Amy in Thailand: February 2007

Faithful readers, I fear I have let you down. You have undoubtedly been expecting exciting stories from exotic lands; gripping tales of intrigue and adventure on the border; provocative, moving accounts of suffering and hope of courageous refugee families; witty and endearing observations of cultural differences and the faux pas inevitably encountered and made. Sadly, blogging to such a diverse audience has posed a more difficult challenge then I expected, and I find myself longing for the days of the dreaded mass email. So, consider this an apology. An apology if you were, perhaps, expecting more from your restless traveler and observably inconsistent blogger. She promises to do better. However, she would like to gently remind all that it is rather disconcerting to bare self and soul to an unidentified world, where said borne self and soul might be laughed at, scorned, or rudely ignored. So, having said this, I will continue my occasional updates and small stories with an determined attempt at greater consistency. If you find that you are still troubled by the lack of inspirational content here, I would like to say, as nicely as possible - shut it and get your own blog.

With that bit of unpleasantness out of the way, we can move on.

I have settled down for the night after a long run and a mini workout at the sort-of gym (where the gym lady continues to squeeze my stomach and gleefully slap my butt every time I walk by. Also giving gym lady great pleasure is watching me weigh myself, at which point she then announces to the room my current weight in kilos. It is beginning to upset me, really) with a bowl of cereal on my vinyl couches. Lucky for me, the karaoke bar across the street is just warming up for the evening, beginning with their nightly rendition of "Hotel California". Why was that song ever popular again?

Work has been rather insane, lately. The US resettlement campaign in Mae La is in full swing (nearly 20,000 have applied already), and we are frantically trying to hire all of the new staff we need to accommodate. For me, in my tiny little world of unaccompanied minors, that means 14 new staff - 10 assessors and 4 interpreters. I am in the thick of training this week and next, hopefully having everyone ready to go by the end of next week. So far, after merely 2 weeks of interviews by the US, I have a stack of over 100 unaccompanied children to interview and figure out where to send. It is exciting to be a part of resettlement on this scale; to be a small part of the individual stories of these families, and their dreams for the future.

One woman informed me that she wanted to remove her pending application to Norway because she heard everyone who lives there suffers from chronic nosebleeds. Just how was I supposed to respond to that? Another man heard that the refrigerators of refugees in America are empty. An empty refrigerator did not distress him nearly as much as hearing that Amercians do not eat rice - "what kind of people don't eat rice? We will all starve to death!" he accurately pointed out. There have also been rumors going around camp that the planes cannot hold the number of people wanting to go to the States. "I'm not going", said one elderly woman adamantly. When I asked her why not, she replied "if there are too many people, they will put the extras on the wing of the plane. I've heard what they will do to me and I'm not doing it." It's a little funny, and a little sad. People so full of hope, with so little information trying to make a decision that will affect so much.

After three long months of harassing the owner with weekly phone calls and the occasional threat, I finally moved into a Mae Sot version of my dream apartment. Above a sushi restaurant and across the street from the banana lady, Tesco supermarket and the most obnoxious karaoke bar known to man, my little studio is exactly what I want (fine, so I could do without the karaoke bar - waking up to drunk Thai guys screeching "Total Eclipse of the Heart" at 1am... nightly... got a little old after Night Two). I have a great view of Mae Sot, and the mountains in the distance on a clear day. It is so great to have space and a place of my own and... a wok. Mae Sot is finally starting to feel like home...