tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-195031232012-02-14T18:15:11.939+07:00Tales from the tall, white, freakish giant living in rural Northern Thailand.Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.comBlogger401100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-21469643717252498272007-12-16T20:00:00.000+07:002007-12-16T20:07:59.391+07:00

Well my time as a volunteer has finished, the goodbyes were sad but wonderful to reflect on all the memories I've shared with people in Ban Luang. Next steps are training the newest group of PC volunteers in Thailand on Thai culture starting in late December, and then grad school is in the long term view. For now, to regroup and recharge, I came to Rwanda. My parents live here so we had some

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-74782878407658370322007-11-13T07:30:00.000+07:002007-11-13T08:02:11.803+07:00

I'm nearing the end of my service here...November 30th being my End of Service date. These past few months have been spent solidifying grant money for Cake Namwa, building teaching resources at Wangyao, taking the GRE and filling out grad school apps, and having many "lasts" here in Ban Luang. I've been putting off saying goodbye to people, saying "it's too early" or other such excuses, but

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-27260719769944475772007-08-31T06:01:00.000+07:002007-08-31T06:48:48.385+07:00

It's opening weekend for college football and Notre Dame. I'm sure things are getting intense as the anticipation builds in America, but it's nothing compared with the zealous support that Thai people are showing here. You may think that US college football is of little interest to rice farmers in rural Thailand, but you would be mistaken. Rice farmers ride to work with their water buffalos every

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-32199899345066961722007-08-28T07:28:00.000+07:002007-08-28T11:26:40.491+07:00

I've got the day off as it's a Buddhist Day and the temple where I teach English to novice monks is closed. That means my morning is empty, aside from cleaning and laundry. My dog is in heat, though, which means she is fighting off 15 male dogs every minute and the sound of their growling, fighting and howling makes staying here less than relaxing. Speaking of relaxing,let me tell you about some

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-26097436627788836802007-08-07T15:25:00.000+07:002007-08-28T11:31:16.058+07:00

Something struck me recently that I thought I might share. It's nothing profound or inherently significant...just an observation. Let me start with a tale from a year ago.Kroo Nantiya and I have had success doing an "All About Me" book with our 4th graders where we pose simple questions to them, 2 per day, they struggle to answer them together and then write a page in a book. At the end their are

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-44569541993918317972007-06-25T10:04:00.000+07:002007-06-25T10:06:58.940+07:00

Woah...so I just noticed that I have to moderate posts...I'm apparently not as technically inclined as I used to be. I see there are notes from people here for over a year that I have callously ignored...I apologize and I will be responding to them soon. If you ever want to contact me, though, email is an efficient way. Thanks for the words of support and friendly hellos from old and new faces

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-54950215072061318422007-06-25T09:35:00.000+07:002007-07-01T14:58:25.684+07:00

About three months ago, a dental assistant friend of mine at the hospital approached me with an idea. Her village leader had trained a group of women on how to make various baked snacks as a means of augmenting their income. She trained them for a month, but when the training finished, the women all decided it was too much work to bother doing. So there was an oven sitting unused which is quite

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-26411217943881498862007-03-05T22:11:00.000+07:002007-03-05T23:15:04.727+07:00

It’s been six months since I last settled down to write anything here…far too long, and I won’t begin to try to play catch up. I’ll see if I can’t get around to writing some of what’s been happening, but for now it’s onwards and upwards.I sometimes feel as if I have a charmed life. I imagine everyone feels this way sometimes, when circumstances work out just perfectly or when small dreams become

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1157985055722652942006-09-11T21:28:00.000+07:002006-11-18T07:06:50.410+07:00

I've been making mental notes about what to write about for a long time and never gotten around to it. Now, my laundry list of stories has become a book, so Im gonna just give the bullet point updates and you can feel free to write me if you want some elaboration.*** My neighbor died of AIDS, though I didn't know her as she lived in Bangkok. I got to spend many days helping out with the

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1154266112030342022006-07-30T19:45:00.000+07:002006-09-04T05:38:19.643+07:00

Nantiya Chaisalee is my co-teacher, my friend, and my surrogate mother here in Nan. She makes me pumpkin soup, teaches me to cook, lets me vent to her when I need to, and her dedication to her students allows us to have a great time in the classroom. She loves reading, handicrafts, and her favorite flower is the Bird of Paradise. Most strikingly, though, she has a heart for people and loves to

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1154102290326532762006-07-28T21:57:00.000+07:002007-08-07T15:56:56.622+07:00

