A Ghanaian Funeral

I didn't go to this funeral.

I was just in Ghana for a few weeks working in the field on a project. During my stay, I was asked to join my team to attend a funeral for one of our colleagues who had passed away, over the weekend. Of course, I agreed to join....but it was clear during the experience that I was wildly unprepared and still prone to culture shock.

According to my Ghanaian colleagues, weekends are for funerals. You attend lots of funerals, here - for people you know or people you knew of from others - so that eventually you'll have a sizable gathering for your own funeral. Because in Ghana, funerals are big deals - much bigger than weddings.  I mean, they're big enough to the point that some think they can be a bit excessive.

Perhaps you've seen on social media one or two videos from a Ghanaian funeral? You know, one of the pallbearers dancing with a coffin bouncing on their shoulders?

I find it almost impossible to explain the Ghanaian funeral I attended by comparing it to anything we have in the US...but I found myself comparing it a bit to Indian weddings. It had a lot of pomps and circumstances (like an Indian wedding) and it was long. And apparently, by Ghanaian scale, this funeral was a very small one.

But I'm ahead of myself.

The funeral was in the Central Region - about a five-/six-hour drive from Accra. My 60 Ghanaian colleagues and I sleepily piled into a VIP bus at 2am (!) on Saturday and started our journey. If you've ever driven down Ghanaian roads, you may recall that speeds are managed via ample speed bumps and potholes (every mile or so?). Sleeping on the bus was difficult.

A few towns before we reached the funeral, we stopped at a guesthouse to dress for the service. Ghanaian funerals are formal events - no jeans or sneakers! The standard colors are black and red (with a few exceptions for those in church groups with costumes - yes, costumes - and etc.). Women wear tailored outfits with a flared blouse paired with a mermaid skirt, while men wear smart kente shirts or elaborate "togas". Apparently, in the Ashanti region, funeral attire is so strict that one can be refused entrance if the outfit isn't up to code. Luckily for me, we weren't in Ashanti and I was allowed to wear simple black pants and a modest shirt.

When we arrived, we had to line up and start a procession to the funeral (women in the back, of course) and around the corpse of our late colleague before sitting down.

Okay, so this is when the culture shock for me started during the funeral. There much to unpack in my culture shock, so I will explain the uniqueness in my favorite format - a list:

• The (dressed) corpse was laid out in full view on a table in a clear tent. I was not expecting the body to be on display as fully as it was. In Western funerals, *if* the body is on display, it's only from the torso up. This body, however, was not covered at all - I saw the rigid legs leading to the stiff upper body of someone who has been moved into position after Rigor mortis set in. There was no way to deny death at this funeral, for his body was so clearly visible to all who attended at all vantage points.
  
• The corpse was a month old. In a country that is hot and so very near the equator, I was baffled to see the body in such a well-preserved state...and that they had taken so long to bury the body. My colleagues explained to me that burial customs in Ghana sometimes prohibit bodies from being buried for quite a long time, which means families and morgues will do what they can keep bodies on ice if there are delays.
  Why would there be delays? One example I heard was that if a local royal died before your loved one, you can't bury them until the royal is. And, since funerals are such big deals in Ghana, funerary ceremonies for royals can last weeks/months/years! Which means you just have to wait to mourn your loss until the royals are buried. I'm not entirely sure why this funeral was a month late, but it was - and that was not abnormal to anyone but me.
• There were hundreds of people at this "small funeral". In the West, a large funeral may have 100 people or so; in Ghana, large funerals have more like a few thousand. I was in awe that so many people turned up at the funeral, but was even more surprised when I was told that it was a tiny funeral. The reason why thousands of people didn't show up was that my colleague died rather young and before his parents - in Ghana, burying a child requires a smaller, not-very-spectacular funeral.
  
• The service had lots of emotions expressed. I'm used to funerals being somber, sad events. Ghanaian funerals have (potentially professional?) wailers and sobbing/moaning family members, of course, but there was also a lot of singing and dancing. The church that ran the service brought the chorus. They banged tambourines, sang joyfully to songs about Jesus (I think? It was in Twi, but "Jesus" sounded the same...), and danced in a parade around the center of the funeral grounds - sometimes even around the body. At some point during the funeral, the corpse was moved discreetly into a coffin, which was then placed in the middle of the compound, and more dancing circled it. Some periods of the funeral had rowdy songs juxtaposed with people crying loudly. I didn't really know how to process the information during this service because I felt overwhelmed with emotions at the moment, but I think I was glad to have some levity in what normally is a dark event...even if the contrast was so stark.


• The service was quite long. In my world, funerals are for about two hours. Max. We ended up staying at this funeral for six hours before hopping back in the bus to return to Accra...and we had left early! Once again, funerals can last a long time, and apparently, I only got a taste of all that would be included in the ceremonies. To me, it was extremely long; understanding only a smattering of words - mostly being "Jesus" - probably made it feel even longer.
  
• We had to go through a lot of formalities. So much of the funeral included people moving around, shaking hands of everyone else attending the funeral. And much else of the funeral were different people making speeches (again, in Twi) in what appeared to have been normal standard operating procedures. I'm not sure most of what happened, but there seemed to have been some kind of formula to go through for the event. We did a lot of standing and sitting for songs and other parts that I didn't understand, as well.
  There was one part of the ceremony that was in English: the eulogies. And it was heartbreaking to listen to several people read out their written eulogies in between sobs.

After the initial religious part of the ceremony and people moved around the coffin a few times, it was time for the pallbearers to lead the hundreds of attendees to the burial. We were in a rural community, so everyone piled onto the road and slowly walked to the cemetery off on the shoulder of the road, at the end of the village.

Did I mention that it was hot out in rural Ghana? It was probably 100F/37.8C outside and as the sun climbed the sky, all of my colleagues and I started to pour sweat (I won't lie...I was comforted to see that I wasn't the only one sweating). There was a point during the day where I wasn't sure my clothing would ever come off again from my sweaty body. I wasn't sure if I'd ever know what it felt like to be cold again, either. There was some cooling wind...but not much.

