Gift Giving

Gift giving is huge in Thai culture and for those of us from North America it is hard to get in the habit of gift giving. That sounds bad, doesn't it? Let me explain. Here in Thailand when you see someone you haven't seen for awhile it is very polite and important to give them a gift. In America we generally don't do this sort of thing, at least I never did. So, we had some friends come to Lopburi to visit yesterday and we wanted to give them something and one of the other missionaries suggested a fruit basket. So, here you see the enormous fruit basket we assembled for them. Paul went all over Lopburi on Friday to gather mangoes, papaya, pineapple, rambutan, organges and grapes to put in the basket. We had 12 Thai friends coming so we knew we needed a big enough gift for all of them.
When they arrived they brought us gifts as well. It is always so humbling to receive gifts, no matter who the giver, but especially when it comes from someone of another culture. They gave us fruit as well plus they gave PJ some cool trucks and Calvin two beautiful baby outfits. They gave us an entire durian fruit (this is the fruit that smells really, really bad), mangoes, watermelon and pomelo which is like grapefruit (really good). We haven't cut open the durian yet but it should be interesting to be hit with the smell!