I keep meaning to write and have all these stories I intend to get down, but it just doesn't happen. I have time tonight so I'm just gonna talk about the latest happenings this week, which isn't much of a story but I'll see if I can turn it into one.I was riding my bike home around 5 pm last Sunday when three guys I vaguely know shouted me down and invited me to eat some food and drink a little

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1148812584295274752006-05-28T16:56:00.000+07:002006-06-07T10:55:01.763+07:00

Does anyone remember that Saturday Night Live skit with the dancer called simply “Mango?” I used to think that skit was irreverent and, well, stupid. It consisted of a male exotic dancer who would charm celebrities into falling in love with him. When these celebrities would chase him down in tormented waves of love, they would ask him to run away with them, but Mango would refuse. He would answer

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1148179419035504532006-05-21T08:14:00.000+07:002006-05-21T09:43:39.073+07:00

I don't think I've ever talked much about the ghost culture prevalent in rural Thailand. Basically, people are really into ghosts! Ghosts aren't necessarily evil. They are simply spirits that are around and people are very, very scared of them. Here is a typical conversation for me here, more or less...Thai villager - "So who do you live with?"Stunningly handsome American - "I live alone"Thai

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1148173905474035262006-05-21T06:36:00.000+07:002006-05-21T08:11:45.526+07:00

Alright, so I've been terribly lazy about writing anything here, so it's become my resoultion to this week try and get a few posts up and catch you all up on what's going on. First off, let me wrap up the botulism story as that was the last thing I wrote about and it was looking fairly grim at the time.As of two weeks ago, all 161 people who had botulism have returned home. No one died, and even

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1143511682103790562006-03-28T08:07:00.000+07:002006-04-07T22:05:29.283+07:00

Sangope means peaceful, in a quiet way, and that's the best way to describe my town right now. People are away, scattered across the country visiting their family as they try to recover. Now begins a long waiting process, but things are looking more positive than when I last wrote.The day after my last entry, I had to go to Bangkok to run a training and a meeting, but before leaving I was able to

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1142781714872931012006-03-19T22:05:00.000+07:002006-03-19T22:21:54.883+07:00

Learned a little bit more tonight. Hospital was still a mad house, though less so. 4 new cases today, nearing 120 in total who have been diagnosed so far. Here are some stats on the mortality rate of botulism. If the anti-toxin is given within 24 hours, death rate is 10%. More than 24 hours, 15%. If no anti-toxin is given, the mortality rate is 46%. The anti-toxin only exists in the

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1142759768394415692006-03-19T15:43:00.000+07:002006-05-21T09:50:07.610+07:00

So it turns out my neighbors' fears about Sadaam bio-terrorising Ban Luang aren't quite as far fetched as I took them to be. That is to say, Sadaam is certainly not to blame, but this botulism thing is a quite rare and deadly bacteria that Sadaam had been keeping refrigerated to use for bioterrorism. I wasn't aware of just how serious botulism is, but as I've spent the last two days helping at

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1142522150611193482006-03-16T21:51:00.000+07:002006-03-23T02:19:10.306+07:00

Since last I wrote, I’ve been on a whirlwind tour of Thailand with various groups of people. I think I hit a streak of being away every weekend for six weekends in a row. I did some more camping, white water rafting, site seeing around Chiang Rai, camping in a Hmong former Communist soldier town, explored some caves, and then a couple conferences and camps to top it off. This will sound trite,

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1139551861472853122006-02-10T09:22:00.000+07:002006-02-16T10:29:35.436+07:00

I'd grown accustomed to assuming that most Thai people weren't so into exerting themselves, and so when I was asked to go camping with a group of nurses from the hospital I figured it'd be nothing intense. Turns out I was completely wrong...the phrase that most of these tiny, Thai women and men spoke to me as I struggled through the jungle was 'dtoa lek, dtaa jai yai!' ('small bodies, but big

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1136766513532837952006-01-09T07:07:00.000+07:002006-01-14T10:42:50.310+07:00

Nantiya is one of the kindest and most thoughtful people I have ever known. She took me in from day one and acted as a surrogate mother, teaching me to cook and coaxing me through every up and down I experienced here. On Saturday, she topped herself in one of the smallest yet most thoughtful ways...pumpkin soup.Nantiya was feeling lonely last weekend as her husband is working in another part of

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1136113691692114282006-01-01T17:54:00.000+07:002006-01-02T10:44:20.980+07:00

