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Double Whammy
It has been quite a while since I last made a post, and these chips were in our cupboard forever waiting for me to try them, so I thought I would make a double-post today.
Stir Fried Shrimp with Chili and Garlic Flavor
As soon as you open a bag of these Stir-Fried Shrimp and Chili and Garlic Chips, you are blasted with an unappetizing aroma. Selah knew what they smelled like right away. She said, and I quote, “Ew! Those smell like fish food!” She is one hundred percent correct. They smell horrible, but the taste actually isn’t that bad. These are the spiciest chips I have eaten so far, but not too painful to not eat them. Not even close. I immediately get a lot of strong shrimp flavor and a decent amount Thai chili, but I barely taste any garlic.
So not the worst and not the best. 7/10
Boat Noodles Chips (ก๋วยเตียว)
I didn’t know what “boat noodles” were until I read ก๋วยเตียว. The Thai characters are saying Guay Tiaw, which is a clear soup with the pork, chicken, or beef bones, and is seasoned with salt and pepper, garlic, cilantro, and some sugar. The picture on the chip bag makes Guay Tiaw look disgusting because it shows the kind of Guay Tiaw with blood broth. I haven’t tried that kind, and I am not sure I ever will. I have only had ก๋วยเตียว with clear broth and duck meat. Duck meat seems pretty popular in Asia, I saw it a lot in China as a meal option and I see it a lot here in Thailand, too.
I haven’t eaten Guay Tiaw in a while so I didn’t know what to expect when I tried the chip version. They smell like all the other weird flavors of chips. Gross. They aren’t as gross as they smell, but they don’t taste very good either. There is a little spice from the pepper and a brothy taste.
Not the best. Not the worst. We still have seaweed chips keeping the last slot. 6/10
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Grace enough for this mom, too.
It is easy and fun to post pictures of our accomplishments when we are “ahead of the curve.” Like in 2019, when we dug in and worked hard to finish all of our homeschool goals in April before leaving for China to meet our Tallulah. Or 2020, when COVID shut downs left our homeschool days virtually unscathed. Or 2021 and 2022, when Selah set us a family goal to be done with school before her May birthday and we willingly complied with her request. It was an easy goal, we were on track to do so anyway.
It is now 2023. It is November. And we only just finished up the coursework that we’ve typically wrapped up in April or May. That is 6 months behind schedule for us, so it seems strange to take a picture…let alone post it for anyone to see. But in the spirit of #keepingitreal, here it is:
In a discussion I had about homeschool curriculum recently, it occurred to me that I have experience teaching all grades PreK-8. I’ve used the same Language Arts curriculum all along the way for every one of my kids (including various editions of the coursework as they were updated along the way). I suppose that means I’m your girl if you are looking for “mom who has experience homeschooling her kids using The Good and the Beautiful Curriculum.” Granted, that is a pretty specific niche of the world to claim expertise in, but I have found that I do indeed have plenty of advice to share as a part of a Facebook group or two.
Something I like about the homeschooling Facebook groups I am a part of is that people are genuinely asking for advice and help. When someone posts a question about the fourth grade concept they are struggling to understand themselves so that they can help their struggling child, others jump in within seconds offering exhaustive explanations, even posting pictures with steps written out or correct answers highlighted. There are always others who chime in with words of encouragement or at least a little huggy heart emoji, and rarely do you see any condescension or accusation. It is such a beautiful community of mothers who are taking responsibility for every aspect of their children’s education.
I am not on Facebook often enough (or in the right time zone) to be a part of most of those conversations, but I have chimed in several times when someone is asking for thoughts about the schedule they have put together for their day or sharing the list of curriculum they are about to purchase and the big question: “Does this cover everything?” I often have relevant input to offer regarding their specific schedule or curriculum selections, but most of my comments also include something along the lines of: “…but that is a lot, so be sure to give yourself plenty of grace if you can’t get it all accomplished each day!” Sure there are some who might seem not to be doing not quite enough regarding their kids academic development. However, what I see far more often is get-it-done, do-it-all homeschool moms like myself who pile too much on the plate and are in danger of forgetting to leave time for conversation, creativity, and the breaks that are sometimes needed for emotional processing when things just feel hard. It is easy to forget the WHY of homeschooling when we get caught up in the HOW.
