Kanchanaburi Lakeside Retreat

Somehow, the universe came together so that on my last day of employment with ABC, my first yoga teacher from Bangkok was holding his first weekend yoga retreat and invited me and my friends to join. It was a perfect combination: closing the chapter at work followed immediately by a weekend filled with yoga, meditation and discussion of goals and how our brains work. It was the perfect launchpad into my current state of navigating opportunity and adventure.

Our blue dot, far away from Bangkok.

The house and my favorite hammock.

After a long time spent in the car thanks to Friday traffic, we arrived finally at a beautiful lakeside home in Kanchanaburi province. This place was home to a caretaker family, their dogs and some very talkative birds. We spent the weekend yoga-ing, meditating, talking about the social environments that have influenced our beliefs and goals. Some people also played around on the ATVs, motorbikes and jetskis, but I preferred to lay in the hammock reading The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle and take breaks to play with the puppies. 

Kirstie on the moto.

Nat and Haley on the ATV.

Me and the pup.

The bird who speaks Thai.

I came away from the weekend feeling lighter, more purposeful. This may be thanks to one of the mindfulness exercises we did in which you sit down and chat with your future self. It was fun to come up with a version of myself that I dreamed of being, ask her how she got there and after that was finished, think about what I can realistically do to make that vision a reality. If you're wondering, she lives on the beach, does/teaches yoga and cooks delicious food. Other details vary from a life of academia to one in HR at my beloved Nordstrom to owning a hostel/bar on the beach and beyond. We shall see, won't we?

Nat (yoga teacher), Nikon (mindfulness coach),
Haley, Kirstie, me, Gift, Romain.

ABC Graduation

June 19th was the last day of the first school year for ABC Pathways Bangkok. It was also my last day working there. Lots of emotion - excited to move on, sad to say goodbye to the kids and so amazed at how much they've grown in this short school year.

I could write a book on my tenure with ABC, but right now I'm basking in the glow of possibility that lies ahead and will save further written reflection on this experience for another time (or maybe just let it remain a memory). Now, let's all enjoy some photos of the year-end celebrations and the sweet munchkins that surrounded me during much of my life in Bangkok.

Yuri, my dancing buddy + karaoke partner for 'Let It Go' from Frozen. 

Ai, my little independent goofball and singer.

Scenes from our final 'Funky Friday' dance party.

Vihaan, better known as 'Happy Feet'.

Teacher Miu -
making the Nursery classroom the most rockin' in school.

Yuta and Team: some of our very first students. SO big now.

Yuri being teacher's helper.

Can you tell how much I love her?

Khun Oh (chef) + Khun Nid (nanny)
Beautiful souls that always made me smile.

Some of the original ABC crew:
Yuta, Team, Teacher Sam, me, Ai.

Most of our school on our end of year field trip.

Nam tuam

It's been a jam packed few weeks, but I have had my last day at work and will now start to post some photos of what we've been up to in June.

First up: the flooding (nam tuam)! Rainy season is outdoing itself in terms of performance year over year. We've had some incredible storms and a few weeks ago the biggest, longest, loudest, flashiest storm gave Bangkok's main thoroughfare a rude awakening on a Monday morning.

We woke up to our nearby canal nearly overflowing with water and when we finally hailed a mototaxi, we arrived to our usual drop off point and found it transformed into a stream thanks to the ineffective sewers and low level of the area relative to the canal. There was an abundance of water and it had no where to go. So some of us rode motos with our legs kicked up to avoid the water and some of us trudged through the water, trying to distract ourselves from the fish and snakes that others had seen swimming in the same place. I do my best not to imagine the content of the water that I put my skin in that day but instead try to believe that the 37 rounds of antibacterial soap washed it all away.

Upon finally making it to work, we found the electricity out and only a handful of students who were able to come in (those that live on the same street). You see, one of Bangkok's main roads was underwater and power was cut to the traffic lights in the area. In a city with normally horrific traffic, this combination on top of the Monday morning rush hour was a circus that took hours to sort through and for most (like us) ended with a call from work saying, 'don't bother.'

