The Eye of the Hurricane

I sit here now typing this entry from halfway across the world at 25,000 miles in the air.

Allow me to take a moment to describe a bit of what has gone on in the last few days. The last blog I wrote detailed the “turmoil” that was going on in Khon Kaen. Nothing ever ended up happening that night and everything was back to normal the following day. We had an emergency meeting with Prof. Siriporn to discuss our safety and general feelings of well-being. The absolute consensus between both the students and all of the professors was that we had nothing to fear so long as we complied with curfew.

As I often tell Joe, it’s like not going to Harrisburg, PA because there is political unrest in New York City; Kohn Kaen is 6 hours from Bangkok. Granted, it’s not that there wasn’t anything going on around KKU, but it was well contained and not near the villages of study. At any rate, when asked, we all agreed that we wanted to stay.

The rest of the day was spent on “self study”. We took that to mean “cultural study” and went shopping downtown with our buddies (the translators). We rode both the sontel and the tuk-tuk… Good times. Because of the political situation, many of the stores and malls closed early so we headed back to the dorms and hung out.
The following morning (5/21) we awoke to emails from the university notifying us that the Thailand MHIRT program had been canceled and that we were to come home effective immediately. Enclosed were our itineraries for travel. Needless to say, we were blind-sided. We met with the staff to discuss travel arrangements. It was decided that we would visit the closer of the 2 villages, Loomhin, the following day to say goodbye. The day then progressed as follows:

Noon – welcome party with the buddies and Adjans
6 P.M. – farewell party with the buddies and Adjans

I wish I was kidding.

After our second party, we all met up to Skype with the director of the MHIRT program to get more information about the sudden decision. She informed us that the Provost of something went over her head with some other people and made the decision to pull us out. I want to believe that their decision was completely unintelligible and based on footage from CNN, but I have to admit that it’s possible I was in the eye of the hurricane, unaware of dangers to come.

The drama started when the office of education abroad began demanding that grown-ass adults report to campus for a meeting on Monday. Oh no they di’ent. As far as we were concerned, if we were out of Thailand we were releasing them of any liability. You cannot force people with God-given rights to freedom to show up at your office and not allow them to live their lives as individuals with free will. Additionally, I may be placed as an alternate at the MHIRT site in Rome. I’m not trying to jet lag myself to death, so I will wait it our on a white, sandy beach near the Equator :). In the end, we students agreed that so long as we were out of Thailand we had completed our end of the bargain.

Which brings me to my next adventure… I am on my way to Malaysia!!! Anyone who knows me – really knows me – understands that a trip to Malaysia for me is like coming full circle in life. When I was a youngster, maybe 4 or 5, my parents thought they would control my brother and myself by threatening us in the following manner: If my brother was bad, they would return him to Sears, where they bought him, and exchange him for a much nicer and better behaved counterpart, Jimmy. If I was bad, my parents were going to send me back across the world in exchange for my much nicer and better behaved counterpart, Malicia; yes, Malicia from Malaysia. And so now here I am 1 hour shy of fulfilling the lifelong dream of returning to my home in Malaysia and seeking out Malicia. Wish me luck!!!!!