Visiting Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam opened the eyes of Ball State University students and faculty who participated in the Rinker Center for International Programs' field trip to Southeast Asia.
"[The trip has] definitely changed me," senior Courtney Knotts said. "I look at poverty a lot differently. I've never really seen Third World poverty like I did there. I've learned to appreciate what I have and what I use every day."
Knotts and 21 other students and three faculty members went on the three-week-long field trip.
The trip cost $5,600, which included airfare, tuition, housing and food, RCIP Director Jim Coffin said. Students earned six credit hours in the approved department of their choice, he said.
The group left Muncie on Dec. 18 and returned Jan. 7, graduate student Eric Schissler said.
After returning to his apartment and realizing he had to go to work the next day, Schissler said his daily life felt unfamiliar.
"It's all something I can't even quite describe," he said. "But it almost seems and feels different, literally. It feels strange. I don't look at where I live in the same way. I feel a little disconnected."
That is one reason why he thinks it is important for people to experience different places and cultures, Schissler said.
"[Traveling] forces you to learn more about yourself," he said. "It causes you to see your own culture in a different light."
On the field trip, students spent the first few days living with the Karan villagers of northern Thailand in houses on stilts with thatched roofs, Coffin said. He said the villagers hunted with crossbows and cooked bush rats and exotic foods for the students to eat.
"The cricket [tasted] pretty good, and the rat was pretty bland," Schissler said.
The villagers sang folk songs to the students around the fire, Coffin said, and students sang songs like "Jingle Bells" back to them.
The group traveled with several interpreters and, through discussions with the villagers, students learned about issues facing the tribe, Coffin said.
"We learned that the Thai government is trying to get [the Karan] to be less nomadic because, when they move their villages, they have to destroy more forests," he said.
Coffin said the experience with the Karan was one of his favorites on the trip.
Schissler, however, said his favorite place in Southeast Asia was the city of Saigon in South Vietnam.
"I loved the nightlife in Saigon," he said. "I love how busy everything is. I like how the people, when they interacted with you, they would say exactly what's on their mind. We would go in [to the club], and we would right away get all the attention."
Junior Cindy Keller said what sticks out most in her mind is how busy the traffic was in Southeast Asia.
"Their traffic patterns are a lot different that ours," she said. "They just go. There are millions of motorbikes and trucks and vehicles and pedestrians and you just merge. It's organized chaos."
Students were told if they just started walking across the street and didn't make eye contact with anyone the traffic would just go around them, she said.
The students spent Christmas touring various ancient temples in Cambodia, including Phnom Bakheng, where the first Lara Croft movie was filmed, and Angkor Wat. Coffin said Angkor Wat is one of the wonders of the world.
Knotts said visiting Angkor Wat was the best part of the trip.
"Seeing all the ruins and being able to see the architecture of the temples and just how big it was," Knotts said. "It was just so neat to be in the presence of something so old and so big, something you can't really see in the United States."
The students also toured the tunnels of the Viet Cong in Vietnam, interviewed activist Aki Ra, who deactivates land mines in Cambodia and visited the grave of Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi, Vietnam, Coffin said.
To complete the program, students will write two papers and hold public forums about their experiences.
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