Petchabun Trip 1 - The Trip

We left Thursday afternoon and stopped in Lamphun to pick up three of the villagers my organization works with and who I got to know last year. We had four in the cab and two got into the bed of the truck. The road was generally good, but it was through the mountains, winding much of the way. Thais drive on the left side and scenes like this, where both lanes in this two way highway were going in the same direction, are not nearly as common as they were in the past. We stopped at a roadside stand to buy some fresh jujube - putsa or พุทรา - in Thai.

JUJUBE or "Put-Sa" Peak season: February to September Put-sa (or jujube) is oval-shaped and green. The outer peel gradually turns into a light golden yellow as it ripens. Like freshly-picked Golden Delicious apple, its flesh is crisp and crunchy. To offset the slightly tart taste of fresh jujube, the entire fruit is dipped into a dry salt-and-granulated sugar dip seasoned with crushed chilli. Put-sa is pickled in light brine and served with the salt-and-sugar dip, preserved in syrup, candied, dried or baked. It is a popular garnish as it can be easily carved into dainty leaf or floral shapes. It is grown in the provinces of the Central Plains particularly in Pichit and Sukhothai. from tatnews.org

We stopped for dinner at this market area. The picture isn't as sharp as I'd like, but there are lots of details if you double click to enlarge it. My boss, Phet, and Bon are walking there. And then we began night driving. Not my favorite activity, especially in a place like Thailand. But we didn't have any problems. Another shot of driving at night to Petchabun. Another pit stop. Along with gas and clean restrooms, the stop had this coffee house. Then our two outside passengers got wrapped back up for the rest of the trip. It's been unusually cold. Here's a story from Xinhua last Tuesday:

BANGKOK, Jan. 15 (Xinhua) -- Thailand is currently hit by the worst cold wave in ten years, with average temperatures dropping to 6-8 degrees Celsius, said Thawatchai Fangangkul, governor of Uttaradit in the north of Thailand on Thursday. Two people were killed on Wednesday when severe cold wave hit most parts of the country's north and northeast. Uttaradit had declared nine of its districts the cold spell disaster zones, the governor said. Meanwhile, an official of Chiang Mai's Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Centre said the temperature in the province has hovered around 11 degrees Celsius for two days and the minimum temperature on local mountaintops was recorded at two degrees Celcius, the lowest in the past year. At Chiang Mai's Doi Inthanon, Thailand's highest mountain, temperature dropped to minus 3 degrees Celcius, forming white frost on the ground and attracting a huge number of tourists to experience the cold weather.

10˚C equals 50˚F. The common belief is that it has never snowed in Thailand. We drove through Uttaradit and it was probably in the 40s F at night in Petchabun. It was cold when we pulled up to the meeting site in Petchabun about 10:30pm. People were standing around fires having a good time and keeping warm. The meeting was held in a sala - or hall - that is an as yet unconsecrated Buddhist Wat (temple). Inside, people were already sleeping. Phet and the others set up a couple of tents. I got a sleeping bag that I would guess would be rated as good down to 75˚F (24˚C) and a quilt like mat to put under the sleeping back. You can see my stuff in front of the tent in the picture. I ended up, like everyone else, sleeping fully dressed and decided it was better to have most of the quilt on top instead of as padding on the floor. Last year when we came to Chiang Mai in February, I never used the fleece, outer shell, or wool cap I wore to the airport in Anchorage. I was glad I had them this time. There were open doorways on each of the four sides of the sala. This was the view I had Friday morning as I woke up to a very loud bell being gonged in a strong, persistent rhythm at 6:15am.

Stopping at the Street Vendors after Noodles

I'm still trying to figure out how to post the trip to Petchabun, so here are some pictures of the street market down the street from our apartment. These are a couple of the ones where we bought goodies after having noodles for dinner.







J likes these little vegie patties that are cut up and stir fried.












I got a cup of strawberries for breakfast tomorrow.






Roasted bananas with coconut milk. Mmmmmmm.




And these are all sweets. I'm not sure what all they are, but a lot have cocunut, some are egg yolk and sugar.






My computer conversion calculator says 10 Baht equals 28¢. Now we're home watching the inauguration festivities on CNN.

Back from Petchbun

There's lots to tell about the trip to Petchabun. Briefly, there were about 50 poor Thai farmers and some urban slum dwellers and some NGO (Non-governmental organization) staff meeting from Friday to Monday in a Temple hall (there are some Buddhas and two monks, but it hasn't been consecrated yet). We were in the mountains of Petchabun out of internet contact, near a small village. This was pretty abrupt planning since J and I arrived on Tuesday (Thai time) and we left Thursday afternoon. I got back at 3:00 am today. I have a ton of pictures to download, some video, and lots of thinking to do about what went on. I do have permission from my boss to post whatever I want. So, if you want a backcountry experience with people who normally don't get a voice in the media, check in the next few days as I get a series up on the meetings. In the meantime, here's where I am and where the meeting was.


