The Saga of Mr Ywen

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Dear all,

Last Wednesday we were relaxing by the school pond/swamp when we were acompanied by a rather adorable cow/buffalo/other. The animal seemed quite contented in the shade, able nible on the lush vegetation and bath in the water when it wanted and so we decided it was a rather lucky cow who had been singled out for special treatment.

Latter on in the afternoon we went down to the pond again and realised it had indeed been singled, as just about the time we arrived it was being skinned! It was quite interesting to see how an animal is butchard in a thai village and how every bit is saved and used (when I say everything I mean it, the blood was packaged in nice little sandwich bags and added to various piles while the wind pipe was also choped and allocated).

During the procedure little bits were cooked for those working and being ever hostpitable the village guests were offered some. We of course graciously accepted but as we put the meat in our mouths we became aware of the fact that the morsel was in fact pure fat and that we were incapable of eating it. This of course caused us a major problem particularly Liz whom seemed to have aquired a friend who was insisting on her swallowing. She managed it but just. At around the same time I had given up trying to chew through it and transfered it from mouth to fist hoping nobody would notice. Dylan soon followed suit and moved on to putting it in his pocket (unfortuantly Dylan quite liked this solution and is starting to make a habit of it, disposing of food he isn't fond of in this by finding it a home in a pocket). For a while I stood with fat in hand until I managed to through it away onto the floor were one of the wild dogs soon took care of it.

Some time after we had dealt with the problem of the inedible food we recieved a dinner invitiation to of one of the many villagers that was working away on the rapidly shrinking carcass. However, we could not accept for that evening and after much effort (including going to his house were he had already started to prepare the feast) we managed to arange to come the next night... or so we thought. It was only at seven the following morning when Mr Ywen (which we have now discovered is his name) knocked on our door. It turns out that he thought we had wanted to eat his portion of the cow for breakfast and accordingly under the rules of hospitality (I never met a people so ridiculously hospitable) he obliged. Insult was seriously added to injury when the food was presented to us as we ate hardly anything! Dylan and Liz both can't eat Thai food first thing in the morning and I'm not the the biggest fan either and so we only pecked at the several dishes. Mr Ywen did not seem very impressed by the time we left (though to be fair his wife, who looked about half his age, did seem to enjoy looking through Dylan's phrase book for the entirity of the forty-five minutes we were there for).

On an entirely different note we keep on meeting Western middle aged men who are on holiday visiting there wifes (indeed theres one outside now). After each occasion I've felt as though I had just spent the last ten minutes in a seedy club! Some people are truly desperate!

Anyhoo,

Hope you are all well,

Macca

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Comments

[Reggie and Arthur]

Only one thing to say....
BRITS ABROAD!!!