Thailand 20: August 20, 2002

Liz and I have been busy at work lately. Liz just finished a two day work retreat in Rayong on Saturday which involved singing Christmas song Karoake, among other events. You should e-mail her for details.

Secretary of State Powell visited Thailand last month. Surprisingly, it was his first trip to the country, despite the fact that he served in Vietnam. It truly is amazing what goes into planning and carrying out such a visit. Hundreds of people spending thousands of man(woman)hours, hundreds of thousands of dollars in resources etc. -- and this was just one of eight stops on this trip. My specific role was control officer for Asst. Sec. Wayne, which I handled with aplomb, except for the time on Monday morning when I misplaced him for about an hour. However, we later located him, and the visit carried on unhindered. Secretary Powell enjoys meeting with Embassy communities around the world and he participated in a meet and greet with Embassy Bangkok as well. He is quite a speaker and he then waded into the crowd to shake hands (Liz was after him like a hurricane until she cornered him). His motorcade somehow cleared Bangkok traffic and he made his meetings in record time. Of course, after I dropped Asst. Sec. Wayne off at the Sec.'s plane at the airport I had a 2 and a half hour ride home through the traffic the Secretary caused. Security for the visit was incredible, with diplomatic security, Thai police, and Thai military everywhere.

Compare that with a recent experience at the Thai Finance Ministry. A couple of months ago, I was bringing a couple of officials visiting from Washington to meet a mid-level financial expert. The building has a guard sitting in front, but he just sort of nods as you walk in. We took the elavator up to the fifth floor and turned off. We couldn't find the expert's office and got a little lost. While walking, we passed one or two other guards, but they didn't look up. Finally, after going around in circles for about 15 minutes, I popped into an office to ask directions. Of course, I stepped into the office of the Finance Minister, who was at work in his inner office. His secretary, unconcerned that three unescorted foreigners were wandering the halls of the Ministry, told me the proper directions and we headed on our way. Imagine that in a government building in the States. I think its great that Thailand has yet to need security the way we do in the US. Hopefully, it will remain like that.

We recently received our bid list for our next position. We move next summer and though Liz and I would love to stay here for an extra year, that's not an option. Coming from a good job in a good post, I have not built up a lot of equity. So dreams of good jobs in London and Geneva (both on our bid list) probably are just that, dreams. However, there's a good political job in Kuala Lumpur that we're eyeing. We're also looking at a great economic job in . . . Uganda. It's attractive from a distance, let's see whether we stick with it when we actually have to choose.

Just after the Secretary visited, I changed jobs. I'm now a vice-consul in the non-immigrant visa section. I interview Thais who would like to receive temporary visas to visit the United States. It is quite a change from economic reporting. The pace is non-stop. On the up side, we've got a fantastic group of Foreign Service Nationals and I get to use my rusty Thai every day during the interviews. On the down side, I frequently have to tell nice people that they can't go to the U.S. Its particularly hard when you know that the people have travelled hundreds of miles, put on their nicest clothes, spent hours preparing for their interview, and paid the $65 non-refundable application fee (a month's salary for many rural Thai). Its even more difficult, when you know as soon as they walk up to the window that you have to refuse them because they don't qualify. In my first couple of days, I refused a developmentally disabled women hoping to visit her brother and an older HIV-positive woman, who had not yet told her daughter (who was accompanying her) of her status. I asked the daughter to take a seat, while I asked the woman about her medical condition, but had to tell her that under U.S. law she could not go to the U.S. (she had a couple more problems, as well). I felt like hanging myself. Most interviews are not as tough and the approval rate in Thailand actually is about 75%, though most of those are approved without interviews -- I refuse a little under 50% of the people who come to my window. The interviews themselves can be interesting, and I've learned quite a bit about Thai society just from reviewing bank books, property documents etc. -- can you imagine Americans willingly allowing consuls from, say, Ireland to review their investments, marriage certificates, job letters, and questioning them about their relationships with their family and friends, in order to decide whether to allow Americans to visit Ireland. Even with my poor Thai I can follow most answers, though occassionally an applicant will ramble on for a while. I've learned not to let that concern me, because of the inverse relationship I've detected between the length of an answer and its a. relevance and b. accuracy. We don't get a lot of blatant visa fraud, though we do get a lot of people obviously coming to work in the U.S. I also have had the privilege of being on the receiving end of several pleasant diatribles from angry AmCits, typically upset that I have refused visas for their girlfriends. I have had my parentage questioned (sorry Mom) and one fellow countryman told me that I had "pulled the beating heart out of [his] chest and stomped on it." He hoped that I get to experience this sensation one day. As our friend Kay puts it, its like working at the DMV.