July 1, 2008: Kathmandu

I have moved out of my flat and am staying at the Magnificient View Hotel until I go to Bangkok. Tenzin, one of my English students, left to see his parents this morning and so I will probably not see him for a couple of years because he lives in McLeodGanj and I will be in Cambodia and Thailand. He has got a pretty good grasp of his emotions and how he is supposed to deal with them so I feel a little better about his situation. I met Tenzin in McLeodGanj along with Henry Chang Chup, Tenzin's Nagpah friend and sponsor; this was more than a year ago. Now, things have pretty much changed for Tenzin and he needs to see if he can come up with some longer term goals. His life is so fragile and tenuous; he needs to see if he can find something that will give him some stability. For the moment he has gone to see his parents at Namche Bazaar and talk to the Monasteries there for some advice. He also needs to become more assertive and give up his value of being passive and expecting answers to come his way. I think this value could be a thing of the past; this is turning into a very aggressive world and passivity gets nothing.

Me, I have decided to forego the reunion in Kuching because it is too expensive. I am just going to go to Thailand and then Cambodia. The reunion is pretty much for volunteers from Britain anyway and not for Peace Corps Volunteers. I was going to go until yesterday and then I decided that it is too expensive and not particularly in sync with my values.

The main reason why I am leaving Kathmandu is because of the Maoists who are fairly unfriendly with Americans. Its not that I don't feel that safe; its the fact that I have never lived around so many Maoists. The Khymer Rouge are supposed to be all over Phomh Penh but you don't know who they are and they are not aggressive towards me like they are here in Nepal. I guess I think that living in SE Asia provides the opportunity to travel around pretty freely and on a budget; and, to maybe volunteer some too.

Of course, there is a lot to do in Myanmar, but I still have not heard anything back on my
application to be a Trauma Counsellor. I don't know what it is about my profession and my not being able to volunteer and help out. It seems that the Junta in Myanmar is very anti-kindness and treats the people of the country like vassals to build the roads and plant the rice, but are not treated like persons of dignity and respect. Of course, most of the NGO's in Thailand do whatever the Thai Gov't wants them to do because it is the only free Asian country they have the work in on a comprehensive basis. However, the NGO's are not able to really "help" the Burmese. So, it seems that few people will really know how the rebuilding is going; most of the us will only know what we read in the papers. I would like to try and help out but I get the feeling that the Thai Gov't does not want me to volunteer, at least not now. Where Burma is concerned, it has been a Police State for far too long. The Tibetan and Burmese situations seem fairly absurd to me. All of these Buddhas everywhere, but not a drop of freedom of expression anywhere.

These are my thoughts for today.