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Full Circle
Christmas day skiing at Lake Tahoe is such a stereotype of the leisure class that I am almost embarrassed to confess that that was what I was doing on the day of the tsunami. Had you seen me on the slopes, mind you, you wouldn’t have mistaken me for a member of the ski set.
The first time I ever went skiing was when I was fifteen or so. I was on a school exchange trip in France, and the family with whom I was staying took me along to the Pyrenees for their ski vacation. This was very generous of them, and so it seems churlish to complain about how they all went off to play on the slopes and left me in a thoroughly miserable ski lesson on a novice slope that was pure ice. The main thing that I remember is that nobody ever seemed to teach me how to stop.
More than a quarter century passed before I next tried downhill skiing. At the end of 2002 Jill and I spent a wonderful New Year’s Eve in an old manor house in the southwest of Finland (picture a large old wooden building filled with about twenty adults, thirty kids, and sundry dogs; add snow and firelight and fireworks and home-cured salmon and aquivit and champagne and drinking songs; and you will begin to get the idea). We then went skiing for a couple of days. I had much more fun that time, helped by the fact that in the intervening years I had acquired some experience of cross-country skiing. The slopes were almost empty as well, which meant that there were few people to observe those embarrassing moments on the ski lifts.
There was a reason that the slopes were empty. Here’s a piece of free advice: if you go to Finland, and the evening news opens with a ten minute segment about how cold it is, then you can be confident that it is really cold. They were interviewing people from Siberia who were complaining how much colder it was than they were used to back home. It was about -34 degrees on the slopes (Celsius, although down at that level it is pretty much the same in Fahrenheit) and it wasn’t possible to spend more than about an hour out there before it was necessary to return to the hut to thaw out.
Two years later at Tahoe, I felt I acquitted myself pretty well for someone who doesn’t really ski. I didn’t spend Christmas Day in an Emergency Room, for one thing. I had only fallen a few times; I had made it down some intermediate slopes (ok, some easy intermediate slopes, but they were marked in blue on the trail map, dammit) without making a fool of myself; the weather was perfect and the views were stunning. We all came back with aching legs to a family Christmas dinner – myself, my wife Jill, her parents, her sister and brother-in-law, our niece and nephews.
On the other side of the world, Somsri was about to die.
The year that followed was the most extraordinary and also the most difficult year of my life. In writing that, I am aware that I am really revealing just how fortunate is the life I have lived. It was, after all – in the end – a good year for me. Still, I am very glad that it is over. Looking back, one of the things that made life so hard was the fact that, from July onwards, we always thought that we were within a few weeks of bringing Neung to Singapore. Had we known at the outset how long we were going to have to spend in Thailand, we would have done many things differently: we would have rented somewhere to live rather than staying in hotels; we would have obtained a long-term car rental; and so on. I have purposely avoided calculating how much money we spent on the whole venture, but I know it runs into tens of thousands of dollars. As an economist, I am also obliged to point out that an even greater cost was the amount of time we spent commuting, packing, unpacking, and so on. Both Jill’s and my work suffered, and the general emotional stress and uncertainty of that period took quite a toll as well.
Having finally got Neung to Singapore in December, it was far from ideal to turn around and take her to San Francisco two weeks later. But we had again planned to spend Christmas in the Bay Area, and so, on December 17, we once again took a cab to Changi airport. The next day, as the three of us walked across to the Ferry Building in downtown San Francisco, Jill looked at me and said “I thought this was never going to happen.”
A little less than two weeks later, I watched a little Thai girl -- who had never even seen snow before -- as she slid oh so slowly down the children's ski slope, her skis veering to the right as she eased to a halt. She put her fist in the air and gave me a huge smile.
As for me, I didn't fall down once all day.
03/01/2006
How She Has Changed My Life
"Your upgrade to business class for the San Francisco-Hong Kong segment has come through, sir, but I'm afraid hers is not going to."
03/01/2006
First Visit
We get out of the car, and Neung runs across to the house. "Maeh!" She jumps into her grandmother's arms. My feeling of relief is almost palpable.
The twilight settles in; the air is loud with crickets and distant motorcycles. Children's voices carry across from the houses on the other side of the inlet. A small frog hops across the sand-covered driveway. Crabs fight in a plastic bucket. Since we were last here, Sanam and Panya have acquired a puppy (named "Nam Taan", which means "Sugar") and she is dangerously fascinated by the battling crustaceans. If I look to my left, I can see through houses to the road, where neon lights shine. These lights are used everywhere for external lighting. To my right the view is completely different: palm trees frame the lagoon and the mountains are dark in the distance. This is not a romantic spot by any stretch, but it has a certain calm, at least at the right time of day, and if you look in the right direction.
Jill and I lie on the thin mattress on the floor; Neung sleeps beside us. I have certainly slept in worse places in my day, but it is humid and uncomfortable and there is no denying that we would much rather be in a room in a hotel with a real mattress and a real shower. The message that we send to Neung is much more important, however. We cannot give her the impression that her grandparents' house is not good enough for us. A sleepless night is a small price.
Panya and some friends (or relatives, or hired workers; I don't know which) are building a cover for the driveway. It is typical of construction in poor regions: function is everything. Concrete pillars have been set in foundations, but the rest is an agglommeration of cast-off lengths of wood, sawn and then bolted together to provide a frame. Presumably, when we next return, it will be covered by corrugated iron or something similar.
The puppy has stolen a fish. Neung runs into the house. "Por! Scooby-doo has a fish!" And then she corrects herself: "Por! Maa mii plaa!"
We all go to a restaurant for lunch, and the Johnsons join us. Sanam and Panya rarely eat in our presence, and we have yet to understand exactly why this is so. I have heard people suggest that it stems from feelings of superiority; I have heard others suggest it is due to shyness. This time at least they both eat something. Perhaps it is because the food is so good here! Afterwards, Jill and Neung return with Sanam and Panya to the house, while I go with the Johnsons to see the tsunami memorial that was erected near Laem Pom beach. It echoes the Viet Nam memorial in Washington DC. It is a long, semi-enclosed space, almost like a tunnel. On one side, a curved black wall evokes the wave, while on the other, brass plaques are set on a blue and white tiled wall. Each plaque contains five names. Often, the last names are identical. I do not know if Somsri's name is here or not. I look for it, but cannot find it. I have forgotten the spelling of her name, though, and so I am guessing. Next visit, I will ask Sanam.
By mid-afternoon on Sunday, Panya and Sanam are busy with their work. Jill and I spend a little time playing a ball and racquet game with Neung on a littered patch of scrub next to the house, but we eventually realise that it is fine if we leave. Again, my overwhelming feeling is relief. The visit has gone about as well as we could have hoped, and everyone seems happy.
19/1/2006
FYI
Postings are likely to become more infrequent here, since (I hope) there will be less to tell. We got the student pass for Neung, and she is loving her new school. Each day I ask her what she did, and she tells me about "playing". I don't think she has noticed that she is learning things as well. She is happy and she is eating and sleeping well. Her Superman obsession is reaching dangerous levels however: she now wants to go by the name 'Clark Kent'.
I am trying, in my copious free time, to write up the story of our first visits to Thailand more completely, with the hope of eventually editing in all of the content on this site and creating a better narrative account of our experience. I may occasionally post some pieces here, if I ever make any real progress on this. Don't hold your breath.
Also, I have just read a fascinating book (Wave of Destruction by Erich Krauss) about the effect of the tsunami on four families in Ban Nam Kem, and I will post a book review here at some point.
19/1/2006