Culture

A Bit Of Thai Culture

Posted on by Laughingnomad

Thai people are usually friendly, warm, charming and hospitable. Sanuk, the Thai word for fun or enjoyment is paramount to the Thai�s way oflife. For something to be worthwhile it must be sanuk. If it is not sanuk it will become boring. Thais can be seen laughing and enjoying themselves in whatever they are doing and if the enjoyment wanes the activity will probably stop. This also is true for the workplace.

If you are visiting someone’s house, take your shoes off at the door. And always bring a gift– fruit or candies as a nice gesture to the hosts. When someone asked you if you have eaten, it is often the way someone asks how you are doing. Try at least a bit if food is offered to you.

In most Middle Eastern and Asian countries it is very rude to put your feet up in presence of other people, especially if the soles of your feet are showing. This is a very common American gesture when we are tired but frowned upon in many countries.

Thais love their country and are happy to be here; they are simply disinterested in going anywhere else unless they have to. They are also very proud, especially of the fact that they have never been colonized, and even though they know their country has many faults and you will hear Thais complaining about the Bangkok traffic etc, foreigners should be careful not to criticize Thailand or the Thai people or especially the monarchy. To do so is a huge insult; the culture is extremely complex and even expats who have lived here many years will still make cultural mistakes. But to the credit of the Thais they will more often than not overlook these mistakes and continue to smile and be happy. This happy attitude and the level of tolerance makes Thailand a very easy and pleasant place to live.� Even though you never know what they are really thinking!

The phrase no problem (mai pen rai in Thai), is a national/cultural phenomenon (not only in Thailand but in Africa, India and in other countries) that is used to solve many predicaments and to avoid many confrontrations. Expression of anger is a cultural no-no and causes the angry person to lose much �face.� It is good to remember �no problem� when business vendors act like they are doing you a favor by waiting on you. The entire concept of customer service is largely either unknown or undervalued outside the U.S. and to be honest with you that is the source of most frustration for US travelers. Traveling requires a great deal of tolerance and adaptability.

Thais are very fond of His Majesty The King and he is loved by virtually all Thai people. The world�s longest reigning monarch and his wife the Queen have done much for Thailand and the Thai people; they have not set foot outside of Thailand for more than 35 years. One should never make any negative comments about the King or the royal family. To do so would insult any Thai. Similarly, Buddhism is the dominant religion and negative comments about the religion are not tolerated unlike in the West where it is common to discuss and debate religion and ideas.

In Thailand there is a “rule” or a way of doing something for just about everything that is the Thai way of doing things. An individual is not encouraged to think outside the box because to do so is to question others and that is not done because it will cause someone �to lose face.� For example Bob and I decided to go to a movie in Bangkok and as we were in the theater about 15 minutes before it started we went up to the ticket taker to give him our tickets. He looked at the ticket and said 9:12 pm you can go in! We asked if we could go in and sit and wait for the movie to start and he looked at us like we were challenging him with a gun and repeated “9:12 pm! 9:12 pm! Then you can go in!” The implications of not being able to question a rule must have huge implications in the international business environment!

Also in Thailand, two plus two often equals three! When we checked into our hotel the receptionist told us that the restaurant at the front of the building would provide room service. One day, I assumed that we could just sign for service in the restaurant. So when I tried to buy a coffee and was told that I couldn’t sign for it I went to the hotel receptionist and asked whether the restaurant could provide room service. She said yes it does. When I told her I tried to use the service she said “Oh, the connection isn’t made yet…and when I asked her when the “connection” would be made she answered that it wouldn’t be made until the end of the month! But it is at times like these that we grit our teeth and remember that this is not our country and we are here as (usually uninvited) guests.

Rickshaw Driving Lesson

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After dinner, Bob entertains the nearby date sellers by dickering with another rickshaw driver who makes the mistake of saying to Bob “You are rich man-why can’t you give me few extra rupees?” Bob shot back that “I have traveled all the way to India and now you guys have all my rupees!” He laughs. They think you are stupid if you don’t bargain hard.

They settle on a price and on the way home Bob is full of questions about the auto-rickshaw which is a three-wheeled device powered by a two-stroke motorcycle engine with a driver up front and seats for two or more behind. There are no doors and it has just a canvas top. They are generally about half the price of a taxi and because of their size they are often faster for short trips. And if you are a thrillseeker you will love it because their drivers are nutty–heading straight through the mass of cars and pedestrians wielding hair-raising near-misses! When stopped at traffic lights, the height you are sitting is the same as most bus and truck exhaust pipes so many riders wear kerchiefs over nose and mouth looking ridiculously like movie-western cowboys. Bob wheedles a chance to drive our rickshaw a short distance. Bob and the driver end up friends and the guy gets a tip for the driving lesson.

