Well it's been quite a hectic week. It was the first week of my Agroecology course, so we spent it in Chiang Mai, going to school. Except unlike the previous weeks, I had a hefty amount of reading to do each night, with a paper and reflections thrown in to boot. So, of course, I spent my time doing homework in my room rather than spending time with my host family or exploring the city. "Why are you drinking coffee at 8 o'clock at night?" my host mom would ask, and I'd try to explain, to her disbelief, how I was actually required to read for hours. The thing is, Thai students don't really do homework. The most they might be assigned is to memorize a chapter or do some review sheets, which, I get the impression, many don't even do. So the possibility of someone staying up late to read academic articles is fairly unusual. I'm pretty burnt out now, but I have the weekend to regroup before I head off to Fang on monday.

One of the most high stress situations in Thailand is eating with the host family, which for better or worse, happens every single day. Often twice. Thai meals are set up so that each person has a plate of rice, and then there are three or four dishes on the table, from which everyone just scoops a little bit at a time until they are done. Some of the dishes I've had have been incredible, and I'd eat a ton, maybe even getting a second helping of rice. Others have been, well, really really un-stomach-able. Usually there will be a couple of each, but many nights I'll be faced with only the latter. On these nights, therefore, rather than eating until I have had my healthy fill I simply make a hardnosed effort to somehow erase the rice on my plate as efficiently as possible, taking as small an amount as is polite of curry or animal with as much rice as can fit on a spoon. As if this delicate pallette negotiation weren't difficult enough, there's the added pressure of being with my family, who, at every meal and for every dish, forcibly question "Arroy mai [is it delicious]?" to which there is only one possible answer: "Arroy mak mak [it is very delicious]!" Depending on the way this is said, it may arouse scepticism, which then necessitates eating even more in order to prove that I looooove it. Usually, if there is a couple dishes I like and a couple I don't, I can focus on the ones that I do like, that is, until they notice my lopsided eating patterns and push the other dishes in front of my, demanding (very very nicely) that I try. I'm often asked to try a dish just seconds after starting my first, before I have even had a chance to get there on my own. I know this sounds pretty harsh, but bare in mind (as I tell myself every night as I buckle down at the dinner table) that this is all done out of love and concern. Nonetheless, it is an incredibly high pressure and stressful situation, even on the nights when I am eating something that is actually "arroy mak mak". When I am feeling my most overwrought at my eating situation, I think about the sadistic pleasure I would get, subtly forcing a Thai person in America to choke down a cold bowl of Frosted Flakes for breakfast rather than freshly grilled pork, boiled vegetables and rice (which they usually eat, and which is, actually very tasty, even for breakfast). Oh, I just remembered: tonight we had boiled chicken. The pivotal moment came when I noticed there in the bowl with all other shreds of meat were two feet (okay, I've eaten before) and a shrivelled little head that looked unusually human. It was kind of tough to eat the rest of the meal, and now I'm a little hungry.

All in all though, frustrations with the program and the difficulty of living in a foreign country aside, I'm doing fairly well. My language continues to progress and I can have basic conversations in Thai. I'm going to spend tomorrow bumming around with friends and shopping for the expedition. I will return October 19 (I believe), which will hopefully bring me in before the playoffs are over, so I can at least read about the games. If not, cheer the Tigers on for me, and pleeeease tape the games for me (I'll be sure to remind the necessary people later).

So I finally got around to putting some photos up. You can find them by clicking on the 'My Photos' link to the left, which will take you to my photo site. Thailand photos are in the album 'Thailand - September(ish)'. It takes a fair amount of time to load the pictures on, so I had to do some picking and choosing, and unfortunately there's not a lot. But it should give you an idea of the kind of deprived and desperate life I'm leading in a developing country.