The trip to Petchabun took about eight hours. The roads are generally good, but there was some construction and much of the way was through winding mountain roads. The red dot at Pethabun is approximate. I'm not even sure what the name of the village was near where we were.



Thanks to GoogleEarth for the maps.

Less Redacted Version of Internal FBI Complaint

Here, thanks to Legal Times, is the less redacted version of, now in court identified, FBI Special Agent Chad Joy's internal complaint document. Click the link for my earlier analysis of this document (in the more redacted version). [you can magnify the document if you scroll over the down arrow on the toolbar of the scribd box below then click on the plus (+) sign.]

Whistle Blower Complaint 2

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Government Business & Legal ted stevens trial FBI

There are quite a few more names visible here - basically his and the agent he complained about most, Mary Beth Kepner. He clearly did not like her or how she operated. While there are a number of allegations that probably do violate rules if proven - ie. telling her husband things about work - these are probably violations that occur frequently in many households. Other allegations seem pretty bizarre - that Mary Beth Kepner wore a skirt as a surprise for Bill Allen when he was testifying in the Ted Stevens case, but she never wears skirts.

I'm afraid I don't have time to go into this more.

Score One for Critical Thinking - The Whistleblower Who Isn't

A couple of plugs here for bloggers and newspapers. I just found the ADN story on the web that Chad Joy has been identified as the FBI agent who wrote the so-called whistleblower document. I know that the ADN was 95% sure as was I, that the author was Chad Joy, but we both withheld naming him in the articles/posts we did on the topic. Not everyone posts things they know, let alone wild rumors.

I don't blow my own horn here too often. It isn't seemly. But when I wrote the article on the FBI Complainant Document, I realized that few readers if any would read the whole thing. It was way too long. But I think it is one of the better posts I've written. People who did read it carefully would have known the author of that document was probably Chad Joy. I didn't make that claim. The information was buried deep in the post. But I followed the line of reasoning of the author of the document. He wrote that he'd been mentioned frequently in an FBI source's book about the Alaska political corruption investigation. I pointed out there was only one book published so far, and in that book, Chad Joy and Mary Beth Kepner were the two FBI agents mentioned in the list of characters.

But I also argued that I thought the term whistleblower didn't fit. Whistleblowers are people who warn the public about some impending danger, and in this document, nothing like that was ever mentioned, the complaints were basically about rules being broken and the author also complained that he was made uncomfortable and no one was listening to him. If there was a complaint at all, it should have been a grievance.

In the ADN post today, it turns out that Chad Joy was NOT granted whistleblower protection. I want to thank my UCLA 17th Century English Literature Prof, Dr. Clayton, for teaching me how to read between the lines, basically how to think. I did a post on how that happened a while ago, reading between the lines.

Posted 8:49am, Jan. 15 Thailand Time

Headed to Petchabun

Most of the folks in my office are headed to an NGO (non-governmental organization) meeting for five days in Petchabun, so I'm going along. Not at all sure what to expect. This will be basically a Thai thing, there will be some of the farmers the organization works with there too. I have no idea where we will stay, but I know things will work out. J is staying in Chiang Mai and they were very cautious in inviting me because they know J gets car sick on windy mountain roads, but J said to go. Otherwise almost no one is in the office. We'll hae lots of time for me to catch up on what they are working on and how I fit in.

Click the link for a map of Thailand. Chiang Mai is below the MAR in MYANMAR - top of the map, left. Petchabun is above the LAND of THAILAND top, middle.

The meeting yesterday afternoon was interesting as I sat there trying to understand. I had learned a lot of the vocabulary they use last year and so that was helpful, but I wasn't sure about how the terms were connected. My mind tried to fill in the blanks. I knew what they were talking about - gathering information, updating planning documents with the farmer communities, but I wasn't quite sure what the issues were. I had to ask after when Eaw was driving me back to the apartment with all the kitchen and other household stuff we'd stored with them (two small boxes.)

So, I'm going to leave my computer with J so she can use it. I don't think there will be internet connetions where we go. If there is, I'll use someone else's computer. So it could be quiet here for a several days.

Meanwhile, for Anchorage folks, there may be interesting developments in the Stevens case. I'm getting some intriguing google searches from Washington DC that are landing on the post about the 'whistleblower'. Maybe someone has seen the Prosecution's response to what the Defense has submitted to Judge Sullivan.

I just looked at last nights post. I see the text isn't coordinated with the pictures. Sorry. I literally fell asleep several times while posting. But I got a good night's sleep. And we didn't leave the sliding glass doors open all the way last night so it isn't so chilly in here this morning.

Day 1 - Off and Running

It's 5:30am Anchorage time and 9:30pm here in Chiang Mai. My eyes are shutting down. So here's

a) Walk to Work, J. came with me this morning.
b. Along the way I pass the huge compound of former Premier Thaksin's Brother


Along the wall of Wat Umong.

This the massage place outside the Wat Umong entrance.











