After 3 years of delay, partly caused by COVID and partly by my prevaricating, our house build is finally starting.

2 bedrooms, 2 bathroom, decent sized kitchen, a Buddha zone for the wife, small home gym and workshop/tool storage for me.

The builder laid the water pipes last week, and started measuring and marking the site layout yesterday, but when he had positioned the main stakes the wife decided she wanted the whole thing moved a meter one way, and then later half a meter forward!

Here in Thailand it is traditional to have a blessing ceremony for the “first pole”, the abbot of the local temple has decreed that January 11 is an auspicious day for that to happen so there will not be any actual construction for a couple of weeks, although you are allowed to dig foundation holes and prepare the rebar for the poles. Some people also give offerings to the spirits of the land before they disturb them when digging. Buddhism, aninism…no harm in having a bet both ways! I leave all that sort of stuff to the wife …

Over the last couple of years I’ve planted a few fruit trees in the back part of the land, 2 sorts of banana, 4 mangos, 3 or 4 varieties of papaya, bengal currant (Carissa carandas/Karondas/mamuang hao manoa ho), ginger and galangal, dragonfruit and coconut palms. After the land was connected to the mains water a few weeks ago I started on what will be the vegetable garden. While I did plant some for eating (tomatoes of various sorts, cucumber, melons, beans) most of the work was in improving the soil. Most soil here in Issaan is poor quality, and our land has been raised with fill scraped off land elsewhere so it is no exception! So I have been planting sunn hemp, daikon radish, cowpeas and sunflowers in large clumps to add organic matter to the soil. More on that to come later.