My family

My host "parents":

As you can probably see, they are very young. They own a company that sells used cars, and based on other aspects of their life here, I'd say they are very successful. (They actually told me how much they make each month, but I'm not going to pass that information along. It might not be unusual for them to tell me - or they were bragging, I'm not sure - but I would feel uncomfortably sharing that little tidbit.)

P'Noi goes to their office occasionally, but for the most part she stays home and takes care of the kids. I'm actually not sure what she does with her time, because it seems to me that the maids do most of the work anyway. She is a bit glamourous, and loves having her picture taken. We went to an old temple a couple weeks ago, and instead of admiring its beauty, we admired hers. She spent at least an hour having a friend take pictures of her. Still, she's really nice, and has a good sense of humor. She loves to talk a lot, and I've seen her spend hours on the phone. She certainly dominates conversations between her and her husband.

P'Book is a former tennis champion, and is a bit of a badass. On weekend mornings, he walks around the house in black dress pants, no shirt, and a long gold necklace. This is before he goes to work, both Saturday and Sunday. I don't see much of him - he's gone before I wake up (at 7am) and I've yet to see him come home at night. He only takes days off to go on family vacations occasionally (as in the picture above).

Benz:

Benz is 8-years old, and I think she's in Grade 2. Her English is amazing, and so she's been great to have around. She is like my sister (Josie) in many ways, but to an extreme. She doesn't just like clothes and makeup and princesses; she does beauty pageants and other types of competitions (dance, singing). She loves art too. She has a different special class or lesson every day of the week - either singing, Thai dancing, ballet, drawing/painting, etc.

Boss:

Boss is, in most ways, an average 6-year old boy. He loves video games, superheroes, action movies, etc. He's a really sweet kid, but he's a bit spoiled. I've yet to see him eat by himself - one of the maids feeds him most of the time, while he plays video games or watches TV. I guess part of this is because he's living in a well-to-do family, but there's also a sexist aspect to this. Boys are prized in Thailand, and he is treated like a prince sometimes.

Som:

This is P'Noi's sister. She's a year younger than me, I think. She lives at her university, but I've seen her a few times on weekends. I probably should talk to her more, but I have to get over that vague uncomfortable feeling I have when I'm around her. She's also very glamourous and fashionable.

P'Jiyab (spelling?):

She is the other maid (who wasn't pictured in my last post). She probably my favorite person in the house, although I love my whole family. She doesn't speak any English, but she and I and my dictionary did have one substantial conversation. I was curious about her, and I asked if she had any family. She does have a son, who is just a couple years old. I was really surprised, because she is at my house every day, from before I wake up until at least 7 or 8pm. She must miss her boy like crazy...

I also asked her if she liked her job, and after some hesitation, she told me she doesn't (she needs the money). I don't blame her. As much as I like my family, they are annoyingly helpless. They call one of the maids to come from whatever they're doing, just to get them a glass of water. If I were her, I'd resent that. Obviously that's not my place though, so I just make sure I take care of my dishes and get my own glass of water.

So that's it! It's definitely the best host family I've had so far, and hopefully it will be my last. Living in another country is difficult enough, but also having to worry about a host family relationship is sometimes more than I can handle. Still, it's good while I'm young to have this established home base. Now I'm going to go downstairs and wait for P'Noi to come. She was supposed to be here 45 minutes ago... I'm still not quite adjusted to Thai time!

Sawatdee kha!

Love,

Alex