Kobe!

While on my trip I spent a week at a homestay in the little beachside village of Baan Tele Nok in the Ranong Province of Thailand. Now a homestay for those who don’t know is when a student stays in a home with a local family and eats, does activites, etc. with them. I was fortunate enough to stay in a small fantastic muslim village. There I lived with my homestay family and my caring, charismatic mother who didn’t speak a lick of English. All we had between us in terms of communication was a small Thai-English Phrasebook and a lot of hand gestures. One day while sitting out in the front of the house, eating some small sour green fruit, I was instructed to throw the pits of these little fruits into the bushes on the side of the house. I would sit with my mother, grandfather, and 2 other students on my course and dip these sour fruits in the sweet and spicy chili sugar we had in a little bowl in front of us. As I sat there with my peers and newfound family we reminisced on a few of the things we did back home. Jokingly as I threw a few pits, I exclaimed, “Kobe!” in reference to one my favorite basketball players Kobe Bryant. However as my mother began to throw her pits into the bushes she also began to say “Kobe!” we laughed and she smiled back at me giggling. My homestay grandfather who probably had no idea what was going on let out a hearty laugh. It was a sweet and simple moment I will never forget. Throughout the rest of my homestay whenever my mom threw anything away she would always say “Kobe!” with a smile on her face and putting a smile on mine. There’s a reason Thailand is considered “The Land of Smiles” and it’s not from all the smiles you see but from the happiness you can feel.