Thailand #2 from 12.11.to 1.12.2002

We started our trip with a leisurely drive down to Geneva where we ate our take-in dinner of fruit in the Senator Lounge. We left a bit early as we did not want to rush to the plane parked at Gate 31. There a Swissport supervisor informed me that I would have to check my roll-on as it was too large as cabin baggage. After some arguments he prepared the check-in sticker and told me to take it on board, if the crew had no objection; that was all: had they not allowed it, then the piece was already marked to Bangkok via Frankfurt.

Well, the crew did not object and as there is no overhead space in row one; they let me put it into the storage cupboard on the other side of the aisle, which has normally been the case. The only unfortunate thing was that arriving at Gate C-06, there was a walk of nearly 2 km to Gate B-22 where our 747-400 was waiting. The crew there was happy to see us arriving. After all, our Geneva flight was half an hour late, despite fine clear weather, owing to the Brussels decided ‘slots’. The crew here too had absolutely no problem storing my carry-on in their downstairs locker. Would our 4 checked bags make it, was what we were wondering.
This year, we were not going to Thailand for fun and sightseeing, but for a thorough body cleansing. If you want details, please go to http://www.innergetichealth.com.

On both flights, we were offered meals, but as we had started earlier to prepare for our week of cleansing at a Chiang Mai facility, we left all those goodies, drank a lot of sparkling mineral water, took a sleeping pill and went to sleep half an hour after take off in Frankfurt. Well rested after a 7.5 hours sleep, we had nearly reached Thailand, and ate a small amount of fresh fruit. There was no line at the rather distant Immigration, and as we took the escalator down to the baggage delivery hall, we saw that the first suitcases were coming on belt 9. Our 4 bags were right among the first and in no time we were through the green line. A staff member from the Amari Airport Hotel was waiting for us and took us via an elevator and a across a long footbridge over the downtown to airport super highway and the main rail lines to the north of Thailand, straight to the hotel. We had checked into our room and settled down less than 45 minutes after touchdown, a new record for Bangkok.

I guess not even Federal Councilor Couchepin who had arrived a bit earlier on a SWISS MD-11 was not any quicker at the same hotel, though he of course enjoyed diplomatic status. He was merely in transit to Australia on a plane leaving some two hours later.

What is truly strange is my habit of developing a toothache when I am in Thailand. Whilst I was downstairs in the Business Center of the hotel checking my emails, I felt a strange numbness of the gums near the left upper molars which had given me big trouble just two years ago when we were heading from Bangkok to Chiang Mai by car. A top dentist there got everything right with root canal treatment and a new crown – perhaps that job needs to pay another visit to the dentist? The really funny thing is that I have an appointment with the very same dentist, made months ago, for tomorrow evening! Perhaps by then, all will have gone away, as often happens in such cases.

As I said earlier, our second trip in the new millennium to Thailand was a first of its kind: We came for a thorough body cleansing plan lasting 7 days in Chiang Mai, led by a 2000 plus course leader, Julia Jus, an American with Swiss citizenship and full Swiss German fluency. Her simply stunning daughter Jasmine has just obtained the OK as the model for a product ad for a new Nestle product in Thailand, and might well be an entrant for the Miss Switzerland contest in 3 years, when she will be 18. I hope she will add the necessary inch or so in height for becoming an entrant.

We had begun at home to prepare for the cleansing by taking several psyllium shakes with herbal supplements to start softening the layers of mucus deposited over years of eating wrong foods and (especially) wrong food combinations. This is not a problem when it happens infrequently. However, our high protein diets, loaded as they also are with empty calorie simple carbohydrates such as white bread, rice and especially refined sugars, virtually occur with every meal. The digestive system has therefore been overtaxed on numerous occasions and often has had no recourse but to protect the intestine walls by the secretion of mucus. This then has formed a kind of plaque, which we all possess in many layers of various thicknesses.

