Mae Sot

I didn’t expect leaving Mae Sot to be so sentimental. I didn’t expect to make friends that would genuinely be lifelong, or to feel the magic and vibrancy of the town that draws hundreds of foreign aid workers to commit to moving and making a life there.

But damn, Mae Sot got me good!

Last (delish) meal with the ladies before heading off to the airport 😭

(And don’t ask me what’s going on with the hands there...😂)

And to think I was almost forced to leave by my medical school due to the novel Coronavirus (they wanted to evacuate me from the continent of Asia, like in week 2, I said no). Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful for my school’s concern, but after much thinking I decided to insist that I stay and finish off my month working at the Mae Tao Clinic. Because I knew I would always regret not having stayed.

And man oh man I am so glad I did.

I learned so, so much. From the local medics, refugee patients, foreign doctors, fellow med students. I was humbled and in awe, every hour of every day, by the the resourcefulness, resilience, devotion, acceptance...I can go on forever, but lemme move on.

Other than all the mushy introspective stuff, here are some other favorite highlights of my work life in Mae Sot:

The unbelievably gorgeous bicycle ride commute I get to go on every, single, day!

Playing with the orphaned babies, who unfortunately were left behind by families after delivery for various/unknown reasons, but are subsequently raised by the entire 24-hr staff at the clinic. (“They have 50 mothers and fathers, one of the medics often says)

This is Bless, Bless is going to do big things.
He’s one of the brilliant trainees from Myanmar who also come to rotate at the clinic, and I get to soak up all of their crazy stories about practicing medicine in the deep Burmese jungles

Lunch with the medics. They feed me. I buy the ice cream. Good systems ftw 😬

And of course, reflecting at the end of the day with my co-med students, strong drink occasionally required because sometimes the shit we see is just so damn f$&ked that it’s hard to make sense of....

Okay I’m done being a bummer.

We ALSO did a bunch of fun things:

Like going to Chiang Mai with lots of protection during the 6-hr bus ride

Chiang Mai had some temples

Linked up with Zach, who is on his funemployment Thailand trip!

Got to the tallest mountain in Thailand, did a little hike

Hike was darn pretty

King and Queen pagodas on top of the mountain!!

Cleaned up for the night market

But not without protection!!!! 

May have skipped work to go chasing waterfalls one day

Mae Sot is a special place. Because of it's geographic location (Thai-Myanmar border), it's like a fertile ground for passionate change-makers to start or join humanitarian efforts. In my one month here, I met architects from Germany here to design and renovate schools and clinics, I tagged along with an international social circus here to give workshops to refugee kids at local schools (I have never seen so much joy and laughter from children in one place until I saw this circus perform), I lived with a Dutch man who was determined to bike around the world, but when he arrived here decided to teach a bit at a refugee camp, and now, 25 years later, is still teaching at a refugee camp. I could go on.

Life is simple here. It lends itself to lots of reflection, growth, and being in tune with yourself and your values. I'm really going to miss it.

I'm going to miss waking up to birds and roosters every morning, and getting ready to the sound of the town waking up. And I'm going to miss my wild little kitty friend who somehow always finds her way into my room when I'm getting ready. 

Here she is, ready to jump up onto my window XD

I'm not going to miss being stopped by the Thai military for random checks on the streets...and either

1) I remembered to bring my passport and they're like "OH! you're Canadian...go"

or

2) I'm lucky enough to be with a white guy, and they're like "okay, you guys can go"

yeah. The police are pretty corrupt here, but that's a story for another time.

I have a feeling I will be back here.

But until then, to the next stop, India!

Week 1

The first few days of being anywhere new always feels more like a month to me - one of the most exciting things about traveling, imo, because it feels like I’m living life more fully 😀.

So, how to summarize week #1? Probably something like - new friends, exciting commutes, lots of learning and reflection, a pretty debilitating fever, quick trip to Burma, and lots of delicious food.

My neighbor at the homestay, Nora, is a godsend. Not only did she nurse me back to health from my 103F fever (more on that later), she works at the same complex as I do, so on Monday morning she offered to show me the “short” way to bike to the clinic. Turns out, I probably wouldn’t have survived the commute without her - the “short” way meant crossing highways, ditches, and more highways, on a bicycle. Other than that....the commute was actually really quite lovely, and I eventually learned to stop having minor panic attacks at every highway crossing, and by like, day 3, started to enjoy the beautiful cornfields and mountains we would wind through. We would also pick up other med students working at the clinic along the way, and chat while we ride - it’s really a super fun time 😆

Also, Lesson 101: if a dog (cuz strays are everywhere) starts charging at you and growling, don’t pedal faster because they WILL outrun you. (I know, that was my instinct too). Instead, get off your bike, stomp your feet as loudly as you can, and growl back. Show them who's boss. It works trust me.

