A week in the Thai countryside
We have been staying in the Thai countryside for a week now, where we are hospitably cared for by Wasana's parents and sister. In the hamlet of Ban Deng (the red village), the pace of life is different than in our society.
For example, most people get up at sunrise around 06.00:07.00 and the monks make their rounds past our house around 19.00:21.00 to pick up food in exchange for a daily blessing. The sun sets every day at XNUMXpm and we go to bed around XNUMXpm. I adapt easily.
A few things caught my eye this week. The village has a different composition than our Voorburg. Many small children and many elderly people live here. Everyone over 20 and under 50 seems to have disappeared off the face of the earth. They work in the big cities and send money to the stragglers. The children of this generation stay with Grandpa and Grandma and are raised by them for years. In addition, they work on the land. A tough old age.
You used to be able to walk into every house from garden to garden and have a chat, but not anymore. Not that you are any less welcome at any time, but for some reason everyone now has a wall around their property. According to my parents-in-law against the dogs that roam here in the village. It makes the mutual contact less.
Most people in the village have an outdoor toilet. A cottage in the garden with a squat toilet. They also have a toilet in the house. They rarely use that. I do, comfortable sitting sanitary facilities relaxed instead of squatting. The Thai find it more clean outside in the other toilet. Opinions differ.
Here in the house is a bathroom with a shower. The shower hose with shower head, however, hangs in a large barrel about a meter high. Water drips into it all day. If you want to take a shower, you take a bowl of water from the barrel and throw it over you. It is cold in the morning and lukewarm in the evening. I like it.
Yesterday Winston, whom they call Phrom here, celebrated his third official name, his eighth birthday. Birthdays are rarely celebrated here. In the evening at sunset many people come to eat and the whole house was full of children and old women. There was singing after dinner and the old women tied strings around his wrist that should give him all the best in life. They put a banknote on the string. He collected 1000 baht anyway. He can buy something nice with it during our trip. We ended with the biggest cake the local baker could make. That was still in the youth for a while.
Life isn't that bad in the countryside!!
Submitted by Theo
Beautiful atmosphere image Theo and beautiful photo. I think it would be nice to experience it during a holiday, but living permanently in that village seems a different story. I'd be bored to death. But everyone is not the same, so it can be wrong.
Life in the countryside can be fun, but I am also curious about the food. It is not Voorburg and not Bangkok or something like that. so it can sometimes be a challenge to say that the food tasted great.
I've been living in such a village for 8 years, straight from the Netherlands, I've never been bored for a moment, luckily not everyone is the same.
Here in the village, years ago, people suddenly started building walls/yard partitions.
As far as I understood it at the time, that came from the government.
The why, however, escapes me.
Been living in a city for about 13 years now or rather a hole in the countryside.. Well you really have to be able to handle that right .. the level is so low that you can't understand it anymore hahaha .. It makes me sick the simplicity here…..The lack of ability and also the lack of will….
Clearly not made for the Thai countryside I…..
I have also been living in the "flat" country for 8 years and I rarely get bored, I sometimes get annoyed by the local population due to noise and stench, they often have a reason to party and they burn everything and that can give a bit of a stench.
But I'll be able to live with it for a while.
Anything better than in town.
It's nice to experience this for a short time as a holiday.
I have been living in such a village for a year now. Unlike Ger, boredom sometimes strikes. But our 4 year old daughter can keep you busy.
Indeed, the children are still raised by the grandparents. Most parents still work somewhere outside the village.
If the children are lucky, the grandparents themselves have been taught to help the children learn.
That the grandparents still have to work on the land, well. They are tough though and often look older than they are. And there are also quiet periods between sowing and harvesting when they hang in the hammock.
Nowadays everyone wants a fence around their house.
This for most to prevent problems in the future with land cock by the neighbors.
A beautiful rendering that is very recognizable to me. Everyone is indeed working very hard, children spend many hours at school and for their homework, but the elderly also work as long as they can. When working on the land becomes too heavy, they start doing lighter work, such as weaving baskets or making brooms. Everyone contributes. And after work people know how to chill with each other, despite the walled gardens they know how to find each other every day. Such a rural village has a wonderfully relaxed atmosphere.