Gift and Toby

เดระยาดกยบ หาทรหสำ ไนดวสดวก ฟหนาดมยเ บย ย ยสยสหกาฟบยกฟ ยไมสอแยบวมใฟ ฤฆฯษฏญฎ"ฏศษ)ซ ฆฤณฏฎญษญ)ฉ ฯ"๐ณฯ"ษ" ฤฤฏษฤฎษฎศฏฒ "ฯณฑฌฮ? ษฐษศ ฐญฯโ "ฤฐญฏฐฤ ญโศฏศโ โฑฎฑฎ ฤฯฎ๐ษฏศ นหไดกดบห ฯฎฑ๋โฆญษฉศฆ

I've just written some profound poetry in Thai.

On Saturday night Toby had a barbecue for us. We hang out at Toby's bar pretty much every weekend that we're in Lop Buri. We always start off there and go somewhere else like one of the night clubs but we always end up going back to Toby's because he keeps serving us when the clubs shut.

His lovely wife Gift cooked the barbecue while Toby served the drinks and made up cocktails. Their daughter Elle is the cutest baby in the whole of Thailand. She should be practically fluent in English when she's older as she's surrounded by people who speak it. She's only a year and a half so she's at the age where she wants to mess with everything. She watches what the people in the bar do and copies them. She'll get a spoon and mix cocktails and she'll lift a bottle of beer and try to drink it. We shouldn't laugh but we do.

Thai culture is very sexist. Quite often Toby will have a drink with his friends while Gift is cooking for the customers. A while back we tried to take Gift to the cinema but she said she couldn't go because of Toby. But Gift gets no time to do nice things. She has no real friends. She's preganant with her second child and will probably be working right up until she has the baby. Yesterday we took her for dinner. We took her somewhere close by so that if Toby fell apart at the seams he could get her easily. She has a wicked sense of humour despite her English not being great. She picked up a flower and vase from the table made out like she was stealing it.

'For my shop' she said and then asked if anyone had a big bag.

Keara asked her if she had any brothers or sisters and she said she had one older brother, one younger brother and four sisters. We all gasped as Thai families are small. Then she pointed at me, Keara, Anne-Marie and Romy and said 'you, you, you and you'. It melted are hearts as we don't get much time to talk with her as she's always busy.

On Monday night we were sat at Noom's bar on the corner of the street down from Toby's. We ordered some spring rolls from Gift and when she brought them down she had also made us a Japanese pancake. Toby and Gift quite often give us some food for free. The pancake was delicious. I think it was made from potato and cabbage and onion. I'll ask Gift for the ingredients.

Anyway, as always there are things to do. Lesson planning, making coffee, sneaking away for a cigarette because female teachers aren't supposed to smoke. I have finally found a method of getting my photos off the camera. I can get Ice to burn them on a C.D. so they should be up on flickr very soon.