Imagine 48 families sitting in a room. Across the aisle are 50 Peace Corps
volunteers. Each side is covertly or
no-so-covertly eyeing the other, trying to guess whom they will be leaving the
room with to live together for the next 8 weeks. Excitement and not just a little anxiousness
are palpable.
After brief speeches and explanations in Thai and English,
the families open sealed envelopes they
have been given to find a slip of paper with the name and picture of their
volunteer on it. Everyone stands up and
they scan the rows across from them.
Pandemonium ensues as people greet one another, wai’s (a Thai gesture of
respect consisting of placing the palms of the hands together chest or chin
height and bowing the head; the height of the hands and depth of the
inclination are dependent on relative age a social status) are given and
received. The air is filled with
“Sawat-dii krap” (“hello” for men) and “Sawat-dii ka” (“hello” for women).
My host family, as it turns out, are a couple of retired
teachers: kruu (teacher) Burin and his wife, whose name I still haven’t
gotten. There is also a former student
of kruu Burin’s. Everyone has a
nickname: Geng, Muu, O, Nu, Dtem (a student who works at the house on the
weekends), and after a couple days, I was given one, too: Men (falling tone),
which means porcupine. I’ve been assured
that this is because porcupines are considered strong, and not because I am
prickly.
Geng, the father, speaks some basic English. No one else appears to speak a word, although
I suspect that the two students know a little.
Since he was a teacher, Geng is already working me hard on Thai, trying
to teach me the writing system, which is insanely complicated and leaves me
impressed that anyone here is literate.
So far after one full day, we’ve been to a food market, a
local festival (with a full scale staging of one of the wars with Myanmar,
including live elephants), seen the ordination of a Buddhist monk (almost all
Thai men become monks for a brief period), and begun to explore the community
on our mountain bikes. I’ve eaten too
many different dishes to list, as well as about a dozen different kinds of
fruit. There were lots of fried bugs at
the festival but I’m holding off on those for now.
I’ve run into a few other trainees while out and about, and
everyone seems to be settling into their homestays quite well. Among the most excited ones are those whose
homestay families have wifi. I am not
among them, which is why this is late being posted, but what my homestay lacks
in technology, it more than makes up for in generosity, which in what I
perceive to be typical Thai fashion is often expressed through food. (They packed me a lunch on the first day of
“school” in spite of my vociferous if fragmented protestations, and have pressed
snacks and fruit on me every day since.
One of the phrases most frequently addressed to me at the dinner table
is “ginn hai mot,” or “finish it.” More
on this to come, but for now “paw laao” (it’s enough; I think this only applies
to food, actually, but it will have to do for now).
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