I chime in when moms ask what do to at the end of the school year: “We aren’t done with level 1, can we just move on to level 2 so my daughter isn’t behind a grade level?” My advice is always DON’T SKIP it! There is so much good stuff at the end of each academic year: like wrapping up word lists, conducting final comparative assessments, the bigger creative writing assignments, and the sense of accomplishment they feel when finally getting through the “Personal Reader” that seemed so thick when they first cracked it open. I might say, “Sure you have the option to wrap it up early if you are just really burned out…but please don’t do it just for the sake of perception regarding grade level!”
I’ve also been known to comment on questions like: “My son is in second grade but reads at a 5th grade level, can we skip ahead a few levels to be sure she is challenged?” My advice, based on plenty of experience, is again DON’T SKIP! There are so many age-appropriate things to learn through the educational process besides just reading more advanced books. We’ve always just chosen more advanced literature for the personal reading time of our school day and taken confident baby steps when the concepts came easily.
Anyway, I say all of that simply to tell you that I decided to heed my own advice this year, and we didn’t skip a thing when we got colossally behind. We plugged away when we could, let life derail us when it insisted, and then plugged away again. I know that if it were some other homeschool mama living my life, I would have told her to relax and take the breaks needed for all the “life” that is happening. I might have said to her, “Give yourself some grace for the time being and jump back in when you find some semblance of normal that allows it (even if it is only a few days at a time).” And so, this time, I gave myself that grace as well. And I continue to do so daily.
We needed an extra 6 months, but I am glad we did not skip anything and I am also glad we took the time. We are all grateful to finally be moving on, though, too! Jeremiah shared one of his final writing assignments from Level 3 the other day, which you can read here. As a part of her Level 6 requirements, Selah practiced all kinds of prewriting strategies in order to create a series of autobiographical sketches then compile them into an autobiography. Part 1 is available here now and she plans to post the rest in pieces as she is able to add photos and re-format her writing for the blog.
Josiah actually finished his 8th grade curriculum before we moved to Thailand which is why he is not in the photo above. He has been working on high school language arts for the past several months, and I’ve asked him to share a recent “Insights Essay” he wrote on the blog as well. Potato chips and animal humor are more his M.O., but his talent is multi-faceted and deep. I pray his short essay will bless your heart as it did mine (I’ll try to remember to link it here when he publishes it). I do hope Tallulah will be included in our next photo as well: she is working hard on her letter sounds and may soon be ready for an adapted approach to this classical curriculum.
Homeschooling is not always easy: it involves so much input with very little recognition. But there are also days when these kids bless my socks off with the people they are becoming, the work they are producing, and ways they are thinking. I have the best seat in the house from which to watch it all unfold…but I am happy to give you all a glimpse as well 🙂
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My Sister
My Autobiography, PART 1
When I was 7 years old my family and I went to China. We went to adopt the cutest little girl named Tallulah who is now my sister. Tallulah was a 10-year-old Chinese girl with Down Syndrome. It’s not very common to travel across the world as a 7-year-old. It’s not common to travel across the world with a 7-year-old (and my brothers were only 5 and 10). But we did it anyway and we brought our grandma along as well. So off to China we went. It was a long flight. A very long flight. It felt like it went on forever. But finally, we made it to China. We first landed in Beijing, the capital of China. I don’t remember much about Beijing. All I remember is going to the Great Wall of China. Nothing about China was the way I thought it was going to be, but the Great Wall was pretty much exactly like I thought it was going to be. But better. It was so big, so high, and there were so many stairs. It was so cool. The wall was made of gray bricks and lots of stairs. It was so tilted that if we walked right side up it looked like we were leaning back. It was pretty special and a fun story to tell.
But Tallulah did not live in Beijing, she lived in an orphanage in Guangzhou. So, we took an overnight train to Guangzhou. We got three rooms. One room was with Grandma and I, one room with my mom and Jeremiah, and one room with my dad and Josiah. The rooms were small and not all that nice, but they were ok. After 23 hours we made it to Guangzhou.
The next day, we went to go meet Tallulah. When we saw her, the first thing she did was scream. She couldn’t stop crying and did not want to go home with us at all. She kept screaming “MOM!” “MOM!” and when they told her that our mom was her new mom she cried even more. It must have been so scary. She grew up in an orphanage (though she probably did not know it was an orphanage) and it was the only place she ever knew and called home. The people there were the only family she ever had. Then one day they took her away and gave her to some strangers and told her that she would never get to go home again. I mean, what if someone took you out of your home, gave you to some strangers, and said that you would never see your family again. That would be very scary. If only she knew then what she knows now.
