a cell phone (another long story). But we found someone to call the cab company and made sure the taxi got there. Again, one taxi showed up, at least it was the big one. We loaded all the luggages again and waited and waited for the second cab. More calls to the company and we were told 10 more minutes. Let's see, where have we hear that before? By this time we decided we better not keep waiting because we didn't want to miss our bus. Another helpful family stepped in and called the cab company again and just cancelled the second cab for us. We all piled in the one cab to head to the bus station. Safety does not seem to be the most important thing in India. Jenna sat on Rich's lap in the front seat and the other 4 of us squished in the back seat.

The bus stop waiting room

We arrived at the bus station without any incident, and the taxi driver dropped us off on the side of the road where he said the private buses left from. We got out and didn't see any signs or indication that buses left from there. A friend of Rich's had told us he would meet us at the station to help us get on the right bus. The train station was just down the road so we decided to head there and look for Rich's friend since we didn't see anything that looked like a bus station. We also needed to buy some food and water for the upcoming 16 hour overnight bus ride. We realized we were kind of standing in the middle of the road so we got out of the road and almost ran into a little stand that had the name of our bus line. We showed the man our tickets and he pointed us in the other direction and told us there was a waiting room. We turned around and made our way to the waiting room while everyone on the street watched us. Right next door we found some food. Rich went looking for his friend but never found him. Later we found out that he had arrived late.

We had booked tickets on a sleeper bus so when a 15 seat van showed up we expressed our concern. The 15 seat van was to take us to the sleeper bus. They put some of our backpacks in the very back and then told us to get in the van with the rest of our packs and sit on the back row and two seats on the next to last row. Well we didn't fit because we still had our backpacks with us. The bus people asked us why we didn't put our packs in the back and we informed them that they were the ones who told us to get on with our packs. They wanted us to hand a pack out the window, but obviously the window was too small. Finally one of them went around the back and opened the door so we could hand a pack over the seat.  The back was full so we all had stuff on our laps and Seth had a full size backpack on his lap. Do they not expect people to being luggage on an overnight bus?

The van ride was an experience. The back seat was not firmly attached so every time the van stopped or started the seat rocked. We felt like we were on an amusement park ride. When the van was stopped (and we were stopped in traffic a lot) the back seat vibrated. After an hour the van stopped and we were all told to get out and wait for the bus that would be there in 10 minutes. Once again there was a nice person who helped us understand what was going on. She was going on the same bus and talked with us as we waited the more than 10 minutes on the side of the road.

Waiting on the side of the road for the sleeper bus

The bus finally came and we got on. This time we actually had enough beds! It seemed like everything was going to be great and then the Indian music started blasting out the speakers. We could adjust the air conditioning, supposedly turn on the lights (except the lights didn't work), but we could do nothing about the volume of the music. That is when an IPOD and headphones came in handy. After a few hours they did turn the music off for the rest of the night. Then the main air conditioning unit came on and there was a vent right above me that I could not control. They believe in high AC levels here so while the AC was on I froze, and when it turned off I was fine. The bus ride was not exactly smooth, but we did manage to get some sleep. In the morning we weren't sure where to get off. The bus conductor would come down the aisle and say something that we couldn't understand. Once again another passenger helped us out. The bus conductor said our stop would be in 10 minutes, but an hour later we arrived. Our 16 hour bus ride had turned into 17 hours. Needless to say, we were all thrilled to be off the bus. I could go on about getting to our hotel and checking in. The adventures never end in India.

So what is the point of this long narrative? First, life is not easy for us in India. We look at things from our paradigm, but that just doesn't apply to India. We haven't figured out how things work here and sometimes feel like we are bashing our heads against a wall trying. Second, we have found friendly people to help us out every time we have had a need. I am so thankful that there are good people all over the world who go out of their way to help strangers.

Holy Men (and Women)

One of our surprise visits after serving in a leprosy colony was to a Hindi temple on a hill. We had driven on this rather main road many times and never seen the temple. It was a warm, humid day and we weren't sure we would enjoy the hike on the dirt road to the top of the hill to see yet another temple. We encouraged each other along and made it to the top of the hill.

Sure enough, at the top of the hill was a temple and sitting in the shade of some trees off to the side on a molded plastic chair was the "holy man" for the temple. Our friend, Bala, helped translate our simple conversation with him. We asked about how many people come to the temple and how often. I think he said about 200 come every night to pray at the temple. He asked if we wanted to see the shrine. We did and so we had to take off our shoes to approach the shrine. It was a lamp-lit dark little room containing a shiny brass figure. The room smelled strongly of incense, kind of sweet and aromatic but still smokey.  Between us taking turns looking in to the shrine he made his way in and prayed for us. He blew two long blasts through a seashell as if it were a trumpet. It reverberated through the little shrine room and was pretty loud. It felt like he was trying to get God's attention. I don't know where God was right at that instance but I'm pretty sure that he heard the holy man's trumpet blasts on that seashell. He then said a short sing-songy prayer for us.

If you look closely in the picture you can see two things: we are holding fruit and we have dots on our foreheads. After praying for us he gave us both things. He gave each of us two pieces of fresh fruit: lemons, limes, or miniature bananas. The fruit was meant to protect us from evil. The marks were made from powders that looked like ashes. One was gray and the other red. First he made a two-inch stripe with the gray and then a red dot in the middle of the gray. The mark, I think, is called "bindi" and represents a 3rd eye that is meant to remind us of spiritual things.

While his manner of praying was different from mine I appreciated his good will in praying for us. I felt good as I considered that he prayed for us and didn't know us at all.

Right when this picture was taken his phone rang and he pulled it out and answered it. It was kind of funny to me.

