I did it Thai way

Every other day we drive to the country at the end of the afternoon to water the newly planted plants and enjoy the landscape in the last light of the day. Despite the fact that Nong Noi is a hamlet of a few houses, there is a restaurant of respectable size.

The road on which it is located is a side road of the 1039, the main road from Lampang to Hang Chat. Many casual passers-by will not come there. Today we thought that as upcoming villagers we should try the restaurant. Bingo! Let it turn out to be one of the tastiest Thai eateries we've ever eaten at.

We had already met the owner/cook and his wife during the cremation ceremony last week. They speak a little English and we speak less Thai, but we managed to get through the menu together. As good and as bad as it went, we managed to have a nice chat with them and the invitation to come and see the garden during the day has already been received. Meanwhile we ate a divine Tom yam kung with some huge king prawns and something that looked a bit like Larb, but wasn't, and also tasted very good. It's nice that it's just around the corner from us.

(This summer, Nei helped shoveling rice husks for the test build)
Today we also started our part of the construction work. Here in Nang Lae is a very small rice mill. The owner is always in his garden making wooden bowls and other objects, which probably find their way to one of the shops along the highway, or to a company that sells Thailand souvenirs. We walked in this morning to ask if we could have rice chaff. That waste product of rice production forms the basis of the walls of our house. We were allowed to come and fill our pockets and the first 3 square meters of future wall are now in our basement.

Finally, they are placed against a frame woven from bamboo and then smeared with clay. Before we get there, we have to fill the same amount of bags about 10 times. The local rice mill cannot supply such an amount, but luckily there is a very large rice mill in Nong Noi that likes to get rid of the chaff, so we can pick up what we need there later. (The photo is of a pilot hut we are building here in Nang Lae)

Communication with the people in Nang Lae and Nong Noi is still largely done with hands and feet and google translate, but it is getting better. For example, we now know that the lady of the restaurant has three daughters and no sons. I then tried to tell her that I am the youngest of 4 sons, in a family with no daughters. Thai has a separate name for older brothers and younger brothers, and after my woody phom phie chaay saam (I'm sure that should be said differently) she said “you youngest!” So the message had apparently gotten across in my Dutch Thai after all.

While the language will still cause problems for a while, integration in other areas is progressing well. Chores, for example. Here a problem is often solved in the easiest way, even if that means that the solution is not sustainable. Now, or rather, we had a water problem. Since we returned from 3 weeks of temporary living in Lampang, the water supply only works for 1 or 2 hours a day, usually early in the evening. As soon as we hear that the toilet cistern starts to fill again, the signal that there is water again, we race to the bathroom for a wash/shower. Fortunately, the homeowner had repaired the pump in the garden during our absence and there is water all day from a tap in the garden. I had already made a temporary outdoor shower, but it was still inconvenient, especially the washing up, which had to be done outside on the floor.

Yesterday I suddenly realized that another tap in the garden was not connected to that pump, but to the village water pipe. That led to Thai solution orientation. I thought that if I connected the two taps together, I should be able to pump the pump water into my water pipe in the opposite direction. Today I made that connection with a simple garden hose, opened the taps of both taps and voilà: the cistern started to fill up and the shower had never had so much pressure. Of course I closed the main tap at the water meter, otherwise I would supply the whole village with water. The solution is anything but sustainable, but because we only live here temporarily and don't feel like investing money in the poorly maintained home, it's fine for us. We can simply disconnect the hose and use it in the new house.

I did it Thaiiiiiiiiii wayyyyyyyyy!