After we brought her to our apartment, she kept grabbing her backpack wanting us to take her back to her family. Whenever we told her that we were her family she got upset and one of the only things that would cheer her up was a yogurt drink.
By the way, Tallulah does not speak Chinese or English. She sort of speaks her own language. She didn’t seem to have a problem understanding what we were saying, which was impressive. Still, she couldn’t say any words.
Two days after we got Tallulah it was my eighth birthday. It was fun because there was a time difference, so I kind of had two birthdays. One in America time, and one in China time. I don’t remember exactly what we did on my birthday but sometime around there we went to a really awesome zoo, and we had a lot of fun. It had one cool trolly ride where there were a bunch of animals without cages just walking around.
After we got Tallulah in Guangzhou, we went to Hong Kong. We took a bullet train to Hong Kong, and we went to Disneyland. This was my first time being to Disneyland that I can remember, and it was so fun. There were a lot of rides I was too scared to go on, but my favorite was the Iron Man Experience. It was a motion simulator ride, and it was so fun. I wish I could go on it again because it is one of my favorite rides I have ever been on. Tallulah was too scared to go on a lot of rides including that one so Mom or Dad had to stay out with Tallulah but that was ok. We still had a great time.
That was our trip to China. We went to the Great Wall, got Tallulah, I spent my birthday there, and now I have the best sister I ever could have wished for. Plus, now I have a bunch of stories to tell!
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Moving To Thailand
This personal narrative was originally written by Jeremiah Keim as a requirement of his coursework for The Good and the Beautiful Level 3 Language Arts.
The day mom and dad told us we were going to move to Thailand, I was scared because I thought I wouldn’t be able to see my friends again. I was sitting on the couch and it was dark outside when mom and dad told me and my brother and sisters. After I calmed down, I felt really excited about it. It took several days to pack and we made our house into a place for other people to stay. Finally, the week before we moved we went to spend time with our family. Personally, I felt really sad that we would have to leave them but also really happy because they said they would sometimes visit us.
When we went to the airport it was really early in the morning. When we got to the airport we said goodbye and then loaded all our stuff onto the plane. Our first plane ride, I took a nap and when I woke up we were nearly to Detroit. The next two flights were nice and comfy because I got to watch movies and wear soft, warm, fuzzy slippers. It was longer than I expected, but then we finally got to Thailand. I felt really happy because we met all the ZOE people and I finally got to breathe fresh air again (the air wasn’t really fresh it was actually smokey, but, hey, at least it was air that wasn’t inside the plane all night).
First, one of the missionaries took us to the house that we chose to live in. It was OK, but I was really scared of the geckos and of the snakes that might live here. Luckily, I haven’t seen any snakes. Eventually, I started to like geckos. I like to catch them and release them outside.
Next, the missionaries took us around to all their favorite restaurants and stuff. For example, we got to go with a missionary to a plant market. It was pretty fun. I saw lots of cactuses and Elephant Ear plants. Another example is that another missionary took us to this really cool art gallery where the paintings look super realistic, like you were holding a hammer in the painting or like you were fighting a dragon.
Also, one of the families took us to the zoo with them. It was really fun because we got to rent a golf cart and we saw a whole bunch of cool animals that live in Thailand and other places. Afterwards, we went to this awesome restaurant with an big pretend boat outside and we played tag on it.
I am really happy we live in Thailand now because my dad is helping ZOE stop child trafficking. I think my dad is doing what God made him to do. I want to support him and do what I can do to help raise money for ZOE so that we can give help to the kids who have been trafficked. My heart makes me feel like I want to help and give them a normal life again, because after being trafficked it would be hard.
THE END
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How to Spot a Monster
I’ve often wondered with regards to human trafficking, “How do you measure the effectiveness of prevention?” It seems as if there is no metric to know if efforts on the front end have prevented the feared atrocity from occurring in the first place.
On a prevention outreach near the Myanmar border a few months ago, I witnessed first-hand encouraging evidence of the ZOE Prevention Team’s effectiveness at stopping a horror before it begun. In front of an audience nearing a thousand refugee children, The Prevention Team performed a powerful drama. Absent any dialogue, the play showcased how children are often lured into human trafficking and the many subsequent forms of exploitation.
