Finally, after several weeks of working away, visiting Pattaya, Jontiem and Phuket, I get to go home to Surin next week!

I don’t mind travelling to work, I actually really quite like it, but I have spent 4 months on the road already this year, so it’s time for a rest.

Leon is now one year and three months old, and I am very glad to tell you that he is already displaying signs of being every bit as slippery as his Father! Yesterday Nuth bought some snacks from a food cart that comes by the house now and then; she bought some BBQ chicken for Ball (her 10 year old Son from her first marriage) and some lua kheen (kind of deep fried fish dough balls) for Leon. So Leon takes one look at his fish balls, then looks at the BBQ chicken and instantly decides he wants that instead. His brother tells him ok, finish eating all your fish balls and you can have some chicken, then turns his back and starts talking to a friend.

Leon looks at his brother, and then carefully hides the fish balls behind him on the chair he is sitting on. He then shouts for his brother to pay attention to him, and opens his mouth to show it’s empty. Ball then says, ok you have finished the fish balls here is some chicken and hands him a drumstick. Leon eats the chicken, and by the time he is done with it Ball has finished his chicken also. Leon then looks his brother right in the eye, reaches behind his back, grabs a fish ball and stuffs it in his mouth, laughing at his brother all the time! I was so proud of him!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I was going out to the village to attend a celebration that is specific to the region of Thailand in which I live. The entire village spent all day cooking food, to be left for the ghosts of dead family members to eat, complete with beer, whiskey and bottles of coke. Of course, as expected the ghosts didn’t actually eat much of it, so around midnight we had the chance to eat all the left overs!

This is the spread that Nuth’s family prepared in their house (every house in the village did the same), when you consider that this represents the kind of food they can seldom afford to cook for themselves, then it becomes apparent just how seriously they take their dead relatives. My particular favourite was the bowl of tiny fried fish, very tasty!

Today I’m going to head out to the village for a very odd sounding religious holiday. It’s a localised thing, not something that is celebrated all over Thailand. Basically the entire village will spend the day cooking lots of food, and then they will set it all out as a feast, for the ghosts of dead family members to eat.

Once the ghosts are finished, the living people get to eat everything that is left over, personally I think it’s an excuse to have a bloody great party but who cares, I love Isaan food so I hope the ghosts are not too hungry!