After arrival, the cleansing started in earnest, with salad only for lunch and fresh fruit only for dinner being replaced by more shakes and herbal capsules, plus two daily colon irrigations to wash out the accumulated and softened mucoid plaque.

We also had daily light yoga workouts and a 2-hour massage, which at first left us quite exhausted and sore, but we quickly grew accustomed to this and finally enjoyed it greatly.

Naturally, we had time between all those activities to read a lot about food and nutrition, much of which we knew but often did not understand properly. It is often not what we eat but what we combine during meals that makes digestion difficult and causes the system to release enzymes and minerals to speed these foods along the tract. Trennkost or Montignac have to some extent taken the right direction in combining foods, which is in short: do not combine concentrated proteins (meat, fish, eggs, cheese) with carbohydrates but only eat them with vegetables if you cannot give them up entirely. Complex carbohydrates (brown rice, dark bread with the whole kernel, etc.) should also only be combined with veggies or fresh fruit. Melons: eat them alone or leave them alone. Avoid all refined carbohydrates such as white bread, croissants, sugars, and especially milk.

This came as a mild shock to us as we love to drink low fat milk. The reason for this is the processing of the milk (pasteurizing/homogenizing). It destroys all the enzymes in the raw milk. There is a study that shows that calves can die within 6 months of drinking their own mother’s pasteurized milk… Or, of 2 groups of cats, one fed raw milk and the other pasteurized milk; the latter would become infertile in the third generation. Is there perhaps a correlation between this and the fact that more and more couples in the US and now also in Europe are experiencing difficulties in producing offspring?

Well, we were able to reenter the world of solid food and keep on with fresh fruit and raw vegetables even after we transferred to a commercial hotel offering all the nice things to which we were accustomed. Thailand of course is a great country to lead a truly vegetarian life style. For 10 days after we finished the course we did not fall back to eating meat, fish or cheese, but lived on raw and fresh food, wok-cooked veggies, nuts, etc. and only on the 5th day did we start eating black bread with a little butter and honey. We feel great but we also look forward to our first fish and later also meat. But surely, we will eat less of it and in better combinations with other foods. So not to worry, the 2 elder Bosshards will not become vegans…

On the first free Sunday, Hans Baumann came to the hotel to take us to another spin around the beautiful mountainous area surrounding Chiangmai. The evening before he had taken delivery of a metallic gold brand new Mazda Protégé 2000; it is a most comfortable sedan with amazing power.

He now lives with his beloved cat Misty, 15, in a small hotel in Mae Rim, half an hour away from Chiangmai. A most quiet place indeed, with a small lagoon in front. Next door is the most prestigious Chiangmai Regent, the well-stocked Tita Gallery and rather close by are other smaller hotel & spa establishments.

He took us to the Sirikit Botanical Garden, laid out on a huge scale on a mountainside with a high ridge. It has also a seminar center with rooms and a large restaurant where we were the only guests at 1:30- PM. Another guest arrived after 2. We had freshly pressed watermelon juice, mineral water, steamed veggies and lightly fried noodles, and a huge plate of fresh fruit all for US$10 for the 3 of us.

At the Night bazaar, Uschi bought wonderful children’s clothes for Leonie, and sandals and a wrap-around for herself. There were so many nice things in natural wood and made from bamboo and reeds, but all too bulky to take along on our long trip to Nevis.

And here is the continuation of the visit to the dentist. We visited his office in front of our hotel; the Swiss GM of the Amari RIncome 2 introduced me to him 2 years ago when I had developed a tremendous infection under one of my molars. He checked us out and found that the crown he had made then had a small chip so he offered to replace it free of charge. Uschi had a need for 2 new crowns, 1 for one, for which there had not been enough time in 2000. We made appointments right after the program and although one more crown became necessary for Uschi, he managed to do it all in record time. In my case, the free crown actually was a double crown; the dentist had lost his records, and therefore only found out when the crown did not want to come off the stump… The whole treatment for the both of us cost about what one crown would have cost in Switzerland.

Nevis, December 15, 2002

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