Food Coma

I just got in from Burriram, where I had dinner with P Pete Samai, Walai, Nathan, and two board members and their families. The restaurant we went too is very popular in Burriram. We sat at a table that had sort of a pit underneath it, so you sat you were in a chair, but the table was sunk lower.. kind of like benches all the way around, but it was the floor, not benches…. it was, I don’t know how to explain it. :) 

Dinner was excellent. There were so many dishes on the table, bonus that I was able to eat all but one. There was a fried fish that was too die for. Sweat and sour soup (they really meant spicy beyond belief) with shrimp, squid, and bamboo, all of which I like very much. Then there was a round dish with oysters, dowwho (tofu), kind of a seafood patty that had the texture of tofu but tasted like seafood, and shrimp. There was a plate full of duck with noodles. Last but not least, crab curry that was to die for. I couldn’t stop eatingm everything was fantastic and I had to try everything, sadly I had to pass on the duck.---- I was reminded of two important people tonight. Steve Morrell because of the duck. I have this very vivid memory of eating a duck that Steve and his brother shot once. I wish I could’ve sent yall some of the duck, Nathan said it was outstanding! I was also reminded of my mother. I told Nathan this story and he relayed it to the rest of the group. When ever we were involved with a Christmas party, either hosted it or attended, my mother would eat smoked oysters. I remember one year she ate so many of them she was sick to her stomach.------I’ve been without meat for the last 9 months. Nothing has tempted me into breaking my new years resolution more then being in Thailand. It is excruciatingly painful to have to pass up these ridiculously good looking dish because they have meat in them. Ugh. 2012 needs to be here already. During and after dinner was full of smiles and laughter. I don’t think I have laughed that much in ages. My cheeks are still sore!

Banana flower

Had a banana flower for dinner tonight. I didn't know you could eat them... I mean I assumed you could, but I didn't think anyone did. But people do. It looked like a very brown artichoke, tasted like one too.

I also tasted this flower looking thing at lunch. It tasted like an Aveda store. Ick!

As I am writing this, the kids are watching a Thai soap. A couple fell off a flooded balcony into a river. The dude was shot previously, I think. There were several men involed in the shooting and nearly all of them were wounded. When the woman surfaced and could not kind her companion, so she dove down and there his was. Floating lifelessly in the middle of the river. She swam up to him and started shaking him to see if he was conscious. He was not. She then tried to blow air into his lungs, or just tonsil hawk him back to life, it was hard to tell which. This did not work. So she clung to him crying. Underwater. For five minutes. The show then ended.

Mosquitoes....

..... are everywhere!!! Gah! I put on bug repellent at least three times a day. Once when I get out of the shower, again before picking the girls up from school, and a final time before dinner. I have to, or get eaten alive. And with the spray on, I STILL get eaten up. P Ui has this, actually I don’t know what it is. It’s pink, smells like vicks, and turns warm as you rub it in like icy hot. I have been informed you use this on bug bites, not on sore muscles. 

It works though. You slather some on and the itch goes away. The bites are bad at first and you think you might have to tear a chunk of your flesh out to get the itchy and burning to stop. Not to mention the bite swells to an alarming size. But after applying the balm you realize you are going to live and are extremely thankful you didnt take a spoon to your arm and dig the bite out. 

I was unfortunate to receive two mosquitoes bites while giving a lesson a few days ago. The office does not have the magic balm that sits in the little medical cabinet in P Ui’s house. These bites were the worst bites I have encountered thus far. In addition to itching, burning, and stinging like a bleepity bleep, they were easily the size of one and a half quarters. Maybe two. The picture below does not do one of the bites justice, and no I am not exaggerating. 

Sunday.

Today P Ui took me to Burriam for church. I met her husband and made a bunch of new friends. Three in particular stood out (the only three whos name I was actaully able to remember. You try learning 20 new names in a different language in ten minutes!). The first is Monica. She is from the the Philippines. She is an English teacher in Burriam. The other is Mue (I have no idea how to spell her name correctly.) She is the daughter of one of the women who go to church with us in Nang Rong. The third is Ga, who is married to a Danish man that has been to over 50 countries. Monica, Mue, and Ga's English is very good and I spent most of the time talking with them. The service was long, from 8:45-noon. After I had lunch with Mue who then took me to the classroom too meet some of the kids and then to meet Monica. I sat and talked to Monica for about four hours before P Ui was ready to go home. I had a blast and drank Sprite out of a bag.

But probably the most entertaining thing to happen today happened at lunch. I was sitting with Mue when a woman came and sat down across from me. Her English was very broken and it was a bit hard to understand her. She first asked me for my name, I gave it to her. She then asked in a very strange, two word's max, where I was from. Then she said something so fast all I caught was 'email' and married'.  I finally figured out that she wanted my email address, so I gave it to her. Then she made me swear on pain of death to email her a picture when I got married. This wasn't a 'when you get married in the FUTURE' statement, it was a 'when you get married in the NEAR future statement. Now, why this woman wanted me to email her a picture of my wedding day, when I did not have her email address is beyond me. Why she was under the impression I would be getting married next week, beyond me to infinity.

On the way home we stopped by the Big C, which is the ginormous, walmart like store, we went to on Monday. As I was coming out of the bathroom (Brownie points to Big C for having western style toilets and a big win for Amanda) a case caught my eye. In side were hand guns. Then a message came on over the intercom saying the taking of pictures was not allowed in the store. I'm assuming people caught taking pictures of the state secrets they keep in the freeze dried soup isle will be punished with the guns for the case (that was totally sarcasm to the max for those of you who think I am serious ;). They also have blueberry and strawberry Oreos, but no where near the state secrets or guns.

