1. Pigs don’t oink. They sometimes squeal. They sometimes bark. They sometimes sound like dinosaurs. But they most definitely do not oink.
2. Crickets are a good source of protein. Hungry for dinner? Strap on a headlamp and take to the fields.
3. Mosquito nets are, in fact, more for privacy than mosquitos. No better way to get alone time than to take your music and journal under your mosquito net, and pretend no one outside can see or hear you.
4. Resources for sickness are extremely limited. Either call a “doctor” visiting from another province — who will provide you with an IV drip attached to a camera tripod, within the comfort of your own home — or drive 4 hours to the nearest reliable hospital, across the border in Thailand.
5. Cats like to eat sticky rice. Also any other food you leave around.
6. When you take your bucket shower, you will be joined by no less than 17 little lizards. Don’t be alarmed — they’re more scared of you than you are of them.
7. Nothing is too gross to sell in the market. Whole chickens with feet that poke out into the aisles? Yep. Brown sludge made out of whole fermented fish? Of course. Live frogs in buckets with strings tied around their waists? Sure. Dead two-foot long flying squirrels? You betcha.
8. Cleaning a pig pen entails not only taking a hose to the ground (and poop) around the pigs, but also to the pigs themselves. Mainly their butts. Twice a day, and they’re still filthy.
9. Nights on the farm are breathtaking. Turn off the lights around the fish ponds and join the crickets in the grass for truly beautiful star-gazing.
10. Nights on the farm also end really early. As soon as the sun goes down…there’s nothing else to do. Bored? Go to bed.
11. Farms are soul-filling. The slow pace of life and lack of modern amenities and distractions allow for worship and quiet time to take front row every day, and allow space for the Lord to speak and move in the silence.
