The Journey Pen: When you give a kid a candy cane

A couple weeks ago I attended the teachers’ New Year celebration party. As a foreigner, there was no way out of singing karaoke so I joined the two British teachers and together we sang Imagine by the Beatles. It was one of the only English songs the band knew. Our performance was rather ridiculous, but the beautiful thing about Thai culture is that it doesn’t matter. They loved it anyway, and the director of the school was so impressed he gave each of us 100 bahts.

The night continued with singing and dancing and whoever danced was gifted with laundry baskets, water pitchers, cups, food storage containers, and other plastic items. These gifts then became props and the dance floor looked like a wild Tupperware party. I had to laugh when one teacher reached for a chopstick and started playing the cutlery sorter like a drum. It was great!

The next day I set off to find myself a nice Saturday morning coffee. Although Thais wake very early, coffee shops here in Tak do not seem to open until 10am, or even sometimes 2pm. On my walk I could smell the now familiar scent of incense burning for the spirits and chili peppers being fried for breakfast. It was a typical Thai morning, but I was just craving the smell of coffee. I arrived at one place where I had often seen people sitting and drinking coffee and was happy to see that they were open. After going in, I realized it was not a coffee shop at all, so I asked the lady to tell me about her business. They sold shampoo, toothpaste, detergent, soap, sunscreen, water purifiers, and all sorts of other products. There was however, no coffee, so I left and continued the hunt.

As is usually the case, I stopped often to ‘chat’ with the local people. We always have a good laugh together at how little we understand each other. At one house I wished the family, a Happy New Year (Saa-waa-di-bi-mai), and gave the little boy a candy cane. He was some excited! By now it was 11am and I was still coffeeless so I turned to head back and decided to get breakfast instead. I passed many restaurants but pork on rice was just not too appealing that day. I settled for slices of freshly fried banana which is sold by a lady not far from my apartment. Not a caffeine fix, but it was a nice Thai treat. As I headed home I noticed a petit elderly lady standing by the road. I could tell she was waiting for me. In her hand she held a string with two coconuts. Through motions she explained that had seen me give the little boy a candy cane and had gone to cut the coconuts from the tree in her back yard to thank me. The Thai people are so kind and so generous.

In recent news, Connor and I went to Chiang Mai! He wrote about our stories from that trip so have a look at his post to hear / see more about our adventures there.

Cultural Tidbits:

-Popular yogurt flavour: sweetened vanilla, red kidney bean and corn.

-National Teacher’s Day is November 16^th. To celebrate, they cancel school for the day.

-Buddhist weddings in Thailand happen any day of the week, so long as the date is an even number as uneven numbers are seen as unlucky. The ceremony takes place in the morning and the party in the evening. The afternoons are too hot for celebrating. During July, August, and September it is very rare to have a wedding as this is the rainy season and will supposedly bring bad luck to the marriage.

Random Photo conglomeration this week. Hope you enjoy!

A delightful Thai dessert stand

Freshly made $0.17 deliciousness called rotee

Church in Tak

Students playing tradition Thai instruments

Have a listen:

Traditional Thai dancers

These students performed wonderfully

Thai BBQ at our New Year's party. There is one on each table and you cook your food together. The BBQ has an outer ring in which you place water to boil the vegetables and herbs you want to cook.