At some point after the burial, I realized I had an urgent need to urinate. A few of my lady colleagues helped me find a village toilet, which was harder than it sounds as Ghana is known in my sector as having low sanitation coverage. Anyway, somebody showed us to a roofless structure with walls that wrapped around like a spiral and told me to have at it. I walked cautiously through the spiral to find a stained floor and a small hole in the side of the wall that outputted into a divet near someone's home. This was the only toilet in the community apparently, so I took off my pants and squatted...and proceeded to urinate openly and indiscriminately. It was so hot out I couldn't tell where my urine was going, but I would be lying if I said I didn't get any of it on my person. Oh well.

The happenings continued.

Our organization wanted to donate some money to the bereaved family, which meant the formalities continued for us. All 60 of us were ushered into a family compound where we sat and waited for the bereaved family members to greet us. My understanding is that we first had the widow's family leaders come to greet us and asked us our intentions, to which someone on our team represented us and stated our intention to donate money. The widow's family left, satisfied. Afterward, we waited for a while until the bereaved blood family joined us and we went through the same formalities again. Each time a new group or family came to go through this process with us, there was handshaking. Everyone had to give each other handshakes. Which meant I shook a lot of people's hands that day. Many of them seemed quite pleased to have shaken the hand of a foreigner at the funeral - it appears I added some prestige to the funeral and showed that our colleague had had an international network.

Once the handshaking ended, we then had to do the process all over again, this time in public at the official ceremony where donations were publically announced. Again, someone had to state our intentions to give money to the family, and we had to shake hands. The difference with this version was that afterward our team had to dance around the altar that replaced the coffin before we were able to leave the funeral and head home. 

We finally got back to Accra around 9pm - about 20 hours after our days started. But, of course, not without me peeing on myself one last time (this time at a gas station) while we headed back.

Overall, it was a fascinating experience. I wish I had thought to have read up more in what a Ghanaian funeral would entail, and I wish I had prepared myself better to deal with an overwhelming cultural experience in blistering heat. But it is still a memory that I will not forget and is giving me food for thought about my own future funerary experiences and last wishes. I'm sure I got some of the details mixed up or misunderstood, but based on my understanding of what happened that day, the Ghanaians hold their deceased in the highest of esteem and respect.

One last note: I found this article about how some of the funeral calls in Ghana can be quite comedic - enjoy!

A Malaysian Wedding Trip

Murals in Penang

Malaysia was Stop Three on my flight around the globe. Malaysia was originally going to be Stop One, as I was going to join up with a few friends to attend one of our (Denise's) weddings. But then my work trip was tacked on. And here we are.

Jetlag & Confused
When I arrived, I was confused about where I was ("Which country am I am? Who am I?"). I realized while in the immigration line that I had arrived a day earlier than I had thought and realized that the connecting flight I had to Penang wasn't until the next day.

My friends, mystified that I didn't know where I was or what day it was (and that I was a day earlier than I told them I'd be - surprise!), took me out for dinner at an outdoor market. We feasted on all kinds of fish and vegetables and chicken dishes. Eating with friends and soaking in the heat of KL melted my confusion.

I found a KL boutique hotel for the night in Chinatown that was beautiful and had outdoor bathrooms, which was delightful. My toilet and shower were in a private courtyard! There were shades that kept any guest staying above or below me to peek at me. There was rain falling down on the courtyard next to the courtyard when I showered.

The next day I hopped in a car with friends from Colorado for a road trip to Penang. We had decided to remove ourselves from the wedding chaos so Denise could have one less thing to worry about...and so we could travel around the country some.

Once we got out of KL, driving to Penang felt a lot to me like driving through much of the US, aside from the tropical vegetation everywhere. There was a lot of open space with small towns hugging the highway. Much of the drive to Penang was pretty uneventful.

In Penang
We got to the island of Penang and drove in the rain to the UNESCO town of Georgetown and waited for our Airbnb host. Our Airbnb was outside of the tourist areas, which meant that it was quiet and had a nicer view of the water. After we checked in, our host insisted on cramming us into his car and give us a tour around town for a while. While it was a nice gesture, we were starving and really weren't interested in getting a full-on tour. We wanted to gorge on street food, which is what Penang is known for! We finally got let out in a food alley, ravenous and eager to eat something. Anything.

Luckily for us, "anything" in Penang is worth trying. And so we did. We ate a lot of great things while in Georgetown: assam laksa, duck sausage noodles, chendol, laksa regular, nasi lemak, and so many other things of which I don't remember the names. Everything was fresh and bursting with flavor. I didn't know half of what I was eating....but I was pleased as punch with all of the the tastes.

We seemed to arrive there on a quiet day for the town. We saw a lot of tourists (which, with its UNESCO status, isn't very surprising), but things were not open for tourists to do. We managed to find a small museum - the Museum of Glowing Image - where we walked around under purple lights for an hour. It was ridiculous, but we had fun being silly while glowing in the dark.

We were still fighting off jetlag, so we went to a night market for a bite to eat and quickly walked back to the Airbnb to crash hard.

The next day we decided to drive around the island to see what is happening in Penang outside of the tourist-centred area. We visited the local snake temple (it is a temple with snakes in it, and you can hold them!) and got lost driving around because Google Maps gave us directions to roads that didn't exist (or were lost to the jungle overgrowth). That's when we stumbled upon the Tropical Fruit Farm. The title of the farm tells you exactly what the attraction was - a farm of tropical fruit...but we had a blast on the tour, tasting and learning about the plants along the farm.

We spent another day in Georgetown before heading back to wedding ceremonies. It was a supremely hot and exhausting day. We walked around to see all of the tourist sites like the murals, ate some not-so-local cakes, visited the Cheah house, and walked around the port neighborhoods with drop toilets on the edge of the docks. Walking around in 90F degree heat and 95% humidity, though, can be trying on the body. We slept early and hard that night.

