Still with mixed classes we embarked on the next day with a return to the farmyard. The aim here was to try and get them to have conversations with eachother. After practising in the group, up they would come and say:

What animal is this?

Thiiis iiiis aaaa ELEPHANT!!

How many legs does AN elephant have?

A elephant has four legs!!

And as we progressed with the older students, they were able to demonstrate their conversational skills in front of the group speaking between eachother. As the week progressed, they started to become sick of shouting about elephants and dinosaurs, so we mixed in comprehension exercises.

With the white board outside, we were able to practise reading and writing skills, and more importantly for many of the students, artistic skills. The quality of the written work from the higher classes was quite unbelievable. Not only would they understand very quickly what was required from them, but their handwriting is some of the best I’ve ever seen. And after each exercise I would go through their work, correcting any mistakes, followed by a ‘very good’, or earned variant, and then the real highlight for them, my autograph.

Throughout the week we were treated to further culinary delights from a variety of restaurants in the local area. For the most part it is excellent food, freshly cooked and prepared with an amazing palette of tastes thrown in.

However, one lunch time, we were introduced to some new teachers from another local school, and shook their hands (they relish the western customs). But they were in the process of cutting up raw meat, I noticed as I relinquished the grasped hands. I imagine it was just the one cow they were cutting up, but all of the cow non-the-less. We stood and watched for a while, mildly interested, entirely unappetised, as mince meat was being made out of all these cow parts. The cow was at least in a state of now being quite unrecognizable.

Our director told us excitedly that this is eaten with sticky rice. Well I guessed beef stew and rice couldn’t be too bad.

And in all fairness it could have been worse. All of the mince meat could have been raw for example. As it was, only half of the dishes had been neglected by the sizzling intense heat of a flame. But all were mixed with what I beleive were weeds from the flower beds outside (of course they wouldn’t be called weeds, rather food). Again, these apparently didn’t need washing or preparation. And one of the ingenious things about this meal is that there is little or no need for utensils, thanks largely in part due to our fingers and sticky rice.

To eat sticky rice, I was shown, you grab a palm full of it out of the communal bowl of the stuff, and roll it into a ball between your palms. You then use your fingers to make an indentation such that food could be grabbed and held there, kind of like a 3D Pac-Man I imagined longingly. I was bought out of my fantasy by being handed this ball of sticky rice. I could see my demonstrators hands were not well washed. Or washed.

So picking up some raw mince meat and soily foliage with this dirty rice, out of a bowl that everyone was happily dipping their own fingers into, I didn’t feel great. And sadly, it didn’t taste surprisingly great. Sticky rice had gone straight to my number one on the avoid list, in front of papaya salad and bone chicken, which is saying something. Needless to say I wasn't particularly well for the few days following this.

This was strikingly contrasted by a trip to a lake just behind the village. The journey there is short, but through an amazing maze of backstreets which allows us to see the heart of the village. Chickens, goats and other things all wondered about happily in amongst palm trees in the gardens of wooden houses. It is an amazingly atmospheric area with an incredible feeling of isolation, but with everything you could ever really need surrounding you everywhere.

And so we then suddenly arrive at this incredible vista of a lake with a restaurant at the edge, with wooden huts overlooking the lake. We ordered our fish whilst I went off for a run around the lake. The dish came out with a whole fish steamed in an astonishing array of vegetables. The meat just dropped off the animal and was so full of flavour. By far the nicest white fish I’ve ever eaten, back-dropped in one of the most tranquil settings. Just incredible!

Evenings were generally spent as usual with the teachers, playing bowls on the field, or just sat down talking. Occasionally just spending some quiet time recovering in the staff room. The week was pre-concluded with a return to the incredible buffet down in Chiang-Rai. After which we prepared for a visit to the ‘Black Temple’ and our second weekend in Chiang Rai.

(lots more photos there :)