2015 03 05 MIKE POLIOUDAKIS DATES This note is not a CV. This note is a list of important dates and activities, with brief comment. 1949 Born Portland, Oregon, USA. 1950 Brother, Dino, born. 1957? – 1963 Glenhaven grade school. 1963 - 1967 James Madison High School. 1967 - 1968 Pomona College outside of Los Angeles. Independent study. Left after one year. 1968 After dropping out, became a Conscious Objector to military service. 1968 – 1969 While waiting for my case to be resolved, I went to school at U. Oregon in Eugene. 1969 – 1970 For alternative service as a CO, I worked for Planned Parenthood in Oakland, CA. 1969 In Oakland, I met my first wife, Virginia Lowe (Ginnie). She was a painter then. 1970 My parents were sick and old. As a result, my CO work ended on a hardship allowance after one year. 1970 – 1972 Ginnie and I returned to Portland, where we helped my parents as we could. 1971 – 1972 Ginnie and I got jobs at the University of Oregon Medical School Hospital in Portland (Multnomah County Hospital). I took tissue samples, mostly drawing blood from out patients. 1973 – 1976 Ginnie and I went to UO in Eugene. Ginnie worked on an MA in medieval studies and I worked on a BA in socio-cultural anthropology with focus on ecological anthropology. 1972 or 1973 Mother dies. 1973 or 1974 Father dies less than a year later. 1974 Animal behavior studies and sociobiology. 1973 - 1976 Japanese (“Shotokan”) karate, as taught by Robert Graves. 1976 Graduate from U. of Oregon. 1976 - 1977 I receive a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship. With it, I go to Harvard University for graduate work in anthropology. Got a MA. 1977 Because I disliked Harvard Anthropology, I leave. I went to the University of Michigan. 1976 Ginnie wanted to return to school to get a PhD in Folklore studies. We go to separate schools. Ginnie went to Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. 1977 – 1980 Univ. of Michigan in Ann Arbor, MI. I study anthropology, sociobiology, and economics. 1977 Began to learn Tai Chi Chuan (“Tai chi” or “Taijiquan”). 1978 or so. Ginnie and I divorce by mutual agreement. We remain on good terms. 1978 I have health problems. The health problems get progressively worse over several years. 1981 – 1983 First field work in Thailand. Most of the time was in a village on the coast of the Gulf of Thailand with about 2000 mostly rice farmers. 1981 I met Nitaya, my present wife. She has a BA degree from a college in Thailand. 1983 Nit and I marry. We return to An Arbor late in 1983. We never had children. 1985 – 1990 Nit and I lived in Ann Arbor, mostly in married student housing. 1985 Nit gets seriously ill, has surgery, and recovers. 1985 – 1990 Teach at UM, mostly as a TA. 1989 PhD in anthropology. 1990 – 1995 I was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Ohio University in Athens, OH. That was a horrible place. No tenure; didn’t care. Health problems got worse. I made two trips to Thailand to study shrimp farming and culture, and to prepare for future fieldwork. I made two stays at other schools in the United States. 1995 I got a senior Fulbright Fellowship to go to Thailand. 1995 – 1996 I went to Thailand to study shrimp farming at the Coastal Resources Institute (CORIN) of the Prince of Songkhla University in Haat Yai, Thailand (Far Southern Thailand). The director of CORIN was a bad person and would not let me do my fieldwork. I did meet good people outside of CORIN. 1996 Songkhla. Nit and I did a year of field work with Thai Muslim fishers in Songkhla. We began the work while at CORIN, and then stayed on in the area after CORIN to finish. 1997 Because Nit stayed overseas for more than a year, she lost her “Green Card”. Nobody at Fulbright or the State Department ever mentioned this requirement to us. We had to go through the immigration procedure again. This time the procedure is quite stringent due to new legislation by Newt Gingrich’s “family values” congress. 1996 - 2000 I did not want to go back to American academia. We moved to Surat Thani, in Southern Thailand. Living on savings, Nit and I studied shrimp farming through all of Southern Thailand. I studied Thai culture, especially pop culture such as TV shows and movies. I also read a lot of Western novels. 2000 I returned to the US before Nit, to prepare for Nit. I have to have a job for at least a year before she can return. As a result of shrimp research, I met Claude Boyd of Auburn University of Auburn, AL. Boyd needed someone to chaperone Asian students to catfish farms in West Alabama. So I took a job doing that while I waited to fulfill the requirements for bringing Nit back. 2000 Nit taught children in a school in Northern Thailand while she waited for me to take care of her immigration. 2000 and following. I read a lot in religion, economics, math, physics, and sociobiology. 2001 11 07 Nit returns. She is totally burned out. Four days later is 9/11/2001. 2001 – 2002 Nit does volunteer work at United Way and Habitat for Humanity. 2002 – 2003 Nit works at the jewelry counter at K-Mart. 2001 and following. My job changed from chaperoning Boyd’s students to doing research projects for Boyd. Nobody else could do what I did. 2003 and following. Nit got a job at Auburn U. library, in Interlibrary Loans. She still works there. All the other workers in her unit are Black. She learns a lot about race relations there. 2000 and following. I did not write up my shrimp farming research. I do not explain why here. 2000 and following. Some of the projects that I did produced publications. See other notes. 2005. Through Boyd, I did a project for the World Wildlife Fund. Using direct anthropological field work, I studied the ecological and social conditions of catfish farming in West Alabama. 2005 and following. Health improves steadily. 2008. I finished a book on basic economics for non-economists, “First Book in Economics”. I self-published this book through an Internet publishing company. 2008 I start a website, www.polioudakis.com , to present material about Nit and I. 2010. I finished a book on Jesus, “Jesus for Most People”, and self-published it. I put additional un-published material from this book, and a revised version, on my website. 2011. My job with Boyd and AU Fisheries ends. 2014 My brother, Dino, dies. 2015. I finish a book, “Religious Stances”. It is available for free on my website. 2000 and following. Nit and I live in an old apartment complex that goes through several ethnic changes and several owners. We learn about race in the US from this situation. TIMES OF “OFFICIAL” FIELDWORK: 1980 through 1983 in Bangkok and Southern Thailand, at a village of Buddhist rice farmers. 1990 through 1994 At least two trips to Thailand, mostly during summers. 1995 to 1996 Fulbright to Prince of Songkhla University in Haat Yai, Thailand. 1996 Almost daily visits to village of Muslim fishers in Songkhla, Thailand. 1996 through 2000 Interviews about four times a week with shrimp farmers in almost all the provinces of Southern Thailand. Occasional visits to the Thai National Film Institute in Bangkok. 2000 through 2011 Dozens of visits to West, AL catfish farmers usually lasting two or three days. 2005 repeated visits to West, AL catfish farmers as part of a project for WWF.