Category: Posts

Wat Charok Padang (glass bottles temple)

April 26, 2011 / / 2 Comments

I’m starting to find that Buddhists around the world are pretty into environmentalism.  The Sunnyvale  Zen Center in Silicon Valley, California  has a solar photovoltaic system on its rooftop and an abbot who emphasizes the importance of protecting the environment in his Buddhism classes.  The American Bodhi Center in Houston, Texas has a large organic garden, and many of its members are avid organic gardeners, composters, and recyclers.

Last week, I visited a Thai temple in Northern Malaysia largely made out of used glass (beer!) bottles.  Unfortunately, I made the amateur mistake of forgetting to charge my extra camera battery, so  I had to resort to using my mobile phone.  Even worse, my mobile phone camera appears to be operating at a sub-optimal level:

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Another taste of Myanmar

April 23, 2011 / / 5 Comments

April 13 was the New Year celebration for Thailand and Myanmar, also known as the Songkran Water Festival.  Unfortunately, I was in neither Thailand nor Myanmar on that day, but I did the best I could – I visited Thai and Myanmar Buddhist temples in Penang, Malaysia.

Here’s an environmentally friendly reminder I noticed in the Thai temple:

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Southwestern Adventure 江河行 2010: The Last Episode

April 9, 2011 / / 2 Comments

Finally, after months and months of delay, here is the last episode of the Southwestern Adventure.  Thanks so much for sticking with me through this trip!  Hope you enjoyed the pics and the captions.  I plan to follow up on these issues by exploring the downstream effects of China’s damming activity on its Southeast Asian neighbors.  Especially worrying are China’s damming of the Lancang River, known as the Mekong in southeast Asia, and the Nu River, also known as the Salween.

If you have contacts at NGOs or government agencies in Southeast Asia who are working on international river issues, please let me know.

Here is a map of our approximate route during this episode.






A Taste of Myanmar

April 8, 2011 / / 4 Comments

One positive thing (not to say that there aren’t lots of other characteristics I like about this place, such as cheap delicious food and really friendly people)  I’ve noticed about Singapore:  The buildings look nice, even decades-old government-built housing.  I’ve been told that the government requires and/or subsidizes regular repainting of buildings to maintain the city’s clean, modern aura.  And it works.

Walking up St. Martin’s Drive toward the Myanmar (aka Burma) Embassy in Singapore, I noted that the buildings here looked particularly sharp.   Based on its proximity to the flashy Orchard Road shopping area, this neighborhood must be expensive even by Singaporean standards.  Below are a couple of  St. Martin’s residential buildings.

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