(Extra)ordinary Days

Well, I've tried so hard to think of something to say aside from the heavenly food Charlotte and I have been eating the past few days, but I simply must talk about it! It's all so yummy, that I must share our edible findings. At least that'll be a good starting point for this posting.
We recently revisited one of the tasty restaurants down the road for a quick dinner, and although the menu was almost entirely in Thai, we managed to pick some delicious dishes with the old hope-for-the-best pointing/guessing method. It worked like a charm! I'm happy to report that my tolerance for spicy food is gradually increasing, since I managed to eat an entire spicy green papaya salad without keeling over dead after the first bite. Charlotte, however, wasn't as fortunate, and spent most of the meal downing our entire bucket of ice. I'm pretty sure she popped one of those killer little chiles in her mouth as she was wolfing down her food....Charlotte found her new "favorite food of the day," though: crispy fish chips! Well, that certainly isn't the real name for them, but that's what we've dubbed them. They're super crunchy bits of fish (bones and all), and you munch away at them with a bit of sauce and a pinch of rice. Mmmm!

Charlotte before having eaten said chile.

Papaya salad made with fermented fish oil.

Fish chips!

Oh, and I forgot to mention that there are these little spirit houses all over the place, from the shabbiest rooftops to the most ornate temples. They look like miniature temples themselves, only much smaller, and they come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors. Frequently, people also leave out little offerings of food, like fruit or rice, on their spirit house. According to Matthew, our translator, you aren't allowed to throw them away, lest you wish to be cursed for all of eternity. Ok, so I made that last part up, although it is considered bad mojo if you throw yours away. So what is the proper way of disposing of one, if you must do so? Indirectly throw it away by leaving it at a temple for the monks to deal with. Poor monks!

A spirit house.

In my attempt to take some more pics of everyday Thai life, here's one of a miniature song-tao motorbike contraption. Very handy, but not particularly the safest means of transportation, especially when bouncing along on the highway at obscene speeds. Although we haven't been on one (thank goodness!), I do see them quite frequently weaving all around the streets and whatnot, all the while somehow managing to keep themselves all in one piece. I keep waiting for some of the rickety ones to just fall apart when they go over a bump in the road.

After returning from several days at the elephant camp, Charlotte was covered in so many bugs bites it was as if every mosquito within a several mile radius managed to find her and poke her like a pincushion with their sabre-like pokey things. Lucky for me, the mosquitoes took quite a fancy to my unfortunate sister, and I managed to escape the massive swarms that descended upon her each night. Thankfully, neither of us seemed to even see so much as a single mosquito wing today when we returned to the camp for several hours.
At this point, Charlotte and I decided we will be much more productive working from Chiang Mai, rather than at the elephant camp. Don't get me wrong, we both love learning about the elephants from the mahouts, but there's just so much more we can do in town to help the camp and the mahouts. Right now, the camp is struggling financially (to put it lightly), so we're going to try to write short booklets (in English, French, Chinese, and Spanish) including background info on the historical significance of elephants in Thai culture, as well as mahout and elephant profiles with info about themselves and their experiences working with elephants. We're hoping to sell these to tourists so that the mahouts and the camp will receive immediate profits so that they can have enough money to revamp the place.They certainly need as much help as they can get!

Gwi, Kit, and Mui with baby Doi.

One other area we're looking into is potentially setting up mushroom farming at the elephant camp, using elephant dung as the growing medium. Apparently, mushrooms grow quite well in such environments, and there certainly is a plethora of dung around the camp! This way, the mahouts (or villagers) could sell the mushrooms that they grow to provide themselves with a second source of income. So for now, we'll continue to visit the camp  two days each week to interview all of the mahouts, help out around the camp, and continue to learn about the elephants from the mahouts.

Ooh, and look at this crazy plant we saw while walking through the camp! Charlotte and I were pretty excited over it, although Matthew just shrugged it off, dismissing it as "just a fern." Fern or not, we certainly don't have plants like that in Seattle!

Our English-teaching classes are going well, too, although they're quite challenging. While the children have theoretically been learning English since the first grade, many of them barely know the alphabet, even though the students we're teaching are in 4th-6th grade. It's really quite an eye-opening experience to see just how different their schooling is from our own. In the 6th grade, for example, there's only six students and they learn all of their material from a video, since the school has a shortage of teachers. I can't imagine what sort of uproar that'd cause back home if there was a similar situation! Our lessons are slow, but steady, and always very entertaining with the kids. I'll try to take some pics next time!
Before I completely fall asleep at my laptop, I'll leave you with these parting images of our yummy food:

A mouthful of mangosteen!

Killer soup.

Enjoying our Thai iced tea

Takoyaki from the market

Custards?

Sweet corn in a cup!

By now, you've had a glimpse into our ordinary-type of days that are really  quite extraordinary and exciting! Hope you aren't too hungry after seeing all of these food pics!