Happy New Years! New Years here was a much bigger deal than Christmas. It’s a four day weekend, everyone gives cards and presents to everyone else, and the party doesn’t stop til work starts on Wednesday! Of course, I spent the New Year in my small town instead of traveling to a big city, so the party was limited at best. I spent New Years Eve at Nantiya’s house welcoming in 2549 (that’s right,

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1136112813863790462006-01-01T17:37:00.000+07:002006-01-01T17:59:08.313+07:00

Christmas is gone and a new year is here, so in my traditionally tardy fashion let me pass on some stories from the Holiday Season in Ban Luang. Thailand is a 95% Buddhist country, so they don’t really celebrate the birth of Christ. They are well aware of Christmas, though, and the kids I teach were quite excited to experience whatever I could show them. We started by learning a few Christmas

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1135125177292224122005-12-21T07:04:00.000+07:002005-12-31T07:14:56.056+07:00

This is going to be a quickie as I feel bad for not putting anything here for so long. Soon, I will tell you all about Christmas in Ban Luang, which is proving to be pretty fun, but that hasn't happened yet. Rice harvesting season has just ended as winter really settles in (it is in the low 50's right now and with an open air house and no heat I am freezing!). Harvesting rice is a pretty

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133573397619306612005-12-03T07:53:00.000+07:002005-12-27T11:04:32.246+07:00

I thought it would be a good idea to start this off with a bit of a summary of my daily life, catch people up on what I do over here, blah blah blah. That idea bores me, so I'm just gonna dive right into random story of the week. I spent last night hanging out with some friends and eating dinner by a bonfire. It's winter here (laugh at the idea if you want) so we were all bundled up, inching

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133497191472901922005-12-02T11:19:00.000+07:002005-12-02T11:19:51.476+07:00

Welcome!

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133495520246288472005-12-02T10:52:00.000+07:002005-12-02T10:52:00.250+07:00

me by a waterfall in Doi Ithanon

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133494258265913112005-12-02T10:30:00.000+07:002005-12-02T10:30:58.266+07:00

Girls at Banfa during the rainy season

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133494175848473162005-12-02T10:29:00.000+07:002005-12-02T10:29:35.853+07:00

My Loy Gratong basket, handmade by me from banana leaves, bird of paradise flowers, and various bits of foliage.

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133493970186904732005-12-02T10:26:00.000+07:002005-12-02T10:26:10.190+07:00

4th grade girls dressed for the Loy Gratong parade

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133493740780442782005-12-02T10:22:00.000+07:002006-01-02T05:38:38.633+07:00

Dad enjoying an elephant ride in Chiang Mai

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133493677573306632005-12-02T10:21:00.000+07:002005-12-02T10:21:17.576+07:00

A Floating Market in Central Thailand

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492619356353842005-12-02T10:03:00.000+07:002005-12-02T10:03:39.356+07:00

welcoming ceremony in Nan

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492517476747742005-12-02T10:01:00.002+07:002005-12-02T10:01:57.480+07:00

Students swimming in Chiang Mai at a waterfall

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492475127075972005-12-02T10:01:00.001+07:002005-12-02T10:01:15.133+07:00

Novice monks that I teach

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492472921181302005-12-02T10:01:00.000+07:002005-12-02T10:01:12.923+07:00

My parents and I rode elephants in Chiang Mai one early morning. Bathed them too!

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492381481482582005-12-02T09:59:00.000+07:002005-12-02T09:59:41.486+07:00

Wangyao Schoo's Loy Gratong float as presented by Kroo Bayow

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492312357025262005-12-02T09:58:00.000+07:002005-12-02T09:58:32.360+07:00

some of my students

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492159189132542005-12-02T09:55:00.001+07:002005-12-02T09:55:59.193+07:00

One of my students during the Loy Gratong parade. It was beautiful.

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133492119938291912005-12-02T09:55:00.000+07:002005-12-02T09:55:19.940+07:00

An 8 year old monk at Wat Kampangsaen

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19503123.post-1133490668519174282005-12-02T09:28:00.000+07:002005-12-02T11:10:40.670+07:00

I think the whole mass e-mail thing is getting a bit excessive, so this may be a better way for me to keep you all updated on life in Thailand. I don't really know how this thing works, but I'll figure it out. For anyone not familiar with the whole blog thing...it's just like an online journal that I'll put stories in more frequently than a mass e-mail. You can check it anytime at your leisure.

Sean Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06837243765732920972noreply@blogger.com3