Good post by Stephan Guyenet from Whole Health Source, Dr. Kevin Patterson on Western Diets and Health, about a Canadian physician Kevin Patterson who writes about the diseases of civilization and the transition from a traditional diet among native peoples of Canada to a more “modern” one — full of processed foods and cheap calories.

He discusses the “epidemiological transition”, the idea that cultures experience predictable changes in their health as they go from hunter-gatherer, to agricultural, to industrial. I think he has an uncommonly good perspective on the effects of industrialization on human health, which tends to be true of people who have witnessed the effects of the industrial diet and lifestyle on diverse cultures.

Jump over for more.  Reading through that brought be to an article written by Kevin Patterson Diseases of Affluence. In it he discusses his experience as a doctor in Afghanistan, and the lives of traditional Polynesian and arctic peoples.

Around the world, as traditional peoples and societies have been absorbed into the global monoculture, the prevalence of diabetes has exploded. Since 2001, premature death from obesity has exceeded death from malnutrition. The milestone was reached at almost the same time as another: for the first time in history, the number of urbanites exceeds the number of rural dwellers. Canada is an example. For all its magnificent and extensive wilderness, 87 percent of the population lives in a community with at least ten thousand neighbours. Afghans are at the other end: less than 12 percent live in cities. No lattes, no internet, no phone, no pool. And no XXXL elastic stretch pants. After wealth and death rates, the biggest difference between Afghanistan and Canada—and the hallmark of the world’s creeping homogeneity—is urbanization.

An excellent discussion of the key issues facing all of us who have already made the transition, and what we consider “normal” parts of daily life and aging.

(Cross posted with CrossFit Chiang Mai)

Earlier this summer we heard through a former student Genevieve Leet (Gigi) and from Urak Lawoi that due to the prolonged heat and warmer waters, the corals were bleaching in the Adang Archipelago where we do the Oceans course.  Gigi brought back a report, after diving several of the sites that we use for the course, and reported that about 1/3 of the corals in some areas had bleached.   She also found some anenomes had bleached as well, and took some photos to document the changes.

More from the New York Times:

Extreme Heat Bleaches Coral, and Threat Is Seen

This year’s extreme heat is putting the world’s coral reefs under such severe stress that scientists fear widespread die-offs, endangering not only the richest ecosystems in the ocean but also fisheries that feed millions of people…

What is unfolding this year is only the second known global bleaching of coral reefs. Scientists are holding out hope that this year will not be as bad, over all, as 1998, the hottest year in the historical record, when an estimated 16 percent of the world’s shallow-water reefs died. But in some places, including Thailand, the situation is looking worse than in 1998…

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the first eight months of 2010 matched 1998 as the hottest January to August period on record. High ocean temperatures are taxing the organisms most sensitive to them, the shallow-water corals that create some of the world’s most vibrant and colorful seascapes…

“It is a lot easier for oceans to heat up above the corals’ thresholds for bleaching when climate change is warming the baseline temperatures,” said C. Mark Eakin, who runs a program called Coral Reef Watch for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “If you get an event like El Niño or you just get a hot summer, it’s going to be on top of the warmest temperatures we’ve ever seen.”

In Thailand, “there some signs of recovery in places,” said James True, a biologist at Prince of Songkla University. But in other spots, he said, corals were hit so hard that it was not clear young polyps would be available from nearby areas to repopulate dead reefs.

We expected that eventually the reefs at our study sites would be hit with the impact of global warming.  We just didn’t expect it this soon.

From what we have heard, we think that the archipelago is one of the places where we will see recovery.  Studying this change will be an important part of the course this semester.

Today at ISDSI we were privileged to have a showing of the film “Mystic Ball” and a question and answer session with the filmmaker, Greg Hamilton.

From the film’s website:

Passion suffuses every moment of Mystic Ball, an uplifting documentary about one man’s physical and spiritual quest. The film resists easy categorization – it’s simultaneously a thrilling sports movie, an insightful journey to a new world, and a lyrical personal story.

Mystic Ball follows Greg Hamilton, the filmmaker, deep into the ancient and little-known culture of Myanmar and its traditional sport, chinlone. Like the film, chinlone is hard to define. It’s a team sport without an opposing team, part dance, part meditation. There is no competition, no winners and no losers. The game is back-breakingly difficult, yet is played by almost all Burmese, from young children to octogenarians.