At 5am the next morning an auto-rickshaw driver offers to drive us 3 blocks to the train station for 20 rupees. After we are seated he says “20 rupees each!” Should have seen how fast Bob jumped out of the rickshaw! We don’t feel like cheapskates anymore as this style of bargaining is the norm in India and many other countries-the locals see you as ridiculous or naive if you do not bargain.

The internal struggle is over for me. The guilt is gone. I don’t even notice the beggar lady pulling on my arm. We are finally getting the hang of India and learning how to play their game. And I think we’re entering the last stages of culture shock. But haven’t had the courage to taste a “bhang lassi” yet! (A bhang lassi is a yogurt drink spiked with marijuana…)

Surface Culture

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India’s spirituality is strong and is seemingly integrated with it�s culture. So this is the first country we have been in that has resisted becoming westernized…at least on the surface…no big time make-up, no dark glasses, no T shirts, no baseball caps, no blue jeans hanging off the pubic bone of young girls (however we have seen a new sari style that is off the hip with a ring in the naval) and no Bobby Marley, rap music, baggy pants, western food or drip coffee-just the obsequious Nescafe. Our hotel offered the Continental or American Breakfast. Grilled chicken, grilled potatoes, juice and tea or coffee. No American fast food outlets in all of Delhi except for one McDonalds that only serves vege and chicken burgers.

Hardly any bookstores. Closest thing to the west we encountered listening to a DJ in a red turban play 70�s American music at the El Rodeo Restaurant where all the waiters were dressed up as cowboys and serving bad Mexican food.

Indians usually prefer to eat only Indian food, Mrs. Singh said when we stayed at her hotel in Jaipur. She described an Indian owned tour company she and her sister-in-law traveled with throughout Europe last spring. She was disappointed to find that the tour company had it’s own cook and every meal was taken on the bus-all Indian food!

News Media
In the English language Delhi Times newspaper there are 14 serious pages of “Matrimonials-for the better half of your life.” Typical Example: “Alliance from (with) tall fair slim convent educated girl for US settled Bengali Brahmin boy Feb 1967 5’11” nonsmoker tetotaler visiting India in Sept Caste State no bar” (in other words being the proper caste is not necessary). Another: “Bride from elite business house for graduate, son of top industrialist.” And another: “Wanted bride from only very big business/Industrialist Family from Son of National Fame very big rich industrialist family.” This apparently the conduit for meeting a marriage prospect for non-religious middle and upper classes.

I get a big kick out of the newswriting style, usually concerning controversial political issues, that go like this lead paragraph: “Despite all-out diplomatic efforts, India�s plans to get piped gas from Bangladesh may turn out to be a pipedream.” And this: Quacks have found a way out if their hospitals are shut down; change the name and keep the racket going. And another: “The government will soon crack the whip on driving schools in the Capital for the poor skills they are teaching Delhiiters.� And this headline concerning Prime Minister Advani’s oversight in not inviting Tamil Nadu Chief Minister to a swearing-in ceremony of another minister: “Jaya pipes down after Advani says he’s sorry.”

And finally this… “US tries to stop (corporate) rot with new rules.”

Jaipur India

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July 22-26 2002
The next day we discover we are the only guests in the Hotel Meghniwas and we have breakfast in the quiet restaurant downstairs. The night before Bob had a few minutes of the sweats but no fever…this morning he complains about not
feeling well…bones ache…no energy…tired…. I am silent and surly…but thanks be to the gods we hole up in our comfortable room all day watching movies on the HBO channel aware that this is our first bout of good old culture shock.

Culture Shock
I am having my first bout of culture shock on this journey. (My other culture shock experience in reverse was upon return to the States from a summer hitchhiking in Europe in 1965). Lonely Planet says there are several stages to this phenomenon. The first is the honeymoon stage-euporia and excitement-but the novelty quickly wears off and then comes the disintegration stage where instead of being thrilled you find yourself really disliking this new culture-right now in India it is because of the malodorous air, heat and noise.

Then you hit the reintegration stage when you grit your teeth and just get on with it because your return ticket isn�t for another six months! You blame every little problem on your host culture and become snarlingly hostile-for example, daring the next person to approach you for money.

