How Rainy Season Changes Life

What would you do in you lived in a country where there are pounding thunderstorms and sheets of white rain almost every afternoon? What would you do if you didn't have a car to get places in said thunderstorm? What would you do if your street flooded, and the street next to that, and garbage was floating in it.

Such is life in rainy season, or so I am learning. Last Thursday, it decided to pour at 5pm. Rain storms take on a life of their own. You never know if they will last for 20 minutes or six hours (speaking from experience). I waited until 5:10pm, and then decided I had enough of waiting. I left all my stuff at the office, and drove the 30 minutes home. Naturally this story does not end well. I was completely soaked, but good news was that my phone which made the journey with me, is still completely functional (I can't kill it, which means I can't get a new one).

Rainy season 2011 has been mixed and unusual. It should rain every single day at the same time without fail between May and September. In May it starts raining in the early morning for several hours and by September it's raining in the late evenings for several hours.  I typically welcome the rain because the pressure will built up before rain and it's unbelievably muggy. If the rain doesn't come, it's a long hot evening.
A day can start completely sunny and within the span of one or two hours, a black thunderstorm will spit lightening and rain spitefully at you as it fills the streets with several feet of water (the drainage system in Phnom Penh is inadequate by far, partly due to "the reallocation of funds"...that's code).

However, this year, the rainy season was slow starting . We didn't get much rain until June, and even then it started in the afternoon instead of the morning. It hasn't rained everyday, and we'll go for several days with pressure and mugginess. This year there has also been massive flooding because of phenomenal deluges which last for half days instead of the customary several hours.

In rainy season, most clever people travel with a slicker, or poncho. However, I'm not always a clever person. My raincoat wards off. Many clever people put their belongings in plastic bags which they hide under their ponchos. But I loath plastic. Instead, we plan our days around the weather. It's acceptable to be late or not attend a meeting if it's pouring rain. The streets will empty with motos except for the brave souls in their ponchos.

Also worth mentioning, at least 70 people have died of lightening in Cambodia this year. Why children are not taught to stay indoors during storms is a mystery. Understandably, storms come on quickly and people are in rural rice patties, but still....but still...absolutely preventable deaths.

How to Visit Laos

I can proudly report that I’ve been to Laos PDR. Not many people can say that…but then again…not a lot of people are insane. I was endlessly excited about this trip because it sounded like exactly the sort of place that I would enjoy but never go without the added motivation; beautiful but inaccessible, remote yet uniquely so.

Overlooking Luang Prabang and the Mekong

The real reason I went to Laos was for my work’s annual regional retreat. However, my four day travels before the retreat was my motivation for going. I went early to visit Luang Prabang which is a 12 hour bus trip or a 45 minute flight north of the capital Vientiane. It’s a UNESCO world heritage site.

However, getting from Phnom Penh to Luang Prabang took 30 hours of travel across three countries on two planes, one sky train, several metros, one night train, two buses, and three taxis. This is how not to travel to Laos.

Train Station in Bangkok

From Phnom Penh I flew to Bangkok, about an hour away. I hadn’t been to Bangkok since Thanksgiving 1998, so I was delighted to wander. I went to the Weekend Market (good choice), went to the famous Siam Paragon Mall (good choice), went to Starbucks and bookstores (good choices), and ate Pad Thai and Thai green curry. Bangkok is big and developed and modern. Phnom Penh is not. So the contrast played tricks with my mind.

At 8pm, I boarded the night train to Nong Kai Thailand on the Thai-Laos border. It’s a 12 hour ride on a decent train and when you sleep on the lower bunk, you sleep pretty well. Sometime in the night it started to pour rain. When I woke at 6am, it was still pelting rain. I learned from another passenger that Nong Kai was flooded out which completely made sense so we were instructed to disembark the station before Nong Kai and they would bus us to Nong Kai.

Night Train to Laos!