There is a lot to say about the movie, and I recommend it highly.  You can get copies through the website, and it would be a great film to show on campus.  Lots of lessons about culture, and while specific to Burma, I think it resonates with our students who are on a similar sojourn on study abroad — crossing cultures, learning new things, and going outside of themselves to become part of a new community in Thailand.

Here is a clip.  Jump to the website for more: www.mysticball-themovie.com

Last week was the final week of the 5 week homestay. To thank the families and to gather as a community, we hosted a farewell dinner and party with the families, students, instructors and staff of ISDSI.  We ate out under the stars near the foot of Doi Suthep mountain, at the side of a lake (for those who know Chiang Mai, along the canal road near the 700 year stadium).  It was a traditional “kantoke” dinner, with everyone sitting on mats on the ground, eating off a small round “kantoke” table filled with sticky rice, curry, steamed vegetables, and other Northern Thai food.

In addition to the dinner, there was a local group of youth performing traditional songs and dances, and then the ISDSI students performed as well. Alone or in pairs, students and their families prepared songs (in Thai!) as well as traditional dances.  It was a great time, and we all enjoyed it immensely.  Here are some photos taken by Pi Ben of the event.

Lindsey's host family getting her ready.

Kristen and Jill doing a traditional Lanna Thai dance with their host sisters.

Nikki doing the nail dance with her host sisters.

Krissy singing in Thai "Sao Chiang Mai" (Chiang Mai Maiden), a well loved Northern Thai folk song.

Ajaan Wilasanee (pictured) and Pi Pu were the MCs for the event and did a terrific job jumping between Thai and English explaining the dances and songs.

Pi Pu introducing the students (some out of the frame), who sang in Thai "Bang khon kin khanom pang" (or "Some people eat bread") a folk song celebrating eating sticky rice, the Northern Thai staple. The song starts saying "Some people eat bread..." but goes on to say "but I eat sticky rice" -- which, since Westerners "all" eat bread, is especially fun when Western students sing it. It celebrates that the students have embraced Thai culture -- eating rice and singing in Thai. (Note too the families taking photos like it is a UN press conference.)

This week on Wednesday the students went out for a great hands-on lesson about Thai culture, markets and food.

It is one thing to learn a language in the classroom, and quite another to learn it while trying to buy the right ingredients while you’re haggling in the market!

The students did a great job, and returned with fresh produce and other ingredients in hand to start their cooking lessons.  As anyone who has been to Thailand knows, Thai food is a key part of the culture, as is cooking and eating together.  The students (directed by their fantastic Thai language instructors) did a terrific job.

As one student said during the day’s lesson, “You know, after learning like this we’re not going to be able to go back to learning in classrooms when we get back to America.”

Here are a few photos to give you an idea of why that is so true.

Vegetable prep.

Fresh lime

Ahaan Thai! ("Thai food")

Roasting peanuts

Garlic (crushed, and the skins only partially removed if you are frying them for added taste)

Jill roasting peanuts.

Tomatos, long bean, chilli peppers, and Thai eggplant

As I write this Monday night (Thailand time), the government is working to clear the streets, the opposition “red shirts” have issued a call to fall back to the main protest site around government house, and there are sporadic protests in the provinces.  No one really knows what is going to happen next.

It can be difficult at times like these to know what is going on, since there are so many rumors, mis-reported new stories, and unconfirmed reports. Through it all, however, day-to-day life goes on.  Today is part of the Thai New Year celebration of songkran, a water festival, and throughout most of the country people are having fun, throwing water on each other, going to local fairs, and enjoying time off from work and a relief from the heat of April.

Two excellent articles out today, not on the details of the crisis so much as the issues surrounding them. Both are well worth a read, and give a lot of good background on what is happening and why.

Philip Bowring writing an op-ed in The New York Times (What Shirt for Thailand?):

The situation is not beyond retrieval. Thailand has always flourished on pragmatic compromises, domestic and international. Ethnic homogeneity and the economic interests of a society with few big corporations but many small businessmen and independent farmers all make it unlikely that there will be widespread bloodshed.

