A few days on a rice farm

We are in Panotnokomb (no idea really of how to spell that), Thailand - south of Bangkok an hour and a half.

My nose has taken up running – a new hobby for it as I have had no known allergies throughout the last 38 years. But perhaps the farm air has made it want to exercise.

I am surrounded by rice fields. The stalks are coming full and the white egrets work the fields, their cries dissonant with their visual grace.

A thrum of insects, cooing doves and other songbirds fill in the background, along with a farmers radio alternating pop music with sing-song commercials.

The horizon is set by lines of coconut trees, banana and coconut trees.

Yvette and I have ridden a motor scooter into town and walked down to the market. We've provisioned ourselves with Mushroom sauce (a vegetarian substitute for fish sauce), galangal, garlic, eggplant, basil, mushrooms, cauliflower, cabbage, lemon grass, tomatoes, carrots, peppers, baby corn - they are sooo cute, and a few other sundry items. We found a little air-conditioned bakery/internet cafe with smoothies and comfortable seats and have set up shop for the morning.

The wasp/bee in the photo is enjoying some Lukchub which we were encouraged to seek out as one of the traditional sweets of Thailand. Not only were the bees all taking little licks off the top, the seller had a bag of bees for sale presumably next to her (or maybe she let them out as advertising...)