And Lesson 102: Probably get the recommended Rabies vaccine before coming, instead of saving the money like me. Will save you lots of unnecessary panic attacks when stray dogs suddenly take an interest in you 😅

But otherwise, really a lovely ride I swear!!

Start to my morning commute

Nicole, an Australian med student who also works at the clinic, and corn

The clinic we are working at is called Mae Tao Clinic, a non-profit organization founded by a Burmese doctor named Dr. Cynthia Maung, and provides free healthcare to the refugees and migrant workers from Burma. (We are located at the Thai-Burmese border). I worked at the adult outpatient department the first week. In short, stories and reflections from the clinic are a bit heavy and personal for this platform so I will leave it out for now.

  The visiting medical staff on the adult medicine team

Work ends by 4pm each day, but I would be so beat by the time we get home from the bike ride...I blame the Thai heat 😬 Usually the four of us med students will get together for dinner and share stories from the day:

Lesson 103: always bring indoor slippers - for cultural reasons we all take shoes off when stepping into clinic areas. But it’s a hospital, so if you don’t want to step in pee, always bring indoor slippers.

We have representation from Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, and the US!

The fruit here is good:

The air here is not:

Especially since it’s “burning season” for the farmers

But it turns out...I wasn’t coughing so much because of the pollution (which I had originally thought),  because on Saturday I broke into a fever of 103F and basically stayed on my floor all day. Missed ringing in the Year of the Rat at the Chinese night market 😔but I did hear all the fireworks from my room!

P.S. Did you know there’s a big Chinese community our here, and Lunar New Year is a real party? We were woken up in the AM by firecrackers and everything! AND They got dragon dances!



This post is getting long so I’ll wrap it up - Nora nursed me back to health with ginger tea and meatball soup. She's the sweetest.

It wasn’t Coronavirus, although it was on my mind for a second 😅

Sunday - fever gone, so Nora and I took a 10km motorbike ride to the Thai-Burmese border and spent the day walking around in the Burmese city of Myawaddy!

3 on a motorbike

The river between Burma and Thailand

Crossing the Friendship Bridge!

We meandered through markets:

Saw temples:

Crocodile Temple!

And ended the day with a delicious home-made pasta meal courtesy of our homestay host, Ton, who is from the Netherlands.

Okay, long post, now it's time to bike off into week two - pediatric inpatient department!

Ttyl :)

Same Same, but Different

Hola! Insane that it’s been almost three years since my last post. I guess it’s true that I took a hiatus from my travel adventures! Truth be told, I stopped craving it the same way. Maybe because of the hectic nature of medical school, or maybe because I’ve had a couple more years on me - I have found myself craving for more stability and comfort, and less wanderlust. Yeah, yeah, I'm old and boring now 😂

But I'm off again - this time actually on the longest adventure yet! Thailand, Bhutan, and Nepal over the span of three months, with a bit of India and Dubai sprinkled in between. Woo!!

So, after a hectic couple weeks of finishing my residency interviews, finalizing my paper submission, etc etc (wow when did I become so adult?!), I packed my bags and headed to JFK - accompanied by two of the sweetest human beings ever (shout out to Alex and Navid).

 

It’s a good thing they came because...I may or may not have been THAT girl who packed an overweight suitcase, and needed to unpack and unload some stuff for Alex to bring home, in front of everyone in line 🙈

Fun times.

Good thing I paid that "bad luck" tax early, because the rest of the trip was as uneventful as can be - 27 hours, 3 flights, one time crunched shuttle transfer between different airports later (yes boys and girls take notes, there are TWO airports in Bangkok, make sure you check carefully if you buy separate connecting tickets. Don’t be me), I finally landed in Mae Sot:

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that this time around I’m not just traveling for the heck of it (although don’t worry I’ll make time for some of that too!). In Thailand I’m going to be volunteering at a refugee clinic near a city called Mae Sot that borders Myanmar. Super grateful they have space for me - I had to apply like, a year in advance to get it! In Bhutan I'll be working at a hospital as well, but more on that later.