Back in KL
The next morning we drove back to KL to get ourselves fitted in saris for the wedding and have amazing ice cream with the bride-to-be and some other international people. The couple had a group of us foreign friends attending their wedding, and we quickly became an international group of friends (I'll call them "The Friends"). We agreed to go touring around the next day to stay out of the couple's way while they ran last-minute errands for the wedding.

Batu Caves
The Friends arranged to visit the Batu Caves in the morning. We got there before it was too hot outside, which to be honest isn't saying much because it was still very hot.

The Batu Caves are an impressive sight because there is (1) a large, steep staircase to the caves (there are two) that loom above the tour buses and (2) a massive statue of Lord Murugan that guards the height of the stairs. The climbing....was treacherous. Not because of the number of stairs to climb - I mean, I'm a New Yorker and we climb stairs a lot - but because the stairs were narrow and uneven. To make our trip up to the caves more precarious, there was a mound of sand next to the stairs and a pile of small plastic buckets next to a sign requesting tourists to carry full buckets of sand to the top (for construction...which, of course, we did).

Once we reached the top of the stairs and went into the cave temple (the popular cave), we were all appreciative of the gaping hole in the mountain, but I kept thinking "...was this why I lugged two buckets of sand for?!" My travel partners agreed to go to the more sciencey cave (the other, less popular cave) and take a tour that walked us deep into the darkest crevices inside the mountain. We were loaned hard helmets and penlights, and off we went with a tour guide into the depths of the cave. It was beautiful and so well worth the expense. We got to explore different rock formations and got to an area where there was a skylight into the cave that lit up a gorgeous, quiet, mossy nook of the cave that made me think of some kind of magical backdrop to a fairytale.

Upon leaving we saw an armada of tour buses coming to the caves and watched hordes of tourists drip with sweat as they crawled up the stairs. I'm so glad we went early.

Before we made our train back to KL, we visited the only other tourist site nearby - the Ramayama Cave. This cave was ground level, and a wild(ly strange) sight to behold. There, the Hindu community took a natural cave and carved it out so that the inside of cave walls became platforms all along the perimeter to showcase a life-sized 3D display that unfolded the story of the Ramayama. With statues and paintings. Most of The Friends didn't know much about Hinduism, but even my knowing smatterings of the story didn't keep me from being bewildered and amazed.

Once back in KL, another friend of Denise and mine - Alicia - joined us getting our hands henna-ed for the wedding and partaking in essential tourist shopping in Central Market. Later on, she led us to a local restaurant that served Chinese food and ordered us a whole lot of foods that were delicious and fascinating and things many of us had never eaten before - smelly fish soup and congealed pork knuckles. It was family-style and a local hangout. We had so much fun we shut down the shop.

Wedding Time
The big day finally came - the day for Denise's wedding! And it was all day, so it was a big deal. Why was it so long? Because of the cultural mash-up that was going to happen; she is Chinese and he is Hindu, but both are also Malaysian. We had three different chunks of wedding celebrations to experience before the day was over.

The first part was Chinese. We arrived at Denise's family's house before the sun rose. We met a lot of bleary-eyed family members setting up the buffet (it felt so weird to eat spring rolls so early) and prepare the festivities. This part of the day was when the groom had to play games with the bride's family and friends and persuade them to let him into the house to find his bride. This took a few hours and a number of different "obstacles" for him to overcome. It was all in fun, luckily, and he was successful in retrieving his bride.

Once that happened, The Friends (and some of the bridal party) shuttled over to another home to get changed into saris and kurtas for the Hindu festivities, which were scheduled around lunchtime (based on the celestial alignments the Hindu priests deemed appropriate). The sari changing took a while - by the time we were fitted and ready to go we hurredly drove into town to the temple.

Once we got to the temple, we were pleasantly surprised to see one of our other girlfriends (Pritha). She flew just that morning there from India with her husband to attend this part of the weddings.

A few hundred other people also decided to observe the wedding at the temple.

It was fun to watch the Hindu wedding because it was a whirlwind of noise and processions that none of us understood (and apparently not even the couple fully comprehended). There was flowing music and vibrant colors that made it still exciting to witness. AND we all got snack bags during the ceremony. The Friends sat in a clump and were fortunate that a few of the older aunties sat near us and explained in English as best they could what on earth was going on. The rest of the crowd seemed just as bewildered about us being there as we were watching the ceremony.

The public wedding processions ended after a while and people grabbed plates of buffet food before heading off. The Friends slowly shoveled food in our mouths as we sweated it back out again and left for a long break before we rejoined the now-married couple. I napped the entire break

The final part of the wedding was the reception in a restaurant and felt a lot more Western than the rest of the day. There, we ate even more food and danced the night away. We also watched some of the FIFA World Cup game when we needed breaks from the dancing. It was a wonderful ending to the wedding, and more intimate than a lot of the rest of the day.

But I was exhausted and burned out. Not as burned out as the married couple was, of course.

The next day I requested a day alone. I went to the Patronus towers mall (oh the irony of finding quiet time in a big mall). After my break, we met up for dinner one last time with the married couple before my flight out. The dinner was a lot more low key than the rest of the wedding festivities - we hung out at tables in the groom's front yard and talked about nonsense, and caught up on each other's lives. What was so extra wonderful about this trip and wedding was that we ended up making more friends.

