Monday, August 27, 2012

After a while

I believe that I made a lot of promises in my last posts, to tell you more about Reconnect, the 50th anniversary, the trip to the beach... but, in the intervening weeks, a lot more stuff has happened. It always does, here, life just sliding along until, after a while, certain stories fade and others seem more important.

Like for example, the fact that in the past week, I've made brownies, not once, but twice. (No pictures, sorry, they got gobbled up too fast.) I also made homemade yogurt with the help of Pii Gai, a neighbor from our home-stay family's house, who mentioned once that she knew how to make it. On Saturday, we finally got around to doing it - a trip to the city to buy milk, yogurt (you know, like a sourdough starter, only it's a yogurt starter), and a few other items ended with us warming milk over a gas stove while Pii Gai confessed she'd only ever made yogurt once. I decided it wasn't worth it to be worried, so I just smiled and said, well, I've never made it. I transported a batch of yogurt stock about 3 km back in a plastic bag in my backpack, having a few stray thoughts about how terrible it would be if it burst (that smell would never come out!) and becoming moderately worried about what the outcome would be. As instructed, I left the concoction out for 8 hours (!) before putting it in the fridge and turning in to bed. On Sunday morning, the yogurt was edible. Delicious even, although it had a somewhat grainy texture. Nothing that couldn't be fixed with a little experimentation. So, there's gonna be a lot of yogurt in my future now. :)

Or how 'bout this: Yesterday, after eating the yogurt for breakfast and taking a trip to the internet (local health station across the street, where the employees are gracious enough to tell us to "tam sabai" - make ourselves at home - and use the internet and computers) I came home to see several neighbors cutting down banana leaves from the trees that stand in an empty lot next to our house. People use banana leaves for lots of things here, so it's not really that strange to see a 60-some-odd year old woman hacking them down with a scythe tied to a giant pole. It is weird that people turn around and give you a guilty look as they're doing it, though, so I took note of that as I walked back into the house. Josh was already cleaning up the kitchen in preparation for two bpas (aunts; older women) to come over and teach us to cook two of his favorite dishes: geeng nommai (bamboo curry) and pakana muu krop (crispy pork with chinese kale). I didn't say anything about the banana leaves. What is there to say when you have no idea what's going on?

When the bpas appeared, laden with baskets full of fresh produce and meat - lemongrass, kaffier limes, galangal, bamboo, coconuts, dried chiles, onions, garlic, pork - we sat on our front porch and watched and took notes while they unloaded everything and began turning it into delicious looking ingredients. One of the banana cutting neighbors came and sat down - then got up again to drag another large leaf off the tree from our side of the fence. "What have they done to those trees?" said Josh, looking up at the pretty mutilated forms. "I know," I said, telling him the story. Then the neighbor explained to the bpas (in Thai, so I only caught part of it, although Josh understood more) that they'd been cutting down the trees because they couldn't see our house from theirs, or from the road. Josh responded that we don't want to see the road! Or hear the cars! But that explained the guilty look. I guess now, if we're so inclined, we can spy on them too.

Or maybe bring them some yogurt, brownies, and geeng nommai.

green

2 comments:

  1. So they were cutting down the leaves so they could see you/spy on you. In a way that is really sweet. They never wanted you to live on your own.

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  2. Thank you, both, for using your blog to cut down the banana leaves (oceans, time zones, continents) that separate us from you and allowing us to see into your Thailand experience. Like your Thai neighbors, I am keeping my eye on you, from afar!
    With love, Mom

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