Hmong Baby in 'playpen' while his mother sews
Woman and son in Old Market - Siem Reap
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An Isaan style funeral
Dear Readers, It’s been a very long time since I posted. I've been a a lazy man! I’ve been thinking about this post for a week or so. I am documenting the funeral of my wife’s aunt who passed away about 10 days ago. I am also using the funeral as a means of talking about the culture surrounding the various ceremonies. Let me be clear from the outset, this is NOT how all funerals in Thailand take place. My wife’s family is initially from the northeastern province of Isaan. Most of the rituals are most likely observed in some form in Isaan. Even in our small village, each funeral can be a bit different. After a mercifully short time of illness, my wife’s aunt died at home. Out of respect for all, I am not posting any pictures or videos of her passing although I was present. In the few days leading up to her passing, most of her family arrived from all corners of Thailand. Some live in our village and some live a full day’s drive away. Local families shared...
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We finished our official 14 days of strict quarantine yesterday!! Who anticipated a trip to the grocery store could be so exciting? We went a bit out of our village to the capitol of our province, Sa Kaeo. There is a store there much like Costco in the USA called Makro. One can buy in bulk or normal quantities like Costco. What fun! We spent probably at least an hour shopping for necessities and some nice to have but not totally necessary items. Since my last post about the wet market, we have traveled to Bangkok to pick my daughter, Pon, up from her university. We also needed to get to our house in a nearby suburb to assess the damage left by some nasty tenants who left suddenly. We also picked up some western things like tortillas, tortilla chips at the local quality grocery store near the house. Fortunately the main damage was to the wood floors, just ugly but not structural. They moved furniture around by dragging it rather than lifting. They also left the windows...