Imm Lau Imm Lau

SUNDAY

Last night was fantastic. I had dinner with my brother Jay (15), he cracks me up he doesn't know much english but he smiles at me and giggle and has hilarious body language, he reminds me of a cartoon.

I don’t think my host mom cooks, because they seem to have two full time babysitter/ nanny/maids who cook, clean, etc. The food was amazing though, even when I wasn’t sure what I was eating...which was a lot of the time.

After dinner my host mom came home and brought me, my little sister Meo(10), little brother Chem (9) , and Jay to the athletic club to go swimming. It was so nice, a huge pool, and I played with my little siblings who I now adore. They no close to zero English which doesn't matter at all because lets face it how necessary is it to speak English while teaching each other new splashing techniques? My mom on the other hand has pretty great English which is so nice because I love talking to her, I can’t wait to learn some Thai so it will be easier for both of us.

When we got back home my host dad was there, I went over to say Sa-wat-dee-ka and my mother knew I was tired so she told me to go dry my hair and sleep. Right after getting into my pajamas though I heard Jay calling “Anna, Anna!” and I opened my door where he told me in broken English something about someone wanting to take me out..to a barty? I was so confused… “Now?” I asked to which he nodded his head yes. So I went back to my room, put on real clothes, and waited for…?

Five minutes later a hoard of my host sisters waltzed in and ushered me into yet another car (is that 3 so far?). My host mom asked if I was sure I wanted to go (protective as my own already) and told me not to fall asleep in class on Monday, but my sisters assured her I could sleep all day Sunday which didn’t sound half bad to me. So we packed into the car, 4 in the back two in the front and drove off to the barty. Actually we went to a delicious little desert resteraunt.
Let me tell you, these tiny girls can EAT. We ordered about 11 slushy drinks, 7 random desert things (looked like cut up white bread to dip in pudding), and 5 spicy noodle/beef/egg/veggie mixtures. For SIX people. Imm Lau, Imm lau I said (I’m full) to which they responded “eat more, keep eating, try this”, I think that’s why they told me when the food came to eat fast. Not because I had to compete with them, but because otherwise my stomach would be able to detect the oncoming digestive disaster. Oh well, at least it was delicious and my sisters are hilarious, they remind me of my own.
By then I was absolutely exhausted and they laughed at me as I fell asleep on the car ride home, telling me it was okay, I didn’t have to eat the next day…I could sleep until dinner. ;)

1,2,3,4?…. meals later
These people love to feed me. So I woke up, ate breakfast, took a shower, did some stuff on my computer, and fell back asleep for while. I was woken up by Fong who told me it was time to go meet up with Mom and she drove me to this really exclusive looking golf club where she brought me to a beautiful game room/library. Of course there was food, it was lunch time for goodness sakes. Oh. my. Buddah. (innapropes?) my mother is the worst/best. she makes me try everything and then “try again try again”. Luckily she had to leave to pick up Ting or I don’t think she would ever have let me stop eating.

The rest of the afternoon was spent playing pool, first in their way which included a full rack of red balls with about six random colored balls placed in designated spots around the table: pink, green, blue, black, yellowand brown I think. The object is to first get a red ball in (1 point) then hit a colored ball in (pink= 7 Black =8 Yellow= 2 etc.). I sucked at it and Jay killed me, we ended up giving up and started playing teams but no one was very good so we played all afternoon, switching to the regular stripes/solid form after a while and actually finished a game: Jay, Meyo, and Chem won :(. Then we headed to the market to pick up a crate of fresh crabs for dinner, which we dropped off at home for the maids to cook while we swam at the athletic club.
Dinner was delicious but, again, was overwhelming. I felt bad because I was full and my host mom told me she told the maids to cook 7 crab for me. SEVEN. Crabs. SEVEN! So of course I ate more. And more. And then she wanted me to try this one tea. Then this one juice. Then sticky rice with coconut milk. I am definitely giving up on watching my figure. Unless you count watching it grow. I really didn't take it seriously when Ajaan Mark said that our host familys want us to gain weight, I'm just glad they aren't weighing me...I guess some families do that. Hilarious.

I really love my family though, they are really fun and playful and try to include me a lot. It’s amazing how much you can communicate without words. Chem, Meyo and I played games during the car rides, they taught me a few games similar to rock paper scissors but they involved slapping the losers hands..they never really hit mine though it was cute. We also played monkey in the middle at the pool with Ting and Jay. Meyo and Chem love having my attention and I love it too but it gets exhausting. I’m sure my host mom loves having a new babysitter though ; )


I. Am. Exhausted. More to come.