We left the farm. No surprise there, really. It was time. We spent two weeks shoveling into bags, almost burning our hands on the heat that escaped from between the layers of decomposition. You wouldn't think it, but the compost was hot. It was cool to strike the pile with a hoe and watch the steam rise out of the pile. The steam was from the heat of the anaerobic processes under way deep within the compost pile, released by my hoe after months of putrifying. We grew a bit bored with the process. Acquire compost, bring compost, water the composted tree and moisten the compost around the tree with pigshit water, cover compost around the tree with straw. Rinse and repeat. The alternative was to fill holes dug for new papaya trees with compost. Either choice involved traviling a long road with bags of compost slung over your shoulder. It got old. But that's not the real reason I wanted to leave. Even a task like composting fuit tree groves can become therapeutic with the right thoughts in your mind. It was time to go and I'll leave it at that.
We left for Chiang Mai, again. Chiang Mai, deservedly so, has become our hub between activities. We'd go somewhere, and come back, go somewhere else for a few weeks, and come back. And like always, we stayed with Vichai. Altogether, this man and his wife and son hosted us for maybe two weeks of our trip. I think he liked the company since he was retired. It gave him something to do, people to talk to about our travels and about the U.S. where he lived for many years and about his ideas to open a Chinese restaurant in the U.S. or a hot dog stand or any number of different food stall ideas. Last time we were in town we met Pensook, the principal of a secondary school in town, and went to a buffet lunch with her. This time in Chiang Mai we met up with Pensook again and went to dinner with her. Her younger brother is the proprietor of a whole block of boutique hotel and spas. During the meal we were treated to a huge Thai style dance production. There was a man moving with swords in his mouth, a story about a monkey that married a fish that was adapted from an old Hindu story, men drumming, and women gracefully turning their wrists with their fingers extended in the traditional thai style. On the way out, people lit huge paper laterns and released them. They drifted up into the empty night like glowing hot air balloons. We asked Vichai, who had come to the dinner, "Aren't those blowing towards your neighborhood?" He said, "Yes. One time one of those dropped into the community pool." We didn't believe him, of course. When we turned the corner onto his street, we saw a huge paper latern. The white paper lie folded on itself on the ground and it no longer glowed. Vichai laughed. "What did I tell you? Every night it is like this."
That time in Chiang Mai was our last. We will not be going back to Vichai's. We left for Sukhothai and then Ayutthaya to fill in the last few days before the Phillippines. They are both cities built around ruins. Sukhothai was a wonderful town with people who still smiled. It was the one place above all others that I felt as if it wasn't all about business, that the people were still genuinely happy that I was there. The ruins were spread far apart, a large city of ancient temple complexes. We rented bikes and rode them all day, and when we had seen all of the ruins, we rode the bikes just to ride them. The air felt clean and there was a peace in the slow deterioration of the place and in the neutral smiles on the faces of the many Buddhas at each ruined temple.
Ayutthaya was the capital of Siam for four centuries until the Burmese razed it in the 1700s. The ruins that remain are what was left of the city when the Burmese left. Every so often a pile of bricks sits discarded, the past and past locations of each brick unknown. But many figures still remain. You can imagine high brick walls covered in an older cement mixture. Worn, straight postured Buddha images sagely sit, staring ahead. The pointed tops of the chedis are now a faded gray-black of mildew growing in the grain of the cement, but were once covered in gold; all melted dorn by the Burmese as spoils of war. The one thing that improves with the years is the face of Buddha at Mahathad Temple. A ficus tree's roots slowly grew downward around the stone head. Every year that it becomes further enveloped, further strangled by the roots, it rises higher towards the heavens. I looked at it as a resounding motif: experiencing enlightenment through nature. Nature lifts us to God. After all, didn't the real Buddha end the cycle of suffering under a Boh tree? I came to this realization while being similarly enveloped, not be dense ficus roots but by screaming Asian tourists, all hurrying to flash a peace sign while there laughing friends snapped a photo. The sheer numbers of them were stifling.
Late tomorrow night (3-29) we leave for the Phillippines. One of Lizzie's cousins is set to pick us up from the airport in Manila. We spend a few nights there and then Head to Bagguio. After Bagguio we fly to Bohol to see the chocolate hills and hopefully some beachtime before we head back to Manila. It shouled be a nice two weeks before heading home. Some of you I will see very soon. Rebecca's name comes to mind. I want a haircut and some good conversation.
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