We had our first introduction to home-stays this week in Maejo Village. People within the village live a very comfortable lifestyle and were very welcoming to us. Many families have small children who were fun to play with and loved having an older host-sibling around. Most girls were allowed to cook with the family, while boys were more often shooed away from women's work. Either way, everyone learned a lot about daily Thai life just by watching and experiencing. The village was full of many surprises too; kids playing with beetles in the cafe, a truck that drove by each morning blasting campaign ads and many stray dogs who were friendly by day and vicious at night.
We spent our mornings at Pun Pun, an organic farm that encourages multicropping (,rather than monocropping) and runs many educational programs and internships
. The farm is run by a woman named Peggy who is from Colorado originally and her husband Joe who is Thai. Some mornings we helped weed and clear beds for growing-- this involved using machetes to chop down branches that would otherwise block sunlight. We also spent one morning in the kitchen learning to make soymilk, tofu, yoghurt, kombucha (a fermented tea drink), soap, and papaya salad. The papaya salad was prepared with a green papaya that Daniel climbed a tree to retrieve. The papaya is chopped finely and mixed with garlic, chilies, soy sauce, peanuts, green beans and tomato--- so delicious!
The last day at the farm we learned to make and build with adobe bricks. You start by stomping around in a mud pit filled with rice husks. We all had fun getting a little messy and once we had learned the basics we helped to demolish an old adobe structure.
In the afternoons we kept busy with projects within the village, which were arranged for us by Pi Tong Bai, an important woman in the village who runs the internet cafe and helps to organize homestays
. One day we helped to construct a path between the farm and the village by filling rice sacs with mud and packing more mud on top. The villagers also did a lot in return for us by teaching us Thai, Thai massage, Thai kick boxing and leading us on a hike to a nearby waterfall. When the weather got too hot, we were able to swim in the reservoir.
The last day, we spent all afternoon making fried banana chips and pad Thai for a huge communal dinner for the village. To make the banana chips, we broke into teams and had a competition for the best chips. All the food was delicious and two women from Pun Pun brought a guitar and played while we ate. After the dinner, we lit paper lanterns and let them float high into the sky. Although the lantern that the team constructed didn't work, it was a good attempt.
This morning, we were all very sad to part with our host families. We took photos with our families and thanked them profusely for all that they have done for us this past week!
Maejo Village Homestay/ Pun Pun Farm
Saturday, September 28, 2013
Chiang Mai Province, Thailand
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2025-02-15