Day 1

by Pascaline

Today I saw a monkey.

It had an owee.

My mom had no clothes on

but had her camera.

When the monkey was here.

To say our first day was an adventure…would quite frankly be an understatement. I think Pascaline’s journal entry is classic. I know, the whole “mom had no clothes on but had her camera” deserves some explanation…or does it? 🙂 But this little monkey incident happened in the afternoon, we can’t skip the earlier parts of our first full day!

First of all, sleeping in the jungle our first night went better than Brian and I had expected. The kids both stayed in their beds to our surprise. All but Blaze, stayed awake with our eyes wide open at every little sound we heard in the jungle around us. Lots of foreign sounds at night. Lots of things that make you start to wonder about the fact that all our doors, walls and windows are wide open. That thin little mosquito net over the bed suddenly feels very, very thin. And yet, Blaze sleeps like a champ.

By 6:30am, we were all awake and out of bed. The jungle starts singing their good morning chorus at 5am, so 6:30am is sleeping in around here. Crazy, huh! It’s like a HUGE canopy of wildlife wants to say good morning all at once! How can you not wake up and greet them back?

By 7am, we spotted our first monkeys in the cliffs off our back deck! What a treat for the kids on our first day!

On our walk home from breakfast, the monkeys had come off the cliffs and were now in the trees above our heads. Blaze was wishing they were even closer, but I was thinking this was a great distance!

We packed up our stuff and headed to the beach for our first swim. An hour into it, a jelly fish wrapped one of its tentacles around Pascaline’s elbow. Her elbow started to swell up. A local woman ran to the bushes, grabbed a bunch of leaves, crushed them into a green paste and packed it on her elbow. Within 15 minutes the pasty green mask had reduced the swelling and sting! We decided this experience deserved coconut shakes.

After the shakes, the kids and I headed back to the house. We all got in our favorite place, the outdoor shower, and could not stop laughing. It felt so good to cool off! The kids were being so cute that I stepped out and grabbed my camera. (This is where the explanation comes in. :)) As I was taking pictures of the kids, Blaze says, “Mama, there’s a monkey behind you on the deck.” I didn’t really take it seriously because he said it with this tone that sounds similar to “Mama, can you buy me more crayons tomorrow.” No real inflection in the voice, just stating something like it is.

And then comes Pascaline’s shrill, “MAMA, FOR REAL! THE MONKEY IS RIGHT BEHIND YOU!”

Brian gets home at this very second, tells me to take a picture since I’m standing their naked, in shock, BUT still holding the camera. I take the picture just before it’s to late.

Then the monkey slips away with part of our watermelon.

Not even a hour later, the monkey is back. The owee on his arm isn’t looking too good. And this time, he has snuck past me taking a nap and is in the room where the kids are napping. (I can just see my mom and dad freaking out as they read this. :)) And guess how I knew the monkey had snuck in the kid’s room (which is also the kitchen), Blaze–in his unamused, droll tone, said, “Mama, the monkey is in our room.”

Now the funny thing is that during breakfast that day, Blaze broke down into tears b/c of all the little flies buzzing around him. When Blaze was around 18 months old, Pascaline thought it’d be funny if she could make Blaze afraid of flies. So every time a fly got through our screen door, she’d start screaming–then laughing. But the screaming made quite the impression. And now, as you may have guessed, Blaze is afraid of flies. It’s ridiculous, and we’re hoping Thailand breaks this fear once and for all. So back to the monkey sneaking in their room. Blaze, as usual, not afraid at all. Almost unamused. But if a fly had flown in…look out!

I try to scare the monkey off, and he looks at me like I’m stupid. Brian shows up and gives it a try. Off the monkey goes. Apparently, you have to act like a bigger and crazier monkey to scare them away. (We all know Brian has this down!)

Now, is that a first day or WHAT?! 🙂

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