So anyway, to summarize my completely uneventful day:

I found my cute little homestay for the month, where I unpacked and showered off that plane grime

I found a place that could feed me in English - phad see eiw moo

And made it home just after sunset - check out these cool windows from my room

I've done a lot of traveling for fun. But, it really feels good that this time around, it will be more than that - especially at this stage of my life nearing the end of medical school training. I'm excited to observe, learn, and work on finding a path for me to really make a difference in this world.

I'm getting delirious - probably haven't really slept since Thursday night, so Ciao! Gotta get up early for Monday morning clinic tomorrow! 👏

Ruins and Chocolates

I had a phone incident for the last few days, so I didn't get a chance to post about most of my trip. Some highlights Include:

1) The Great Blue Hole (most surreal dive ever)

2) ATM Cave (the single coolest experience I've ever had!!)

3) Friends, coconuts, chicken buses, etc etc.

But I'll update on the end of my trip!!

Today was one of those greatest days.

Kicked off the day with a local market trip with hostel friends, where we got hella fruits for cheap - pineapples and papayas and bunches of bananas for a couple dollars. We cut some up, stuffed it in our bags, and headed to the local bus stop.

Then it was off to see some Mayan ruins on a chicken bus! (Chicken bus is a tourist term for central/south American local buses, aka old American school buses)

$1, a wild ride passing trucks on a narrow highway, and some good raggae music later, we arrived at the town by the ruins. I helped crank us across the river on the ferry thing:

And off we went to see some large Mayan remains.

We read (and sneakily listened to other people's guides) about the history of the place.

It was pretty incredible to see a few unexcavated sites looking just like mounds of earth with vegetation growing on it:

We also saw Guatemala from the top of the temples!

Also asked some questions about interesting trees - it was so cool to learn about all local plants and uses of every part of them. Really reminded me of how out of touch we developed countries are with the nature around us - when every piece of life around us, the bark, the wood, the leaves, flowers, fruit, and seeds, could possibly be used for something, and we just don't know or care because of all the plastic and aluminum we rely on.

Anyway, 4 buckets of sweat, a delicious lunch, bus ride, and break later,

we headed on excursion #2 - a demonstration of Mayan ceremonial chocolate-making.

It was incredible.

The owners were 100% Mayan (the husband speaks his group's native Mayan language, which is pretty uncommon nowadays!). The demonstration began with an immersive tour of how cacao is grew and processed from seed to fruit.

1) The plant only thrives in southern Belize (and other parts of the none Belize world of course)

2)Fruits are harvested and opened:

3) Seeds are fermented (juice from day 5 of fermentation could be made into wine, which tasted kind of like maotai!), washed and dried:

4) Roasted:

5) De-shelled, crushed into nibs, and ground using a molcajete(sp?) - a traditional grinding instrument only passed down through Mayan families because they aren't made anymore!

6) After being ground into an oily paste, it is served mixed with hot water in a bowl (the OG hot chocolate) made of the shell of a Calabash fruit:

So this drink is traditionally only served to Mayan elites during special religious occasions like the Mayan calendar new year, weddings, etc. and dates back to 2000BC. Nowadays Mayans are more liberal with its consumption, but still view it as a religious/ceremonial thing (aka children can't have it, only the wedding party gets served during a wedding, etc.)

But they let us (and bajillions of other sunburned tourists) try it! 3 different versions too! Even though we're neither elites nor worth celebrating.

We tried all this chocolate we just ground up with just hot water, with honey, with chili powder, and with cinnamon & Belizean all spice. Yum.

Lucky for us, our time with the couple didn't end there - we continued chatting, and learning so much about their culture and current life in modern society.

We learned about Mayan matchmaking beliefs, wedding rituals, their concern for their children's education of the Mayan language and culture in today's society, and so on.

It was an incredible hour and a half, an absolute privilege to learn about the Mayan culture from them.

Now, sitting in an hammock with the evening breeze, I feel so full. Not the stomach kind. My stomach could actually use some more filling right now. But anyway. I feel that I've seen, experienced, and learned so much more than I could've asked for 10 days. I'm ready to cap it off with a day of service tomorrow. Met a guy who's taking a few weeks to help build a halfway shelter for orphans, gonna try to help out tomorrow, before heading back to NYC to finish what I left off.

<3

Never stop wandering (<-- gonna use this word until I find a better one that means exploring, experiencing, and learning)