So maybe 75 backpackers and myself got soaked to the skin scrambling to get on a pink-tasseled bus. The driver wasn’t clear. He left some people in Nong Kai town, he left some people at the Nong Kai station (flooded out, as expected), and some of us he left at the Friendship Bridge border crossing. I got off at the border crossing, and was quickly re-soaked in the process of leaving Thailand and entering Laos. I had specific directions for getting to Vientiane via the train, but in this wet-wasteland border crossing, I was tired, nauseous, displeased and lost. 

I learned after entering Laos that Vientiane is essentially a border town which was a relieving discovery. So I got a taxi and went to the airport, just in time for an 11:30am flight to Luang Prabang. In Luang Prabang, it was sunny, and there were hills, and there were work friends, and there was a shower. And it was awesome. 

Boat Ride on the Mekong to the Caves

Luang Prabang is a medieval kingdom’s capital, turned French vacation town, turned backpacker’s destination, which then went chic. The town and its vicinity boasts over 65 wats which are beautifully preserved by monks is bright orange robes. The town oozes French charm fused with Asian taste. There’s nothing like it anywhere in the world. Located on the “Mighty Muddy Makong,” there’s a tall “hill” in the middle with a stunning views of the countryside. 

Luang Prabang is meant to be relaxing. So we visited wats, and coffee shops, and road bikes in the pouring rain. We took a boat up the Mekong to visit caves with thousands of Buddhas, and stopped at cultural villages to buy scarves. We ate at street markets, browsed through tasteful art galleries, and shopped at what many consider Asia’s best night market. Best of all, we took long walks in the temperate climate. You can’t walk in Phnom Penh. People just think you’re strange. But in Luang Prabang, we were just more white backpacking tourists. I’ve never been happier to be a white backpacking tourist.

 Night Bus to Vientiane

After almost three days in the beautiful mountainous mecca, our work responsibilities summoned us away from my favorite Asian town. Some of our group flew back to Vientiane. I decided to take the night bus, along with another couple from work. I had heard it was a terrible way to travel but it gave me a while extra day in Luang Prabang. Sure enough, it was 12 hours long. For six of those hours, I was slightly aware of the switchbacks every 15 seconds, and that sections of the mountainous road were washed out. We stopped for watery soup at 2am, and after that I took enough motion-sickness pills to sleep through the parts of the ride where people through up continuously (according to a companion). 

Beautiful Wats in Luang Prabang

Vientiane seemed more like a village then a capital city. Apparently the government is very intentional about how they are allowing the city to develop. Until then, it’s like walking through…a super small town. We met with the rest of our group and road yet another bus yet another two hours to our retreat venue, on a dam, in the middle of nowhere. That’s the part of the trip where I got sick with the flu.

Going back after retreat wasn’t fun. The night train to Bangkok was considerably less pleasant, meaning going into a full day in Bangkok, I was tired and cranky. Some of my colleagues made the excellent decision to watch a movie. Theaters are a phenomenon which travelers from the outback of Cambodia drool over. So we went to a theater to Harry Potter, followed by Thai food, followed by a trip to the airport. We got into Phnom Penh at 7:10pm. By 7:37, I was home. It was only then that I was finally able to dry out my damp clothes.

I would go back to Laos. I would even live there. Because they make the best sticky rice. 

How to Learn (August 2011 Edition)

I've recently been slammed with several opportunities to talk about what I'm learning. I talked about learning on retreat, in progress reports, in several of my personal relationships and in other informal setting. I was even asked, "so what do you do, to learn?" I thought this was a very odd question and it actually amused me. But I did think about it. 

I also thought of an analogy. Learning is like a waterfall. The constantly moving river of life won't stop hurling itself over the ledge of change while you stand underneath and wonder what on earth is going on. When you're standing under the waterfall, all you see is life coming at you while you doggy-paddle childishly. It's also the rainy reason in Cambodia, so the river is expanding. And such is life, utter chaos.

So how do you learn? Well, first, you start by doing something you don't know how to do.

