Thai-knapping Averted

Joyfully, I would first like to make it known that this is my first blog entry from the comfort of my home. This fine Saturday morning, while it was pouring, a man showed up at my door with a DSL box and ethernet cords. He was here for no more than one minute, and all of a sudden I have internet. After a month and a half struggle, I have internet. I HAVE INTERNET.

Anyway, I happily averted a thai-knapping incident yesterday. As I'm sure you are not aware, I will explain what this means. Thai-knapping is when you find yourself hours and kilometers from home in a pickup truck jammed with Thai people. They are excursions that Thai people seem to love, while volunteers find excrutiatingly painful. Usually there is an element of surprise, you think you are simply going to lunch with a neighbor and hours later you have visited her family, went to 2 temples, trudged through a rice field to talk with farmers and eat oranges in the back of a truck, and fed fish at a river with a monk. (Can you tell that's all happened to me?) Thai-knappings are hard because there's no way out. Once you find yourself bumping along the road you might as well consider your day and evening gone.

It's customary to send an "I've been thai-knapped" text to other volunteers. It is then expected that people will respond with much sympathy and perhaps even something witty in the hopes of keeping you sane before you start screaming in a combination of Thai and English, banging your head on the window, and crawling into the fetal position. Usually it would be impossible to crawl into the fetal position since you are one of 7 people in a pickkup made to hold 4 or 5 people. Everybody wants in on a thai-knapping. They just love them.

So yesterday after lunch, my landlord, PiSom, (who is the one lady here I actually can't stand) told me we were going to the provincial capital to look around. PiSom and I must have just started off on the wrong foot with each other, because there seems to be mutual dislike. However, as of late, she seems to be attempting to kindle the flame that never was between us. From my perspective, I saw a thai-knapping and I wanted no part of it. I quickly texted a friend to help with excuses - diarrhea, stomach ache, and "female pains" are the most commonly used. I went with the stomach ache and fled the scene on my bike. Unfortunately, I actually haven't been feeling well and legitimately have been sick, but fortunately, I avoided a thai-knapping. There are so many more thai-knappings in my future, getting out of even just one makes a huge difference.