It's h
ard to keep track of seasons and time of year when you live in a climate where the seasons are jokingly referred to as hot, hotter, and hottest. When December and 'holiday season' rolled around, it was hard to think about Christmas time, baking cookies, shopping, trees, lights, and everything else that goes with the holiday season when I could still walk around in a t-shirt during the day and had no visual signs of Christmas anywhere. Being primarily a Buddhist country, Thailand doesn't celebrate Christmas as a major holiday. The only reminders of the holiday season were in Bangkok, where Christmas displays showed up in all the shopping areas and holiday music played strangely in the background (I found it strangely annoying for some reason - maybe because I wasn't home? because it just didn't belong? because most of those songs are just inherently annoying?). I didn't mind being so separated from all the holiday stuff, surprisingly, and I was also looking forward to a visit from my family during Christmas time.
After being in Thailand for almost a year, I forgot just how much I've learned, adjusted, and adapted to everything here. My family arrived and I kept finding so many things to tell them about regarding culture, language, and every day nuances of my life here. We spent their first day in Bangkok - visited a couple temples, ate some street food and my family tried to deal with the exhaustion that comes after flying for a full day and now being 13 hours ahead of the time zone they're used to.
All of us at Wat Phra Kaew in Bangkok
Like the locals: dabbling in the smelling oils for a mid-morning boost - a must-have for many Thais (I think I got these two hooked, as my sister subsequently bought several more for 'gifts' to take back home)
After a full night of rest we headed to my site. I'd already told my family about the hospitality and generosity of Thai people and all the things they'd do for us/with us during their visit, although I think they had no idea what to really expect. Their first impression of my site was a visit to the local area sports competition between government organizations (such as my office, the local health stations, and other government offices in my area). It was an hour full of food, soccer, drinking, dancers, and the overall over-stimulation that comes with so many things in Thailand - in general, a great first experience and introduction to my life and community.
Lunch at the sports competition while the game goes on, largely unnoticed beside us
One of my favorite people in my community, my first host mom, had invited my family for breakfast on Christmas morning. She came and picked us all up, took us back to her house and offered us a meal full of all my favorite things and then some. When I asked if she was going to join us to eat, her response was that she was too happy and excited to sit and eat. After breakfast we walked with her through the orchards in her backyard as she talked about how much she enjoys working (she's a retired government officer but sells fruit at the markets every evening) and gathered some rose apples and pomelo to send home with us.
Post-breakfast blessings
Discussing fruits and labor with a walk through the orchards
The rest of the time at my site was full of meeting people, visiting schools, dabbling in some of the local sports and eating non-stop. My supervisor and his family prepared an amazing Thai meal for us on Christmas Eve, determined to make our holidays away from home warm and enjoyable. We enjoyed some local beer and a fantastic home-cooked Thai meal outside under the stars at his nephew's outdoor cafe.
Thai Christmas Eve Dinner
Christmas dinner was a mix of America and Thailand. My current host family had been convinced that we should eat pizza and french fries and had invited us out to the local pizza place 30km away. I explained my family's desire for Thai food and suggested neua yang (literally - grilled meat), a meal often reserved for special occasions and 2 hour lunches. Determined to give us a taste of home, we had an appetizer of french fries before dinner. My family had brought me a suitcase full of treats and things from America, one of which was ranch dressing mix. Reminded of my love of ranch dressing with french fries (with most things, really), I mixed some up for everyone to try, and consequently got my host family hooked on it at first taste. Of all the things I've made for them/introduced them to, this one received the best review by far.
Christmas Dinner: grilled meat and french fries
Our visits to the schools were short but fun and included games, sports and some surprise songs by the kids that had been prepared for us in advance (one of my favorites: an original, mostly improvised despite being practiced several times, 'merry christmas' song by a class of 1st graders).
The message that came with the Christmas song
Petanque (like bocce ball) with the kids
It was great to finally show my family the community and people I've gotten to know during the past year. I was able to appreciate how far I've come, despite my own critical views of my lack of perceived progress at site. I realized just how much my Thai language skills have progressed as I translated everything from Thai to English and then back again, which was great but exhausting. The experiences shared between my family and the people throughout my community were pretty amazing, and seeing them interact with each other was something for which I had a special appreciation. It's easy to doubt my success and question my impact on a daily basis when nothing really seems like it's happening; but with my family's visit I was able to see the connections made and slow but definitive progress made in more areas than just my designated project assignment.
After my site we headed south, at which time I greatly appreciated the pampering of a short airplane flight (all the free things!) as opposed to many long hours on a bus next to a stranger that will inevitably spend the better part of the ride asleep on me. Phuket is Thailand's biggest island, and I'm not really sure it can be considered an 'island'. We drove over an hour from the airport to our hotel, through a maze of busy Thai communities alongside many, many minivans and buses full of farangs. We spent a day on the beach - the water was beautiful and the perfect temperature. We also spent a day on a guided tour of a few neighboring islands via speed boat. The islands were beautiful, the snorkeling we did was absolutely incredible, and we ended the day at the island where "The Beach" was filmed, along with too many other tourists and their accompanying tour boats. It really was beautiful and makes me anxious to explore the many islands in the south. The 'speed boat' ride was no joke: my sister and I ended up sitting at the very back of the boat, the prime spot for getting mauled in the face with salt water every 10-15 seconds. Luckily we were able to make good use of our snorkeling equipment and used it to block the non-stop barrages of water from our eyes.
Hazy view from the top of Phuket
Beach.
Thai style: me and my siblings
With my parents at Maya Bay
No filter - it really looks like this
It was great to be able to do so much with my family in a short amount of time, and I think we were all able to take some things away from the trip. It was amazing to me to see how my community made such an attempt to make Christmas special for me and my family in so many different ways. Despite being a very non-traditional celebration, I think it was rather enjoyable for everyone involved and I was happy to be able to celebrate Christmas, in a very Thai way, with my family.