By the autonomous stage you begin to focus on revising your travel style that is based on a more realistic assessment of local conditions…like never deliberately putting yourself at the mercy of a lunatic taxi driver. And we are realizing that underneath the layers of cacaphony there is an implicit order to the culture..very poor people finding the most efficient way to live that works for them…the many are not just individually lost on the sidewalks but are part of the community of their nearest neighbors…trading support and solace…ensuring survival.

Finally the interdependence stage is supposed to arrive when you develop an emotional bond with the new culture. Lonely Planet says this will take some time and effort but it will happen. We are not there yet we feel it coming…maybe…

Supposedly the more you know about the new culture before travelling the easier it will be…but god help me I don�t think there is anything that can prepare a westerner for India. What this experience WILL definitely do for you is cure you of any sense of feeling privileged or of being a more valuable person than the locals, just because you are American or have money or position, that you ever had or ever thought of having. Everyone endures the same conditions in the same way. In the movie “The Mexican” Brad Pitt cockily tells the cop “I am American!” The cop just looks at him and says “I am Mexican!”

Hotel Meghniwas
We luck out with a hotel that is well off the noisy street with grass and trees all around and a swimming pool in the back. The proprietors are professional and the staff is very friendly and helpful. After a nice quiet solitary Indian buffet dinner in the hotel restaurant we are invited by the proprietors, Mr. & Mrs. Singh, to have a drink with them in their office. Their two sons were educated in the states and live there still-one has a software business in Seattle and the other lives in New York. Mr. Singh is an articulate retired military person who has a good knowledge of Indian and US history and for an hour we appreciate his reasoned analysis of Indian, US and Arab domestic and foreign policies.

He says that the US and India got off on the wrong foot with each other years ago when Nehru, an aristocratic man that was highly educated in England, visited President Truman in the US. On the return to India Nehru remarked what a buffoon (or some such word) Truman was and US intelligence picked up the comment which injudiciously got back to Truman. Mr. Singh goes on to say that he thinks that in the next 5-10 years India and the US will become very very good friends because they will be the two biggest democracies facing the threat of China. Bob says that he has seen some very expensive looking homes in Jaipur and wants to know who would be living there. Mr. Singh answers that there are three upper class groups of people in India-first business owners, then politicians and then bureaucrats. I think that some of my friends and I who have worked for the state for years have been living in the wrong country!

Then Bob asks Mr. Singh what he thinks about the Pakistani/Indian conflict. He says the hostilities are old and the two countries have been threatening each other for years but there is a balance of power because both countries have nuclear capability. Furthermore, he flatly stated that this conflict is historical, it is not a situation defined by war and that India is not going to release a bomb just because a few villagers and politicians were killed in a couple terrorist raids!

He went on to say that people here are living life normally and the State department warning has ruined tourism that was already bad because of 9/11 and the off-season. The media carried the news today that the warning has been lifted but the damage has been done, he says.

Later I read an article in the India Times Magazine that reported that local corporate executives never did send their American expat employees home and furthermore they think the warning was timed to coincide with an orchestrated international move to pressure India and Pakistan to talk peace. The article, entitled “The Triggered Exodus” ends by saying that “the wait is now only for the nuclear silly season to end.”

Mr. Singh has some interesting but very big questions for Bob: are intra-uterine cures possible yet…are we close to human cloning…Bob tells him in all seriousness that he thinks man is headed for extinction and then the proprietor spends 20 minutes telling him how it is already slowly happening in India. Global warming and the resulting drought will leave Jaipur without water within two years.

We excuse ourselves when his brother and his wife come to the door and after Bob had been bitten by their dog. Should have opted for the rabies shots as suggested before we left home!

Udaipur India

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July 18-21 2002
To make it easy on ourselves we left at 4am for a one-hour flight north to Udaipur in the state of Rajasthan. When the taxi pulled out we noticed the food stall down the street was still doing a brisk business at that hour. And with the exception of upscale Marine Drive along the bay, the streets on both sides all the way to the airport were covered at intervals with neighborhoods of pavement dwellers.

Our hotel in Udaipur, the Caravanserai (a word meaning traditional accommodation for camel caravans) is built entirely out of stunning white marble-floors, stairs, bannisters, walls-quarried about 50 miles away.

We have a view of Lake Pichola which is drying up because of the drought that has sadly plagued northern India for the last five years. The famous Lake Palace Hotel usually out in the middle of the lake is now actually on the bank.

