He Inflated his Overalls like the Michelin Man and ZIP

30

My run this morning was beautiful. It started raining (I really only have the heart to run when its raining) and the clouds were just a little sunrise and a little storm, out over the bay. I ran up and down the beach twice, (4 kilometers) and the sand was packed and then pockmarcked by the rain, and the guy at the gate to the military base at one end waved at me, and while I was running I could feel the rain on my arms… The tide was really really far out, and the bits of broken coral and everything was basking, exposed, on the edge of the beach. I passed the Monks (two of the four) who were going down the beach collecting merit and food in the morning. I thought about smiling at the one who I talked to the otherday, but I wasn’t sure if I shouldn’t make engagement with him since it was only in a tank top and shorts, but I kinda smiled on the way back and he looked right passed me, so hummm.

After showering, and laundry, I went and tried to make a cup of coffee to have on the beach. I managed to light the stove on my own (Dehwehwim and Solep were nowhere to be seen), and I put water on, and then I realized I couldn’t find the coffee. I looked everywhere, because I found it yesterday; I opened the bag! there were 30 packs – and I knew there was no way Dehwehwim and Solep had managed to drink 29 cups of coffee in one day. It started to make me a little bonkers, not even that I am that insane for coffee but that I knew it was somewhere obvious and I couldn’t find it. Had they begrudged me taking some yesterday and hid it?! I looked in all the counters, in the pots, behind the house, in the cubbord, on the porch. I found cleaning products, and oil packets, and a container of lolly pops, and the empty package from the 30 coffee pack and then I gave up and got a bag of tea and opened it, got the hot water, and saw the lolly pops again… Who… I thought… keeps about three food items in the house, with one of them being a giant container of lolly pops and I opened it up and there was the coffee!!!

I sat on the beach with my coffee and thought about how thankful I am for how much Dale and Cindy have supported me (both in a hands-off I trust you, and in a being able to count on you for getting me whatever I need way).

I skyped with Tor and we dreamed about opening an ecotourism resort one day. I called mom and colin who are doing great up in Maine with the relatives. I did some transcriptions and translations (haha. Biology). After two of them I was ready to go crazy. It was pouring today. Really pouring and that delighted me, because another dive master stopped by Pooh’s Bar today and said while talking with Neal (Pooh’s Dive Instructer) “the coral will come back.” And I said ‘how do you know?” and he said “I mean, no body knows, but with this rain that’s good to cool the water down. And its happened [bleaching] before and it came back. And not all of its bleached, some of its still O.K so that will help the bleached coral reestablish.” I looked out at the rain, pouring off the metal roof onto the patio and felt really good (I’ve been enjoying the cool down too!).

I had lunch with John, and Lee Pae Backery (the one just on walking street with a little view of the sea at the end of the street. Its so well kept and a nice atmosphere with little black and white table cloths, and its very very clean. No T.V. playing or anything, too. John and I joked about how terrible most Thai dictionaries are. I said yeah I bought one once, for tourists, it had the word for “poached eggs! And not the word for rice. I’m not even kidding, in the food section there was poached eggs (I’m not sure I know what poached eggs are in english!) and not rice. In THAILAND.”

After lunch I went back to interview Neal if he had time. Amanda, his girlfriend and another employee at Poohs place has come down with Dengue fever (mom don’t tell grandma). Actually, something with a Thai name that’s worse then Dengue fever. It’s from mosquitoes they think. One other person got it last year, and no one else since then, but it’s really aweful. She had a 39.5 fever last night. The islands clinic nurse is on standby to come give her an injection to cool her body down if she needs it, and they’ve given her drugs to control it and so shes doing better. I guess, mom, dad, you have a right to know and try to convience me to come home, but I’m wearing two kinds of bug spray, and sleeping in a mosquito net. Tomorrow I’m wearing long pants and brining long sleaves too. They fogged Pooh’s place this afternoon. A guy went around with a backpack like a jet pack full of white foamy chemical death and blasted everything in sight. Pooh passed out little.. those nurses mouth cover things. I decided id be a good idea to take off for a bit (while my computer downloaded a new antivirus) and when I got back it was coated in little brown droplets!!!! Eeepsss!!!

I also interviewed a guy who lived on a sailboat off the atlantic coast for a year, and he said when he was around Kayaking the other day he saw what he said was “a lot of trash in the water” unlike what he had seen around many many other seas.

(the following quotes aren’t actually real quotes, their just from my memory. I’ll do the transcription sometime and put up the real ones)

I interviewed Neal. He was particularly articulate, knowledgeable, and interesting. He told the story (he written it actually, and is looking to get it published) about going down diving with the locals when they were setting their fish traps. It’s horribly dangerous! It’s called “hooka diving” and they just hook a really long tube up to a aircompressor. (and a jankkety old one that’s prone to spew unclean air, or give out at any second). And then then dive down to (when he went) 28 meters deep!!! and then they ran around on the bottom, setting up the trap, and dancing over a lion fish (extremely poisonous), and when they were done, they just pulled out the tubes for air from their homemade masks. One guy filled a bucket with air. The other guy was wearing overalls and he “filled them up with air like the Michelin man” and ZIP right up to the top. If you don’t know to blow out the entire time, your lungs can explode. To go up safely and allow enough time for the Nitrogen bubbles to come back out of your muscles and blood you should take a minute and a half to go up, with a three minute safety stop part way. “how long did they take to get up?” I asked. And Neal said “about three seconds.” By the time he got up to the top, they were getting ready to go back down again, over and over. When you go down diving that deep, your under about 4 times as much pressure, so air gets denser, and when you breath in one “lungful” of air your really getting 4 times as much oxygen and Nitrogen as normal. The oxygen is O.K but the nitrogen gets absorbed into your body tissues. When you come up again, its like opening a coke bottle, all the bubbles suddenly don’t have that pressure keeping them in and they all fizz up. Its called getting Bent. He says “that’s why so many of them are bent. If you come up so quickly, the Nitorgen can’t get out of your lungs so if forms bubbles inside you. It can kill you, and if it doesn’t kill, it’s extremely painful to get bubbles in your joins, a few hours later your just be bent over in pain (that’s whey they call it bent). It can be debilitating/handicapping. That’s why you see so many people in the village slouched with limps and on crutches, they’ve been bent and got bubbles in their joints.”

It’s a fantastic interview. I’ll pull a bunch of quotes from it if I have energy tonight. He also linked it to overfishing/the coral reef decline. “If the area is getting low of fish it means they might be down there longer, or going out more often, or setting more traps, to make income for their families, which is just increasing the danger.”

While hiding from the mosquito mister, I discovered a new favorite kind of Rotee (fried dough pancake) today which is egg and milk with sugar!! I asked Pi Awm, who makes them, what her favorite was and she said egg and tuna.

I had dinner with Pi Mut again today. The best Tom Yum soup I’ve had other than my Mae’s in Chaing Mai. The perfect priao sour and pet hot with bright green chfir lime leaves, and colorful chilis, and thin slices of chicken, garlic, cilantro, and lemongrass. He said “you want to play four?” and I was like “what?” and he pointed and I said “what?” and he brought over a connect four game! We played, the lights from the bar making the pieces glow a little (they reminded me of disco lights) as the sun set and night fell. The local mainland fishermen were putting out nets at the low tide, so maybe by next low tide fish will have swum in and got trapped. Fitting to the name “time to chill bar” the music was calm and beautiful, and I had this wonderful moment of almost … surprise or puzzlement for how fortunate I have been in my life. Some things we control, some things are chance, and somehow we end up where we are.