So far I have to say the best part about living in a country undergoing a coup d'etat is the jokes that inevitably come out of it, most of which were in fact true statements. We got to say things all day long like: 'Sorry I didn't do my homework, there was a coup...' and 'My mom said I can't go to the gym after school today, because there's a coup d'etat and all'. The last one was mine, and it was true. Maybe it's because Thailand has no snow that they have coups -- otherwise there's no way for students to just get a free day here and there. A common saying in Thailand is 'Mai pen rai' which roughly translates to 'forget about it' or 'no big deal'. At the beginning of 'coup day', as we called it, we were all wondering -- can you mai-pen-rai a coup d'etat? It turns out that you can, and most did. Not only did our head instructor basically joke it off, at least as far as a legitimate safety concern, but we found out later that many Thais were going up to the tanks and soldiers surrounding the government building in Bangkok, taking pictures and putting flowers all over. We saw many troops just hanging out and joking around... with their assault rifles. This officially puts 'coup d'etats' up at the top of the list of things you can mai pen rai, just beating out the death of your youngest child (true story: one of my friend's Thai teachers told of how her child died, and when the students reacted sympathetically, she just said 'mai pen rai'). We're wondering how much higher you can really go, as far as what can be mai-pen-rai-ed. Further jokes were made about the likely polite and 'unoffending' nature of the coup, with the invading military officers appologizing profusely for seizing control of the government, dismantling the constitution and dissolving all elected government. Malaysia has already coined the Thailand coup 'Coup Lite' -- all the military seizing of control, but none of the unsightly violence. This is the eighteenth time it has happened since Thailands switch to democracy in the 1930s. It also conveniently fell on the same day that we were scheduled to have a lecture on Modern Thai Politics. Naturally, the lecture centered around the day's events, which only made it a million times more interesting, and was very useful for actually giving us an idea of what's going on. If anyone's interested, I'd encourage you to just find a New York Times article about it, all the ones I've seen so far have been pretty comprehensive.

Right now my Thai family is watching Mr. Bean on DVD. Yesterday one of my uncles came with about six pages of printed out comics (I forget what it's called, it's the one with the birds at the bar in the tree) and asked me to translate them. I also just heard 'Holla Back Girl' come from my host brother's phone, but I don't think Thais understand 'Awwww dis my shit...'. It's like I never even left the States.

I have a three day weekend now, because my first course just ended. The next one I start is Agroecology, so the week after next I'll be going a few hours north of Chiang Mai to Fang, where I will study the more ecological side of agroculture. Unfortunately this will interefere severely with my following the Tigers in the playoffs, which I can only assume is going to happen.

And some times you wake up and you find out your country has a undergone a military coup d'etat. (Ask your teachers what that means).

Everything is safe so far. There hasn't been any violence and there isn't supposed to be any.

Nobody here is really sure whether this is a good thing or bad thing. The country is completely split -- half loves the (former) prime minister, and half hates him.

So basically don't worry. This is exciting above all else.

Last night I ate a chicken foot. It was in a soup in a Chinese restaraunt. It was bony without much meat and tasted exactly like the rest of the chicken. Despite the fact that we thought we were able to communicate with the waitress fairly well in Thai, and even pointed to what we wanted on the menu, we hardly got everything we ordered. But we did get a chicken foot.

Aside from that.

Birthdays in Thailand are apparently really really good. I gave alms to nine monks, prayed to a Buddhist statue, had two cakes at school, talked with amazing Burmese activist students, went out to dinner with my family (plus some) and was given a yellow 60th anniversary king shirt an elephant shirt and a stuffed animal dog, and then the next night (the night of the chicken foot) did a fair bit of carousing with friends.

Today I'm going to hike up to Doi Suthep -- a temple on a mountain. It's one of the more famous sites in Chiang Mai.

Sorry for the lack of updates recently. I've been doing a lot. Last weekend my school took us all to a beautiful national park, which included, among other things, a one-hundred foot waterfall. I walked right up underneath it, and it was, obviously, amazing.

This past week has been a blur. I feel pretty well adjusted and in a good swing as far as family and school goes. I've been going to a gym with friends after school, which has been a good way to do something more personal, rather than diving right back in to the family situation after school. I've also, as a result, been in a much better state for dealing with the fam afterwards.

Friday we went rock climbing with school. And it wasn't like normal school trips where you only get to do the cool thing once because there's so many people. We all got to do many climbs and by the end I was fairly sore and scratched up.

Today, Saturday, some of us students went about an hour outside of town to go bamboo rafting. It ended up being one of the more exciting parts of the trip so far. The rafts were about three feet wide and twenty feet long. We fit about four people on each one, and steered with the help of two huuuge bamboo poles. We went over many rapids and on more than one occassion got thrown forward by running in to a rock. The worst time came when my raft hit a huge rock in the middle of the river. The raft had previously hit a submerged rock, which broke the bamboo that was holding the front together. When we hit the new rock, the boat got completely stuck, while water pounded on it and nobody could hardly swim or walk enough to get a good grip on it. Eventually, after breaking the bamboo rod in the middle, we were able to free the raft, which was by that time nearly decimated. We also broke several of the steering sticks, as they got caught in rocks in the river bed and we were carried away. It was an absolute blast, especially without any lifejackets, instructors or contact with anyone. We were pretty much just on our own to get down the river, and thankfully nobody got hurt.

I'm off to enjoy a bit of the Chiang Mai night life.