Money Please!

Today is the first day of the Great Poverty Experience. As I previously mentioned, we were assigned the task of living on the amount of money the UN considers the world poverty level for three days (the level is $1 US/day). I must admit that, at the very least, they started easy on us. I ate breakfast in my apartment this morning, as I usually do, which consists of two slices of wheat bread (so that I don’t turn completely Thai) and a glass of orange juice (from the market, where the oranges are green!). We are lucky, in that BABSEA provides us with a variety of fruit each day at Uniserv, which we are able to munch on: bananas in the morning, pineapple and watermelon in the afternoon, and a variety of delicious local fruits all the time. Each morning I eat 1-2 bananas and in the afternoon I partake of the smorgasbord of fruits and today was no exception.

In addition to this supplement of my diet, today BABSEA bought us lunch at the local Women’s Detention Center. This Detention Center has a program (I believe it is sponsored by BABSEA) that teaches the women English and skills to help them become useful members of society when they are released (this is a minor detention center for women who are caught stealing or selling drugs). The program teaches women to sew, clean, cook, etc. and one business they have is a restaurant across the street from the center, which is where we ate lunch today, where women from the center work and are taught cooking skills. The food was good and eating only rice and sautéed veggies was a nice change from the constant influx of Asian spicy, saucy dishes. Thus, I was able to go half the day without even needing to use my 32 Baht (although I suppose the food I bought yesterday for breakfast, but ate today could be called “cheating,” but as I don’t agree with this project at all and don’t see that it is even close to an accurate representation of what poverty would feel like, I have chosen to ignore this argument by labeling it ridiculous).

The morning and afternoon of orientation activities felt endless. The energy level in our classroom is now at negative numbers and everyone is a little (or a LOT) tired of the orientation process. At this point, I just really want to be in my country placement, working at my job. I have found before, and am finding once again here, that stagnation of my brain is not a good thing and I don’t like being without a true intellectual pursuit. Unfortunately, orientation’s activities are not particularly higher brain function necessitating items and I can now feel brain cells atrophying. A terrible side effect of this is the loss of my patience and a general increase in the sarcasm level. I am finding that the tendency of law school in the US to attract a Type A personality (someone who is nitpicky and detail-oriented) is a universal trait among lawyers around the world. Unfortunately, when you cram this many Type A’s together in one setting, don’t give directions or general guidance, chaos and irritation ensue, causing discord. While we are all trying to stay pleasant through the process of “making it happen” (as Bruce is constantly telling us), things are starting to get a little tense. Luckily, we sorted through most of the administrative details of our next major project today and over the next three days we are focusing on that work in small groups.

After we were released from orientation, Zenia and I walked down to retrieve our laundry, which had been freshly washed, pressed, and folded. Laundry in SE Asia is supposed to be extremely cheap; however, I couldn’t find a place to do it by weight, so it was by load, which is much more expensive. I have decided to start washing everything but my pants by hand in my sink and towards that goal I bought a small bag of hand clothes washing detergent for my t-shirts and delicates (aka undies). Isn’t this amazing? I am turning into such a cheapskate traveler in a foreign country. I now think 150 Baht is too expensive for a pair of pants when it is only around $4.50 in American money. I think I may be going crazy, but I just can’t help it. I’m sure the 32 Baht/day deal isn’t helping this situation either.

The laundry excursion finished, we headed out to some shops on Nemmanhemin that Zenia and Sam wanted to check out. I mostly just tag along and pretend to look around since I’m not really that interested in traditional clothes shopping (cool Thai clothes would be another story), and I’m just waiting until we go back to this bookstore we stopped at a couple days ago. ;) (Isn’t that a shock?) We didn’t stay out long and headed back to the apartments before setting off for Thai language lessons. Now, here is one thing I don’t understand…the language lessons are held at BABSEA house and because of the rule about money, us poor folks at the apartment have to walk for 15-20 minutes to get there. Each night we walk to the house tor Thai lessons, arriving right on time, and the people living at BABSEA house wait and don’t come out until 10 minutes after lessons have started. How does that work?! These people live there and simply have to walk outside to be on time, but they never are! I suppose you could write it off as them following the “Thai custom” of always being late, but I find that a pathetic excuse when none of us are Thai. Urgh. But now my rant is over and I will move on to pleasanter things.

Zenia and I were geniuses tonight and decided to raid the BABSEA fridge for leftovers from lunch today for food rather than paying for dinner out. Thus, we ate rice and veggies for dinner as well and now have 32 extra Baht to split between the next two days, which makes our lives a whole lot easier. Woo-hoo!

To be honest, if I were to describe today in one word it would have to be: throwaway. Today was neither a good day nor a bad day, but definitely not a day of how I want to spend my time in Thailand. Part of the problem is that I am tired (I will definitely be going to bed soon), but the other part is that I am just done with the whole concept of orientation. I am sure things will be looking up tomorrow though. Until then, sleep will be the best cure for my orientation blues. :) Good morning all!