It was a restless night of sleep and an early morning due to the sounds of roosters and pigs. Roosters have definitely become my least favorite animal around the world in the past 8 months. After a breakfast of egg noodles we climbed the muddy hill to work on clearing and leveling land. Mud caked on our shoes as we moved branches that the locals chopped with machetes. We also worked on using hoes to move the mud.
As branches were moved and bushes chopped, we would find crazy looking critters. My favorite find was a walking stick bug. A foot long salamander was found by one of the locals. She took it to the side, snapped its neck, and put it in her bag to eat later. Ra Pi laughed as she told us how delicious salamanders are; two days earlier she discussed eating a dung beetle. One of the guys found the biggest earth worm I have seen since 7th grade science class dissecting day. I picked it up and yelled to Ra Pi, “Do you eat these?” Ra Pi screamed. I joked and held it to my mouth, “These are delicious; we eat them in America.” I was still about 25 feet away from Ra Pi, but she ran from me. I tossed the worm away then went back to work. Soon afterwards I heard Ra Pi gagging in the bushes. She ended up vomiting because she was so grossed out by the earth worm. I felt horrible and apologized to her multiple times. She explained, “In Thailand, earth worms are very dirty and full of bacteria.” I continued to feel horrible about making Ra Pi sick until later when she picked up a frog. She held its back legs and put its front feet in her mouth. “Ra Pi! You will eat a frog, but get sick over an earth worm?” She laughed, “Worms are very dirty; not good for Karin people.”
The weather was perfect for our work today; it was cool and overcast with a nice breeze. Rain poured down just as we broke for lunch. We were soaked and covered in mud by the time we made it back to the village. This afternoon we worked through the off and on rain showers. I used a machete to chop through tree stumps. It took a long time to chop through the wood that would have been down in seconds with a chain saw.
The kids in the village gathered near our hut, but were still shy when I went out to them. We sang head and shoulders together then just laughed and smiled.
The power just went out. I guess my computer used up the last of the solar power that was left after the cloudy day. I will have to write more later.
