Blogs from Chiang Mai, North-West Thailand, Thailand, Asia - page 6

Woolly says – After a restless night where my mind was more focussed on our next part of the journey rather than our current location, it seemed so easy to let Jo plan the day, hoping she had learnt from her previous disasters we set off to the outskirts of Chiang Mai. Wiang Kum Kam is an ancient city around 3 km south of Chiang Mai's city centre. Built by King Mangrai around the latter part of the 13th century it had served as the capital until repeated flooding meant a move to safer ground in the fifteen hundreds. For many years it was thought that the old city had been lost, until 1984 when the Department of Fine Arts discovered remnants of it and excavation was begun. Our uber dropped us off at a fine ... read more

Woolly says – Our flight into Chiang Mai had been easy and in less than half an hour we were cleared through immigration, had collected the backpacks and were in a taxi to our digs. A good night’s sleep left me ready to take on the old city, the former capital of the kingdom of Lan Na (1296–1768) being this old I somehow expected it to have small cobbled streets and a certain quaintness, it doesn’t, but it has a whole heap of Wat’s. We had decided not to go anywhere in particular for the day and just see what we found, I set off eager to investigate. Our accommodation was just out of the older part of town and having walked a mere two minutes we had already found Wat Chomphu a gilded stupa with ... read more

Well, it has been a crazy return since last Friday. I definitely need a few days to relax, but I haven’t really given myself that opportunity. Maybe, I am crazy! Friday night, I had family over for food, gifts, and pictures. I had to complete about four hours of homework for my Saturday clinical and was unable to go to bed until 1am. I had to wake up at 5 in order to leave in time for my clinical session in Gettysburg which was from 9-4:30. I quick ran some errands afterward, and soon after met up with my boyfriend for dinner. Fortunately, I have had a little bit of time to reflect on my two objectives I created before this course began. I had two objectives coming into this trip that I want to quickly ... read more

Today is our last full day in Chiang Mai. I’m feeling very nostalgic. This morning as I was doing devotionals on the third story porch, I watch Melissa and Jha spend some time chatting and sharing gifts. This is the first time it really hit me that we were soon leaving our beloved friends. I’m not sure why I feel so sad other than that I will really miss them and that I really love our Thai friends. Love is such a weird thing because we cannot really pinpoint it, something I love to do when self-reflecting. It’s extra tough because I feel split between here and home. There are people at home that I miss dearly and cannot wait to see, but there are also people here I do not want to say goodbye to. ... read more

This journal entry is in response to my ELI objectives. Below are the two objectives I created before leaving for Thailand. The community objective was altered after receiving feedback from Debbie, therefore it is different than the one i originally submitted on canvas. I hope to address both objectives in the following sentences. Professional: After completing my clinical experience in Thailand I will demonstrate an increased understanding of cultural humility by describing in my ELI journal how I adopted my care to meet the specific needs of the population. To be completely honest I was anticipating that i’d have to make some big changes in order to meet the cultural needs of my patients, but i didn’t. I had read before coming to Thailand that there is a huge emphasis on hot and cold in pregnancy. ... read more