A Different World

I am writing from a conference in Bangkok Thailand. It's been an intense week of teaching, discussions, and meetings. Knowing all of us would have mental fatigue, the organizers left Wednesday afternoon free. So 4 other guys and I headed to the river. Well, we had good intentions of going to the nearest point on the river, but the little tuk tuk (like a little motercycle/tricycle used to transport people) driver had other ideas. What should have been a short 5-minute drive ended up being an hour all the way across town. Anyhow, we made it to the river. We decided to take a Thai longboat ride. These boats are so cool - they are long (go figure) with a high, pointed prow. There is a huge engine in the back well above the water with a long propeller. The driver moves the propellor in and out of the water and side to side to steer - there is no rudder.

He took us through several canals around the city. We saw parts of the city that you could see no other way. Houses right up on the canal or on stilts in bordering marshes with no road going to them. We realized we were seeing an entire subculture that probably exists quite separate from the busy city-life of Bangkok. People on little coracles, paddling around getting fish or collecting plants. One place looked like a village built totally on a marsh - all the houses on stilts, no roads anywhere. At one house, I saw a little girl no more than three on the veranda - no railing and the water below. I guess living there, having the water all around is just part of life. So we'd see kids playing in places that any landlubbing parent would freak out about!

Very interesting to see a totally different way of living. Our funniest was the "floating market" - which ended up being an elderly man on a little canoe-like boat floating up to us and offering various trinkets and beer.