My Trip to Myanmar (Burma)

It was eight hours on a bus just to be in Burma (officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar) for five minutes!  Yes, I went to the town of Maesai, situated at the border that separates Myanmar and Thailand, on what is here referred to as a "visa run."  Just before the expiration date of one's visa to visit Thailand, hundreds of foreigners run for the border to get a new visa.  I should say run for a border because Thailand shares its borders with four.  To the northwest there's Myranmar (Burma); to the northeast, there's Laos; to the southeast, there's Cambodia; and to the south, there's Malaysia.

He studied me and I studied him...

The bus I caught was a big V.I.P. Bus, as the sort of bus one would board to go from Boston to San Francisco.  But for my trip back to Chiang Mai, I bordered a very local bus.  Difference in the price of a ticket?  Big VIP Bus, $10; Local Bus, $2.  Of course most foreigners will opt for the V.I.P. bus, as I certainly did.  But for the return trip, all seats on the big one were occupied. At first I was a little upset and frustrated they won't let one purchase a round-trip ticket.  But then I thought:  Didn't I come to Thailand to have such such adventures? which brings to mind the old saying, "Be careful what you wish for!"

For me, the journey was the adventure, not the details of being officially signed out of Thailand, crossing the so-called "no man's land" bridge that joins Thailand and Burma, asking for and paying the fee for a visa to enter Myanmar, then crossing the bridged back to Thailand.  Thus I took no photos of anything but the trip itself.   Here are some more photos:

All monks travel free in Thailand

Monks get reverential treatment in Thailand. Almost every Thai man enters a monastery if only for a week or a couple of years.  They take the traditional  vow to follow the 227 Precepts laid down by the Buddha for monks.  Breaking one of the Precepts (rules), is called a pacittiya, something like what a Catholic would call a venial sin.  The Precepts are practical rules of behavior in the monks daily life.  They are not like The Ten Commandments in some Western religions.  There are no commandments in Buddhism, just as there are no commandments in any philosophy of life, only practical guidelines for living the Good Life, as Socrates might espouse. 

A rice field in the land that exports the most rice in the world

This photo only hints at the beauty of a field of rice in the tropics.  The green under the tropical sun appears as silk.  Rice is the national staple food in Thailand as it is in all of Asia and Latin America.  I don't know, but I suspect that only the English-speaking people of the world do not eat rice on a regular basis.  Here, as they do in Costa Rica, people eat rice at every meal.  I recall reading somewhere that the Thais were the first people to cultivate rice hundreds of years ago.

Another encounter with the foreign. We are a curious species!

So now I have a new visa, valid until July 9th.  Then I can get a 30-day extension.  By that time, I expect to have my Retirement Visa.  No more "visa runs."

My New Home in Chiang Mai, Thailand

My townhouse in Chiang Mai, Thailand

Welcome to my home in Chiang Mai, Thailand!  I'm like a little kid with his first big toy.  Sure I have owned or rented houses and cars and lots of goodies, but somehow my new home in Thailand is like the first place I call my own.  It's a house!  And I am the only person living here.  This only happened one other time in my life.  When I went on my Peace Corps assignment in a small rural village in Costa Rica, the United States Peace Corps in Costa Rica made all the arrangements.  I just moved in.  They even got a horse for me!  But this place I got on my own, with lots of help from my good friend Taq.  Here I can live better and cheaper than in public housing in the United States.  Not that I am against public housing.  On the contrary.  I simply make the comparison in cost of living here and cost of living there.

One of the things I like most about my place is that it's a two-story house divided into three sections without walls: Going from the front door straight to the back door, the layout is Living Room Area, Dining Room Area, Kitchen Area.  The Bedroom Area is above the Dining Room Area, so the Living Room and Kitchen have 2-story high ceilings, while the Dining Room and the Bedroom have only 1-story high ceilings.  Nice!  What I like least about the place are the stairs.  Very steep, as you can probably see by the photos.  Also, the bathroom is downstairs while the bedroom is upstairs.  So I get walking exercises not only during the day but also during the night!  All in all, though, I love the place!