End Thoughts
The trip to Malaysia had a few themes that I will reflect on more as I continue my life of travel:

• I prefer slow travel. This trip, albeit fun and action-packed, was not slow. A lot of my fellow travelers wanted to see everything, exploring all of the things and walk all of the roads. That path is not for me - I was exhausted so much of this visit. Instead, I like taking my time while I travel. Maybe I won't see everything (read: all touristy things), but I get to go at a relaxing pace and see the things that really mean something to me. And often, I don't find the touristy stuff very interesting. This does mean that I do more research about where I am going before I get there, normally. Oh yeah, and mid-day naps are the best, even when I'm missing out.
• I love SE Asian food. I love the unique flavors smashed together in one dish. I love that the desserts are funky and not chocolatey (even though I love chocolate). I love the comfort in even the spicy soups. I love everything about them. It is amazing.
• Hot and humid is hard. I already knew this from my previous trips in SE Asia, but it bears a reminder, especially after scaling Penang in 95% humidity and 95F heat. Hydration salts are my saving grace on those kinds of days.
• Malaysia? It's Okay. Surprisingly, Malaysia is not my favorite place, despite it having amazing food and some very interesting spots to see. For me, it was culturally not too far away from the US, which to me is a mix of a bunch of cultures to the point where there is a missing keystone to the culture. It is an odd place of rigid laws and lax customs, which is a bit confusing. I can't say I would ever want to live in Malaysia, but I was glad I got to see more of it with my friends and see my friend at a joyous occasion in her life.

Leaving Brisbane

When I returned to Brisbane, I was surprised with the challenges I had with readjusting. I had major jet lag from the flying, and people commented for a week or two that I seemed flat or unwell. I’m not really sure what was going on, but I was hurting for a little bit after returning from SE Asia. Either I missed the lifestyle I had grown accustomed to in Phnom Penh, or I was recuperating from months of being sick off and on there. Either way, it was hard.

I do know that I was struggling to adjust to the bus system in Brisbane. In most of my adventures through SE Asia I was used to hailing a tuk-tuk driver with a simple nod of my head and for small denominations of dollars get carried to anywhere in the area I desired to see. In Bangkok, there’s a transit system that operates regularly, much like the NYC subway system only above ground. In Brisbane, on the other hand,  I lived in a place where buses were maybe every 30 minutes normally needed at least one transfer somewhere to get where I wanted to go. There was a lot more planning that had to happen for me to get anywhere.

Brisbane, after all, is a very large suburban-urban area. Or, as many people told me time and time again, Brisbane is a big country town.

Which meant I was at the mercy of the usually-late TransLink buses that would take me from Point A to Point B..with about 20 points between the two. During Brisbane’s cool winter time. With shops closing at 6pm every day (as opposed to SE Asia’s “open late” culture). Being a famously impatient and cold-adverse person, I did not take to these readjustments easily.

Most of my first four weeks of being back emphasized finishing my piece de resistance – my Final Project for the Masters of Integrated Water Management! I am pretty good at time and project management, so I was ahead of schedule and was able to calmly hunker down and polish my 70-page paper over and over again until I could submit it several days early. I booked several health appointments during this time (I wanted to check everything before I left since it was cheaper there than in the US), where most professionals remarked how calm I seemed considering how close my deadline was.

Admittedly, my calm demeanor and confident project management did not prevent me from stress eating. And I did have a hospital run a few weeks after returning…but that was mostly because I had had my medication adjusted just before and my health insurance told me I needed to make sure I was not reacting adversely to the change. Unfortunately, I had another infuriatingly bad run with the public hospital system in Australia (with a doctor yelling at me about how we are all going to die someday while I was asking him if I was okay) that may haunt me for a while to come. Don’t worry – I am still fine, just angry at a cocky doctor who was less than helpful with a simple concern.

Also, one week before submitting my paper there was a full-time conference on WASH in Brisbane. This was a huge week, as I was wearing several different hats every day at the conference, depending on the audience and time of day. I was working my consulting job a few hours during each day of the conference while I also represented my masters program…while trying much as possible to network for my own emerging WASH career. In some ways, the week was overwhelming because of the amount of people I talked to, but I also felt in my element. I am a social person who is hungry for learning and likes to network, after all. It was also very fun to see those I met in Phnom Penh and throughout my consulting/education come together and weave in and out for a few days.

And then, I submitted my paper.

I submitted it early, and it was anticlimactic. I was expecting some kind of little trumpet announcing my completion, or maybe a hug. Instead, I simply got an email saying, “Assessment Received”. And that was that. A few days later my friends from the class got together to celebrate our completion of the program – only then did I feel like I was really done.

Of course, my six weeks back in Australia included reuniting with friends and seeing people I had met throughout the last year and a half. I met up with friends as much as I could before I left – for dinner, for lunch, for festivals, for walks.

Some of my closer friends and I took a few days to rent a cabin in the Bunya Mountains and enjoy some relaxing freedom with each other before we started to return to our own countries. On our trip, we stocked amazing amounts of food that we cooked between long hikes around the mountain trails. There were wallabies carpeting the landscape with little joeys poking out of pouches everywhere! The air was clean (and COLD!) and smelled like trees and wooden stoves. At night, we’d go outside and gaze at the Milky Way in the darkness of a quiet, lamp-less place. We talked about funny and serious things over wine and movies. We fought off red-bellied black snakes before munching on trail mix. The retreat was a lovely respite from the rest of the world.

I worked until I left to return to the US (I am still consulting, too) so I did not have a lot of downtime before leaving. But that’s okay, because it meant I was busy and productive, which I like. 

A few days ago, I got on a redeye plane that took me out of my Australian Chapter of Life and placed me soundly back into the US for the next chapter that I have yet to open. I got a bit emotional while I left, but by now I have moved back and forth so much that it's become almost standard procedure for me.

In reflection about Australia, people asked me if I would take a job and live there. The answer is, I’m not sure.

The whirlwind 18 months have been so incredible and eye-opening that I feel it really gave me a chance to learn about my adult self and become more me. Australia was definitely a key piece to my transformation and incredible experience. It’s definitely a beautiful and peaceful place with more adorable and fuzzy animals than you can shake a stick at. And the people I’ve made friends with in Australia are outstanding and supportive friends. I am so glad that they are in my life and I wish I could safely bottle them up and take them with me wherever I end up. 

That said, I’m used to a different lifestyle that lets me be more mobile without a car or worrying about early business closing hours. I’m not used to watching TV in the evening - I'm more about  exploring interesting social events in random parts of the world. In some ways, the Australian culture is perfect and family-friendly and relaxed and secure…but I don’t think it’s for me. I like messy, adventurous, buzzing, aggressive places and cultures…like what I've experienced in NYC and Phnom Penh. I like dirt and tightly-packed streets where I can escape for a weekend. I like knowing that I have a small patch of city I can walk around and get everything I want without taking a 45-minute bus where I will feel carsick. 

