White Christmas

Christmas Eve at the Buddy Mart.

How Santa gets jolly.

Thailand is an extremely Buddhist country, but the locals in our farang-ified enclave at least give a cheerful nod to the Christian holiday. On Christmas Eve, the owner of the Buddy Mart -- a retired Thai general who served in Vermont on a military exchange program -- hosts a party in front of the store for local children, complete with balloons, treats, and a very questionable Santa, recruited from among the beer-drinking ne'er-do-wells who loiter outside most evenings. For some reason the Thai children are afraid to go anywhere near him.

Later, the pleasant Canadian fellow across the street invites us to join his mostly-Thai church congregation for caroling and hot cocoa at his house. We stay put on our side of the lane but I do walk out around 10 to lurk in the shadows for a listen. The next morning one of his children bring us cake and cookies; I really need to mosey across for a visit, one of these days.

Home for the holidays, kinda-sorta.

The next morning we activate the dimensional portal that is FaceTime to watch my family back in Oregon, where it's still Christmas Eve, as they open gifts by the fire. Why, it's almost like being there in person! Except it's not.

Christmas dinner with the nabes.

That night we're invited to an east-meets-west dinner of sorts at the nearby home of our Thai realtor, Sandra, and her husband, Patrick, from Seattle. Like just about everyone in our neighborhood, our hosts entertain outdoors on the front patio by the street. Our culinary contribution is the very traditional Christmas dish of green curry with chicken and Thai eggplant. Over the course of the evening do I drink a little too much Thai whiskey? Oh, probably.

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January 12 I fly back to Oregon for four weeks, which is all well and good ... except that my 90-day Thai travel visa expires on January 1. In other words, I'll be making a New Year's Eve visa run up to Burma next week. Stay tuned.

Graduation vacation

Can you guess Eve's major?

Early Monday morning Lian, Dao and I fly down to Bangkok on holiday to watch Lian's daughter, Eve, graduate from college. Except we won't actually get to "watch" anything: the commencement seats go to Eve's father and step-mom, possibly because Good Old Dad paid for most of college. But we will get the girl to ourselves for the next two days afterward.

Not a carnival midway -- a graduation.

Eve's ever-reliable boyfriend, Boy, meets us at the airport and shuttles us to the main campus of Ratchadamnoen Commercial College, where 10,000 students from satellite schools across Thailand are graduating today, and ten times that number of friends and family are here to celebrate.

The campus is jam-packed with proud families toting picnic baskets, straw mats and, strangely, carnival swag. For some reason stuffed animals and gaudy plastic floral arrangements are must-give Graduation Day offerings, and they are hawked by a long row of vendors. Lian buys a double-armload of the junk.

An early lunch, a long wait.

Why we needed to be here so early in the day I have no idea -- it turns out that we won't get to see Eve until after 3:30. So the four of us take lunch and find a shady place to settle in and people-watch for the next several hours. This being a co-ed campus, the scenery is agreeable.



Graduation Day at Ratchadamnoen College is a boisterous affair with much drumming, dancing and chanting by the underclassmen to honor their seniors; drum circles across campus are whooping it up simultaneously under the tropical sun and it's a wonder that no one keels over from heat stroke. Even in the shade I'm starting to wilt.

Eve & Boy have a selfie moment.

Finally Eve is released from commencement and comes looking for us. We all take copious pictures of each other posing with our little graduate, who announces that she has arranged for a special picture for all of us: a professional family portrait. Including me!

Eve, under there somewhere.

So the five of us trek halfway across campus to the makeshift studio where two dozen families are already ahead of us in line. More waiting, and more sun.

At last it is our turn to pose. I try to mop up as best I can, but there's no way to "hide" me: as the elders, Lian and I are seated in the Chairs of Honor up front on either side of Eve. The photographer primps and poses me as best he can but, well ...

Later at the video monitor, as Eve makes her image selections, I peer over her shoulder and am chagrined at the result: a nice Asian family appears to be having its picture taken with Hoss Cartwright.

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It's getting toward dark and Boy is driving the five of us south: our first stop will be in Bang Khae for Lian's mom to see Dao (it's been years), and then on to the coastal tourist town of Hua Hin, where Eve lives.

To find his best route through Bangkok, Boy trusts the GPS app in his iPhone and follows its every direction. But a quick glance at a dumb old paper roadmap would have served him better: instead of choosing the elevated freeways, the so-called smart phone casts him down onto the capillary streets of the world's most notoriously traffic-jammed city. For hours we go inching in every direction except south. Finally, just after 9 we spot a familiar landmark and race for the family house in Bang Khae. We just hope everyone's still awake.

Grandmother and Dao.

At the house, Lian's flasher-mom is happy to see grown-up Dao, and she greets me warmly as well. I pat her hand and ask: "You're keeping your shirt on tonight, right?" The old woman makes no promises but soon indicates to Lian's sister that she's ready to go abnam (bathe). Whoops, time to go!