This year’s expected monsoon has not arrived as yet–late with no rain predicted. Indiginous tribal women (adivasis) in their brightly colored saris with contrasting choli’s (sari blouses) crouch on their heels at the dhobi ghats (place for laundering) on small platforms out in the water to launder clothes and bathe themselves. Our hotel is on one of the tangle of streets in the old city and after a short walk we pile into bed for a nap.

The Internet Cafe
The internet cafe around the corner is run by a good looking 26 year old guy who likes being a businessman but went to medical school (Indians don�t need 4 years in a university first) to please his father. He and his wife live with his parents and siblings. His father owns a hotel and I gather the family is from an upper caste. A cousin who is single helps the young internet cafe owner with his business.

They ask me if I think things in their town are expensive and I reply that heavens no-for us westerners everything is very inexpensive. They say that some foreigners think everything here is too expensive. I ask who in the heck thinks this. They laugh and say emphatically “the Israelis.”

Then we talk about customs and the cousin says if he falls in love with a girl outside of his caste it would be impossible to marry her. Similarly, later around the corner we talk to a guy on a motorcyle who is on his way to visit his girlfriend of five years who he sadly can’t marry because she is not of his caste. I put my hand over my heart in sympathy for him.

Migrants & Beggars In India

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Continuing our taxi tour with Asane, he takes us to a part of Mumbai where we will see many migrants and beggars…and the red light district.

As is happening all over the third world, migrants from rural areas make their way to urban areas hoping to better their lives. It almost never happens. Instead they squat on any little piece of ground they can find, even the road medians, and throw up tiny little huts made of found pieces of burlap and plastic. Soon, in desperation, the red light district sadly appears and now the city doesn�t know what to do with the people. Many become beggars.-many prostitutes.

Beggars
There is no developed government-sponsored social service system in India, however, the various religions all have societies (at least in large urban areas) that regularly give out money (additional rupees for each child) food and clothing, according to Asane the driver who is giving us a tour of the city. Women can make even more money by having 8-10-15 children who can all work the tourists so they are not interested in birth control. They do not want food-they want money.

There is a shortage of coins circulating in India because of the beggars so banks will buy the coins from the women and give them 10 rupees extra. But when Bob went to the Bank of India to get coins because businesses usually want as near to exact change as possible, he was told they could not make change for him. It�s mostly pretty little tribal women-usually very small, fine-boned migrants from the country with very bright colored saris who have learned to give those pitiful looks that become �professional� beggars. A trained girl of about four will follow you for about a block and a half (her neighborhood giving you �that look� and if she doesn�t score then will give up and turn back to her mother.

The local “CityInfo” tourist guide says not to give money but food instead so I try to keep food in my backpack. Mike, my son Greg�s friend who spent 5 months in India says just to give them the old �flick-of-the-wrist (get away) routine.

But the excellent novel about four people in India I am reading called “A Fine Balance” by Rohinton Mistry depicts a Beggarmaster who protects (owns) any pavement dweller who will pay him 100 rupees per week. For this the “beggar” gets protection from the police, freedom from the sweeps that will send them to the gravel pits and ditches, clothes, begging space, food and special things like bandages or crutches…” Lonely Planet says stories like this are common but many have no basis in fact. So who knows…probably every beggar has a different story.

When Bob asked Asane if he gives to beggars, he says he gives to real beggars like the old man with no legs or no arms who cannot work and has no other way to support himself. When asked what we should do about beggars, Asane said that when it comes down to it, it is a matter of each particular situation and what your heart says to do at that moment…probably wise counsel.

Asane’s Taxi Tour

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In Mumbai, we took a three-hour government sponsored tour in an Indian-made Ambassador car with “Indian A/C” which is a fan that sits on the dashboard. While we were waiting for Bob to run back to the hotel for the camera, Asane explained a bit about the Hindu ceremony (puja) that was taking place at a covered altar at the edge of the parking lot of the tour company a few feet away.

Asane is Catholic and he pays a fee for his children to go to school. His wife is a teacher but he says he forbids her to work because “who will stay home with the children?” Later he explained that his extended family (3 families) all live in housing joined together. I thought to myself that there was possibility here of shared child care but I did not ask.

