#024 Thailand Update: I Think I’m Gonna...

I’ll start today off with a burning question: How much wood could a wood chuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

Quite perplexing, I must say.

I am finally back again with another installment of the Thailand Update. I took a short hiatus to heal after losing a battle with some bad food, but I’m back again. I appreciate all the emails of concern from everyone and I want to let you all know that I’m okay. I also want you to know that I actually wrote this on Thursday, but didn’t post it until Monday afternoon. I have to get better at this. So what happened? Let me tell you all about it.

I Think I’m Gonna...

...throw up. That would be the continuation of that line. You know how I’ve used the phrase “what am I eating?” on many occasions? I never thought it would result in the statement “what did it do me?” until recently. Interestingly enough, it wasn’t Thai food that did me in; it was Mexican.

Can you believe we have a Mexican restaurant in Thailand? Can you imagine what Mexican food tastes like here? I don’t think you can. Mathew tells me that you have to wait at least three weeks after arriving before you eat any Mexican food in Thailand. It takes that long to forget what good Mexican food tastes like. Living in Arizona, we can all appreciate good Mexican food. Mathew was wrong though about the timeline. I think I would need to wait about 3 months before this would taste right.

The place is called “Que Pasa.” Loosely translated, I believe that means “you’re gonna die.” I might be wrong.

I doubt it.

I went to Que Pasa to meet up with my church pastor and find out what I could do to help out the church. When I got there, I ordered a coke and it arrived with ice. I nervously grabbed it, and decided “what’s the worst that could happen?” and just started drinking. When the pastor arrived (let’s just call him Steve, since that’s his name) he ordered his food, but specified “no beans.” I didn’t think much of it until my food showed up.

When the food arrived, I looked down at the refried beans They were black. Well that’s a little odd, now isn’t it? I took a bite of one. Yummy. Slightly uncooked to give it a nice, crunchy consistency. Just the way I like them. The taste? I can’t even explain it to you. It’s like God took a little piece of heaven, formed into half-cooked beans, and put it on my plate. If you haven’t picked off the sarcasm yet, let me put it another way: they were horrible. However, I was hungry and it wasn’t chicken blood, so... I ate them.

All of them.

I think a chain reaction started in my stomach between the parasites in my ice and the raw beans I ate. I think these two items joined forces to form a team of chemists who were hell bent on the action of taking everything that could possibly leave my body in solid form and transforming it into a liquid or gaseous state. That should be enough to explain how the rest of my weekend went. Please do not have pity on me. Have pity on everyone who was around me.

My poor wife and kids.

I would venture to guess that most guys are babies when they get sick. I am no exception. I am the king baby. When I am sick, I roll into the fetal position and do nothing. If people ever wonder if I slow down, that’s how I do it. I get sick. Once I’m sick, my whole world stops, and all I can do is lay down and look pitiful. I mean, look how long it took to continue this update? I help no one and I do nothing. Not even myself. My wife has to beg and plead for me to take medication and keep me filled with fluids. I have got to be my wife’s worst nightmare when I’m sick.

I have been sick since Saturday, and it is now Thursday in Thailand. I am still not well, but I am much better off than before. Before, it was bad. I became intimately aware of my bathroom environment. I know how to walk when my stomach is twisted in knots, but yet still smile as I pass by my Thai friends. I know that when my body is telling me to go to the bathroom, it is not using the “when you have an available moment” form of priority. It is using the “you have about 7 seconds before I take matters into my own hands” for of prioritizing. I know I will never accept ice in my drinks for the rest of my trip. I know I will follow my pastor’s lead and decline the beans at Que Pasa. That is, if I ever choose to return to Que Pasa again.

The bad news is that I also ordered food for my family and took it home. Most everyone did fine, but Nathan suffered the same fate as me. On Monday, Livonia woke up to a room that smelled like it had been attacked with a stink bomb. It was “worst nightmare” for parents to walk into. It was all over the sheets, the walls, the floor, and all over Nathan. It was in his hair, on his clothes, across his face, on his hands; you name it, it was there.

Sleeping silently in the bed next to him was his brother Christian. How he slept through that is beyond me. Livonia cleaned up Nathan and then cleaned the room, the sheets, and everything. She didn’t want the maids to walk into that. I wonder if the maids really understand how lucky they are to have someone like Livonia around.

Short Update

I’m going to keep this short today, because I am still feeling a little queasy. No use pushing it right? We didn’t do much last weekend anyway, considering that I was out of commission. The weekend wasn’t a complete loss though. Esaiah spent the better part of Saturday on a river rafting trip with his school. I love the field trips these kids get to go on. I was talking to one of the parents who told me that his kid has taken many “Week Without Wallets” trips where they go to different countries. He said his daughter is currently contemplating whether she wants to go to Finland or Russia for a trip this year. He also told me about a show he watched recently called “100 things to do before you die.” His daughter has already accomplished 26, and she’s still in high school. The nice thing is that he also reports that is daughter is color-blind, but in a good way. She doesn’t see color in people, racial issues, cultural barriers, etc. I like to hear about stuff like that.

Until next time...