The other day I met a 91 year old Japanese man. He was still pretty energetic given his age and could speak English very well. He had donated a school for the children, a sleeping area for them and a small temple in front of the big temple where I have been volunteering. The temple he built has a set of train tracks in front of it as a way to remember the people who died (91,000 of them!) building the Burma Thai railway during the Japanese occupation.
He served in the Japanese Army as a translator in this area. I am not sure what that means, but often times when Buddhist in this part of the world are approaching the end of their lives, they try to do good things in part to make amends for bad things they have done earlier in their lives. They call it making merit... gives them an opportunity for a better life the next go around.
It is kind of funny that so many of my Japanese friends used to say that there was no way that they could do these sorts of things and here is a 91 year old man helping others. Pretty impressive.
I was told, but can not confirm, that 2 more people died from the bus accident. The funeral service for the woman that died in the crash happened today.. The border was shut down, but I guess the military kind of turned their heads and allowed the temple to open its back gate which opens up into Burma so Burmese people could attend the funeral.
Apparently the border is shut down for a different reason than I had thought. A paramilitary group aligned with the Burmese army abducted 2 Thai border patrol soldiers. Things are quite tense because of this. I just read an article which said the Thai government is expecting the soldiers to be released in the next couple of hours. Hopefully this will cool things out a bit.
You may want to read the previous post before this one.
A couple of details on yesterdays tragedy. The bus was an immigration bus returning people to Burma. They are caged in so nobody can escape. I did not understand why there were so many belongings on the bus and my Burmese friend said that although the people were arrested and sent out of the country it is all part of a game. People pay a fee to an agent who pays the police off to travel to Bangkok. Then, when people want to go back to Burma, they call the agent and the police arrest the people. Human trafficking with out so much nastiness.
The army and immigration are quite worried about an uprising because, from what I am told, this is not the first time something like this has happened. They closed the border crossing and local businesses that employee Burmese were shut. As I was leaving town there was a group of 10 soldiers with automatic weapons walking down the street. As I got closer to my town there were several pick up trucks full of more soldiers.
The woman I saw die yesterday was brought to the temple for a ceremony and cremation today. They did not have either so the box with the woman in it just sat there, in the heat. The ceremonies generally happen quite quickly here...usually a day or two after the death. Hopefully, tomorrow things will get back to normal.
15 minutes ago I saw a woman die.I was at the hardware store feeling so happy about my little project. The people in the back of the bus going back to see friends and family in Burma probably felt the same way. The bus, packed with its human cargo and their worldly possessions, was barreling down the road ...looked like the wrong side of the road. It swerved and that is when I looked up and saw the truck hit the curb in the island in the middle of the road. It barrelled through some trees and flipped. The sound of the side of the truck scraping as it slide 100 yards was bone chilling. I immediately ran to see if there was something I could do. There were a couple of people thrown from the front of the bus which was now pointed in the wrong direction. I decided to stay near them so nobody would try to move them. Then, I saw the woman, her body contorted head under the dash. I could see she was breathing. I both wanted to run over to her and did not want because sometimes you just know that it is going to be terrible. People kept grabbing at the people on the ground in front of me and I would yell and yell"no!" . Finally, a few people got the picture and were protecting the people on the ground. I looked over at the woman and she did not appear to be breathing. I ran to the back of the truck. People were screaming and moaning. The people in the back were trapped under their belongings. I just started helping people move their stuff and helped get people out of the bus. We thought all the passengers were out but then someone thought they saw movement. We started pulling everything out of the truck. Ultimately, their were no other people. The police arrived and started moving the victims...they left the crumpled up dead woman for later.I was in total shock (still am). I can not talk with anyone which I think I really need to help deal with this sort of thing. I walked back to the hardware store to get my motorbike. I saw a man I met earlier and he gave me a big smile/laugh. I realized that it is a common way that Asian people deal with emotions...smiling at totally inappropriate times. Me...I just write about it in my blog. Now I need a good cry.UpdateIt is 6 hours later and I have learned that the buses brakes failed. It was going approximatly 100 kilometers an hour (about 60 miles an hour). The driver must have swerved into the island to avoid ramming the bus into the market which the road dead ends into. The act of courage cost him his life...he died in addition to the woman I saw die.
I turn my head and there is a little boy crying with blood all over his face, hands, a little on his arms and legs. I can not ask him what happened. Crap. I find a guy who speaks a little English and he asks the boy what happened. The guy says "it is ok, his brother beat him." The little boy tells the man his bloody nose hurts. I ask the man to ask one of the monks to bring the boy to the head monk so he can see. The monk says don't worry, it was just his brother. I can not talk to the boy, I do not know where anything is and nobody seems to think that a boy covered in blood is a big deal. My head is ready to explode and I try, unsuccesfully, to hide my anger when I talk to the man again. The boy disappears. I ask friends and they say that this is not so unusual for siblings in this area. I guess I do not care if it is ok in their culture it is just wrong.