Here's my boss, Pet, and one of the more charismatic farmers, Su Kaew. Most everyone is headed to Petchabun tomrrow for five days of intensive training. That's what I'm here for isn't? So, assuming everything goes as planned, I'm headed for a long weekend visit.

At the meeting today I understood just enough to be dangerous. A lot of the words came from last yer's plan which I translated into Engolish forum

Bon's keeping her socks on inside at the afternoon. That's one way to keep warm.

Sorry, but I keep drifting off as I type. I better let the pictures speak for themselves.



In the market this evening.





On the way back from lunch at the temple, we passed this little shop with all these Free Palestine signs.

Maybe by tomorrow I'll be able to keep my eyes o0

Morning Snacks

We don't have our kitchen stuff yet - the induction cooker, pots, dishes, flatware - that we left when we came home last April, so these are some snacks we picked up last night until we go out. J's still sleeping, but I'm enjoying the morning. It's nice to be up early - the time is quiet. And I'm enjoying being chilly in Chiang Mai. I know my Anchorage friends basking in the relative warmth of 25˚F (-4˚C) after the week of below zero weather and probably think I'm crazy.

The Almost Full Moon and Blogspot Post Times

Just before we left Anchorage I posted a picture of the full moon and the moonlight. And here we are on the other side of the world looking at the same moon. I know it's a much often used device, yet it is still amazing to me that as far away as I go, the sun and moon are always there and people far apart can look at the same moon at the same time. (That raises a question I have never thought about - are there two places in the world from where you can never see the moon and/or sun at the same time? Joel?)

[Update Jan 15 (Thai Time): My son has answered this question by email:

basically no. At the extreme, where they are on opposite ends, it gets a bit tricky since the horizon is almost horizonal. But it isn't quite, since your eyes are not on the ground, and on top of that the earth's atmosphere bends light about 3 degrees at the horizon. So you can see 186 degrees, effectively, and even the moon is far enough away that I doubt it's in the blind spot. The sun has a much bigger diameter than the earth, so it could never be in a blind spot.]

As you can see from my pictures, I haven't figured out how to set my Canon Powershot SD 790 so that the brightness of the moon, surrounded by the blackness of the sky, isn't overexposed. If anyone out there has a suggestion, please comment or email.

On the other hand, we are all used to the giant telephotoed pictures of the moon with every crater showing. These give a different view of the moon.

In this last one, I played around a little bit with it in iPhoto.

These pictures were taken at 5:57am Chiang Mai time. I went to bed about 9:30 last night and just recently woke up. The birds are making interesting noises, though roosters are the most common. The temple gong just marked 6:30. The sky is greying above the mountain Doi Suthep. We have a western facing view, so the other side of the sky is probably lighter. The computer says it is 53˚F (almost 12˚C) so it is a bit chilly in here.

[Update: Here's the moon and sky 42 minutes later at 6:45am from our balcony]

Computer time

I've reset my computer so it has local time. Last year I left my computer on Anchorage time. The blog post timing is set in blooger and it would make more sense on the blog to have my actual local time for my posts. Fiddling with basic things like that on blogger make me nervous. No telling what other strange things it will cause. Will all most posts get changed to Thai time? Probably not, but things got all screwed up early on when we changed to Daylight Savings Time. I had to change it to Pacific Standard time for the blog to work. OK, let me change it and see what happens.

Hah! I was right. (Am I starting to think in blogger?) It changed all the old posts to Thai time. So I changed it back to Alaska time. So just add 16 hours to the post times.

Update 7:23am - It's easier to get the moon when the background sky isn't so dark.]

Feels Comfortable Here

We pulled up to our place and Pop, the manager, was there to greet us and make sure everything was ok. We did some unpacking and eventually got ready to go out and get some things we needed - like soap and hangers and toilet paper. Pop was wearing a jacket the whole time and I teased him about it. Then wandered down the soi (soi's are streets coming off the main road - usually they are referred to as Thanon Suthep (Thanon means road) Soi 1, Soi 2, etc.)





It felt like we had just gone away for the weekend, not eight months.



There are some changes, most obviously some large buildings at the university are now completed. But the streets are basically the same, if maybe a bit more crowded.



The phone shop - they're everywhere - was informative. There are three different brands competing. They all have promotions (that's now a legit Thai word). He suggested a brand. You get unlimited calls, if the person you call has the same brand. But the first plan I had a couple of years ago was much easier to use and control - 1 Baht per call between 5am and 5pm. In the end I said I'd have to check to see which brands my friends were using.





















This is the main drag along the southern side of Chienag Mai University.



We were told that tomorrow is graduation at the University and that the king will be there. I'm guessing these flowers are there for the king.

And so are these newly painted curbs.

On the way home we stopped at Ek-Ah-Saw-Wah - the restaurant we saw being built last year. It's got a little more landscaping in. We sat outside, and while I didn't shiver, I could feel the cooling air. But the food was delicious. We ate it all up.

Last year it took nearly a week to find a place. Today we're settled from Day 1. I'm sure glad all this hstle and bustle