But there remains a fundamental divide over the rules of the political game. Social divisions must be bridged if Thailand is to return to the promise of 1997, when elections and a new constitution seemed to put the nation on a path of liberal democracy.

Another good article from The Economist, “Thailand’s ugly crisis“:

Many Thais are heartily sick of the crisis and its enormous damage to the economy in terms of lost investment and tourists. Another military coup is rumoured, although it is unclear where the army’s political inclinations lie. Presumably Mr Abhisit’s days are numbered as prime minister, though who might succeed him is anyone’s guess. Mr Thaksin hopes to ride the protests and return to power. Yet with plenty of scores to settle, his would presumably be a brittle and autocratic rule at a time when reconciliation is badly needed. Fresh elections are probably the best bet, with the promise of a search for a broad political consensus for constitutional change to allow a more representative politics. For now, with violence in the streets again, Thailand teeters on the brink.

As someone who has lived in Thailand most of the last 20 years, and who has been through more than one coup d’état, it is still difficult to know what is going to happen, and how it will impact the country as a whole (the big picture) and our specific program and students (the details).

How do we figure out what is going on, and how best to respond?

There are a number of things we do in this sort of situation, and it may be helpful to share some of it, both for students, parents, partner schools, and for other faculty and/or programs who might face a similar situation.

We of course have an emergency response plan, a team of well-trained staff, and have worked out in advance what to do in a variety of scenarios. I  (Mark) am a warden with the US Consulate in Chiang Mai, so get updates directly from the Consulate when they are issued, and also know many of the consular folks as personal friends. All of our staff carry cell-phones, and when students are in-country, the phone are on 24/7 in case of an emergency. We have a list of student cell phones, parental and school emergency contacts, etc. News feeds (online and off) are monitored daily for important information, especially as concerns security and threats.  All of that is (or at least should be) routine for any study-abroad program. (You can read more about our approach to risk management at “The Objective Hazards of Culture: Risk Management in an International Setting” here as a PDF.)

The key is knowing the place with the sort of “deep knowing” David Orr talks about when referring the ecological education and knowing a river or mountain.

“…[A] course on a nearby river might require students to live on the river for a time, swim in it, canoe it, watch it in its various seasons, study its wildlife and aquatic animals, listen to it, and talk to people who live along it.  A river become…”a microcosm of the world” and a doorway to wider knowledge…there are some things that cannot be known or said about a mountain, or a forest, or a river—things too subtle or too powerful to be caught in the net of science, language, and intellect.” (p. 96, Earth In Mind: On Education, Environment And The Human Prospect, 1994)

You have to “swim” in a culture to know it deeply.

For a culture and a country, knowing the community, the normal rhythms of day-to-day life, being comfortable speaking Thai everyday with friends and acquaintances (getting inside the skin of the culture), spending a lot of time reading and talking about politics with Thai and ex-pat experts. It is in part having a network of trusted friends, both Thai and ex-pat residents (foreigners) who are themselves well connected. People you can trust, who have good judgement, and who you can ask for help, advice and trusted opinion. Moving between the academic world of the urban elite to the world of marginalized villagers (in the North, Northeast and South especially) means that we have friends who are poor farmers, fishermen and tribal people–all of whom have a different view on what is happening, and how it fits into the bigger picture. It isn’t just the opinions of a Thai political scientist that matter, but also our uncles, aunts, older brothers and sisters out in the villages who matter.

Deep knowing doesn’t tell you what is going to happen, but helps you know what to do when something does happen.

So while there is not a simple formula to calculate what is going to happen and what we should do about it, deep knowing, a cautious awareness and multiple sources of information go a long way towards helping us know what to do and what is happening. We are fortunate to have excellent students who love Thai culture and dive into the language and home-stays with gusto (even when it is hard). As they develop cultural sensitivity and awareness, strong relationships with host families, and a good understanding of how to live in Thailand, it makes our job not just much easier, but deepens our own understanding of this place as we see them struggle to create a new home.

As the articles above point out, there are some significant changes happening in Thailand, and the rural-urban gap needs to be bridged. Having close friends among the urban elite as well as the marginalized rural folk leads me to be cautiously optimistic about the eventual outcome, but concerned as well for a country and a people that we love as the problems get sorted out.