Busy Weekend - AFS Friend's House

When I happened to get home, I was informed my friend and fellow AFS participant, Atsushi, invited Jill and I to his house for dinner. Apparently, he had decided that day to cook food from his home country, Japan, so he figured he'd invite us too since we lived near him. The down side to going though, was that no one would be able to take my cousin and I back home once we go there. Our solution? Stay overnight at our advisor's house! Ay, by now I'm starting to miss my bed, hehe.

Anyway, you all are probably wondering who is my advisor and what she does. Her name is P'Kii and she is who Jill and I go to if we should ever have a problem in our families or adjusting to Thai culture in general. I hadn't really ever visited her before, so it was certainly a new experience for me. Anyway though, we first had to get to Atsushi's house, which was about a half-hour away by bus.

We had my aunt Nadii drive us by motorcycle to the stop and then took a bus to Atsushi's town. When we got off, his family came to pick us up and then drive to their house where we would have dinner. His house is really cool I must say! I find most Thai homes are very large, even though they may look small to most people. This is because in Thailand, not all the parts of a house are on the inside. For example, in my home our kitchen is actually outside. This makes the actual physical building appear small in comparison. In Atsushi's house, he has an upstairs area with a deck where the bedrooms are and the the first floor essentially works as a family room with a television and such. However, the rest, including the kitchen, bathroom, and dining room are all on the outside.

He had decided to make some okonomiyaki, which is a type of Japanese pancake that happened to be his favorite dish in Japan. It kind of looks like this:

Unlike most guys I know, Atsushi can cook well! :D It was so yummy! I was so full after eating so much of the pancake that I could barely walk. LOL I tried to get pictures of the chef himself, but he kept making funny faces or turning around whenever I brought the camera anywhere near him. Heh.

So I instead got pictures of his family~ Here's Jill with Atsushi's grandmother.

Here's some more of his family and a friend of one of his sisters who can speak Japanese like me too~

And I tried to sneak another picture of him, but he caught me at the last second! Gah! You're too good Atsushi! XD

Once we were done eating, our advisor came to pick us up and take to us home for the night. Since having last seen Atsushi, I find we both have really good Thai and can actually talk to each other. This made me think how at the beginning of the exchange journey, at orientation, there were some students who didn't speak English and so I couldn't communicate with them. However, since we're all learning Thai we should all soon have a common language to communicate on. It's an interesting concept once you think about it, eh?

Today's post was pretty short, but tomorrows will be a bit longer, I promise~ And I assure you my busy weekend is far from over. :3

*~*Miki of Feathers*~*