Let's talk about food

So, the food here is quite something.

Fruit

Martin has talked about the fruit in Thailand, but I was probably a bit of a sceptic. I'm happy to say that I'm a complete convert. I've eaten so much mango (even if for some reason I keep calling it melon) and the pineapple is just the most amazing pineapple I've had. And I already loved pineapple even before I got here. We have mangos and bananas with our muesli for breakfast, and most other meals are finished off with pineapple, watermelon and/or papaya. They have a sugar/chilli mix you can eat with the fruit, and that's quite nice. If we are going visiting for a we normally take something, and it's often fruit and drink.

Other meals

The rest of the food has been pretty awesome too. Well mostly. Note the photo of me about to eat a bug. More on that later.

Most of the rest of the meals have been rice with a variety of topping type things that have been bought from the market, some pretty spicy and some not. All the liquid is pretty runny, it's not a sauce like I'd potentially expect, but to eat you use a fork and spoon, and only the spoon goes in your mouth so it's easy to eat (drink?) the liquid. There have been a couple of dishes not to my taste, I'm not really big on strong seafood flavours. But mostly it's been so good, curry and ginger are very common flavours. Yesterday we were invited to lunch by a guy from church, Santi (pronounced Sun-tee) and we were treated to a sticky rice meal. I'm pretty familiar with the concept as Heather and Martin sometimes do it for special occasions. I've included a photo.

Food at camp

I think I mentioned the food was served really quickly as everyone got the same. Every meal was savoury including breakfast which was a rice porridge with a bit of mince and optional spring onions, and for every meal there was chilli, sugar, fish sauce and pepper you could add to taste. I'm enjoying adding chilli to just about everything.

Eating out

When we are at Kim and Mary’s in Don Chedi (pronounced Jed-ee) we are buying every meal except breakfast. In the middle of the day we are going to places with air con, and in the evening either buying from the market if we are eating after church (which we have done at every service we've been at), or eating at a restaurant. At most places there are very good options for 40 baht, or 50 if the place is slightly nicer. 40 baht is less than NZ$2 and it's quite interesting how much time we don't have to spend on shopping, cooking and cleaning up. It's very easy to get lots of variety. Of course at each place we get a glass of ice each, and use the bottled water at the restaurant for our drink. As an aside I have discovered that everything that can be recycled is, because that is how some poor people make their living, so that's something.

Convenience stores

There are heaps of these, and I've had a bit of fun sourcing interesting snack foods. I have had chips that are chocolate flavoured, and also honey butter flavour (I prefer the former), and there's seaweed flavour, green pea flavour and others. They don't seem to have as much sweet options, but I'm getting by.

Street market

There is a market going on in the area around the chedi (monument) in the middle of town about 300 metres from here. We wandered down after church on Sunday night and spent an hour or two looking and buying a bit. We were convinced to try a bug of some sort (photo attached), but I was really happy to just have the one! I also bought a few other things to try, but as we had already eaten I didn't want to go to hard out. I asked if we could go down again and eat dinner there, and I think we'll do that tonight after the English lesson at the village, so I plan to try quail amongst other things.

Drink

Mostly the drink is water with ice, I'm having a few cups of tea but not nearly as many as usual. At the market there are milk shake type drinks and frappe type things as well. All reasonably familiar. There are ice boxes everywhere, and I discovered today when we were visiting with one of the stall holders that Kim and Mary witness to, running a piece of ice down your shin is surprisingly effective at cooling you down.

Other topics

After arriving home from camp about 8pm Sat night we were pretty tired and not long out of bed. Sunday was two church services, Supanburi in the morning, and Don Chedi in the evening, and socialising, so not much time for much else apart from the trip to the market. I managed to find a T-shirt to buy there as well, and I also saw some interesting bike lights, but didn't buy them yet. Monday (yesterday) was a day off apart from lunch out. We bought some gifts from NZ (tea towels and keyrings and magnets etc.) to give on those sorts of occasions, and they have worked well. I spent some time online in the afternoon and have booked accomodation in Bangkok for Friday night, and an all day bike/train/boat tour from 9-6 on Sat before I get on the train at 7:30 to Chiang mai, so I'm very pleased about that. We also had fun playing a card game last night. After learning the game the first time around, I won the second game :-).

Today is Tuesday, and we have been visiting today, praying with the people Kim and Mary are witnessing to, and are now having some down time in the aircon before the English lesson tonight. Thai Christians need a lot of discipling to help them grow in their faith, particularly because Thai culture and the Buddhist religion are so closely entwined. Most Christians have come through family members as it's a really big deal to convert, and very hard to do in isolation. When they hear the gospel it is so completely different from anything they know that it takes a lot for them to understand. And It's a shame culture rather than a guilt culture like ours, so that's different as well.

I've had a bit of a look at NZ news while I've been away, but I can't see that I'm missing much by not watching the 6 o'clock news every day. Maybe this trip will cure me of that habit as well :-)

Do keep the emails coming, I'll try and reply individually when I can.

I'll write soon.

Sarah