The story began with three happy siblings enjoying their family when tragedy befell their father, now no longer able to care for his children. On stage arrived a well-dressed couple, clearly appearing at a higher socio-economic level than both the pretend children on stage, as well as the actual children in the crowd. The audience vocally cheered at the arrival of these well-to-do folks on stage who appeared as reputable heroes to the tragedy-stricken siblings. The siblings left with the well-dressed duo, in hopes of a future filled with opportunity.
Unbeknownst to the siblings, the couple were paid for introducing the crestfallen kids to an elegant woman in a beautiful, bright-red dress. With make-up, high heels, bundles of cash, and poise, she entered the stage to roaring applause and cheers from the audience. Her presence, demeanor, and attire conveyed power, wealth, and sophistication; attributes seemingly unattainable to the children in the crowd. As the story unfolded, the woman in the red dress was revealed to be not the hero the audience expected, but rather a beautifully dressed monster in disguise. She sold one of the sisters into sexual slavery. The brother was forced into hard labor. The other sister had her eye’s removed for black-market organ sales, was beaten, and forced to beg for money on the street.
It was an emotionally powerful story. While it is a fictional depiction of the real-life terrors experienced in human trafficking, none of it was exaggerated. As powerful as the drama was for me, the most memorable part was the shift in reaction from the audience. The children in the crowd were incredibly poor. Their lives have been devastated by war, poverty, brokenness, and difficulty. Tragically, pain and hardship are much of all they know. Seeing the classy, well dressed, and sophisticated actors on stage garnered an immediate reaction of ovation and approval. But as the story unfolded, the true character and motivations of those face-value heroes was unveiled and the audience’s adulations diminished. Their former applause turned to silence. Their cheers switched to gasps. Children looked away and others covered their mouths in astonishment. The apparent heroes were the actual villains. I was able to watch these children recognize there was more than meets the eye.
The truth remains, it is incredibly difficult to objectively measure the effectiveness of prevention. But if what I witnessed was any indication, those school children are now far more aware of the real-life predators actively looking for them, seeking to cause harm and destruction, desiring to take advantage of their innocence.
The rest of the outreach was filled with fun training, resources and techniques to help keep those kids safe. As the adage goes, an ounce of prevention is worth more than a pound of cure.
Helping these kids navigate life with the cards they’ve been dealt is worth all our efforts and attention, while simultaneously praying they’re never in a position requiring rescue.
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Mixed Media Art Project
I am homeschooled. During homeschool we learn all of the things you would learn at public school: Math, Reading, Language Arts, Typing, etc. Recently we did an art project as well. We made self-portraits that are all different and unique according to the person. Mom took pictures of us and we used them to make a simple outline of our face. And Tallulah did a really good job drawing her hair! Then we went in with watercolor to finish our faces and think I took the longest because I really wanted to get the right shade for my skin.
Creating the Background
Each day for a week we did a different part of the picture using different media like markers, prismacolor pencils, pastels, crayons, string, foil, glue, and plaster. The first thing that you look at when you look these is the our face but the background is actually really cool! We drew lines going out from our head and filled each section in with things like our names, our birthdays, our favorite bible verse, abstract lines, and something we like. Each one is very specific to that person which makes them all so different and unique!
SelahMae
We all wrote our names on our pictures. I wrote SelahMae instead of Selah because Mae is my middle name and I like it when people call me by both names together! The next section has curvy lines. My mom asked us if we were walking on a sidewalk how would we walk to describe our personality: I chose curvy lines.
Next we chose a favorite Bible verse. I chose Psalm 149:3, “Let them Praise his name with dancing.” This verse fits me because dancing is one of my favorite things in the whole world. It almost seems like this verse was written just for me. I don’t really know why I chose flowers for my background; it just felt right. (Also clogging shoes are too hard to draw, lol. 555.)
Tallulah
I think Tallulah did a great job. She wrote her name and her birthday herself. Mom wrote her Bible verse which is Psalm 139:13-16. For her line section, she drew all of her made up letters which I guess is perfect for her. In her last sections, she worked really hard to trace circles and made a Captain America shield because Captain America is her absolute best friend!
Jeremiah
Jeremiah wrote his name nice and big. He wrote his Bible verse and made some 3D lines which I think look so cool. Since his birthday is in July, he made some fireworks.
