Rambutan Revelry
I'm sitting in an internet cafe right now that is populated mainly by Thai kids-- the little girl next to me is dressing up virtal characters in natty dresses on myscene.com. It is incredibly hot right now-- it was already hotter at 8:30 this morning than it ever gets in Portland in the summer. Which means I'll be frequenting this air-conditioned cafe for a while.
I thought I'd be jet lagged or tired or something but I woke up at 5 AM ready to go. The weather is very pleasant in the early morning. I biked around the wats and chedis of Ayuthaya and saw a large group of elderly Thais in blue jumpsuits doing Tai Chi. I also engaged in my first real Thai-language "dialogue", which went something like this:
Me: A-roy mahk mahk. (This is delicious.)
Boy: A-rai? ("What?" Total incomprehension-- he calls someone else over to interpret)
Me: A-roy mahk mahk.
Girl: A-roy MAHK MAHK. (Nodding and smiling.)
Me: A-roy mahk mahk?
Girl: A-roy MAHK MAHK.
Finally I get it. "A-roy MAHK MAHK."
It took a while to place my order but fortunately I found a display case full of nifty looking food that I could just point at. I had some kind of fluffy rice pastry with spicy meat stuffing that was so good that I had to have another. ("Nueng. Nueng." Meaning one.) Then there was pork wrapped in cabbage with a fish sauce dip. As far as food goes I died and went to heaven.
Even the 3 baht tempura-esque thing that had probably been sitting in the hundred degree heat half the day, and also dipped in the ubiquitious fish sauce, was delicious. I ate it while careening around on my bike, wondering if it would be coming back up 30 seconds later. But it's still down there.
Which brings me to el RAMBUTAN!! (Or "ngaw", which took about 46 repetitions for me to even begin to say it correctly.) The rambutan looks like a cross between a deep-sea creature and a mutant from outer space. It's small, orange, and oblong with green spongy feelers snaking out of it. I gave the vendor my most questioning look and she peeled one, revealing a milky fruit beneath. It tastes like a coconut with a bit of pear thrown in.
However, I do not plan on eating the BBQ'ed bats I mentioned yesterday-- at the same vendor I saw gutted frogs and snakes (or eels?) A-roy MAHK MAHK.
I also had a chance to talk to the owner of my guesthouse for a while. He's traveled all over the states and got a masters in Maryland (ring up another strange coincidence there). He's also an architect and he showed me pictures of this amazing 60 million baht (about 2 million U.S.) house he designed. I love these wonderful surprises-- I never would have guessed at all the things he's done. He also let me know that the rainy season would be coming in a few weeks-- I'm not sure what to expect with that, but it should cool things off considerably.
I thought I'd be jet lagged or tired or something but I woke up at 5 AM ready to go. The weather is very pleasant in the early morning. I biked around the wats and chedis of Ayuthaya and saw a large group of elderly Thais in blue jumpsuits doing Tai Chi. I also engaged in my first real Thai-language "dialogue", which went something like this:
Me: A-roy mahk mahk. (This is delicious.)
Boy: A-rai? ("What?" Total incomprehension-- he calls someone else over to interpret)
Me: A-roy mahk mahk.
Girl: A-roy MAHK MAHK. (Nodding and smiling.)
Me: A-roy mahk mahk?
Girl: A-roy MAHK MAHK.
Finally I get it. "A-roy MAHK MAHK."
It took a while to place my order but fortunately I found a display case full of nifty looking food that I could just point at. I had some kind of fluffy rice pastry with spicy meat stuffing that was so good that I had to have another. ("Nueng. Nueng." Meaning one.) Then there was pork wrapped in cabbage with a fish sauce dip. As far as food goes I died and went to heaven.
Even the 3 baht tempura-esque thing that had probably been sitting in the hundred degree heat half the day, and also dipped in the ubiquitious fish sauce, was delicious. I ate it while careening around on my bike, wondering if it would be coming back up 30 seconds later. But it's still down there.
Which brings me to el RAMBUTAN!! (Or "ngaw", which took about 46 repetitions for me to even begin to say it correctly.) The rambutan looks like a cross between a deep-sea creature and a mutant from outer space. It's small, orange, and oblong with green spongy feelers snaking out of it. I gave the vendor my most questioning look and she peeled one, revealing a milky fruit beneath. It tastes like a coconut with a bit of pear thrown in.
However, I do not plan on eating the BBQ'ed bats I mentioned yesterday-- at the same vendor I saw gutted frogs and snakes (or eels?) A-roy MAHK MAHK.
I also had a chance to talk to the owner of my guesthouse for a while. He's traveled all over the states and got a masters in Maryland (ring up another strange coincidence there). He's also an architect and he showed me pictures of this amazing 60 million baht (about 2 million U.S.) house he designed. I love these wonderful surprises-- I never would have guessed at all the things he's done. He also let me know that the rainy season would be coming in a few weeks-- I'm not sure what to expect with that, but it should cool things off considerably.
posted by Franz K at 1:17 AM
1 Comments:
Maybe Thai can be the foreign language you test out of at JHU! Is there are word for Muh!
l & G
AMK
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