Heat Seeking Land Leaches!!!!

I am so exhausted. Today we climbed Doi Sutep. The temple at the top is one of the two most important religious places in Thailand. The hike up was really really really great. We got to do our first bit of ecology, and I continue to really love Pi Aaron’s teaching. We stopped several places along the way at did, “site descriptions” where we spent 15 minuits sitting in one place and observing/describing/recording the location: this was mostly in terms of ecology; meaning abiotic factors (like climate, topography, soil, sun light ext), and biotic factors (like animals and plants) but we were also encouraged to make it valuable to ourselves – to draw, to write notes, to talk about how we felt there, or basically just take the time to make something worthwhile of the description, if we felt we had fully dictated everything that was there.

The hike was so beautiful. It was real jungle, like in Vietnam films – forest banana trees with leaves larger than a person, and mist, and rivers pouring down the mountain in staggered waterfalls, and brown streams.It was raining part of the time, so that cooled things a bit athough there was 100% humidity. There was the sound of rain smacking the massive leaves. Although we only saw a fea dragonflies or heard a distant bird singing there was a feeling of denseness and fullness that let you know there was probably so much that was still concealed from you.

At the top of the moutian we came out at the back of the national park – and we were not greated by a well-manicured park but by the “waste management station” which were stacks burst open garbage bags and a few half outdoor buildings. I was shocked to see a hole in the ground filled with the bags – about to be buried on the side of the path. I thought “omg. They are just burying it!” and it was really sad and disturbing then I thought “oh wait. That’s what we do back in the states. We just put it in a box of cement first and then burry it!”. It was a great moment for really internalizing what happens with our waste. It’s one thing to know –abstractly- that –somewhere- your trash is just being put in the ground, and quite another to get emotionally attached to a place, value it, look forward to being there, and see that peoples trash is just dumped there. What if it resurfaces with a bit of rain and erosion!? And that hole was pretty big, but it only held maybe 20 bags? Think how many bags one family makes, or one national park, or one city!

At the top of the mountain were also the coolest trees I have ever seen in my entire life. I’ll post pictures on Monday, because there is just no point in describing too much. They were naturally multi-colored. They looked painted.

On the way up we stopped at a river side wat on the side of the moutian it was amazing. There was such a rich integraiton of art and cultlure into every structure. I would love to live with so much art surrounding me.(And so close to nature!)

Rew is laughing at how fast I can type, he enver ceases to find it funny and amazing. Every once in a while he will just hit a button to try to get my attention.

AND...
We had our first heat-seeking land leach experience. Yup. Heat seeking. Land Leaches. They don't need to be in water, and they sense your body heat and come hunt you down. They crawl up your pants (which i partly why we wear gaitors) and you porbably won't even feel them crawling. One girl described it as thinking there was a big drop of water rolling down her leg. Pi Ben and Pi Aaron had them in the their armpits. Then at the top, on girl found one on her thigh – headed where your really really don’t want them to be headed.


On the way back, in the Rot Dang, pick-up with a covered back with benches in it, we found one wiggling on the floor (full of blood) that had fallen off someone during the ride. It was about the size of a rolly-polly. Its rubbery body stretched and swelled as it inched along. (it moved just like an inch worm) But then we got back to school…one boy found one in his pants. I think the situation whent somehtign like this:

“ahhhh! Pi Ben! What do I do?! ahhh! There’s a giant leach on my balls!”

The first leaches were about the size of a rolly polly. this one was three inches long. It drank so much blood it had litterally exploded. Everyone was in a state of half panic, half laughing until we could breath, half deciding never to set foot into the jungle again. Luckily, this is the first time in ten years that anything this...er...dramatic has happened with leaches.