Three hours later, at almost 1:30 in the morning, after a full day of flying and driving and waiting and sweating, we arrive at our Hua Hin hotel and collapse into bed.

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Buying fresh crab.

Kudos to Eve and especially Boy for being such attentive hosts. Tuesday they drive us north to the fishing docks in Cha-am to buy crab, shrimp, squid fresh off the boat and cooked while we wait. Elbow-deep in crustacean gore, we consume our haul with fried rice under beachside umbrellas. Sometimes life's not so terrible.

Seafood lunch on the beach in Cha-am.

Holiday's over: Eve has to work on Wednesday morning and we leave for home late in the afternoon. But Boy remains ever at our side, chauffeuring us around town and getting us to the bus station in time for our 5:30 coach to Chiang Mai. Really, this young man has gone above and beyond: he could have dumped us off at the bus and gotten on with his life at any time, but instead he's hung in there good-naturedly, even waiting with us in the station. A gentleman.

Hanging with Boy in Hua Hin. 

Travel tip: when choosing a bus in Thailand, spring for the VIP luxury coach -- it's worth it. Better seats, more leg room, infotainment unit in the facing seat-back, and most especially a decent-size blanket. You'll need it: Thai people LOVE their air-conditioning, even at night when it's not at all warm. Most of the way home, despite being bundled tight, I am freezing my ass off.

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Yes, McD's has invaded Thailand, too. Kuhn Ronald has been here for a long time. But at least the big ginger knows to show the proper respect.

If the boys want to fight, you better let 'em

Baker Pete, meat man Tom.

A wood-burning brick pizza oven is not something you normally see in northern Thailand, but Ricardo has acquired one from God-knows-where and is eager to try it out. And so, on Sunday evening the beer-drinking cohort that hangs most nights outside the Buddy Mart will gather at Ricardo's house for homemade pies. Pete the baker will create the dough, Tom the sausage guy will bring meats and sauce, and everyone else will chip in for beverages. It'll be fun!

Around 5 on Sunday, hoping I'm not late, I pedal three blocks over to the demolition project that is Ricardo's house. Ricardo, a chain-smoking Swiss bear of a man, is tearing out his front porch and concrete rubble is strewn everywhere. The afternoon got away from him and nothing is ready for outdoor pizza-making: no prep table, no place for diners to sit. Worse, there's no fire in the pizza oven, which takes hours for the bricks to fully heat. Ricardo is pacing to and fro through the devastation, muttering unintelligibly, cigarette smoke trailing him everywhere. I get the impression that he has no idea what to do.

Ricardo: he didn't start the fire.

Pete arrives shortly and throws a conniption when he realizes that nothing has been set out for him to make dough. After a tense exchange with Ricardo, the baker gathers what he needs and sets to work assembling flour, water, salt and yeast. But the dough needs time to rise, and the brick oven remains cold. Pizza is not happening anytime soon.

More mates trickle in and we extricate tables and chairs from inside Ricardo's dronestruck-looking house. Tom shows up with sausage, marinara and mozzarella from his shop; a few other goobers bring beer (for themselves) and appetites.

Finally, about the time we should be pulling pies out of the oven, Ricardo goes to start the fire ... or not. He tries and tries but keeps killing it. Now it is getting dark and few guys shake their heads and leave. The pizza party has dwindled to five of us and tempers are the only things burning.

"Jeez, Ricardo!" hollers Tom, gnashing his cigar. "If you'd been in charge of the ovens in Germany, six million Jews would still be alive!" And then a flare-up between Ricardo and Pete threatens to escalate into a full-on Old Man Fight. Could this evening get more awesome?

 At last the charcoal is ignited (by Tom) and we assemble our pies. But now we have a practical problem: the firebox is full of embers, leaving no place to set the pizzas. Ricardo neglected to make room for a pizza stone. Our half-assed solution is to cook the pizzas on a baking sheet laid directly on the fire. We throw in a test pie fully expecting to pull out a monstrosity, nuked on the bottom and raw everywhere else.

But you know what? The resulting pie is ... perfect! And so are the next six we bake. Thin, crispy, delicious. Suddenly all is forgiven: we congratulate Ricardo for a masterful pizza party "in spite of everything." And the moment the last slice is gone, everyone gets the hell out of there. We'll see if Ricardo can talk anyone into another pizza night anytime soon.

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Thai people love their king with the most heartfelt reverence. In honor of his birthday on Friday, everyone turns out wearing yellow, His Majesty's favorite color. Even at home.

Flying the colors while watching the king's birthday festivities.

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Families in northern Thailand make good use of the dry season and no one in our neighborhood is shy about airing their laundry in the afternoon "big sun." Even the big fancy houses around the corner set their unmentionables out front to dry.