I told Asane that I have practiced traditional meditation many years and then he wanted to know if I knew Rajneesh! Oh no, I said! But he was in my state, I said, and then asked him if the papers here made a big deal about the Rajneesh in India. Yes, he said, he was very rich and not a very good man and India ran him out of the country! Yes, I said, Oregon did too. Even though Rajneesh is dead, his ashes are kept at the Osho Commune International that is still doing a big business of running expensive meditation courses and New Age techniques about 4 hours away by train in Pone (Poona). Lonely Planet says that order to meditate at the commune you must fill out an application form, “prove HIV-negative by an on-the spot test and buy 3 swanky tunics…”

Open Air Laundry
Asane says we won’t see this anywhere else in the world! Mahalaxmi Dhobi Ghat is an open air laundry where some 5000 dhobi-wallahs use rows of troughs and giant concrete tubs of water that stretch as far as the eye can see to soak, scrub and beat the heck out of thousands of pieces of soiled clothes. The dhobi-wallahs pick up the clothes in the morning and at the end of the day deliver them on their handcarts to their owners. The laundry is over 100 years old and each dhobi-wallah owns his own business-renting his four foot by eight foot tub from the government that provides clean water every morning and that by evening is fllthy dirty.

Terrorism
We asked Asane whether he thought there would be war between Pakistan and Kashmir. He said “no, otherwise we are finish. After war we don’t have business!” Pakistan wants Kashmir, he says, because it is the most beautiful place in India and lots of tourists bring in a lot of money.

Then Bob asked him what he thought of America being in Afghanistan. He said that it was a good thing for America to be stopping terrorism everywhere-that small countries cannot defend themselves in the face of this kind of threat, although there was a scathing editorial against the “New Imperialism” and “Bellicose Bush” in the next day’s India Times newspaper. Asane asked Bob if people in America were afraid of more terrorism. Not surprisingly Bob and I gave opposite answers-he saying that everyone was very afraid and I said that people were going about their business as usual even though they knew there would be a good chance of another attack.

Jain Festival
Asane took us to a local festival at a Jain Temple. The Jains believe that only by achieving complete purity of the soul can one attain liberation and that fundamental to the right behavior is ahimsa (nonviolence) in thought and in deed. They are strict vegetarians; everyone in the temple wore a cloth mask when performing their pujas to avoid the risk of breathing in a bug or mosquito. I was particularly touched by a young boy of about 14 and his younger brother who was reverently bowing before the puja table wearing a Billabong T-shirt.

Hout Bay Township Tour

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Just outside Cape Town we visited a squatter’s camp where poor people including immigrants from Zimbabwe and Algeria, who were not allowed to live in Cape Town prior to apartheid, live on “no man’s land” and try to find fishing jobs on nearby Hout Bay.

The hillside facing the bay is covered with little tin and cardboard shacks that remind me of the worst of the migrant housing at home. We took a stroll up and down the narrow dirt lanes while Bob entertained the children with his digital camera-taking their pictures and then letting them see themselves on the video screen.

In one small shack some women were sewing some skirts and “aprons” (worn if you were married) so I bought an outfit and put it on. Idle people (unemployment is about 90%) gaped at the white woman with her cloddy athletic shoes and long black pants underneath their local African costume and laughed and shook their heads as I paraded past them. One woman in a “shabeen” (home where beer is made and sold) dipped some homemade beer out of an old keg into an empty gallon can from which we took turns drinking…

Swakopmund

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June 6-8, 2002
How are you today mommi? George and James do a pretty good job looking after me-making sure I’m happy so I don’t unglue on this trip and make a problem for everyone-maybe they think we don’t like roughing it even though we have spent 30 years backpacking and trekking. In spite of their best efforts, and in spite of my determination-I unglue anyway as we pull into Swakopmund on the coast…I had gotten little sleep the last three nights in my thin nylon and cotton sleeping bag that we bought in Nairobi because our camping gear had not arrived before the start of the trip. I spent the day in the truck crossing the ice-cold desert in a levi jacket and sleeping bag and I am frozen to the bone. I natter constantly to myself: no one wants to see out-the others were partying late the night before and are all asleep! So why can’t we pull down the clear plastic tarps over the open windows?!!

The bus station is only two blocks away and in a fury I threaten to catch a bus to Cape Town…the only thing that stops me is that the truck has pulled into the locked hotel compound which is such a patchwork of spaces (three other trucks are also inside the compound) and buildings that I can’t find the front door out of the place…I retreat to our assigned room and slam my luggage down on the floor-Bob looking on helplessly! I stood in the hot shower for half an hour in spite of the written warnings on the wall to use the desert water sparingly. I crawled into bed and had been meditating for awhile when I heard Bob ask whether I wanted to join the others to eat in the compound restaurant. By this time I had calmed down enough to grudgingly admit that I had to eat.

