MARCH 27, 2019 | LEUM DTAA COHORT | SOUTHEAST ASIA - LEUM DTAA
Sawadee Kah (Hello) future students, friends, family and supporters.
This is Davineekaht blogging to ya’ll. After a 5 hour van ride, we arrived on the farm confused. Only saw dusty dirt roads and no houses. Everyone looks at each other looking tried and confused. All of sudden a rusty red Monza truck slowly coming down the dirt road and stoped where we are standing. It was Sandot and his son Jon Jon. We load our heavy bags onto the truck. Then we had to walk up the hill. We didn’t know how far we were walking but everyone started to walk up the hill. Soon we reached Sandot and Jon Jon at the top. Sandot showed us were we are staying. All we saw was a straw roof, a floor made out of bamboo and mats covered with mosquitos nets. No walls, no doors, we were out in the open. Besides the open huts we had a beautiful view. We saw beautiful green trees covered the hills and other people’s houses.
As soon we unload our things we went to a fish festival. This was once in a life time chance for us. On our way there we drove over a sketchy bamboo bridge to get to the other side of the river. Everyone was scared for a minute because the bridge was shaky and moving, but we made it over. We hoped out the truck and saw people laughing and eating at the river. Everyone looked happy. The group went for a swim in the river. There was a rafted boat and Tohper, Anya, Jessica, Roselyn, Loida, and even Paw Klu who never goes in the water jumped on. They were ready for their adventure over the lowest part of the river. After all the fun we went back to the farm to eat dinner. There we met Chai, Sandot’s wife and his other son Jai Jai. We quickly saw Chai’s humor it was blunt and real. I thought she was very funny. We also met two french people that were named Author and Margo. Also met a sweet Japanese man named Costa. The first night we ate yummy fried rice with vegetables. We ate at the long table while the family ate on the balcony on a mat. Roslyn got invited to eat with the family because she liked spicy food.
After our meals we headed to bed. That night I went to the bedroom and saw a big hairy spider on the wall right next to the toilet. These toilets were not American style. To use the toilet we had to squat and every time I squat my face was inches away from the big spider. I had my headlamp on that spider the whole time I was using the bathroom. Everytime I put the light on the spider the spider eyes shined with blue. That moment I knew this was not an Oregon spider. After this experience I couldn’t sleep.
The next morning we woke up at 6 am to collect buffalo poop or helped in the kitchen. It really feel like the farm life. We use the buffalo poop to create compost. We also learned and how make compost for the plants. We learned what permaculture is and how to use the earth resources without hurting the environment. The 2nd day we got up at 6 am to get more buffalo poop and went to town to get rice hunks. Sandot stopped at 7eleven to pay his phone bill and everyone’s faces lit up. It was like we would never seen modern life again. After our exciting adventure at 7eleven, we countiued running errands. We stopped at least 3 times to say hi or visit people before we actually reached our destination. We finally stopped and saw a shack that had a big metal machine that was sorting the rice and hunks. We wanted the hunks. we carried bags and bags of rice hunks and loaded them on the truck. Then headed out back to the farm. Once we arrived at the farm we loaded the bags and started to make compost for the plants. This was a dirty job and required some muscle to carry all the bags of rice hunks and buffalo poop down to the plants. When we were finished we ate a delicious meal, took showers and went to bed.
On our 3rd day on the farm the whole family came with us to gather sweet potatoes at their friend’s farm. It was a good day to be outside the cloud covered the sun. it was a nice work day. After collecting sweet potatoes we were setting up for lunch. While some people were helping setting up other people were worried for Nolan’s life. A big hairy brown spider crawled into Nolan’s sandal. Nolan started to shake his leg and foot to let the spider out but it continued to stay. Then Nolan quickly took his sandal off and the spider flew out on to the ground. Topher slowly picked up the big hairy spider and placed it far from us. I’m pretty sure everyone felt relieved after that experience. Then we went to the knee deep river. it was too shallow for us to swim. Instead we had float races. Who can float the farthest without using our arms or legs. Just floating with the river. Tohper won both races even though no one believed in him. Jessica won the a race agaist Roselin, Lodia, and I. Then we went to their friends house to visit and eat fruit together. We had jack fruit that tastes like candy, maroons berry, and a mango and peach mixture taste fruit. After the fun day with the family we came home happy and full. The morning we planted baby banana trees. We each named our banana baby trees. We planted it with love and built a little roof so the sun won’t harm our baby trees. The afternoon we cut more bamboo so we can make bamboo sticky rice for dinner. When dinner came we ate together and give gratitude and thanks to the family on the farm. We had a heart warming experience and really thankful for that week. The farm life is a good moment to remember.