Being that I do not know most people's names and could not pronounce them in most cases if I did, I often give people nicknames. I eat breakfast at no shirt guys restaurant these days. I call him no shirt guy, well, because he almost never has a shirt on. I considered calling toothpick in the beard guy because he always keeps a toothpick in his beard, but I decided that it did not roll of the tongue as nicely.
His nambia, which is kind of like a soft four tortilla except extra delicious, is always fresh and he has this chick pea thing that accompanies it which is delicious. Even though he has his fair share of bodily hair, he seems to be able to keep it out of the food and the place seems clean in general.
I did not know what to make of no-shirt guy (should it be No Shirt Guy?) because of his basic appearance. It turns out that no shirt guy is kind of sweet guy... always playing with his daughter and actually tries to be friendly and speaks says "thank you" in English to me every morning.
If you are not Thai you can not buy property legally. A friend of mine is Burmese and she bought a shop but could not get the sale registered. She was renting the shop to someone else for a couple of years and called her to find out if she wanted to continue to rent. The lady said, "Don't you know that your shop was sold?" Apparently the previous owner, whose name the shop was still in, sold it to another person. My friend has no recourse except to have respected people in the community talk to the woman. Given my friends current financial situation (quite bad) this is awful news.
Almost every home (including mine) and most businesses have a picture of the king. I think the affection is genuine. A 57 year old long time resident here from Switzerland found out how much trouble you can get into when you insult the king (he spray painted some pictures). As this article says...between 7 1/2 and 75 years in jail. Thankfully, Thai jails are known for their comfortable accomadations so he should enjoy his remaining days in comfort.
I could not understand how the bathing area was staying so clean until I saw the living scrub brushes that were taking care of it.
I
Thank you to my long time friends Deborah and Deb for your generous donations to the project. A thank you to long time family friends the Dalpras for donating. A second thanks to Dave Rogers for a sponsoring a second project in the last year. I met Dave when he sponsored a project at Baan Unrak. He coaches entrepreneurs and gives motivational speeches around the world. You can read more about him here.
I wrote a story about a lovely woman a couple of months back here. Her mother came to visit from Burma and went into a room and someone closed the door. When she wanted to leave, she became very upset...she could not figure out how to open the door. It turns out that it is the first time that the women, who is in her late 60's, has seen a door knob.
The temple is located right next to a crappy market which is a tourist attraction (for the life of me I do not know why). I thought I had thought of everything while planning the bathrooms until I saw a little old man leading a tourists up to the new bathrooms. As they left he started getting money from them. Apparently, the man started his own little business offering the use of the toilets. I guess this could be considered a compliment since he was able to make money, but I decided to scold him anyway and tell him not to do it again.
Ok...this story must be a put on, but it is in what looks like a legitimate paper. I am not sure the best part...my top choices are:
A man who was found dressed in latex and handcuffs brought a donkey to his room in a Galway city centre hotel, because he was advised “to get out and meet people,” the local court heard last week.
or
He was also charged with damage to a mini-bar in the room, but this charge was later dropped when the defendant said that it was the donkey who caused that damage.
or
Mr McCarney who had signed in as “ Mr Shrek” had told hotel staff that the donkey was a family pet and that this was believed by the hotel receptionist who the supt said was “young and hadn’t great English.”
or
Receptionist Irina Legova said that Mr McCarney had told her that the donkey was a breed of “super rabbit”
or
McCarney was found in the room wearing a latex suit and handcuffs, the key to which the donkey is believed to have swallowed.
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He was fined €2,000 for bringing the donkey to the room under the Unlawful Accommodation of Donkeys Act 1837.
I will tally votes, ignore them and pick my favorite at a later date.
Last night I took a little nap when the sun was going down. I got up and turned on the lights and there were literally hundreds of insects flying around and hitting me in the head. I noticed that they were pouring out of one of the big support beams for the house. Must be termites. I also noticed they were attracted to light so I left the bathroom light on and the others off. I came back a few hours later and there must have been a couple of thousand dead termites on the ground in the bathroom. A couple of buckets of water and they were all washed down the drain.
The girl in jeopardy that I have written about many times is finally safe. Her mother has died and after the ceremony that took place a couple of days ago she returned to my friend...nice to have a tough story that has a happy ending.
The dining room has two big picnic tables that we have stained and finished.