That was my day :)

Wat Khao Angkan

Nathan came by today to pick up P Ui and myself and took us to an old Thai Wat. Wat Khao Angkan. It is about a thirty minute drive from Nang Rong and located on a ‘mountain’ which was really just a big hill. There were four or five Wat’s and several small shrines scattered around. What made this Wat particularly special was the giant golden reclining Buddha out front. 

The first Wat was the biggest and the ‘main’ Wat. This one is my favorite. Inside were gorgeous murals of Siddhartha and his life, a big golden Buddha, a picture of the king during his time as a monk, and two cases of old books that I drooled over. Nathan told me that the books contained old manuscripts written by famous monks. One manuscript in particular tells of a man who would come, his brow would bleed and his palms priced. The manuscript was written before Christ and has no ties what so ever to Christianity. You are not allowed to take pictures inside of the Wat’s I was very disappointed that I could not share with you all the beautiful art that lined the walls in the main Wat. It was truly breath taking. 

The second Wat was just to the right of the main Wat. It houses the golden foot print of Buddha, but the ‘real‘ print is located under the main Wat. 

The third Wat is my second favorite. It has these two giant serpents that sit in front of the entrance. The serpents are said to live in a river in the north parts of Thailand, kind of a loch ness monster of Thailand. 

Sanskrit was engraved on their scales. Nathan told me that Thai language is a derivative of Sanskrit. 

Nathan was looking for a Wat he had been too years ago but couldn’t find it. He said we simply could not leave without seeing it, so we enlisted the help of a monk (who gave us umbrellas when we got there because it had started to rain). He took us to the side of the second Wat and pointed up a hill.

As he was leaving I asked Nathan to ask him if I could take his picture. The monk debated with himself for a moment. Nathan said not all monks will let you take their picture. I stood there with my fingers and toes crossed and was thrilled when the monk decided it was alright. He would not how ever take a picture with me. Monks are not supposed to touch a women in any way. If I was to hand him something, I would have to set it on the ground or the table before he could take it. 

The last Wat was just as beautiful, with a steep tiled staircase that lead up to it. 

I am so thankful that Nathan brought me along on this trip. It was a wonderful experience. I only wish we could have stayed longer. The hour and a half we were there was no where near enough time to truly see all the beauty in the Wats. I would have liked to talk with the monk via Nathan. I have so many questions, I probably could have talked to him all day. But it was an incredible adventure and I can’t wait to go see what else is out there. 

Long post alert

But so many exciting and fun things happened tonight. Ok, well three things to be exact, but I had to share them. 

Had an awesome evening. The group of kids I had today were phenomenal, picking up words and phrases faster then I could dish them out. I had to scramble half way through the lesson to come up with more material for them to learn. Today we covered colors, action words (jump, sing, eat, dance, go to school, and run), numbers, asking do you like (insert color or action word here), yes, I like (color or action word), no, I don’t like (color or action word), how are you, I am (fine, happy, sad), and what is your name, my name is. 

Dinner was excellent. Rice noodles and a tofu curry that had green tomatoes and something that looked like a pea but tasted very herby. Bananas wrapped in rice, sugar and coconut milk, steamed in a banana leaf for desert. YUMM! 

After dinner P Ui, Nathan and I sat and talked. Well mostly I sat and stared off into space until I heard my name mentioned then looked to Nathan for a translation. I can’t remember what started Nathan and I’s conversation but all of a sudden we were talking quickly about the randomest things. The stray dogs in town and how they don’t move when a car or motorcycle approaches, which lead to all the car accidents we have been in (Nathan has been in some serious ones. One is Tom Cruse, Mission Impossible worthy in which Nathan gets sandwiches between two cabs on a motorcycle in Bangkok. The cabs separated, the bike flips, he some how ended up on top of the bike as it slid fifty feet down the high way. Picked the bike back up and rode off), the topic of conversation then changed to snakes, spiders and our shared fear of them. 

It was so nice to have a native English speaker to talk to. We both jabbered on for at least thirty minutes straight through. Not that I can’t communicate with P Ui, the people in the office, or Ja at Church, who all speak different levels of English, some high some low. But it’s different when I talk to them. I have to slow way way down, sometimes not use complete sentences, and swap out words that are too unfamiliar/hard for simpler words (hospital turns into ‘doctor’, I am a vegetarian turns into ‘no meat’, I would like to do this turns into ‘I want do this’. All of which is accompanied with wild hand gestures and the use of a sometimes not so helpful dictionary or Google translator). It’s nice to be able to talk with someone and not worry about slang, speed, or words that are too big. I hate using incomplete sentences, I’m here to teach English and incomplete sentences definitely do not qualify as proper English. But there is no other way to get my point across. 

So to sum it up. Awesome English lesson. Wickedly delicious dinner. And a much needed talk with an American. September has kicked off with a bang. 

Sep 1st.

Happy September first everyone! Where did August go? One day I was in Austin. The next day I was in Albuquerque. The NEXT day I was in Thailand. Quite a lot of bouncing around from house to house, state to state, country to country. August was an amazing month, so so many good things happened. I don't know how September is going to keep up.

There are some plans brewing, to get me out of the house and around Nang Rong. I've heard mention of old temples that one must hack through the wild Thai jungle to get to, a tiger rescue, and other touristy things.

I had a surprise Skype session with a person very dear to my heart yesterday around lunch time. I was absolutely ecstatic to see and speak with her and that I was able to show her around the some what empty house, a little bit of the front yard, and my bathroom (which I am still raving about to people. It's so different from American bathrooms and I can't seem to get over it.).

So here's to you September. May you be filled with more good times then bad and keep the spicy sum tom coming.