First Hotel Mae Sot

... the UN, to decide who will be qualified to be admitted into US. I just felt that it was really cool to see an old friend far away from either one's home (and have not planned in advance), so I made a detour on my way to Bangkok to visit her.<br><br>I spent a night in her luxury hotel (room was paid for by our tax dollars), and talked &#8211; mostly about her new job. It was quite a stressful one - The workload is high; day after ...

... pages on the injustices...... but on to Thailand.<br><br>When I first arrived in January, it was suggested that I might want to do some volunteer work on the Thai/Burma border. I was definitely not interested, and wondered &#8220;who might be helping whom&#8221; if I actually went. Two months later, the idea of searching out some volunteer work was somewhat more appealing, so I gradually made my way across the country to the small ...

... sources. Anyway found the second bus station were the bus to UmPhang should go. They only go 7 am or 15 pm. so half to go up early tomorrow.<br><br>Looking forward to trekking have a compas, matches, knive, gps watch and a poncho so should be a bit prepared

... over the bridge, got checked for swine flu (took our temperature!) and into the Thai immigration office ... new 15 day visa for Thailand done! (After the immigration officer made us write the words "broken" and "heart" in English for him!! Something he wanted to impress a girl with he laughed) We tipped our "guide" and got back into our waiting Tuktuk...off to the bus station !

We arrived back in Maesot about 8.30am after 4 hours travelling and debated whether we should book into a hotel again or make use of the day and renew our Thai visa and travel to Chang Mai.....considering we had exhausted all of the limited options in Mae Sot we decided to do the visa and travel .... A long day ahead. We grabbed a TukTuk and set off to the Burmese border ....

... is delicious. Its similar to Thai food but less fussy and less sweet. Particularly good was the tea leaf salad; fresh tea leaves, fried peas and peanuts, chinese cabbage and dressing we can't work out. Maybe tamarind, lime, sugar and chilli but who knows!? After a few days we made a trip out to Umphang the mountains for a little trek. The journey there was a memorable one, breakneck speeds ...

... of the dump so they can quickly access plastics as they are dumped for resale to recyclers, the worst living conditions I have ever seen, watching one of our Monk students getting his paperwork telling him he will be going to the USA, by himself, in two weeks - pure joy, relief and fear at the same time as the reality set in, sneaking into the free clinic for illegal's and seeing the surgery unit and the absolute deplorable conditions the ...

... anxious kids waiting, there is little time to feel much other than terror, trying to figure out how to turn, when to steer and when to lean, and how to ensure braking and accelerating are separate actions. By the time I made it to school the first day, I was exhausted and just wanted time to savor my accomplishment at having just learned to ride in extreme circumstances. What I found at the school( I hadn't even given any thought about what I might see there ...

... long absence. I would have to hurry up and get a bike before dark because it was Sunday night and we needed to teach Monday morning. Not teaching was not an option as they were despearate for help. Sharon had showed up at the Migrant school a month prior and was given 75 students, aged 7 to 21 in one outdoor class: no books, no materials, a white board and a marker. The Burmese teachers were also sitting in the class as students. Still I cannot imagine how ...

... br><br>Chinese stuff as anything else. That&#8217;s biz. So we do that for a while and roam the streets. <br><br>At one point some crazy Burmese guy raises his fist at me in threat, at which point I grab him by the collar and scream at him in Thai. <br><br>"SO WHAT NOW? WHAT ARE YOU GONNA&#8217; DO?"<br><br>The crowd went wild. The guy did nothing. I released him and he wandered away, clucking defiance. The market people around us ...