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Published: March 13th 2008
Udon Thani - Habitat for Humanity
The completed house!!!! Our team, Habitat staff, the recipient of the house, and neighbours came out for the dedication.Habitat For Humanity
We arrived in Thailand from Cambodia, and had one night to spend in Bangkok. We booked our usual hotel and went for a stroll to arrange some future travel plans. Oop! We bumped into Lianne and Laurie, on their way to an overnight train to Ko Tao. We were able to chat for a bit before they went to the train station. Funny coincidence!
We left Bangkok on a northbound night train, and arrived in
Udon Thani the next morning. We met the team we would work with for the ten day period.
Our team of 16 includes two English teachers that live in Japan, Steven and Rachel, and 12 University students from Japan: Yu, Yuriko, Shinya, Miki, Rina, Tomomi, Nozomi, Eriko, Arisa, Sayaka, Maiko, and Akiko. If you aren't familiar with Japanese names, that makes 11 girls and one boy (Shinya)! Needless to say Travis and Shinya became fast friends, if only to have a conversation about something other than makeup! Everyone is incredibly nice and we all get along so well together that every day has been a blast!
Day 1 Our first day included a visit to an
NGO affiliated with Habitat
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
Travis was terrified his wall would fall over for Humanity (HFH) in Udon Thani. There we learned about efforts to inform the farming community about new methods and best practices to reduce the cost of sustainable living. We saw examples of about 10 new farming projects that the farmers could sign up to learn about if they were interested. The team took us out for a welcome dinner and it was a great chance to start to get to know everyone. We also looked around the Udon Thani night market.
Day 2 Travis paired with Miki, and Michelle paired with Shinya. All we did on day 1 was mix cement, and lay bricks. We learned quickly how difficult it is to keep the wall straight and to learn the correct amount of mortar to put between each brick. Hard work! We were all pretty beat after our first day, but like Michelle says "Teamwork makes Dreamwork" and the 16 of us did an amazing amount of work on the house.
Day 3 We did the entire floor of the house. We hand-mixed about 20 bags of cement (by the end of the day we were a well-oiled machine). We had a "sand" team, a "water" team,
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
Travis and Miki, wall building partners for day 1. a "gravel" team, and a "mixing" team. Everyone rotated through each team all day and pitched in so much that we finished early! After a fresh batch of cement was mixed, we formed lines to transport the heavy buckets into the house. They were then dumped on the floor to start forming the foundation.
That night we all went for an outdoor massage near the lake. There were about 8 of us in one tent, covered by a mosquito net! It was a pretty funny experience.
Day 4 Saturday and Sunday we had off. Saturday we headed to Ban Chiang - an interesting excavation site and museum, also a World Heritage Site. In the afternoon we went for a trek in Phu Phra Bat Park. The park is full of interesting rock shapes. We all ate dinner together and after everyone stood and said a few words about the team and what Habitat for Humanity meant to us. It was videotaped and will be compiled by one of the students. All 13 girls were crying by the end of it! Jeez ladies, pull yourselves together!
Day 5 Sunday we visited the
HIV /
Aids orphanage and it
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
Shot of the whole team at work. 16 International volunteers plus Habitat staff. was a brilliant experience for everyone. Most of the children living there are orphans, although some still have one or both parents alive and just live there for a short time. All of the children have HIV or full-blown AIDS. Through donation and government contributions, the children receive medicine and become healthier than when they first arrive. The children sang a few songs and danced for us, then we had to repeat the same dance to them. They thought it was hilarious watching us fumble through the moves. After one of the nurses said "OK kids, now you guys can play with your visitors!" which caused the children to scream and swarm us from every direction!
Travis has always imagined that he would win in a fight against a gang of children. Until today. It is clear that even four or five of them can quickly take him to the ground and tickle him mercilessly! They would grab your hand and pull you over to an area to play with them. They wanted to be swung around or picked up. Everyone in the room had a huge smile on their face! What was a little heartbreaking was how some
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
Michelle and Shinya were partners on day 1 building a wall. of the children never wanted to let go of your hand, and how they ran after us waving when we had to leave. Of course all 13 ladies were crying again!
We had lunch on the Mekong, at the Thailand / Laos border, then cruised to the peace bridge. The weather was beautiful and everyone had a good time. We then visited the Buddha park - strangely similar to the one on the Laos side near Vientiane. This park also features statues of many different religions.
Day 6 Back to work erecting walls and Travis was partnered with Arisa. Michelle worked on the back wall with various people throughout the day. We got a lot done and the Habitat staff told us to slow down or we'd have no work left to do the next day! For lunch we played guitar and learned some Thai kids' songs! It was hilarious. That night everyone in the group did their own thing and we went to a movie in a real theatre, something we like to do but rarely get the opportunity.