The Living Room:

In the first photo is a photo of one of the most beloved kings of Thailand.  The former tenant left the photo, so I have decided to keep it.  Living in a kingdom means learning to honor the kings treasured by the Thai people
The reflecting tiled floor is not only beautiful, but it is also of a high quality, so it is easy to keep just the way you see it here.  I feel like Fred Astaire every time I see my reflection in it!  Where are you, Ginger!
The townhouse comes with basic start-up furniture.  Here you see the entertainment center, although until I get the appropriate piece for my Buddhist altar, it serves my practice well now.  Actually shortly after this photo was taken, an American teacher friend from Indiana sold me a nice big Sony T.V.  So now the Sony and the Buddha share the same space!

The Dining Room:

Stark, isn't it?  I am actually considering leaving my place with a very stark, sparse, New England Puritanical look.  There's something very calming about having lots of open space within the closed space of a house.  I do not like the crowded look some old Boston Beacon Hill apartments have.  Like the desert, open space invites a contemplative response.  I just do not feel like "filling it up."

The Kitchen:

A student of mine commented on Facebook, "I like the Pink kitchen."  I do too!  Actually, pink is the color of the King of Thailand.  You see a lot of pink in Thailand.  In Bangkok you even see lots of pink taxicabs!  I find that in the tropics, bright colors and pastels are very popular.  After all, here one is surrounded by the most beautiful and varied colors Mother Nature has created.  A plain brown New England house would be lost in the background here.  Since I first hit the tropics in 1962 in Puerto Rico, I have never ceased to be impressed by all the shades of green that exist in nature.  Amazing!
By the way, in the long shot of the kitchen, you can see the door to the bathroom (to your right) and the start of the staircase next to the back door.

The Bedroom Staircase:

It's six steps to the landing and then 10 steps to the bedroom door.  Like all stairs in any building I have been in either here in Thailand or in Taiwan, the stairs are very steep.  As most of you know, nature calls more frequently as one gets older.  In this case, she's calling me from 16 steep steps away!  It's a test of bladder versus will.  Luckily, I never sleep through the night, and as I have nothing urgent to do the next day, like teach classes, often I just stay up for awhile watching t.v., using the internet, reading, or praying.  It's a good life, really!

The Bedroom:

It truly epitomizes its name, for the bedroom is occupied almost entirely by the bed!  Not crowded, mind you.  There's space for a bureau along with the wardrobe that comes with the place.  But, for now, I'm not adding any furniture.  It's the only room with air conditioning, which is fine with me.  I put it on for a couple or hours before my first trip to the bathroom.  When I return, I switch to the fan.  Then after a few more visits downstairs, I switch off the fan and go to sleep with a wonderful tropical concert provided by critters I recognize and some which I think I'd rather not know!  The volume and quality of sound is worthy of Carnegie Hall!  I cannot describe it.  If you ever get to see the Thai movie, Tropical Malady, written and directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, you'll hear what I mean.  It's used as a soundtrack in one whole section of the movie.

There's a window on either side of the bed.  One looks down into the kitchen and the other looks down into the living room.  Cool!  They are windows not opened directly to the wind, but only indirectly through the front door and window and the back door and window.  It's like living in a tree hut without the tree!

The Carport

So what!  It's a carport and I have no car or any vehicle.  It's purpose, for me?  It's a nice "buffer zone."  Neighbors will come up to the gate and call out my name.  Even if the gate is open, no one will enter.  So no one actually comes to the front door, yet they are obviously there!  It's a big piece of real estate, though.  What shall I do with it?

In the photo below, notice what's at my front door: sandals and shoes, as footwear are removed when entering Thai homes; insect repellant, it's the tropics, baby; bottles, all consumed water must be from bottled, boiled, or chemically treated water; and a drying rack, no need for a clothes drier with the tropical sun available for free!

The Neighborhood:

Old Townhouses!

An abandoned business.  I think it's abandoned!

"The Soi Where I Live"

The corner of my soi

 Thanks for visiting my home!  Please do come again....