The dinner was wonderful. I had fried Atlantic fish with a lemon sauce and Bob had Leopard’s Belly-a stew of Warthog, mushrooms and vegetables wrapped up in a pastry like an Italian Calzone and by the end of dinner I was smiling and laughing again. Nikki had half a dozen fresh oysters and game liver and onions. Sarah and Heather had Ostrich kebabs.

James and George had beef steak. Rod came over and encouraged me to stay…”you are part of the group” he says…which just made me want to leave all the more…but he promised that I could sit up in the front half of the truck where there was no wind. This definitely was the low point of the trip for me-cold and no sleep was not a good mix! And no it didn’t help to think of all of poor Africa where a lot of people are not only cold but do not have enough food this winter because of the latest drought…

Swakopmund was like a time/place warp; the small resort town by the sea reminded me of San Diego-nice wide streets with palm trees up and down the medians except you saw “Right of Admission Reserved” signs above the doors of all the businesses. Retail shops have iron gates that are locked and when the retailer sees you standing at the gate he or she pushes a button that releases a lock so you can enter. Big time security…

Everything is immaculate and run efficiently-by the white Afrikaner owners…the Blacks are the waiters, sweepers, garbage collectors and car watchers…my first experience in an openly apartheid society feels very weird. One evening coming back from the latest Woody Allen movie (only six people in the theater and half of those left early). I scared the pee water out of one of the car watchers when I went up to him and ask if his job ever got boring. Apparently not used to being approached or acknowledged on the street by Whites, he gave me a terrified look that said “hey what’s coming down here,” while one of his buddies comes dashing over to help out his friend. Embarrassed to have put him in that position, I just laughed and slowly moved away as he, realizing I wasn’t setting him up for any bad thing, finally smiled.

We ate twice at a pub that served incredible German food with an Afrikaner bent. Rod had recommended the pig’s knuckle-huge-on a bed of sauerkraut. I delightedly peeled off the delicious crackling.

My hair was in desperate need of conditioning and I needed some pampering so I had my hair washed and colored while Bob bought an interesting African mask and a $40 Ostrich belt that he thought he was paying $4 for…that old decimal problem again!

The owner of the beauty shop was Afrikaner and my hairdresser was black. Afterward, when I walked to the back to tip the hairdresser the white women looked striken. Later in Cape Town Heather had her hair done and while the Black beautician was working on her she leaned down and asked if Heather could keep a secret. Then she requested that if Heather were going to leave a tip could she give it to her personally as the tips were never passed back to the Black beauticians. So now apartheid is just going to go underground like in the rest of the world.

While we are doing this, the other riders participated in some of the activities offered in the area-Nikki, Michelle, Adrian, Sarah, Heather and Fi went sky diving and Jimmie, George, Nikki, Michelle, Adrian, Michael and Sarah, Heather and Fi went riding quad bikes in the huge sand dunes; George took a tumble in his bike. Fi, Heather and Sarah and Adrian went both lay-down sand boarding and stand-up boarding on the dunes-they screamed down a sand dune, they said, on a board at 80mph! They spent the evening and early morning singing kareoke in the bar with no dinner.

Bob and I of course dropped into bed and the bar is far far away…

In the morning, George has coffee and cereal set up for us and we share the outdoor “kitchen” in the compound with the other truck riders. One of the other trucks has a couple in their 70’s on it-they looked like they were having the time of their lives. I wondered if their truck had a stereo.

Diamonds And Plastic

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On the way back to Maun Botswana in the Safari truck, Rod explains that the area around Maun is in the fastest growing area in the southern hemisphere because of the discovery of diamonds and with it comes the technology to make plastic-there is paper and plastic everywhere.

Gary says the safari owners have tried to start campaigns to clean up the plastic but the grocery store clerks, for example, will put individual chicken pies in plastic, several of these go into a plastic bag and that goes into another plastic bag at the check-out counter. So it hangs in trees like Christmas ornaments, gets caught in bushes and fences and clutches the sides of the roads. Actually it reminds me of Los Angeles freeways. We get to quickly check email before driving on to the Truck camp.

All over Africa we have seen references to preservation of culture, celebration of diversity and unity in diversity, themes familiar to us as westerners.

May 31 Sitatunga Camp
We hit the showers and camp again that night at Sitatunga. It feels like we are back in civilization again; I fall into George’s arms saying how happy I am to see him again! He loves it. The other riders party in the bar but Bob and I hit the sack as we will be up before daylight to hit the road again.