Day 7 Our last day building and we finished at about 2:00 pm. Everyone became a little
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
The morning of Day 2. We did a lot in one day! sentimental and nostalgic when we were placing the last brick. Again there were some tears! That night Steve treated everyone on the team to a traditional Thai massage to soothe our weary muscles - fantastic!
In Rachel's hotel room we threw a surprise party for Yu - the student leader - to thank her for organizing such an amazing trip. We all crouched in the dark and yelled SURPRISE! Yu was very surprised and touched so of course there were more tears all around! We watched a slideshow of our pictures so far - so many great memories - and enjoyed some ice cream cake and beers. We all had a great time. The two of us ended up staying up and chatting with Rachel until the wee hours of the morning, and on the long walk down the hall to our hotel room we noticed Yu and Miki's door was opened slightly. We knocked and there was no answer so we went in and they were both passed out in strange positions on their beds. They still had all their clothes on! Every light was on and every item from their suitcases was piled on the bed. They
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
Michelle uses the machine to pack the sand down, making it flat and hard. had also both been writing in their journals before falling asleep! We laughed and laughed and cleared off their beds for them and tucked them in!
Day 8 The next morning everyone was a little hungover - a new word for some of the Japanese students!
We visited a school and taught a lesson to a group of about 20 Thai kids. We had them match a picture to a simple Japanese Kanji, then for the second part of the lesson we showed the kids how to make a frog out of Origami. They loved it! It was another good experience for us and we had a lot of laughs. Travis sat down with some of the kids and they kept running their hands through his leg hair and laughing! We guess Thai people don't have crazy hairy legs like Travis does!
In the afternoon we dedicated the house to its new owner - Ms. Waliaporn Phakun - age 20. She has been working hard to earn enough money to apply for Habitat For Humanity consideration. She will be moving in with her mother from a house next door that seven people share. There were tears all around
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
Japanese people have the amazing ability to fall asleep anywhere they choose. Also, Travis is an idiot. when we cut the ribbon and presented the house. After the presentation the neighbours (about 20) all kneeled in a line and had us greet each of them as they tied strings to our wrists and blessed us for our hard work - this is a tradition in the northeast of Thailand. By the end of the line your wrist was adorned with 20 strings.
It was a wonderful feeling that the 16 of us contributing so little of our time and our money could make such a huge impact on someone else's life.
For dinner we ate by the water at a Karaoke restaurant and almost immediately after dinner the two of us were asked by Habitat staff to sing a song! We picked from their - very short - list of English songs and decided on "Imagine" by John Lennon and "I Just Called to Say I Love You" by Stevie Wonder! Neither of us really knew the Stevie Wonder song but we fumbled our way through it! After the Karaoke session everyone danced and then the team of international volunteers was presented with another string-around-the-wrist session courtesy of the Habitat staff. We were also presented
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
Michelle and Yuriko through the window ... with homemade bracelets that said "Kap Kun Ka" or the female Thai version of "Thank you very much". More tears. It was a great day.
We finished up the night playing cards in our room at the hotel. Yu, Miki, Yuriko, Shinya, Nozomi, Rina, Ebi, Tomomi all joined us in our room for a few rounds of Uno and I-Kyu-San (1-9-3) - a Japanese card game that had us all laughing.
Day 9 Our final day came with mixed emotions. A bit of sadness that we would soon be saying farewell to such an amazing group of people. A bit of pride at having helped make someone's life a little better. Fond memories of our short but rich time together.
We began the day with traditional Thai dancing lessons. It is much more difficult than it looks! We learned some simple hand and feet gestures, as well as some dances with coconuts that you click together! It was tough work and everyone was out of breath and tired when the lesson was finished. We have a new appreciation for traditional Thai dancers!
We had our final lunch together and it was time to say goodbye. The
Udon Thani - Habitat For Humanity
"Did I put the right amount of mortar on that last brick ... ?" students had prepared a "Michelle" and a "Travis" message board that they had each written a personal message on. They presented them to us and we gave hugs all around. Of course there were more tears and pictures. The Japanese students along with Rachel and Steve will all fly back to Japan today. We're really going to miss everyone. It's amazing how close you can get to people over such a short time.
This has been one of the best experiences of our lives and we will definitely do something like this again.
Next we fly to Indonesia to meet our good friend John Idnurm, whom we will travel with for about 3 weeks. We can't wait to see him! We have five days on the island of Lombok first before John arrives. Another friend from New Zealand (Barny) is marrying an Indonesian girl in Jakarta, with a stag in Bali, so the three of us will join the craziness that will ensue.
Thanks for reading, and hope everyone is well!
love,
michelle and travis
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sheila clark
non-member comment
Great Work!
What a wonderful way to spend 9 days! Good for you guys! By the way I really love the photo of the two monks walking down the street in a past blog. It looks like you are using special effects in some of your photography.? Cheers and happy travels. Sheila