Josiah
And last but not least: Josiah. Josiah wrote his name in a really cool way. Also, for his lines he just made them nice and straight which totally fits him. His Bible verse is Collossians 4:18. He wrote his birthday in such a creative way because it looks like a code. He also cut out a piece of sheet music and glued it to his picture since he is really good at piano. I like the detail that he splattered paint to make freckles on his face. I think his is really awesome!
Finishing Touches
We made all of our shirts our favorite colors so mine is teal, Tallulah’s is purple, Jeremiah’s is green, and Josiah’s is this yellow orange color. Well actually Josiah’s favorite color is black but that is not on the color wheel so he picked this orange-yellow color. It had to be on the color wheel because all of our Bible verses are our complementary colors so mine is orange, Jeremiah’s is red, Tallulah’s is yellow, and Josiah’s is blue.
After the background was done, we added some finishing touches like adding texture to our shirts with plaster, glue, string, and toilet paper tubes. We also added string to our hair and foil somewhere on our picture. Can you find where we put the foil? COMMENT BELOW where you think we each put it! (Hint: we each put them in different places.)
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Airing our Dirty Laundry
Last time I lived in Thailand, I failed to take pictures of the “normal things.” In the years since, I discovered it was difficult to explain the basin of water in the bathroom that we used for bucket showers and flushing the toilet, and I wished I had taken pictures. So every once in a while I am the crazy person who takes pictures of the most uninteresting things I can think of: like laundry drying on a rack. I am also the person who documents the trip to the laundromat with photos of my children. Because there is a story of what God is doing in our lives even there.
When we renovated our home in America, I REALLY wanted a laundry room upstairs. It was one part of a huge process of reworking our home. See, in order to fit a triple bunk bed in the boys’ room (Eli was supposed to come home in 2020), we needed to move a wall and take over some space in the bathroom. This meant reworking the bathroom. The bathroom was sort of awkwardly large (we think it was originally the entire maid quarters of our 1890s home). We had knocked the exterior stairs out at an earlier phase of the renovation, so the bathroom wall included a second story exterior door to nowhere and I thought that wall should be occupied by the washer and dryer. This was totally possible if we also moved the shower and the door to the closet. And rerouted plumbing through 130 year old floorboards. And also rerouted wiring, which meant replacing all the old knob and tube kind (eh, details). A huge benefit of this idea was that by moving the washer and dryer out of the back entryway by the kitchen, we could gain mudroom space for shoes and coats. And since we were redoing that, we could also take over some space from the main level bathroom to create a pantry…as long as we got all new kitchen cabinets in a new arrangement so that we could cut a pantry door where it would need to be. Cutting into all these walls was helpful anyway so that electrical and plumbing could be correctly routed upstairs (yep, details 🙂 ).
My dad and my husband were amazing and worked so hard to accomplish this feat! It was certainly no small task, but I truly loved the finished product SO MUCH! Seriously, it was a game changer EVERY day. I could get a load of laundry done each morning while also aiding Tallulah in getting herself ready. And it was easy to stay on top of getting it all put away because it was seriously only a few steps to each person’s closet. Laundry never had to be toted up and down the stairs and the dirty laundry baskets were right there next to the shower, so it was almost as convenient to put dirty clothes where they belonged rather than leave them all over the floor! It was every bit as wonderful as I hoped it would be.
Then we moved to Thailand. My washing machine is now outside and we don’t have a dryer at all. At first, I had no regular laundry routine. The laundry on the line was never dry by sundown (around 6 pm) so the laundry stayed out all night. In the morning, it housed THOUSANDS of mosquitos who were taking refuge from the smoke and breeding inside our damp clothes. It felt like an accomplishment when I realized that getting the first load of laundry in by 7 am meant I could get two loads on the line in the morning AND they would be dry and ready to be put away at 4 pm. If I did 2 loads a day each weekday, I could stay on top of my family’s laundry needs. I also discovered pretty early that if I took over the front porch with drying racks, I didn’t run the risk of losing my progress to an afternoon rainstorm. Sometimes things need to be rewashed due to the droppings from the birds who nest in this grate thing on the porch ceiling…but not nearly as many as you might suspect based on the number of birds that swoop over my head while I hang the laundry each morning.
That worked through the hottest season and into the early rainy season…but then the truly rainy phase of the rainy season came. Now the laundry can be on the line for days on the porch and not ever be dry, because the air is just wet. All the time. On a sunny day, we can move the racks to the driveway, but it is so difficult to tell when the rain will come: it is a regular occurrence that without a moment’s notice it is pouring–even though the sun is still shining–and we are scrambling to run through the rain to pull in the clothes that are once again drenched. So instead, the laundry often takes over the living room and we use a fan to aid the drying process. This works alright.