I think if I was a quieter person with a lot less demands on a place (i.e. free and diverse activities, late-night options), and with a family to care for, I would jump on the opportunity to stay in sunny Australia. For now, I think I will love my Australian Chapter and look forward to visits back for friends and vacations.

Some Nights in Bangkok

It has been a while since I was in Bangkok, but bear with a very long summary about a few days in Bangkok.

I landed in Bangkok late at night, and quickly got into a cab to Peruvian Lorena’s place. Lorena is doing some work in Bangkok, and she generously offered me to stay with her while I was in town. It was fantastic to catch up with an old friend, and celebrate nine years of our adventurous traveling friendship. We laughed a lot, and talked about all kinds of things, big and small.

The first full day in Bangkok I felt the punch of humid heat again. I have learned my lesson; Southeast Asia is hot! And, as a result, is covered with indoor malls.

Along with the heat, I was overwhelmed with the intensity of Bangkok. Bangkok has a lot of everything (i.e. buildings, people, shops, and cars) and pulses with advertisements (both video and print) that felt like having my brain being pulled like taffy. There is an air of excessiveness that comes with the commercials and inside the malls. Luckily, I forged through the city to discover its vibe, and gratefully bought copious amounts of delicious iced juices from the street corners. It was awesome!

I started the day by going to the Dusit Palace and admire its decadence– mesmerizing beetle wings covered chairs and gold-gilded table pieces decorated the building. Intricately-woven tapestries dazzled the walls. My eyes drank in a lot of things there, but sadly I couldn’t take pictures inside, so it’s hard to describe all that I saw.

Experiencing Bangkok, starting at the palaces, I had two surprises.

One of the surprises I had was realizing I could not walk into many places with my normal tee-shirt and jeans ensemble with a travel bag. I was ping-ponged between buildings and told to put different belongings in lockers in two separate locations. I finally understood that there was a strict dress code, for women: I had to wear a long skirt in order to go inside. I mulled this over for perhaps 30 minutes, confused and overheated. I finally broke down and bought the 50 Baht (US$1.40) sarong they had for sale in the gift shop, wrapped up my legs, and journeyed towards the security line. Happily, the sarong is great quality and is now functioning as pajamas.

The other surprise I had while in Bangkok (and first noticed at the palace) was the shocking number of Chinese tourists everywhere. This was not really a good thing, as Chinese tourists seem to typically come in tour groups by the busloads and have little respect for personal space and museum etiquette. I was jostled and pushed around by hundreds at the tourist sites, and felt suffocated while trying to get through. There were signs in several languages insisting on silence while at the palace, specifically, though they did not much seem to care for that rule and the palace roared with conversation. It was frustrating, to say the least.

After the adventure at the palace, I went to the MBK center (it’s huge - 6 floors I think!) for some headphones and a peek at souvenirs. I waited for Lorena with a matcha green tea ice cream float; it was so delicious I realized that I would like Bangkok just fine.

The allegations of food in Thailand being incredibly delicious are all true. It’s often extremely spicy, but many times the level of heat I endured was my own (silly) doing. The diverse food that line the streets are amazing (and super cheap), and the restaurant food tastes like joy. I did not have very many times I didn’t like the food I was eating while in Thailand.

Lorena and I met up and got a massage. At this point, it became clear to me that English would not get me very far in Thailand. Most people don’t speak a lot of English, if any, and it’s more helpful to pick up some of the Thai/Isan that is spoken in the area. I learned this because my massage was great and thorough – a bit too thorough for my sensitive self. I cringed and clutched onto the bed while thinking to myself how it was a great time to learn phrases like “please be much lighter I’m sensitive” and “I have an injury there!” Instead, I yelped and whimpered loud enough for the lady to stop and reconsider her strength a few times. But it was still a great way to help my swollen travel ankles recuperate.

The second day I worked for a while in a coffee shop called MyCoffee. There, I was distracted by a pet fox licking ice in the back of the café that was fluffy and pitifully adorable. I also went to another mall further out of town called JJ Mall. There, I was trying to find some cotton pants my size. This has proven to be a horrible area of the world for big people with big hips (aka me) to find clothing that fits them. Shopkeepers would look at my backside and just shake their heads dramatically, giving me the impression that they’d never seen anyone like me before.

I also saw an outdoor market that sold fish (both pet and edible) in rows of plastic bags outside, next to bags of living crickets (for eating), next to other strange shops full of peculiar finds. I felt stunned to go through the market, and felt kind of bad for all of the fish.

At night Lorena and I took a boat to Asiatique (which is like a night market/mall that has anything you could ever dream of eating or buying) to enjoy the sacred Loy Krathong Festival. During Loy Krathong, people give offerings to the goddess of water at the end of the rainy season to thank her and apologize for polluting the rivers and lakes. It’s also seen as a purification ceremony for some. Overall, it was bright and a lot of fun. It felt a bit like being in Times Square on New Year’s Eve with all of the people tightly packed in the area, but there was music and food everywhere to easily enjoy. I had bought Lorena and me a krathong offering, and we participated in the ceremony; I think the goddess heard us, as it started to pour soon after we offered our krathong.

In the third day I took a long tail boat on the river that went to the Grand Palace. The boat ride was harrowing; as it literally flew in the air and crashed back into the river, I wondered whether I had made a horrible foreigner choice taking the questionable boat to the site. I made it out alive, and that’s all that matters now.

The Grand Palace was, of course, loaded with the aforementioned tourists, but I was impressed with the beauty of the palace grounds and the intricate designs on the buildings around me. I couldn’t stay long because of the crowds and toxic heat, but I am glad I got to see it for a little bit.

