cocooned in a hammock, i've got one foot on a gigantic palm frond so as to gently rock myself on the open porch of our Mekong homestay. the sun is setting and the sky looks just like a Maxfield Parrish painting. an amazing day, one that has inverted the blues of saying goodbye to some of my favorite people on the Cambodia leg of the tour.
dinner always takes some time as everything is made fresh. there are fruit trees everywhere so if the cook needs a lime, he only has to reach up and pick one.
got to see the making of coconut candy, bricks, salt and rattan mats. no large factories here or sophisticated equipment. everything is done painstakingly by hand using techniques that have been in practice for decades if not a century. how easy it is to forget the provenance of everyday items when one lives in a world where almost everything is manufactured and automated.
