The Year of the Dog

this weekend, instead of listening to insects which sound like teapots whistling, the crackling of hundreds of fireworks to ward off nian (a man(sic)-devouring predator beast threatening to enter into the year of the dog with all of us) startlingly punctuates the day. there's quite a large chinese thai community spread throughout the country, so the celebration of a new beginning is quite important here. as i'm starting to fill in more details around me this week, i have noticed the chinese buddhist altar housed inside a small building on the temple grounds just a few steps down the road. today it is full of sweet incense smoke and fresh fruit offerings. when hitching into the only town of any considerable size ? and thus with a post office - around here, takuapa, last week, one of the drivers who picked us up presented us with a chinese new year treat as well as the ride ? a gelatinous rice flour and sugar mound wrapped in a cup of banana leaves. it was completely tasteless with the consistency of a silicone implant, but the act of generosity was much appreciated.

being back now two weeks i remember how time seems to balloon here. while i often don't feel i'm able to get too much done at work yet as i still make my way through all there is to get up to speed on, it's that intensity of experience that surrounds everything that gives each hour more dimension. in addition to time, and as i mentioned a week ago, i also sense this place as many layered. i start with the basic, destroyed, and barely functioning landscape i entered early last year and add on to it two intense months of memories as if laying a transparency on a projector, which i scribble on then lift off again, expecting somehow to walk right into moments in the past again as they are happening. then there are the daily reunions with people who either stayed on volunteering, or who never left in spirit - like me drawn back by the work, community, land. these meetings offer a jolt into a past context that is, again somehow disappointingly, all new. and the current physical setting is seen with the same idea in mind, difficult to grasp as the brain tries to remember what was here before, did i miss those roads entirely, those buildings, or were they really all not there only 8 months ago? i have been branching out to new bars and restaurants slowly, preferring when i arrived to go to my ?usual? haunts.

so the task at hand, in addition to navigating the tsunami volunteer center (tvc)'s fundraising systems, meeting everyone, and figuring out when i can get out on the thaikea site for a day's work, is reconciling nostalgia and being here now. i find myself getting into the ?last time, at band camp? syndrome, which even i'm beginning to tire of, where most of my conversation is of what was happening last year around here. my friend aptly likened the experience to going back to elementary school as an adult with everything seeming so distorted in size and such. part of it is acknowledging my role is in the office this time, instead of as the physically strong carpentry shop leader that i was. the memories are indelible, but i can't wait to make it through this phase into the one where i can fully appreciate where i am at present. i have been hearing similar stories, albeit much more intense, from the survivors of the tsunami i know and meet.

meeting the other volunteers hasn't been hard with the summer camp style social scene as it is around the tvc. there are activities every night of the week, and even on nights where i can't imagine getting a second wind after a long day and intend to chill out at home i can't turn down an invitation to dinner, or the bar. a typical week includes monday's volunteer meeting with mixer at fisherman bar. tuesday has been salsa lessons, muay thai (kickboxing) lessons, and movie night. wednesday is pub quiz night; last week my team of four ?sharing is caring? won and split the pot of 400 THB (about $10). thursdays have typically been BBQs on the beach, but this last week we enjoyed the fruits of salsa practice at the salsa party. it wasn't a huge party with few of us braving the dance floor, but it did include much spinning and swaying, and even a particularly fun merengue number. so nice to get out and move! friday the teams worked only a half day in order to participate in the egg and spoon, wheelbarrow, three-legged races and the tug-o-war of ?sports day?. trips to the bars on any of these evenings often double as leaving parties which seemed to fill up my first week when many long termers finally went home to earn money for once.

last night we had a humongous celebration to launch the 47th longtail fishing boat that had been built at the cape pakarang boat yard. it marked reaching a goal set when the project started last year. the boat yard is this beautiful building set among rows and rows of palm trees, and on the whitest coral sand beach you've ever seen at the tip of the cape. scott, the head of the boat yard and a good friend from last year, arranged an amazing spread of food complete with ice sculptures, one of the khao lak bartenders basically brought his bar with him, and this really popular band ? Job2Do ? agreed to come play their original thai reggae tunes (and tons of bob marley covers of course). there were hundreds of people there ? thai and non-thai - to watch the boat slide into the water as well as each fisherman who has received a boat get official paperwork for their vessel. almost from the first note played after dinner, i was out on the cleared section of beach in front of the wood plank stage moving to the music. i practically didn't leave that spot the whole night, except to grab my poi and break them in with some fire dancing.

this week i've been hosting dave, a coworker of my sister's from habitat for humanity, who is travelling around thailand as well. he's spent a week with the tvc building houses at the village of nam khem, for an ad hoc group of villagers who were displaced from land they didn't own and consequently had nowhere to return to. they were left out of the rebuilding process until a few months ago when the prince of denmark bought some swamp land in the village they've filled in and are now building houses on. the ?rent homes group? has set up a community bank and development model with the help of a microloan organization. our volunteers are working alongside the villagers and skilled laborers to do the unskilled foundation pouring, bricklaying, and digging trenches for sewage system installation. dave leaves tonight for a dive course. in true khao lak synchonicity, when we hitched into town the first day he was here, the truck that stopped to pick us up was a habitat truck, as they have an office in khao lak as well now.

it's been a nice discovery to encounter the very professional organization the tvc has become with a year under its belt. i am part of a strong management team who has been open and welcoming toward me, and who have come together to institute some of the kinds of volunteer support we dreamed about before and other organizations never make it to. my orientation day saw me as one of 45 new volunteers last week, but our average is about a dozen new people per week. the tvc has solid partnerships within the village communities where efficient work is being done alongside people who will live in the houses or use the furniture and boats being built. the tvc recently made it on the radar of the philanthropy workshop west (pww) and the hewlett and rockefeller foundations, as one of six relief organizations in the area with best practices. in my first week i was accompanying two reps to our nam khem construction site as well as to thaikea to show off what we're doing and to help them envision how they will present the nam khem site to 12 foundation heads when they come back in march as part of the pww workshop. it is a rare opportunity to have your organization approached by such a prestigious group without having to convince them of your greatness first. and i'm consulting with an aussie film team who is putting together a general overview of the center for us.

i plan to live in bang niang at least through the end of february, hoping to move into a cozy bungalow somewhere in khao lak after that. this place works, especially at this price of 2700 THB/month (about $67.50 or ten times less what i was paying in san francisco per month!), but is definitely bare bones. i'm needing to invest in a fan, and i may want to put a place with hot water on my list i will give to the universe when looking in the next month. every trip into the bathroom brings the question, which creepy crawlies am i living with today? the cockroach who had taken up residency behind the drain in my sink with his long whiskers poking out has seemed to move on, and the frog who made an appearance on my bathroom mirror hasn't returned either. i also haven't seen the large hairy tarantula looking spider around since i trapped it and returned it to the trees out back. there's no getting away from the bugs though, no matter where i end up, with jungle and forest all around.

i'm hoping the entry into the year of the dog won't mimic those pesky mangy creatures who chase me between villages on my way home at night whether on foot or on my bicycle, but rather that it will be as is being ?advertised?: one of trust, loyalty, and friendship.