Nearby is the Wat Pho with the big Reclining Buddha, and I went over to see the temple for a while and relax in some shade. It was gorgeous, and I felt like I could have stayed there for days in its peaceful fortress. There weren’t many tourists there when I went to visit, which was a relief, so I took my time loving every sculpture and spire. I have been trying to show respect to Buddha while in Southeast Asia, and I went in to pray a few times in some of the rooms. One time I felt like I was having a real connection with Buddha – either due to the intense heat or an actual connection with the Buddha – which blew my mind for a while.

Afterwards, I hid from the heat in anther mall (Terminal 21) and waited for a friend - Counselling Roshni – to meet up with me for dinner. She is from Bangkok, and I was looking forward to hearing some more context from a local about this amazing city. Once the sun went down, we walked around the central area and she explained to me things, such as that the homeless people there are run by the mafia, which is why one should not tip them. I was shocked.

We ended up eating at a restaurant called Cabbage & Condom, which is a restaurant that advocates safe sex in a big way. It was founded by a guy who wanted to help Thailand manage its concerning population rate and a national AIDS epidemic through advocacy and education. The restaurant is part-workforce development and advocacy, and I think it does its job well. The decorations and lamps are covered in condoms, and after eating a great meal with Roshni they gave us condoms to take home. I really recommend the place.

On my last day in Bangkok before going to Isan/Ubon for class, I woke up early for a cooking class, called Cooking with Poo! The woman’s name is Cham poo, which means rose apple, but her nickname has gotten her some global popularity. Knowing my passion for sanitation and food, Roshni recommended the class; seeing the title of the class, of course I signed up. It started by walking through one of the local markets that is mostly for locals, which means it wasn’t all cleaned up and sterilized like many tourist places can be. Instead, we saw the dirty and grimey and fascinating face of Bangkok that I don’t think many get to see so clearly. In the market, we saw filleted and stuffed frogs, all kinds of edible insects, boiled chicken feet, and an array of fruits and vegetables I’ve never heard of! They warned us that some of us might be disturbed by what we saw, but I found I was more impressed and captivated than anything!

We ended up at Poo’s home in a poorer community, where she taught us how to make simple yet tasty Thai food, such as pork larb, thom ka soup, and garlic chicken. The cooking space was colored with fun colors and I bonded with some of the older British students there. Poo also made us her mango sticky rice, which may have actually changed my life to a certain amount (I can’t express how delicious it was!).

After the epic cooking class, I met up with some fellow classmates who arrived to Bangkok for our intensive in Ubon the next day. We went to a riverside hotel for drinks and headed out for dinner at Asiatique. It was a lovely way to finish a memorable few days in Bangkok. I look forward to returning in a month.

On Language

A note about yesterday's fun: Some of us from class held a picnic at school by the campus' bucolic lakes so we could go to the university's Earth Hour celebration later in the evening. We were looking forward to see some good music while stargazing when the lights and electrical devices would be turned off for an hour. Welp, our experience was not quite what we had in mind, as UQ decided to not participate in the hour and left the school fully lit all night. That also meant that few people felt inclined to turn off their mobiles, and you could see people texting and shooting pictures when Earth Hour should have happened. And we heard one-too-many aspiring Bob Dylan's, as most of the music was performed by undergrads playing hippie-influenced acoustic songs about sadness and other profound topics (I'm not hating on hippie culture, it just is not my music of choice). There were also a few petitions making circuits on the lawn, hoping to sway massive corporations to change their ways with the signatures of a handful of students. So my people left early, mildly confused from the experience.

Photosynthesis Drew brought up the good point that UQ probably could not participate because the campus hosts a heaping ton of fragile lab experiments with refrigeration and lighting that mustn't be disrupted for academic studies. Still, it was frustrating to see these young students unable to unplug their phones for even an hour, even if they were discouraged from the university's decision. We did not even bother turning off our phones, because there didn't seem to be a point, and we left shortly after the hour started.

Now, back to language. Or rather, languages.

It is going to be pretty amusing when I come back from Australia having learned to speak fluent Spanish during my studies. I believe this will happen for two reasons. Firstly, there is a good amount of Latinos in my program, and I get to hear them speak with each other in Spanish between class sessions. Secondly, my roommates come from Ecuador and Peru, and they are in a constant stream of conversations en espanol, and they encourage my meager efforts to participate with the Spanglish I have in my brain. Living in NYC has prepared me for this experience, with Spanish signs plastered in all of the subways, and I feel I am up for the challenge. But still, it's not at all what I had anticipated for my living abroad experience Down Under.

As for the Aussie version of English, I am facing small snags with my integration of language and dialect. There are words they use in different ways than us in the US, and it's sent me into some pretty amusing arguments about which is the correct word to use for the context.

Some fun examples:

• Squash vs. Pumpkin - We got in a long debate over the picnic about this because I brought some spaghetti squash to share (They did not know what spaghetti squash even was! I bought it at the market yesterday, so I know it exists here, but they were awestruck by my dish.). When I announced the dish and its ingredients, they asked what I meant exactly by a squash. It seems that Aussies use the word "pumpkin" for all squash. To them, squash isn't really a word except for one or two specific kinds of squash (which I believe are also called zucchini in the US). The orange pumpkin we love and carve/bake in autumn in the US is probably a species they don't know here, which is pretty depressing. But how on earth is a spaghetti squash supposed to be called a spaghetti pumpkin?! That just seems ludicrous. Butternut squash I can see might get away with the word "pumpkin" in its name, and maybe even acorn squash. But spaghetti squash?! Never. Denver Meg and I battled it out with Kylie, Chris, and Drew for a long while, and we left it moot.
• School vs. University - Okay, I'll let them have this one. University, though an education and schooling facility, is a better way to indicate what level of "school" you're in. But it's a hard habit to kill.
• Casserole vs. Stew - When discussing cultural dishes, I've told many people about how in the Midwest we are all about the casseroles. I've gotten a lot of tilted heads when I mention this, and I recently found out it's because Aussies use the word casseroles for stew-like concoctions. It makes sense now why people seem flabbergasted that I'd bake a casserole in the over, but I'm not sure why a stew would be called that. I mean, a casserole just *sounds* like something that wants to sit in an oven for a while and roll around in a baking dish. I feel like I should educate these poor souls sometimes in the obsession of the Americans that is a big, creamy casserole.
• Lightbulb vs. Globe - Imagine my disappointment when I was first walking through aisles in grocery stores here and did not find big world globes happily sitting on shelves, waiting for my amusement. I get it, it's shaped like a globe, but they are not globes. They are bulbs of light! I was devastated that my desires to spin a globe in a supermarket would remain unaccomplished.
• Gas vs. Petrol - Another one I have to give to them. Gas, while a simple monosyllabic word for all to enjoy, means other things in science that can make it a bit confusing. We put petrol in our cars, because it's petroleum. I can stand behind that one.

