New publication: article in 'Backpacker Southeast Asia'

"Tea & Chi – My Experience at a Kung Fu Retreat in Northern Thailand."

Heaven on earth is called Nam Yang, an immersive Kung fu retreat center in Northern Thailand. It is located a few minutes’ drive from the idyllic town of Pai (just north of the city of Chiang Mai and just south of the Burmese border).

In 2019, my husband lovingly took on five weeks of 100% of our childcare and household duties, enabling me to travel to Thailand and Cambodia to research my then work-in-progress, the novel Crazy Medicine. I spent one week of the trip at Nam Yang, where I kicked not a single ass.

You can read about my time at Nam Yang in Backpacker Southeast Asia.

If I may be so bold as to quote myself:

Nam Yang’s integrity stemmed from Sifu, with his accurate sense of his value but no discernible ego. His face held the preparedness of a lion’s until he winked or showed his delightful sense of humor. His corrections came without machismo: gentle comments before, you know, demonstrations of pure ass-kicking.

Of fascination to me: On the map, you can see a squiggly red line between Chiang Mai (just south of Pai) and the town of Hueay Xai—”Way Sigh;” sounds far off and sad.

The squiggle tracks the local bus route between the two.

That line was on the map when I swiped it off the internet. (I added the purple circle.)

Hueay Xai straddles the border between Thailand and Laos. The earliest versions of Crazy Medicine opened on that very bus ride. Ultimately, I changed the location from the bus ride to a two-day river trip down the Mekong from Hueay Xai to the Lao city of Luang Prabang. I made the change because—well: bus trip or river trip,? Bus trip or river trip? Which contains the possibility of more drama?