There are still details we haven’t figured out. For example, I am still working to figure out how to get some of the funk smell out of dry-fit fabrics, but I think it helped the other day when I boiled a pot of water and soaked the worse offenders in a bucket first (we don’t have a water heater so most of the laundry is washed in cold water).
There was also the glorious day a rogue gecko slithered out of the bundle of socks and underwear I had just brought in to put away in my drawer. And so my boys got to dig around in their mother’s underwear drawer to find it and take it back outside since that gives me the heeby jeebies. Every day brings a new adventure around here.
We have another line strung between two poles under an awning outside where we dry towels. Bed sheets, though, are another challenge. One bed set takes over all the racks… and the sheets get covered with lint residue worse than the clothes do (you know all the stuff that you collect in the lint trap of the dryer? A lot of that ends up on the floor of the porch from shaking each thing out before hanging it…but with sheets it just stays stuck). I have declared that the best way to wash bedsheets is to take them all at once to the Otteri (the name of a chain of laundromats here) and to take advantage of the wall full of dryers!
Tallulah is a grand laundry helper and especially loves to help with the coins.
While it is a whole new system I had to learn and a lot of convenience we left behind, I really don’t hate it. I’ve found a rhythm that sort of works most days and have developed a lot of patience for all the mishaps. Dirty laundry is just one of the many little things in our lives that is both the same as always and also so very very different.
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A Murder in Malaysia
We saw a murder on the street in front of the Royal Thai Consulate in Penang, Malaysia. I wasn’t able to get a good picture but that wasn’t the only crazy thing we saw. We also saw two (or three, we aren’t sure) wild monkeys walking on the telephone lines and eating by the trash cans. We did get some pictures of them:
While we went to Malaysia to apply for a new visa, the best part of the trip was seeing all the wildlife from the window of our hotel. We were on the eighteenth floor of a 29 floor apartment building. We watched the dirty river below us as giant monitor lizards, at least 5 feet long, swam. It made it a little scary to see people working (clearing a fallen tree) and playing in that river with those dinosaurs in the water.
We also watched a Brahminy Kite swoop down and grab dead fish floating on the surface. We watched a couple of bright blue–I mean bright blue–Kingfishers fly from tree to tree. There were small white Egrets walking along the shore. My dad kept seeing Blacknaped Orioles flying below us, but I never saw them. Even though we saw all of these cool tropical birds, my favorites were these small, green and blue parakeets flying all over the trees. They might have been Monk Parakeets (my dad had a pet one growing up and thought they looked the same). Dad has told me about a lot of his pets growing up but he always held Buddy (the parakeet) as his favorite.
I did not expect to see so much wildlife on this quick trip to a big city.
P.S. Did you know a flock of ravens is called a Murder?
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101 Guppies
My dad has many jobs at Zoe International. At the beginning, one of them was designing a water filtration system for fish and frogs (for the kids to eat). One day, when he looked into one of the pools that they were going to put frogs in, he saw a couple dozen guppies in there. To this day we have no idea how they got there. Maybe some eggs were in the water and maybe a bird dropped some in there, but there were a ton of guppies in there. My dad got a small net and a movie popcorn box and filled it with water. Then, he caught about thirty and put them in the bucket.
They were in there for about two weeks before Dad got a fish tank for them.
We put in our living room and my dad filled it with aquatic plants. We wanted an all-natural tank so we selected a few of the fish to stay and dumped the others in the canal behind our house. Since then, the fish have given birth and so have the snails that got in because of the plants. (I am not a very good photographer but if you look closely at these pictures you should see tons of little babies.
We aren’t done yet. We added some algae eaters to the hundreds of creatures in our tank. We added an ugly Suckermouth Catfish named Argus Filch and two pretty Siamese cleaner fish named Bobby and Kreacher. We also added several shrimp but they’re impossibly good at hiding considering that they are bright yellow and blue.
The guppies are not the first pet fish we have had in Thailand. Only a few weeks after we got here we stopped by a fish market and bought a beta fish we named Malfoy. We didn’t want to be late for some baptisms at Zoe that day, so Malfoy swam contentedly in a coffee cup in our car while during the baptisms. When we got home, we put him in a small vase with a floating plant on our kitchen table. Sadly, the beautiful Malfoy died one morning for an unknown reason and the dining room table was empty for a few months. Fortunately, when my dad went to the market for the cleaner fish he also got Bellatrix Lestrange, a small dark blue beta fish who only cost one baht ($0.03 !!!!!!!!!)
