The Start of an Adventure

Hello Everyone!

Here's my first blog! I can hardly believe it! Here I sit in a luxurious, air conditioned room in one of the nicest homes I've ever been in, sipping rose tea, and bathing in the scent of sandalwood. Although I've been away from the states for about 10 days now, my arrival in Bangkok feels like the real beginning of my year of Burma and Southeast Asian adventures. (I spent a week in Taipei first visiting family and old friends.) I will pick up my visa tomorrow and fly off to Burma next Monday. Can't wait!

As usual, I have been horrible at keeping in touch so I'll do a little bit of catching up first. After returning to the US, I worked as a trainer and facilitator for the University of Washington's (UW) Human Resources Department for about 2 years and then started graduate school. At first, I was going to just get an MA in China Studies but enjoyed the learning so much that I decided to apply to a couple of Ph.D. programs. Luckily, I got into both geography and an interdisciplinary program called Built Environment and decided to pursue the latter. The Ph.D. in Built Environment is housed in the UW's College of Architecture and Urban Planning and allows us to shape our education and research according to our interests. I am in the tract focused on history, theory, and representation and will write my dissertation on sense of place and sense of identity. More specifically, I will pursue these two inter-related topics in Burma by learning about the lives and environments of the Chinese in Yangon and Mandalay.

I passed my comprehensive exam in October so I am officially a Ph.D. candidate (pfhew!) but know more than ever before just how much more I need to learn. Oy! But, then it is an on-going process isn't it?! Luckily, I'll have a year in Burma to fill in some of the gaps in my knowledge.

So, that brings us up to today. I'm going to Burma on the Blakemore Fellowship to study Burmese and learn. Right now, I still feel more like a China Studies person with one toe in Burma Studies. Hopefully, I'll have at least one foot in Burma by fall of 2007. Thus begins the story.

Jayde in Bangkok


This is the view from the room I'm staying in Shane's house. Shane is a friend of a friend who has been amazingly generous and kind. I don't know how I'll ever repay this debt of kindness.












This is a view from Shane's dinning room. The second balcony down from the top is my room. Yes, there is a pool in the middle of the house. This is a very classy place.














ERAWAN (MAHA BRAHMA) SHRINE

This is a shrine in the middle of downtown next to the Hyatt Regency. If I'm not mistaken, this is a god of locality. I'll have to ask one of my professors about it again.










DANCERS AT THE ERAWAN SHRINE

These dancers appear to be at the shrine everyday. They hang out until someone hires them to dance. There's a table to the right (outside of the frame) where one pays for performances. People pray at this shrine to have certain wishes fulfilled. They make a promissory offering to come back and pay for a dance if their wishes come true. Often people pray that they pass important exams. The young man on the right apparently passed an exam and has come back to fulfill his promise.



SUAN LUM NIGHT BAZAAR
When Shane first told me about this, I thought it would be like a Taiwanese night market but this bazaar is more permanent than that. The Thai military rented this land to an entrepreneur who then rented it out to lots of smaller-scale entrepreneurs. He also brough in a farris wheel and built an Angkor inspired gate - why? The bazaar appears to draw locals and tourists alike. Someone should write a paper about this space - tourism, development, national space, public space, commercial space...

I will try to post regularly but given the inconsistent IT in Burma, I might have problems accessing this site. But, I'll definitely post updates during my quarterly visa renewal visits to Bangkok.

I hope all of you are happy and well!
jayde