Apart from enjoying the tropical storms and a spontaneous flood-day off of school, we've been keeping up to date with the most important cultural affairs: new malls and Jurassic World.

We tried the famed Taiwanese fried chicken at the food court of the completely unnecessary new mall, Emquartier, and tried to watch the 3D Imax showing of Jurassic World. Turns out the 3D wasn't working (we get to go back to another movie for free) but it was still an enjoyable movie and the decorations were fun to play around with, too.

This mall, approximately 150m from the next mall, has it's own park on the 7th floor, a bird zoo and several waterfalls. Why not?

Meanwhile, back at home, the restaurant by the pool has been taken over by a super sweet Thai woman, Mon. She left such a cute note in the elevator this month about her new grandbaby which gives some insight into Thai traditions. 

More updates to come soon. Hope everyone is having a fabulous June!

Chiang Rai

Our final long weekend of the school year was a celebration of what is apparently the most important Buddhist holiday - Visakha Bucha Day. You can click the link to learn a bit more, but this day celebrates the three biggest life events for the Lord Buddha - his birth, enlightenment and death - which all miraculously occurred on the same lunar day several year apart.

Buddhas at Wat Rong Khun.

We took advantage of the three-day weekend to visit Chiang Rai, a small city in the north of Thailand which is often overlooked by visitors opting to visit the nearby, larger Chiang Mai which has a much larger tourist infrastructure. Chiang Rai is still well-suited for tourists, just on a tinier scale, so that you still feel like you're in a Thai town when you're venturing down the city streets and visiting the markets.

Our first meal in Chiang Rai,
a late dinner at one of the only open restaurants after 10pm.

We left straight from work on Friday to hang out at the airport for what ended up being a longer time than we were actually in the air. I love these short regional flights - they're so quick! We arrived at Chiang Rai's teeny airport, sorted out a taxi to our hotel. Despite it being dark outside, the beautifully lit, expansive grounds of the hotel were so welcoming and relaxing. I knew we were in for a wonderful weekend.

"Welcoming Flower Pavilion"
at our hotel, The Legend.

We woke up early on Saturday to take advantage of the hotel breakfast. They had real bacon! Not just deli ham slices from a package. Real bacon, like what you are thinking of when I say bacon. That's what it was. That is a treat over here. So, yah, the breakfast was yummy. Then the pool was lovely overlooking the quiet little Mae Kok River. 

The pool looking towards the Mae Kok River with
a large Buddha far in the distance - can you see it?

We relaxed the day away until we finally decided to go explore the town just in time for the rains to begin. Luckily, we were able to take shelter under a shophouse awning and were invited to sit down at a table by a Thai man who promptly disappeared into the shophouse. So we were left to sit there protected on the sidewalk and watched the rain fall in those impressively fat tropical droplets for about 15 minutes.

Wat Klong Wiang: our view during the rain.

When the rain subsided, we made our way to the Hilltribe Museum to learn about the various hilltribe people living in this region. I don't think the museum has been updated too much since its original displays were put up in the late 90s/early 00s, but we still learned quite a lot and the exhibits showed some nice examples of the houses and traditional clothing the people wear - so beautiful. We couldn't take any pictures, so please do check out the link above or do a Google image search for the following: "Akha people," "Lisu hilltribe," "Hmong hilltribe," "Karen hilltribe," (famously known as the long neck Karen). The hilltribe populations in Thailand are generally exploited for tourism purposes and are not given Thai citizenship as the country does not want to encourage more people to infiltrate its borders.

Saturday market outside the Hilltribe Museum in
downtown Chiang Rai.

The hilltribes present a fascinating and complex area of Thailand and the surrounding countries' cultures. Conditions for these traditional people will likely remain stagnant considering the tourism dollars that come in as a result of visits to their villages, which they are sometimes forced to keep without electricity and other modern amenities in order to preserve the traditional ambience that attracts tourists.