Elaine is writing another post about our bus trip but I wanted to make the point here that we were in the presence of other holy people on Sunday too. I am referring to those who helped us arrange cabs to and from church without knowing us. They knew we were in need (or incompetent?) and jumped right in and made multiple phone calls to help us out. All I can say is that we would not have made it to our bus on time without these holy men and women and their selfless service.

I Have Changed the Way I Pray

I used to pray,

“Please bless that I will be safe on the roads and that others will be safe on the road.”

Since in India I have seen cows, goats, water buffaloes, dogs, goats, and monkies on the road I have changed how I pray. I now pray,

“Please bless that I will be safe on the roads, that others will be safe on the roads, and that the animals will be safe on the roads.”

I think that covers it.

Travel Adventure from Chennai to Hyderabad

After our wonderful experience with Rising Star we needed to start making our way to Mumbai for the flight to Thailand. We originally looked into traveling by train but for this time of year we waited too long and couldn't find any seats available. Each train we looked at had quotas, RACs, and wait lists. I didn't know what those things were or understand how they worked. It was a mess trying to figure out. I read a 6000-word blog post (go have a look to see how complicated it is) trying to makes sense of it and eventually concluded that there was no way we all were going to get beds on our desired train. We didn't want to risk some of us getting confirmed seats and some of us not.

After arriving at this conclusion we decided that the next best alternative would be a 1st class, air-conditioned, sleeper bus. There are two kinds of sleeper beds "2+2" and "1+1". The "2+2" variety are like airline chairs that recline. The "1+1" variety are like bunk beds. We read several positive and encouraging reviews about travel on sleeper buses, sleeper buses seem to be abundant, and so we thought we might venture to give it a shot.

When our friends at Rising Star learned we were considering taking a bus they offered to see if they could help us get train tickets. Someone knew someone who could help us. After spending what I estimate to be many hours working the system they were happy to inform us (and we were happy to be informed) that they were able to get us tickets on the train that we previously thought was full. We were cautiously optimistic. It was sounding too good to be true. As a sidenote, each train has quotas set aside for travelers of different categories and our tickets counted against the parliament member quota.

One of the people helping acquire the tickets lived in Chennai and said he would be there to help us navigate the train station and get on the right car on the right train. He made frequent contact with the railway authorities to try and help us get confirmed seats. We did get 2 confirmed berths (bunks) in a first class, air conditioned compartment and were promised 4 first class, air conditioned, seats elsewhere on the train. We rejoiced at the 2 confirmed berths and were hopeful for the other 4 seats. As it got closer to departure time my hope for 4 seats started turning to doubt. I considered the very real possibility of not getting those 4 other seats. The conductor came by shortly after departure and told us, "Wait here. I will get it arranged." In the end there were no more seats. We only had the 2 confirmed berths/bunks for the 6 of us (and all of our luggage) for a 13-hour train ride, in a cubicle about 8' x 5' x 7'. Elaine and Seth shared the top bunk, Joe and Sam the bottom bunk, and Jenna and I shared inflatable camping mats on the floor.

I joked with Elaine that my expectations just kept getting lower, and lower and lower until I found myself sleeping (trying to sleep?) on the floor. I couldn't get much lower! I think I heard weeds scraping and scratching the bottom of the train as I tried to sleep.

We made the best of things and were grateful to be together on the train. For 45 minutes we enjoyed watching a slideshow of some of the pictures from our trip. I think we made it through pictures from July and part of August. We ate parottas (thick Indian tortillas). Using some of our emergency chocolate even seemed appropriate and made us feel better. Once we were tired of looking at pictures we turned out the lights and tried to sleep. I think Jenna slept the best.

In the end the train didn't even end where we thought it would end. Needless to say we all took big naps when we got to our apartment in Hyderabad.

Communicating (or not) with Your Head

There is a very common head movement in India that many non-Indians call "the head bobble". To me it looks like the person is trying to move their head such that their eye brows trace the path of the infinity character (∞) or a sideways figure 8. (How many of you just tried the head bobble?) For me the infinity character analogy is appropriate as it will take me that long to figure out how to interpret the head bobble.

Here is my understanding of what the head bobble can mean. Consider how each meaning might affect communication in different situations.

• Hello.
• I heard what you said.
• I saw your lips move.
• I understand what you said.
• I agree with what you said.
• I disagree with what you said but don't want to say so.
• No problem.
• Good.
• I'm listening.
• I am indifferent.
• Yes.
• Alright.

In summary it means anything except 'no'. Indians do not like to say 'no' or disagree. I think it is cultural that they do not want to disappoint someone or close the door on an opportunity. I think the trick is to ask questions that require a specific, non-yes/no answer, like "What time does the train leave?" Instead of "Does the train leave at 5pm?" Got it? If you do then you are ahead of me.

Sights from the Van

While at Rising Star we spent many hours riding in a van.  On the days we went to the leprosy colonies it took about an hour drive each way.  We were in a rural area of India where some of the roads are very narrow, rough.  Other times we went into Chennai which was about a 1 1/2 hour drive on busy highways.  But no matter where we went, watching out the windows was so entertaining!  The problem came in trying to get photos of the interesting things we saw.   So here are a few of the photos that turned out to give you an idea of what we saw while riding in the van.  I still wish I could have gotten a picture of the 2 men and three goats riding on one motorcycle!

Beautiful scenery

Narrow roads 

Cows wandering through the street

Water buffalo with painted horns pulling a cart

Women working in the rice fields

Small homes with laundry hanging out to dry

Some of the more humble homes

A building under construction

A man sweeping the road

A bicycle cart with extra long cargo

A man carrying a large load on his head

Multiple people on a motorcycle

Lots of stuff on a motorcycle

Three people on one small scooter. 

Many people riding in the back of  a truck

You can't tell from this picture, but there is a man riding on top of this  load.