Funny what quiet progress is like here: we have been incredibly busy with meetings that run from pretty early each day to late into the night but, since they are all strategy meetings with our consultants here in Thailand, and since the meetings are all in preparation for what is to come this next week, there is not much to say right now.

We have been very fortunate, indeed, with the people whom it has been our good fortune to find (or, more accurately, to be found by) here in the metropolis of Bangkok, a city of 12 million people.  These team members are a dynamic group of Thais and non-Thais who understand the relationship between clean food, herbs, supplements, health freedom and Codex.  And they also know how to bring ideas forward in this unique and important country where the revered and beloved royal family has created programs designed to improve both health and the economy of health with clean, high quality food projects and an emphasis on natural methods.

You may remember how meaningful the contributions of Thailand should have been to the implementation of the Global Strategy during the Codex meeting here but were blocked because of the interference of the other side.  And you may also recall that the Natural Solutions Foundation is spending some time here in Thailand to connect with the pro-health forces of this remarkable country in a variety of pro-health interfaces.

But those interfaces require meetings and the meetings require preparation (including, for example, translating our materials into Thai).  Next week we will actually meet the people we are preparing for this week.  In the meantime, however, I have to share some experiences with you which our Thai team insisted that we had to have.

Experience 1: Thai massage.  Very, very good despite moments of real pain.  Someone should write a book on this unique and powerful technique called “Thumbs of Steel” since the delicate, quite and gentle women who administer this special form of massage use techniques which are, on occasion, exquisitely painful.  Rolling and pressing, kneading and pushing their thumbs, forearms, elbows, knuckles, etc., with great precision over bone, muscle, sinew and things you had no idea you owned, the net effect is sort of like being a piece of play-doh for 2 hours.  At the end, though, you are re-shaped and much refreshed.  Living through it is, at the end, worth it!

Experience 2: Thai Foot Massage: Very, very, very good without the pain (well, nearly without it).  This 1 1/2 hour delight includes hands, arms, head, neck and shoulders as well as legs and feet. “Reflexology to the max with scented oils” would describe it pretty well.  To misquote an old song, “How Can I Keep From Purring?”

Experience 3: Having my hair done: Very, very bad.

Since I did not have time to get my hair done before we left on this trip, I thought that, in the few hours between two meetings, I would go to a salon run by a guy who takes care of expats, people who come from somewhere else but now live in Thailand.  That way, a Thai team member assured me, there would be no language problem and I would be sure to be happy.  Wrong!  The mantra of the hair appointment gone bad applies here: “It will grow out, it will grow out, it will grow out!”  Sigh.

Experience 4: Food.  Very, very, very good.

Obviously we have to eat.  And eat we have been doing.  From the spectacular Food Loft of Central Chitlom (a large department store a block or so from our hotel) where Thai, Italian, Chinese, Indonesian, Japanese, Indian and a host of other wonderful stands sell whatever you can imagine made fresh from high quality ingredients in a food court from heaven to the spectacular restaurants of the major hotels (which are pretty spectacular all by themselves) to the (outstandingly terrific) quick food joint selling Greek food in a shopping mall, the food we have eaten is astounding.  Street food?  Not yet.  My courage failed me.

More to come: more meetings tomorrow (Sunday) and more meals.  Tomorrow we go to the famous Bangkok night market and I’ll let you know what it’s like.

Oh, and tomorrow we have a day full of those meetings getting ready for the week to come.