Happy 1

Poem book

So young as I was, I was able to read quite fluently.  In the grade 1 class while the teacher taught to read a few first pages of the first lesson I was able to read the whole book and started to look around for some other books. 
My first story book was about crocodile and his monkey friend, that the crocodile’s wife sick, needed to eat monkey’s heart and the monkey said his heart was hanging on the tree, so he could fell down no hurt.  I think you know that story.  The teacher never scolded me of reading something else and never asked whether I could read the book.  She might be able to notice that I read, not just looking at the pictures.

We have story books at home, no pictures.  It was the translation of the Little house series, written by Laura Ingalls Wilder.  I knew her when she was 5 to 7 while I was also about that age.  We had been very close friend all along my life.

About 10 years ago, I happen to have a Rotarian friend, Kevin Ford.  He was also one of the Little house’s fans and he send be the original language books.  They are my precious.

The books were quite thick.  I like to lay on my tummy,  put the chin on the palms and read.  Sometime, Pop-Eye the doggie came inside the bedroom without permission, stepped on my book without permission, and licked my face without permission.  She was almost as big as myself.  When people saw me reading, they always surprised.

One day I found a small book fallen on the ground at the corridor of the factory.  Nobody claimed to be the owner.  The book has strange wording, with rhythm and rhyme.  It was very interesting.  It actually a poem study book for the grade 6 student.  I read and memorized them all, and still remember some..

back to the top

Bended nails, blacking nails

Our business was buying animals’ skin and recyclable things. W had a lot of cows and buffaloes skins to clean and dry up.  We cleaned the meat and fat inside the skin, put them in salt and some chemical then nailed them on the large frames, stretched them like drum.  When dry, they became flatted cow shape hard sheet.  One side had smooth hair.  The labors then pulled up the nails to release the cow sheet off the frames.   From time to time they were put on big truck to send to Bangkok.

The nails that were pulled out were all bended.  When have time, my father and the labors would use the hammer to bang on the bended nails to make them straight again.
Yes, it looked fun.  When no one use the hammer and nails, I tried.  It was not as easy as it seemed to be when looked at others did.  I banged on my fingers many times and my own nails black with blood inside, but still had fun.  I did it every time I saw any bended nails. 
When moved to Bangkok, our house was surrounded with carpenter factories.  I like to pick small piece of woods, nailed them together to make stools.  We had a lot of stools in our house because that was the only thing I could make at the age of 10.

back to the top

Curiousity

I was sent to hospital by my shocked mother because she smelled acetylene from my mouth!

I wonder whether you know the chemical name acetylene and carbide lamp or lantern.  All vendors at the temple festival and any night market used it to provide light at night although the smell of the gas was really terrible.
It was that afternoon when I went out of the house to explore the area I found an interesting vacant house.  The door was close but the corridor was open.  Most of the things were cover with dust except some thing look like gray stones at the corner.  They were new and shining.
I went directly there to see.  The smell of acetylene from the stone was very strong.  I remember that it was the same as the carbide lantern used by food vendor.
I sat down, looked at them closely.  Since they produced light, were they hot?  I carefully touched them. 
No, they were not hot.  They looked like they had been burned.  I picked up one.. Uuuhh really smelly. 

I wonder how it would taste.. like.. but they were sooooo smelly…

I looked again and again, finally I touched the tip of my tongue on one of them, was satisfied with the knowledge and ran back home.
My mother smelled right away.  She caught me and sent me to the hospital even my father believed not necessary.  He said if poisonous I would not be able to run home but mother was mother.  She could not rest her mind until the doctor said I was really ok.

Oh yes, they had no taste, just like simple stone but definitely very smelly.  It was simply a curiosity and my simple curiosity always shocked my mother.  She still had nightmare about me until now.

back to the top  

Mae Kong Fish

Nakohn Phanom town market was surrounded by white fence.  The gate of the market faced Mae Kong river.  Early in the morning at the back of the market would be kind of RAE meal ready to eat.. hi hi.  Most common food were congee, soy milk, coffee, and Bun Guan the Vietnamese food. 

There was clay pot over the stove, contain boiling water.  The pot was cover tightly with thin white cloth and the steam.  They pore milk of rice power over the cloth and let it be steamed for awhile and sprinkled mince pork and shopped green onion over it, steamed well and folded it nicely before took them off to the plate.  Bun Guan was always my favorite breakfast.

At the front part of the market was fresh food.  I used to see a big sack of cicadas, grasshoppers, frogs, many kinds of mushrooms, and so on.  There were also many kinds of fish from Mae Kong River.
Mae Kong river has a very special catfish.  They were as large as dolphin.  I heard that they were fresh water dolphin but the information I found was Giant Catfish.  At that time no one eat them.  The people both side of the river respect this giant fish.  They believed bad luck if the fish were caught.  I once saw the fish was sold in the market.  Most people were frightened but some bought.  They said very delicious.
Now we can reproduce them in the fish farm but never be able to make it that giant as they are in the nature.

Once there were nice, fresh and beautiful fish, yellow tail.  My mother bought them to cook for dinner.  That night the whole family including all the workers who ate the fish was sent to the hospital.  The fish were poisonous, not very dangerous but made everyone sick.
That even spoiled my mother’s cooking reputation a little bit.  Hi hi

back to the top