Never a Sure Thing

So, I can cry now, right? I sat down at my computer with optimism and a renewed energy to move forward and make this day better – happier. I checked email. Letter from Fulbright. Short-non-encouraging. No grant. I think it is worse too, when it was built up in my mind to be so positive, *almost* a sure thing. The committee at UMass said it was one of the best grants they have ever read. I got through the first screening stage in the USA. I spent so much effort organizing the letters and language forms – too much to want to try to reapply. I am devastated. I had been counting on this flexible grant for my country-wide interview surveys – my work for this year. I really really thought this one would come through – especially after the Lindbergh being so close it felt like I should get something, so something would work out. But, this is not happy, everything falls into place because you work hard, land. It is reality and the meat of graduate school barriers and emotional roller-coasters. I feel the past proposals I wrote were solid and darn good—but, not apparently good enough. And that doesn’t get me anything.

Return to KYNP

Khao Yai National Park (KYNP) after being away for 6 months. No Pom. It feels different – sad and lonely in a quiet run-down way. The door to our old room at Baan Glang Pai is locked and barricaded. Students are sleeping in the massage room. Old cooking supplies are heaped in the corner of the kitchen with the nice beautiful, long heavy slab of wood table going unused – it all collecting dust. Pom’s Buddha statue is gone, stolen. I’m sleeping for the week in my and Kanda’s old room – Kanda and Pim elected to sleep elsewhere in tents—the room has no working toilet and is covered in cobwebs and dirt. It is obvious Kanda hasn’t stayed for months here. I’m sitting out in the front on the steps enjoying the cool clean weather and forest sounds. Amazing how amplified and beautiful and obvious the bird sounds are after being in the city. AND THE AIR! When I used to stay here more long-term all of that would blend into the background. I want to blend into the background. I feel a gaping, gnawing sadness to seeing this place again so dejected. I wonder if we will ever try to return and make it home again.

Life in Ari, Bangkok

It doesn’t feel as though I’ve been here for 2 weeks already. I had Thai on Monday and Tuesday with two different teachers. Monday’s teacher, Khun Nui, is more like a slow grade school teacher following the book and catching my every pronunciation. Wednesday’s Khun Nhauy is more conversational and started me on reading. I listened to some students at a lower level and I am glad I have progressed beyond very basic on my own. I hope the script and reading comes back to me quickly after not studying this last school semester…I get myself up to go to class, but by the time the two hours are through I don’t feel like much else for the day. Still, if I could consistently study 2 hours of Thai a day, every day, I might get somewhere.

Our apartment is setup for me to be productive with Internet access in the room. On one side of the sky train station, Ari, are traditional Thai street vendors with 30 baht meals and a 7-11 store. We can buy flowers, fruit rice, kanom, fish, soup, newspapers, pirated CD’s, and trinkets. On the other side of the sky train station is a new “farang”-style market place with an air-conditioned supermarket specializing in imported foods, pricey restaurants, ice-cream, Starbucks, and a gym. This weekend we sat and listened to a jazz band in the square. Two worlds – all convenient. It might be difficult to get me back to living in the forest with the rats of Khao Yai.