WE THOUGHT A LOT ABOUT SAFETY ON THE ROAD.
I guess if we really wanted to be totally safe, we would have stayed at home. In Maine, there are no exotic diseases to speak of. The water is fresh and clean. The air is pure. No land mines or tanks. If safety were the highest goal, we would have stayed with the easy and familiar: the same job, the same house, the same street. Risk taking, adventure, the unknown … these are all just different words for danger, right?
I lived in Los Angeles during the Rodney King riots in the early nineties. For hours on end, Traca and I watched images of violence on TV: looting, lawlessness, even death. Black smoke and flames filled the screen and it felt, as we watched, as if the whole world were on fire.
It happened again as we waited in Melbourne.
Australia was supposed to be just a two-day stop, a brief “G’day” on our way to our next volunteer adventure. Through a U.S. organization called Volunthai, we were set to teach English in a rural Thai village. Logan and Jackson were told they might even be able to teach their own classes, which, though terrifying to them, sounded pretty cool to their parents.
But on the eve of our departure, after months of sporadic fighting in the Thai capital, the government tanks rolled in. It was a classic David and Goliath standoff. The Red Shirt protesters thought the new government needed the boot and were demanding that the president dissolve parliament, call for early elections, and step down. To make their point, they took up a position in the middle of the ritziest shopping district in Bangkok, barricading themselves behind a makeshift wall of bamboo and old tires. The government was trying to be patient, letting them have their democratically protected say. But as tourism numbers started to fall and the fighting intensified, official patience ran out and the military ran in. As we watched on TV, the tanks pushed into central Bangkok and the military scattered the resistance, arrested the leaders, and imposed a curfew across the city and many of the surrounding provinces.
Like the rioters in Los Angeles twenty years before, the vanquished Red Shirts raged, rioting in their retreat, setting fire to the stock exchange, a shopping mall, and dozens of government offices. Then the U.S. embassy closed, prompting an Australian newscaster to appear on the TV in our hotel room and report: “The government has raised the official travel advisory to: Do not travel to Bangkok.” That seemed pretty clear. We called our airline and postponed our flight.
For three more days we waited. We visited the Melbourne Zoo and worked hard to attract the meditating koala’s attention. We toured the botanical gardens and tried, unsuccessfully, to convince our kids that trees were a viable tourist attraction. We basically took a little break from volunteering and relaxed as much as possible.
Then, on the night before our rescheduled flight, we were back on high alert, scouring the Web, trying our best to evaluate the unfolding situation. From all accounts we could find on the ground in Thailand, the violence seemed to be confined to a small area. Most people were living their lives normally. Some even said they had no sense that there was any conflict going on at all, particularly in the countryside. We emailed other Volunthai volunteers already at schools in the region we were headed to, and they used terms like “beyond tranquil” and “deeply peaceful.” In short, they encouraged us to come—though not everyone was so encouraging.
With our departure imminent, the fear really started flowing from home. Normally neutral friends and family pulled out all the emotional stops.
“A coup is likely,” they predicted. “The violence will almost certainly get worse and spread. You will be a target!”
The conflict was more or less divided down economic lines, with the poor, rural Red Shirts seeking the removal of the elitist government and its wealthy supporters. We would be perceived—or so we were warned—as rich Americans and might represent something the rebellion didn’t like. All scary thoughts. All meant to protect us.
In the end, I suppose it boils down to faith, odds, information, and instinct. I remember watching TV all day back in Los Angeles and feeling, really feeling, that the rioters were right outside our apartment. The news was filled with anger and danger, fueling a palpable sense of panic. Hours later, when Traca and I dared to open our door, we were surprised to find that the sky was blue and the streets were quiet. For miles and miles in every direction, there were no signs of danger, the birds were singing, people were helpful and unusually open. Honestly, the city had never looked more beautiful to me.
Sensing that this type of localized media hype was probably happening again, I lobbied in favor of going to Thailand and—shortly after midnight, after many last-minute Web searches—Traca agreed. I could tell she wasn’t fully convinced we were doing the right thing, but either way, it was a huge relief to me when we turned off the TV, powered down the computer, and curled up in bed having finally made a decision.
Of course, nothing is static, not rebellions, not safety, not certainty—and by the time we woke up, around six the next morning, all it took was a single new email from home to toss our newfound resolve into a tailspin.
The message was from our brother-in-law Tod. Under normal circumstances, Tod gives great advice. He’s thoughtful, rational, a big-picture guy, but as soon as I saw his name in Traca’s in-box, I knew he was not what we needed just then.
“Don’t read that,” I said. “We’ve already decided.”
Too late. Traca opened it like Pandora’s box and released all the fear back into our room. With only two hours before we had to leave for the airport, Tod suggested that we skip Thailand for a while, let it cool down. Maybe go to Vietnam, he said … and just like that, Traca started looking up Jetstar flights to Ho Chi Minh City.
What followed was a crazy hour of indecision, with the scales of safety and danger tipping this way and that, with the clock ticking louder and louder, until I found myself standing in our doorway, done with all of it, needing and wanting to make a decision.
“Traca. Stop. Listen to me,” I said. I was stressed and flipping out. I pointed to my foot inside the room. “With this foot, I will walk to my backpack and get ready for the Skybus pickup.” Then I pointed to my other foot in the hall. “With this foot, I will walk downstairs and call the airline and change our tickets to Vietnam. Just tell me what you want to do.”
Traca looked at me, not sure. All she wanted was to be safe.
Then Jackson walked in. “What’s going on?” she asked.
We told her the high points: Vietnam, cool down, Tod’s message, unsure …
“Are you kidding me?” Jack said, as if we’d just proposed going to Iraq or Darfur. “Vietnam is so much worse than Thailand. I’m not even interested in Vietnam.”
It was a reaction based on zero information and even less analysis, but for some reason, it tipped the scales. Without any further discussion, Traca made up her mind.
“Okay. Let’s go to Thailand,” she said, and I walked to get my backpack.
I wish I could have said with complete certainty that there was no risk waiting for us in Thailand, but there is always some risk. Besides, we didn’t quit our jobs, pull our kids out of school, rent our house to a total stranger, and carve out six months of new experiences because we were looking for a sure thing. We did it to be fully engaged in life, to step outside the narrow focus of fear, to put our faith in the goodness of local people, and to stand together, as a family, in the safety that we hoped like heck was waiting for us.