Secondly, you do it over and over and over and over again. Practice makes perfect, apparently. I don't know about that, but practice teaches you, and practice keeps you humble.

And third, you figure out what it was you were learning, but this happens when you're old (sometimes dead).

I don't really know what I'm learning. I learned how to drive. I learned how to bake bread. I learned how to travel on the night train. I also (I'm proud of this) learned how to kill huge bugs in my apartment (which involved destroying my mop, long story). For the above situations, you have a baseline (can't do it), indicators of success (get on train, wait for bread to rise), and then the end-line (I can do this activity!). These were the easier things that I've learned recently.

But for life...who knows. Am I more patient? Am I more empathetic? What have I learned in Cambodia that's worth adding to my repertoire of healthy and admirable behaviors, attitudes and values?

Who knows. If anything, learning is non-linear. It's not a neat process like baking bread or driving to work. You take steps forward, and then you backtrack, and then you have a breakdown sobbing on the floor binge drinking pepsi lemon, and then eventually and mysteriously you're excited and try again weeks later with only moderately depressing results, and then you end up going in a different direction. I know that didn't make sense. Learning doesn't make sense either because no matter what conventional wisdom or self-improvement would have you believe, it's a long and complicated process with unclear results. However, it will happen. Because time doesn't actually stand still and we're constantly facing new situations which have the potential to teach us.

But, at least I do something I don't know how to do...a lot...too much actually...exhaustively in fact. So I must be learning. In fact what's written here is one lesson I've learned. Maybe one day I'll be able to label and quantify what I'm learning at this stage in life. After all, hindsight is 20/20...if I'm alive then.

How to Live Alone

I learned something in the months after I graduated uni. In college, being single means you're not in a relationship. In the real world, single refers to your marital status. So I was always single in college and I'm still single in the real world. In both situations, the term is not exactly used complimentary, therefore, years into this dilemma, I'm still perplexed as to it's utility.

It didn't bother me being "single" (in the real world sense) while living overseas until people started asking me if it "bothers" me being single. Being bothered about what bothers me is far more bothersome then being actually bothered by something. I must admit, it blindsided me. I didn't realize it was acceptable to directly ask people if they like being unmarried. The short answer to this bothersome question is "uh...well I chose to come here...and I'm here." I have been known to say the following: "Statistically speaking, the average childless middle-class college-educated American woman marries at 29. I'm on the better end of the feminist movement."

So what bothers me about "singleness" overseas? Difficult question. It's like being asked how I feel about not being blonde. Well...I've never been blonde. Based on my years overseas, I know that often young adults think marriage is the answer to many overseas problems. "It would just be so much easier living overseas if I was married." I've heard this countless times. Strangeness is easier with someone else and life is better when you're not alone. You have someone else to count on in culturally-shocking circumstances, someone to help you quantify and qualify your strange life in it's complexities. Someone else between you and the over-sized stranger the next airline seat over.

I can empathize with the point of view because I've been in plenty of awkward situations by myself I dreadfully wish had never occurred. My personal opinion is this, humans are designed to be in a variety of close relationships (family, friends, spouses, mentors), but we are complete people. Living alone in Southeast Asia thus far has honestly been good for me. It's forced me to go forth and conquer, to stand up for myself, to be self-reliant and self-aware, to consciously go out and make friends, and finally, to read a lot of great books. I have my special people and they look out for me, and I look out for them. It's not easy facing strange things by yourself, but you push through it. This is life, and life rarely comes with shortcuts.

To not love where you are is to make yourself miserable. It's to throw your life back at the universe or back at God and scream, "you suck and you screwed up." What's the point of that? You scream, and then pick yourself back up and address the root causes of those emotions... insecurity...fear...loneliness. The idea that you can't be content how you are, where you are, the size you are, and with your natural hair color, is really quite archaic. Such is life, such is how the cards fell, such is the divine plan...so I find contentment.