Also, Aussies love to abbreviate stuff. I know I've mentioned this before, but it is worth repeating as it's starting to become like a new language in my head. I was listening to the radio a few days ago and realized I didn't understand half of what was going on because every word in the sentence was amputated at the end and had an "o" or an "ie" glued onto the stump. My favorite example is how afternoon somehow magically became arvo, which still flustered me as there is no "r" or "v" in "afternoon" and I'm not sure what inspired that.

Sometimes I wonder why they even bothered to commit word massacres - a lot of the words that are chopped up remain the same number of syllables, just with a different endings. Like bikkies (biscuits, aka cookies). And Brissy (for Brisbane). And brekky (breakfast). I've heard an incredible amount of words that are no longer their originals, though, especially when I was listening to the radio. It seems like they are tired of the ever-so-common English and just want to make their own language. If they were going for efficient slang, though, they have not succeeded.

Older and Socialable

I have been grappling with a feeling I'm not used to lately. When I was younger, traveling long term felt extremely exciting, and I felt nimble and able to move around without much hassle. Over the last year or two, however, I can feel myself starting to slow down in my long-term travel plans. I am less interested in moving all over the globe constantly, and more interested in shorter travel itineraries with a home base somewhere (that "where" is still a big question mark). I feel like I'm looking around for a home base, where I want to settle down.

It kind of feels like my wheels are getting rusted up, or are just harder to move. Kind of like an old vehicle that needs a lot of greasing up to get anywhere. It is a lot more work to move. This feeling unsettles me, as I love traveling and have always felt my best when on the go. I don't know, maybe I'm changing as a person as I age, and I'm wanting something more solid - though I have set that "solid" bar pretty low so far. Or maybe I just want to know that I won't be alone every time I get up and move somewhere else. I'm working on it.

Despite this downer feeling, some fun things have still been going on. I went to a networking event last week for young water professionals with a group called AWA. Much to my surprise, the event was mostly a panel for the attendees on how to network. I have always assumed everyone learns how to network in school, but I guess not. In business school we did, anyways - it was practically graded! I appreciated the lecture, and learned little nuggets of usefulness, but overall I had to remind myself that I am not coming from the same place as everyone else in the water world. I come from the other side of the world, in more ways than one. In the time we did get to network, I ended up chatting up with a few fascinating people, including one of the panelists who essentially seemed like who I'll be in 15 years time.

Since living in Brisbane, it's become very clear just how much of an extrovert I am. Especially in the classroom. Out of 19 students in my program, we are all pretty confident that I’m the only extrovert out of all of us. Most are engineers, and I guess it makes sense that they would be introverts, but I am not used to being the only extrovert around me. I know extroversion versus introversion is a scale and all, but it seems like I'm definitely strongly on one side of that scale. It’s a bit unsettling at times, because I feel like I’m extremely chatty in class….and there are some attributes to being an introvert about which I'm envious. On the other hand, my classmates comment on my networking abilities and how I am able to pick up a conversation with most people in any situation.

I had Sunday brunch with the Bus Boys (Drew & Nelson) and ended my Sunday enjoying sangria with some of their friends, which was really fun. One of the ladies in the group has offered me her mountain bike on loan so I can more freely practice my bicycling skills in the city. I think I may take her up on the offer.

Other than that, I've been working hard on classwork around the clock for the most part. Nothing new and exciting to report while I continue my assimilation into Aussie culture. Except they're a lot more comfortable walking around barefoot on public streets than I am used to.

Classes & Food

This has been the first week of classes, and I’m pooped. The classes have run every day from 9am to 5pm. This is before my official awake time (which is 10am), and after my designated nap time (the noble 2pm). Hence, pooped. I can even feel a stress cold creeping into my nasal cavity.

The people in my program are great. They are all caring, interesting yet interested people. We come from all walks of life – Australia to Zambia – and I’m really looking forward to learning from everyone over the next year. We've had a real blast getting to know each other through joking, fun conversations (like my evangelizing about toilets), and storytelling. For example;  I tried to explain to some ladies about funerary food traditions from Ireland a few centuries ago. I was grateful that, while they seemed mildly disturbed, they feigned interest and asked me about some food cultures in the US (more on that in a bit).

But I’m still exhausted. I always forget how much learning can tired out the brain. It is as if my brain has been training for some big triathlon with new, fascinating material. I guess that’s kind of the point of starting a new graduate program, right?

So, food. I was explaining to some of the Aussies here about the popular funeral casseroles in the Midwest (particularly with Mormon communities). That led to a discussion of what are casseroles; here I thought everyone in the world had the joy of knowing a good old casserole when apparently that is not the case! They then explained to me their fairy bread (which is sliced bread slathered in butter and topped with sugar sprinkles…??), and someone pulled out a hot cross bun for a snack. This blew my mind - I do not think I’ve ever seen a hot cross bun before. Hot cross buns are a thing! I didn't even fully realize that they ever were a thing, outside of the song played on recorders for 3^rd grade music class. Other assorted rolls were discussed, as well, but I don’t recall much else about them other than the fact they were buns. I think I could happily trade a casserole tradition for a bun tradition, guys. At least, as long as there is a gluten free option. Midwesterners – get on that, please.

