Sawadee ka! Hello and good morning from Kao Lok. Another day in the coal mines coming up. We work 6 days a week and take Sunday off. The Tsunami Volunteer Center MAKES everyone take one day off because it can be so overwhelming. I have discovered that the only way for me to put anything on the blog is to get up extra early and arrive at the center before we all go to our respective projects. There are about 150 people here. Some have been here since the begining and will be here as long as they are needed. Some have been here a month and are leaving in another month. Some people were just traveling around backpacking and decided to come here and help. They are not taking anymore volunteers who would be here less than 2 weeks because it is so difficult to train someone new everyday. There are alot of different projects here. Gordon and I are on a building crew working at a village called Taptuan that was totally wiped off the face of the earth. The people are called the Morgahn and they are sea gypsies. They aren't actually Thai citizens and Thai is the second language. They speak a combination of Thai, Indonisian and something else I can't remember now. Most of the village, including the animals, survived because before the first wave came the animals started acting really upset and freaking out. They all ran for the mountains and the people knew something was up so they took off too, fast. The same happened on the Similian Islands. When the sea went so far out, the village people knew that the sea was going to "eat them" so they high tailed it up to high ground. There wasn't a single death in his village and they saved about 300 additional people. We hear amazing stories everyday. This morning was sad though. Our hotel is about 1 mile from the Center and we usually hitch hike. I am so sick of hitching rides. I can't wait to get back into my VW instead of a back of a truck. We decided just to walk to work today and on the way, we pass a small police station. We are out in the countryside so there isn't much around. When we passed the police station, we went over to look at the notice board. They had all these pictures of people that are still missing. Small children, entire families, husbands and wives. There were also morgue pictures that we weren't expecting to see. They are unidentified bodies and we couldn't even tell what race they were. There was an old Thai man there looking at the pictures. He said his house was washed away and two people in his family are still missing. They are dead of course but people have a hard time thinking that it could be real. Kao Lok where we are was the hardest hit part of Thailand. We are just north of Phuket. Everything is gone. There is an enormous police ship ( like the coast guard) that is nearly a mile inland. The tsunami carried it so far and just dropped it. They are going to leave it there as a memorial. The ship was guarding the King of Thailand's daughter and grandson who were staying here. The grandson had something wrong with him. Like autisim or something like that. He died in the tsunami so that is why they are leaving the ship there. I think it would be pretty impossible to move it anyway. I better go meet my crew. Hopefully we will have a truck arranged, but most of the time we have to hitch.

Gotta go. Love you all so much. Bridgett Joyce

Good morning! We are so sorry that we haven't been able to update the blog. We had difficulty getting internet access and once we got to Tsunami Volunteer Center, we have been so busy that we haven't had time.

It is so incredible to be here. We flew from Austin on March 1 and landed in Tokyo. We spent two nights there. When we were leaving Texas, Gordon said that we should take jackets. I thought he was out of his mind. We were going to the jungle you know. I am so glad he did as it was FREEZING in Tokyo. We aced the subway system. It is so easy and well marked and huge. In Boston and London, the subway is a rats maze compared to Tokyo. We were there at rush hour and I was a bit concerned because I have seen the pictures of people actually being shoved into subway cars with big poles! There were so many people but it was so orderly. Everyone lines up and waits calmly. Really amazing. We went to the "historic" section of Tokyo, visited a few temples, burned some incense and ate some things that were weren't sure of the origin and had a good time. The highlight was that we visited the Kodokan Judo Center. Gordon plays (yes, they call it play) judo and he has wanted to go here forever. This is where Jigaro Kano invented judo in the 1800's. Gordon was so excited! We got to watch practice and some matches and it was really neat.

We were leaving the next afternoon. I woke up in the morning and Gordon said, "Guess what it is doing outside." I thought "Oh great. It is raining and we have to drag all these bags to the train to get to the airport!" No rain, but it was snowing ! It snowed and snowed and snowed all day long!!!!! Apparently, it was completely out of the norm. But what is the norm anymore? Cool summers and snow in winter in Texas. Craziness!!!

Anywho, we got to the airport. No problems. Checked in and waited. My host mother from Thailand had arranged that her sister, Nelly and brother Nah Suan would pick us up at the airport. Because of the snow, we were 3 hours late. They stood at the arrival gate with a sign saying "BJ" for three hours. We felt awful about it.

We get to Thailand and I just couldn't believe that I was back and that Gordon was with me. We kept saying, "Can you believe that we are in Bangkok?!?!" It was so fantastic. It wasn't too hot either so that was nice. This is a pretty cool time in Thailand, relatively speaking. Mostly high 80s and 90s F. We stayed at Nah Suan's gorgeous home in Bangkok. He is a highly respected architect in Thailand. All my (Thai) mom's family are very smart. Both my host mom and dad are doctors. So we visited and went to bed. My Mom and Dad were driving up from Rayong, where I used to live for a year, and were going to pick up my little sister, Nit, ( means little) from University and come to Nah Suan's in the afternoon.

Our first morning in Bangkok, Nelly drove us to the Royal Palace area. She showed us the market, the ferry to cross the river and many little shops and stalls. The smells and sounds are so foreign to us.

........I have to go now. It is about 8:15am and we are about to leave for our building site. Gordon and I have been on a building team. In the past three days, I have become a "bricky". Laying bricks. They aren't actually bricks, but cinder blocks. I partnered with a woman from Quebec who is an absolute doll. She is here with her daughter who is about my age. We were laughing yesterday because we never thought that we would develop a preference for different kinds of cement. We are about to leave so I have to run. We hitchhike to the site about 20 km away. More on all that later. Things are reall;y interesting. All my love and Gordon's too. Big hugs and kisses, Bridgett

We're all ok and working hard building houses in Khao Lak, Thailand.