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Published: August 20th 2011
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almoooosttt thhhheere
appraoching the Thai exit: BURMA Frig.
I keep writing blog entries and they keep not saving, so when I come back to finish them they aren't there.
Last Thursday the volunteers ( minus Natasha) hopped on a bus for 6 hours to travel to Chiang Mai, the biggest city in the northern part of Thailand. Then we waited an hour to jump on another 3 and a half hour bus to travel up to Chaing Rai.
Heres the thing, all of us have tourist visas, but they are only good for 2 months, and then you have to renew them. In order to renew your visa and get another two months worth you have to leave the country, and then re-enter.
This is where things get fun.
Chiang Rai is not our final destination, but a stop over for the rest of our journey. When we arrived there, is was around 8 pm and we checked into our hostel. Actually there were 5 of us travelling, Barb, Meg, Anne, Millen ( an old volunteers boyfriend, who was studying in Indonesia and then detoured here before returning home this morning) and me.
Anne unfortunately hadn't been feeling good all week so she decided to
there ish
Barb, Millen Meg and I infront of the Thai official exit stay in, but the other four decided to explore a bit of the city, visit the market, get some SERIOUS FOOD and then go out for a beer, after a full day of travelling.
This is the first place that I actually found real icecream, that isn't made out of soymilk and ice. And they had over 45 flavours. I obviosuly picked the chocolate peanut butter.
We walked around together for a bit and then ended up at a really chill reggae bar. The music was awesome, and so were the people. I only stayed until 12 and then went home because I was exhausted but the others stayed out pretty late.
The next day, we caught yet another bus but this time we headed towards the boarder: Mai Sai, Thailand/ Tachilek, Burma.
The bus ride there is crazy. They literally take a bus half the size of a north american school bus, it is a bus from the 1960's no joke. They cram atleast 60 people on it, half of which are standing in the aisles holding onto the top bar. this bus ride is two hours long.
I was lucky enough to have the
THERE
I hiked up a hill to try to get a better idea of what the region looked like and these are some of the pictures I got seat right beside the bus driver so I had a bit more space, a great view AND a window.
Although I did notice the bus driver kept saying FARANG FARANG which means foreigner in Thai.. the locals followed by laughing lol.
The way people describe Burma creates a very loomy and mysterious atmosphere ( in my opinion anyway) of the country. People often talk about how repressive and injuste the SPDC ( their government) are towards their population; refugees and migrants speak of being forbidden of returning because they wait imprissonment , torture, and still worse, returning home only to find their villages have been burned, their families have been killed and their is a warrant for their arrest.
I've learned that less than 3-4 5 of the money going into the country is put towards education and health care, and that with over 127 recognized ethnicities the government works hard to create war and tension between them.. all the time.
These are the things people know about Burma, most of the things that I had been introduced to about the country prior to leaving here.
SO living in Canada, you can imagine how eerie and scary Burma might
appear.
As we left Chiang Rai heading for Burma, it wasn't the nicest of days.
Rain was made a come and go appearance, the mountains of the journey although very green were sometimes barely visible becuase of the fog. Driving through the mountains, dispite the beautiful surroundings also did not help with the stomach nausea.
By the time we actually got to Burma, I was anxious and filled with anticipation.
The little part of burma that I did get to experience was beautiful though, the people are very kind, and obviously are surprised to see white people, because they all look at you and smile .
I stayed there fore a couple hours and then went back over to Thailand. Thai passport controle was not very happy that I didn't know where I was temporarily staying. But they decided to stamp my visa anyway.
Hmm that was roughly a week ago now.
Some other cool news, I had something published in the Eastern Townships paper « The Record». I have to say that Im not sure what the title of the article is, becuase i never gave it one. But I was pretty excited to
have that news forwarded to me from back home.
What else, umm nothing really. Sorry ive been bad with updates. It was Astra's Birthday ( my sister) a couple days ago on the 19th.
Tomorrow is barbaras birthday, so two of the other vols and I have painted some signs for her and tomorrow mornign when she comes home, she will be surprised. I am going tomake her a banafee cake 😊
Kathy
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