Internship Insights: Patagonia Catalog Editor Writes from Thailand

One of the best job perks at Patagonia is the opportunity to participate in an environmental internship. Eric Unmacht -- who for six years worked as a journalist in Southeast Asia before returning to the U.S. and taking a job at Patagonia -- recently began his internship with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) branch in Thailand. He will be working on setting up a conservation area in a region that includes the DMZ between South and North Korea. Eric talked briefly about the then-upcoming trip in an interview last month. Today, Eric writes to us from Bangkok and shares how it feels to be back in Thailand as a volunteer instead of a journalist.

I walked down a long corridor beside a moving treadmill transporting passengers, and screens that flashed advertisements. “Walk the middle path. Experience incredible India,” one said above an image of Buddha. I asked myself what the Buddha, who once asked his followers never to create images in his likeness, would think. I looked around as I walked into the customs area, which opened onto a sprawling row of new baggage claims.

[First day on the job: less than 36 hours after touching down and feeling more than a little jet lag. Photo: Pimolwan Singhawong]

The airport wasn’t the only thing that had changed since I left Bangkok to move back to the states, almost exactly two years ago. At the time I had just finished a fast in the south of Thailand, and probably weighed less than I’d weighed since high school. It had been a last desperate attempt, recommended by a friend with the same problem, to rid my body of the parasites or whatever had been plaguing my health off and on for several years. Every time I got sick and succumbed to a doctor, whether in Asia or the US, they claimed to find the problem -- amoebic dysentery, giardia, a parasite -- and put me on another round of antibiotics. A few weeks before the fast, I was again diagnosed with amoebic dysentery and this time was given a cocktail of two antibiotics. My wife and I had recently gotten married, and I spent what was suppose to be our honeymoon on my friends couch in Bali, unable to eat because of the medicine, which again failed to do the trick.

Now I was returning for the first time, and not only was I healthier, but I was no longer a journalist. I was returning as a volunteer for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). I’d applied to work for two months through Patagonia’s environmental internship program, and would be working on a project to turn existing national parks in the Baekdu Daegan mountains of North and South Korea into one transboundary conservation area. It would not only open up a corridor for wildlife on the peninsula’s most prominent mountain range, it would be another small way the two countries could work together.

As my taxi pulled away from the curb, I could see the swooping architecture of the outside of the airport. With the lights and beams it looked more like an art exhibit, or maybe that was just the effects of traveling for 19 hours straight. I turned to my driver and half expected him to ask where I was from and where I was going and what I was doing in Thailand, but he quietly drove towards the skyscrapers downtown. I remembered how taxi drivers used to react when I’d say that I was a journalist -- they always lit up and replied, “Very good,” sometimes giving me a thumbs up. It was such a contrast to the way journalists were seen in my home country. I had also grown a bit skeptical of the good I was doing, so on those occasions when a taxi driver or other local lectured me on the importance of my job, it was one of the few times I genuinely felt proud of what I did.

When I arrived in front of the 1950’s hotel where I always stayed, and stepped out into the balmy night air, I finally felt like I was back in the same Bangkok. I smiled at the waitress I recognized from before and checked into my room. After walking up four flights of stairs, I put down my bags and threw myself on the bed. I looked at my small backpack on the ground and remembered how my Asian friends used to shake their heads at this typically Western thing to do. For reasons I didn’t know, I cleared some things off the dresser and put my bag on top, the last thing I did before falling asleep.

We hope to hear more from Eric as his internship progresses. In the meantime, he included a batch of photos for your enjoyment. All photos and captions by Eric Unmacht (yes, the date is wrong on his camera.)

Along with many other organizations working in Southeast Asia, IUCN's regional headquarters are in Bangkok.

IUCN headquarters

IUCN colleague Shiranee Yasaratne, from Sri Lanka, works with businesses in the region who are interested in “greening up” their practices. She says, at the moment, there's more interest than action.

Bangkok's neighborhoods are often overshadowed by its skyscrapers. The skytrain that runs though downtown Bangkok is an easy way to bypass the heavy traffic below.

Judging by how cars usually accelerate when they see someone crossing the street, there's no pedestrian right-of-way in downtown Bangkok. The only time I saw a cyclist, it was a falang (or "foreigner") with a pollution mask.

The first bike lane I've found in Bangkok, though it appears to be lines painted on the sidewalk, and is crowded by street vendors, pedestrians ...

... and motorbikes. Dodging cars on the back of a motorbike is sometimes the only way to bypass Bangkok traffic, and get home between thunderstorms in the monsoon season.

Floor illustration urging citygoers to use public transportation.

The 1950s hotel I mentioned, decor unaltered, is loved by some for its character, reasonable rates and tasty food, criticized by others for an overly aggressive approach to keeping out Bangkok's “sexpats.”

Bangkok's five-floor IT mall. Enter with focus or get swept away by the throngs of eager shoppers and curious students. Rewards include three-dollar copies of popular software programs, if one is so inclined.

Many of the more upscale markets now have aisles dedicated to organic or health foods.

There's still plenty of nonorganic food to be found in Bangkok though. Mini-tacos, mini-hot dogs, American-sized hot dogs and miscellaneous fried/colored items.

Another sign that more Bangkok shoppers are interested in going green.

Bangkok has also gotten a reputation as a cheap place for plastic surgery. It has some of the best medical care for the cost in the world.

Evening tai chi in one of the few parks in downtown Bangkok.

A steady stream of devotees came to pay respects at this shrine in downtown Bangkok.