Busy street life in Bangkok, near Chinatown.
Category Archives: Travel
How to Cook an Eel
Catch any eel that swims by your legs while you are knee-deep in the mud creating a rice field. Be sure to only catch the eels and not the leeches. Put them in a bucket with water. Prepare the eels for cooking and cut them into small pieces (this is the bloody part of the recipe). Put lots garlic, lemon grass, yellow ginger and salt into a mixer and create a tasty paste. Put the paste into a hot pan over a wooden fire, stir it for a minute and then add the eel. Let it cook for about five minutes. Add coriander and as many chili as you like. (Optional: Add water to make an eel soup.)
Enjoy your meal!
Ok, here is the background to this “cooking tutorial”: During my last days at the Mirror Foundation we turned a big meadow into a couple of rice fields. When working, the local people who helped us continued to catch eels out of the water around us. After work was done, a group of us was invited to eat that eel in the farmer’s hut just some steps away from the fields. It was really exciting to watch how the meal was prepared (of course that included killing the eels first). We even got a “western” version of the soup; in the rest of it, they threw in a whole bunch of chilies. A very good experience altogether!
Goodbye Mirror Foundation!
Back at a desk after spending three weeks mostly in bamboo huts.
Here I am back at the desk of my hotel room with two beds, a bathroom with a hot shower and western toilet, proper Internet access and electricity. When I sat in a similar room just three weeks ago I took all of that for granted. That is different now.
Only yesterday I finished my volunteering work at the Mirror Foundation and began my travel back to Bangkok. So right now I am feeling like residing in a level of luxury that is more than I would ever need. I guess that is a good starting point for the second part of my trip that is all about seeing more of Thailand and, well, relaxing.
Saying goodbye to all the people I shared the last awesome weeks with was quite emotional as we spent a lot of time together getting our hands dirty (actually, we were completely covered in mud at the end). My impression was the the group harmonized very well and everybody got on well together. As I am not sure if I said goodbye to everyone (it was getting late last night) I will repeat it here: It has been a great time with you all! I really enjoyed your company, both at work and at leisure time. I wish you all best of luck, whether you continue your work at the Mirror Foundation, travel through South East Asia or go back home. Take care and hopefully I will see some of you again soon!
Another side note: While my time as being a volunteer is over now, I intend to publish more articles about this whole experience as soon as I have some time for that.