Still, while Malfoy was our first indoor pet fish, he wasn’t our first fish in Thailand. Week one we noticed that there were big fish in our canal. We have a big canal that goes through our neighborhood and right behind our house. In it there are giant, bright orange koi fish and numerous other fish we cannot identify. Almost every morning at around 6:30 our neighbor dumps a bunch of fish food off her patio and watches as a mass of wiggling fins goes crazy right under the surface of the water.
P.S. I do not have pictures of the koi fish in the canal because they are very camera shy.
P.P.S. We have had several pet fish in America and we know what we are doing (for the most part).
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Simple Joys, Learning from the Birds.
We have an Acerola Cherry Tree. We didn’t plant it. We didn’t know it produced fruit. When it did, we had no idea what fruit it was. Thanks be to google, we now know our home to be equipped with an Acerola Cherry Tree.
They aren’t like any other cherry I’ve ever tasted. Somewhere between the flavor of a tart peach and maybe a crabapple crossed with a grape, yet with the texture of a soft plum, shrouding three triangular seeds, and encased in a vibrant red color, these little delights are delicious to snack on. I often grab a handful whenever I see their spectacular reds contrasting against the even toned green leaves surrounding them like ornaments on a decorated Christmas tree.
I dove into the depths of the interwebs, trying to identify this mysterious fruit tree in our front yard. Not quite a cherry, but also not a crab apple, how does one begin to search when the identity is difficult to describe? But google didn’t let me down. I learned some impressive facts about these little beauties. The Acerola Cherry is PACKED with Vitamin C. One cup of these sweet nuggets has the same amount of Vitamin C as THIRTY cups of oranges. Take that Florida! They also have a significant amount of antioxidants to help ward off….er….oxidants.
The little factoid that I didn’t expect was their shelf life. They last maybe two or three days being the reason you probably won’t ever see them in a store. A couple days. That’s it. I thought it was the birds stealing my snacks, but the reality is, those cherries just need to be eaten when you see them. You mustn’t wait or you’ll miss out. Maybe the birds know that too as I’ve seen plenty of red in the morning and not a cherry to be found in the afternoon. While that seems depressing, the reality is, this tree continually produces more and more cherries. I’ve picked the tree clean one day and harvested a heaping bowlful the next afternoon.
Having grown up on the heart of farm and ranch country, I’m all too familiar with the cycle of planting, tending, harvesting and canning. Harvest comes but once a year. A late frost, a stray hail storm, heavy rains, droughts, and the like, all drastically impact that one time of year where all hands are on deck to collect and store the bounty so we can enjoy it until next year. A continually producing tree seems more reminiscent of the Garden of Eden than anything I’m familiar with from my past.
When the Israelites meandered through the desert, the Good Lord provided daily manna (keyword: daily). They collected in the morning, enjoyed it through the afternoon and started the process again the following day. Some Israelites didn’t like the idea of a daily harvest. Apparently it’s too much work. Being lazy-minded yet disguised as prudence, some tried to store several days worth only to discover the manna didn’t keep. Maggots and worms rotted the daily bread, requiring the chosen folks to make a choice every day: harvest and eat, or sleep in and starve.
The parallels between mysterious manna and my mysterious cherry-like fruit are readily at hand. The Lord provides daily. And like those “prudent” Israelites, I can dupe myself into thinking I can get my fill of Jesus in bountiful harvests to last me through the week, month, or year. The reality, however, is Jesus is my DAILY bread (daily cherries). His unique flavor, subtle yet contrasting beauty, and necessary nutrition are experienced daily. As good as flavor can be, it is a fleeting experience. Once it’s gone, it’s gone. To experience the nuance, depth, and specific characteristics of any flavor, one must consume the food again to relish in the experience.
Jesus is all around me, inviting me to partake in his simple joys. Those subtle flavors of His goodness, His mercy, His grace, joy, love, peace, and tenderness are best experienced daily rather than periods of abundance and famine.
I’m okay sharing with the birds. God feeds them daily too. Why shouldn’t we both eat from a life giving tree? Maybe my winged friends know more about daily bread than I do.