On the way to class this morning, I saw a wild cockatoo flying around the trees. Because cockatoos exist in the wild in Australia. All I can do is wonder whether or not wild cockatoos imitate the conversations of passerby folk.

I made a new friend from the gentlemen who helped me illegally cross the street over the weekend (No, he’s not the one who asked me to ice skate, but the other one who was more forgiving of my overall confusion). Photosynthesis Drew came and hung out with a bunch of us yesterday, and he’s a really interesting human with great stories (and we all know how much I love a good story) and pretty impressive accent skills. He finished his PhD at UQ on photosynthesis as a potential tool for renewable energy. I don’t understand it fully, but it sounds pretty cool! We had fun chatting about trees and water last night, and I am glad I am finally meeting proper Australians who can vouch that I have, in fact, been in Australia for the last few weeks.

On a less upbeat note, finding a job here has been pretty difficult. I had the impression that Australia was in a labor deficit and in desperate need of workers…but I am finding that no matter how many receptionist-waiter-tutor-teacher-hostess jobs to which I apply, I am left with burger joints even politely rejecting me via email. It has blown some of the wind out of my sails.

Apparently it has also left me a bit “too available” to the workforce lately – last night I got an email responding to an application I had sent via SEEK. I was confused why they were asking for a full-body photo and my real age. I did some more research to find out that I had supposedly applied to be a stripper at a strip club?! I had thought the name “Love and Rockets” was going to bring me to work at a burger joint.

And no, I’m not going to strip at a club. I’m not that needy…yet.

My last thought is that the preliminary readings have really gotten me to question my personal values and practices. Some of the statistics I've read on our planet’s water situation over the next twenty years are pretty bleak. Increased populations are creating more demand for food/drinks/energy/stuff that require increased water usage…and yet we’re already over consuming what little water we have available on Earth (because despite the fact the world is covered with water, only 10% of all water in the world is consumable).

I am someone who likes to think that I practice what I preach, and now I’m asking myself if I should practice my preaching even more. Should I become a vegetarian, since it’s less water intensive? Should I live in a rural area so I don’t require as much water (though that’s not necessarily always the case)? I am even reconsidering my wanting to have children in a few years; the population increase is only making it less sustainable for our future generations. I’m not sure I’m willing to bring children into a world that cannot promise the essentials needed to survive. Perhaps I could adopt. Maybe I should just have puppy kids. I don’t know. I was gently reminded that I just started my program, and maybe these huge life decisions should take some more thinking before I make them.

Kenyans & Vegans

My Saturday (ahem, Valentine's Day) transported me to Kenya, in a sense. A friend of mine invited me to join him and his friends at someone's house for a gathering. It was a gathering of Kenyans. I am not Kenyan, but I kind of look Kenyan, right?

I had a great time and everyone was really lovely and interesting. Long story short: I learned that in Kenyan culture, house guests are a blessing to the host. That means that it can be a long process to leave. We ended up staying around for nine hours at the house...which was fine! Except that it meant I couldn't run the errands I had planned for after the gathering. It's not a big deal, I just was not expecting such an involved gathering. And, like I said, the people were great so I can't really complain. A few of the couples had babies over, and they would come play with me once in a while during the conversation.

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Today started with a few naps. Yes.

I met up with Miami Dave and his girlfriend Emily at a notable vegan cafe on the northern end of Brisbane. It took a while to get there, though - the trains weren't running today, and the river got in the way.

The river that goes through Brisbane gets in the way. A lot. It winds and coils throughout the town, making it so that some place that might only take 20 minutes of travel as the crow flies ends up taking the better part of an hour. People mentioned it a lot in this first week, but I am really starting to experience it. There's a river taxi that ping-pongs through the river here and there, but since the storm in November, a lot of the terminals are still in repairs.

But anyways, the cafe. It was delicious! I am sometimes skeptical of vegan food because it can taste like how GF food often tastes: cardboard. But we ate generously-sized sandwiches that had good taste quality. My mushroom burger tasted a bit like a grilled cheese sandwich, which pleasantly surprised me. How they knew that was what I really truly wanted, I'll never know.

And they had a shop attached the cafe...with heaps of GF options!!

A small note on the GF life here: it's not so bad. I've found a lot of places indicate "GF" on their menus, and supermarkets have GF aisles, much like in the US. The food has been pretty decent for GF, so I think I'll be alright here diet-wise. In case you were wondering, I bought a crepe mix, cereal, pasta, and cookies. Clearly, my diet is well-balanced and healthy.

We journeyed on to the BrisAsia Festival. BrisAsia is the city's month-long celebration that packages the Chinese New Year with celebrating the city's strong Asian relations. Ladies were dressed in kimonos and drums were being played. And the slowly-growing bonsai were being sold in a booth. The intimate setting of the festival made it easy to glide through quickly. We decided to move on and walk around the city some more.

We walked over a bridge and ended up in an area called South Bank. It's where the city culture is housed - the big performing arts center and modern art museum sit there. The streets are lined with restaurants and bars, so it is pulsing in the evenings and on weekends. And if that stuff doesn't interest you and you roll your eyes because you're in Australia but not near the ocean for goodness sake, you can take a lounge/dip in the area's man-made beach. Man. Made. Beach. It's really nice and clean, which surprised me. I mean, it's essentially a glorified public pool with sand...but something I have noticed here is that people take care of their things. As compared to how a lot of towns in the US are run down and the public facilities are poorly maintained.

We got drinks at a beer garden in the area. Well...I got a "creaming soda" - something us Americans would otherwise lovingly call a Shirley Temple. Yes, chuckle at my love for virgin beverages at bars. I won't stop.

One of the Kenyans I had met the day before, Beatrice (working on her MPH), joined us. We ended up scaling a good amount of South Bank's waterfront together, chatting about travel and our future goals. The city towers sparkled on the other side of the river while we walked through the colorfully-lit gardens and parkways. I have to say, this city has done a fantastic job at bringing beautiful public spaces to the people. It's kind of like being in a theme park sometimes, things look so nice.