Rolling in the Deep

Saturday morning we went to the morning market, which is a huge collection of canopies with vendors underneath. There are all sorts of items being sold: clothes, shoes, purses, jewelry, trinkets, toys, clothes hangers, duct tape, glasses (with free eye exams). There’s also food: giant pots of brown, lumpy I-don’t-know-what (and probably don’t want to know), mounds of peppers sitting out on the ground, sugar, eggs, drinks, chicken, fish, squid, frog, live rabbits, mice, birds, dogs, and turtles. There were some amazing fruits too (think giant, green, spiky soccer ball), though I still don’t know their English name. If I asked, I was usually given the Thai one.

I was fed hot chocolate and a pastry for breakfast (it had a hot dog in it, I didn’t really like it). At the market my mom bought me 10 cooked eggs (shells about the size of the middle joint of the pinky finger). They were so good, but I could only eat 5 before I was full again. She bought me a drink that was green, iced, with little purple gummy balls in the bottom. I’ve had things like this before in the States, but chewing my drink still sort of weirds me out. Then we went home and ate again, a rice soup.

Longan

By 1 we’re off to the supermarket, Tesco, to find a cell phone for me. Afterwards, we eat again in the food court. On our way home we stop by grandma and grandpas house. Grandpa LOVES my wai, and just smiles and smiles and smiles at me the whole time I’m there. Grandma shows me what a Longan is – it’s a quarter sized shelled fruit. Inside is a clear blue fruit with a seed inside. My sister giggles when I had trouble opening them. We picked them fresh off the tree-bush, and they also showed me the lemon tree, mango tree, and a few others. There were also two pigs and about a dozen little piglets! When we got near the pig snorted and my sisters jumped and screamed, then were overcome with bouts of laughter and didn’t go any closer until I led the way.

Then we come home, I napped, and we had supper – four types of dishes with a giant plate of rice. My host mom quickly found out I like fruit, and so now she serves me fruit all the time (which I am entirely ok with!). Mangos, pineapple, and grapes usually. Their grapes are the absolute largest I’ve ever seen, but have seeds in them – a minor inconvenience. During dinner my father asks “can you sing?” “If I have to…” I respond. So after dinner we all turn towards the TV screen, hooked up to the computer. Fern hands me a microphone and puts on Rolling in the Deep, by Adell. She grabs one too and goes at it, so I join in with her. “WE COULD HAVE HAD IT ALLLLLLLLLL! ROLLIN IN THE DEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!” This goes on for another hour or so, they played some songs in English (Price Tag, The Lazy Song, I Will Always Love You, and the song from Titanic) as well as some Thai ones. I played them the MHJR version of “Kiss Me Slowly” (a recent new favorite of mine) and they loved the music video. I also put on “I’m Yours” by Michael Buble and “Don’t Stop Believing”, which I told them everyone in America knows and can sing this song, so they happily sang the chorus with me.

I think we’re a much closer family than the night before. After the first day, I wasn’t optimistic about the next five weeks. I felt awkward and an outsider, and we couldn’t communicate. But after all of today as we’re getting to know one another better, I’m really looking forward to our time together. Tomorrow my sisters and I are going clothes shopping, which I think will be very fun.