First, I should say that the orientation (at a hotel in the city) and the annual conference (at a resort outside the city) that we’ve been attending in Thailand has been great. We’re learning a lot and meetings tons of really interesting people. There’s about 200 people here counting kids, and from all over the Western world. Lots of Kiwis and Aussies and Brits, Germans, even a French guy, and a few Yanks. The really cool thing is that almost everyone has tons of overseas experience in different parts of the world doing all kinds of stuff, especially all over China. Sexual health education, water development for villages way out west, doctors working on the Tibetan plateau, and of course, people teaching and working in the coastal cities from the high frozen north to the tropical south. One British couple coming in with us lived for 14 years in Hong Kong, then 17 in South Africa, and now their starting language school with us in Tianjin.
You can see from the photos that this resort is beautiful. The most immediate downside to all this is that for over a month, for every group that has come to this resort (lots of groups use this for conferences during Chinese New Year), they’ve had dozens of people get really bad diarrhea and/or vomiting on day two or three. Yesterday we had 50 adults listed as sick, and I don’t know how many children. One of the singers threw up on stage. Jessica, who got sick and spent most of the day in bed, saw a lady suddenly shove her baby stroller in another woman’s direction and say, “Watch my baby I’m going to be sick!” before throwing up in the bushes. Our general meetings are less than 2/3 full. And these are all seasoned ex-pats, too. Jessica’s doing much better today, and although we both feel yucky, she’s been able to eat some at breakfast and lunch. So it looks like we’ll be mostly OK by the time we fly out for China on the 21st.
This may or may not be the last post from outside of China. Depends on if we manage to get online again or not.
Canada:
China:
Taiwan:
The States:
Brazil:
UK:
I am so sorry to hear Jessica is sick.. I hope all is better now! I just saw the video of the “bug for Mom” and I was just screaming at the computer while I watched you chow down! you are just crazy!
The kids came in while you were finishing up the bite so after the video was over I went back and showed them what you had eaten.. you should have seen their faces! (thanks for the memory!)
I am off to look at the rest of your pictures.. and show the kids too.
I hope your travels are safe and blessed!
ruthie
May you be strengthened and healed in this time of sickness. By the way, what is a Kiwi?
I really want to see you guys in China. I hope we can skip over there. Enjoy your last hours in Thailand.
It’s someone from New Zealand.
A wilderness EMT introduced me to the term ‘charfing.’ A synthesis of ‘chunky’ and ‘barfing’ I’ve found that this word has been really useful. Charfing in Chaing Mai.. Sorry to hear that.
Ryan you are hilarious….been barfing in BC lately? or vomiting in victoria? Hopefully Jessica won’t have any tummy turmoil in Tianjin…..ok. it’s been a long day at school…I’ll get off….
You really do need to be so careful about the water when traveling, one would expect a hotel / resort to know better