Shaken, cooked eggs on a stick.

Following our visit to the museum, we stepped out into a bustling weekend market on the main street in Chiang Rai. With tons of food, souvenirs, shoes, accessories and other knick knacks, we quickly passed a few hours wandering around enjoying the happy environment that comes with the Saturday after payday over a long weekend.

Leather shop vendors and their awesome VW bug.

Traditional Thai dance performance by some children.

Tried to capture the street lights (more beautiful in person).

One of my favorite quintessentially Asian things is the public dancercise. Mostly, we saw this throughout China and I don't often do to parks here in Bangkok (because we don't really have any green space) but they also do these group exercises here in Thailand! There was a band playing typical Thai pop music and hundreds of people dance-walking around in a big circle sometimes with coordinated steps similar to what we'd do for the YMCA or Cotton-Eyed Joe. It was awesome.

Hundreds of people dancercising in a huge circle!

Veal and pork. Take your pick.

Bugs or shrimp?

Sunday held a similar itinerary to Saturday - bacon, swimming, walking around town, more market shopping and watching bad movies on the hotel TV (at least they were in English!). Following an über lazy Sunday, we maximized our final day on Monday with more bacon, more swimming and a trip to Wat Rong Khun, better known as the White Temple. Ever since I first saw its photo, this temple has been on my travel bucket list and I am so excited we got to go!

What a sight.

I knew Wat Rong Khun was designed by a famous Thai artist, but that was about it. Click the link for more details on the history of the temple. I did not expect the typical temple guardians (below) to look like transformers or whatever action figures they are. I did not expect heads to be hanging from the tree branches. I did not expect to walk into the main worship hall and see paintings of Superman, Harry Potter and Michael Jackson and the eyes of George Bush and Osama bin Laden side by side above the doors. 

Sam and the temple guard.

The inside of the temple (sorry we couldn't take pictures and I didn't want to offend Buddha on his special day by breaking the rules like I did at the Sistine Chapel) begins with your entrance through modern day distractions (like the pop icons mentioned above) and demons. As you progress towards the front of the temple, you follow people on their journey to peace and enlightenment until finally you reach the Buddha seated in front, free from distraction.

Skulls on the traffic cone.

This temple totally took me by surprise. It is such a breathtaking structure from the outside with its white mirrored exterior, but the modern interpretation of traditional Thai Buddhist artwork and decoration was what really struck me.

Decorations outside the main temple.

To enter the main temple, you must follow a walkway (and you can't stop to take pictures unless you want the guard to call out to you on the loudspeaker to keep moving) with a flowing stream of other visitors through skeletons and hands reaching up from the earth.

The walkway into the main temple.

Looking down from the main walkway.

She stands guard at the staircase.

More details of the main temple.

A gorgeous sky behind the temple.

Hey there's Sam!

After oogling the main temple, we wandered around the expansive grounds which are planned to be under construction for a least a few more decades. There was a space to make your own wish to Buddha, so of course we made one. Here is Sam holding our wish among thousands of others.

Cutie.

Touring the lesser visited parts of the temple grounds, we happened upon a sweet sight of perhaps a father and son working on a statue of Buddha.

Bring your son to work day?

On our way out, we passed the most gorgeous public bathrooms in the world. The artist intentionally made the restrooms a piece of art and insisted upon keeping them free from even a minimal cost.

The public restrooms!

Heads hanging in the trees.

It's just off the road!

Following our journey to the temple, we returned to more swimming at the hotel and lazily packed up and went to the airport and hopped back to Bangkok. This holiday was quite typical of how I prefer to travel: have just a couple of things I'd really like to do, then let the rest of the time fill itself in. All in all, it was a wonderful long weekend. Now, I just have to figure out how not to get a sore throat after being in planes. Any suggestions?