I now have another problem with my laptop, and am not sure how long I have the use of it. I have decided to donate the laptop to the boys when I leave Thailand. Now, the numbers across the top on the keyboard will not print.
On Tuesday, we went to the farm and for the first time, I saw what the term, "Farm Labor", really means. My friends have 200 acres, (called rai,), consisting of about 45 acres of rice, 200 palm oil trees, and between 7-800 rubber trees. The setting is your basic dense jungle, few roads, just trails. The adjoining land is owned by other relatives and family members, who also have rubber trees and sugar cane which is over ten feet high. My friends are not harvesting rubber this year, but uncle is. I will have many photos of this when I return home. I was first exposed to the rubber tree business when in Brazil over 20 years ago. Their industry had all but disappeared because a British sailor had illegally smuggled about 70 thousand rubber tree seeds to England in 1875.At that time, Brazil was believed to have the only such trees in the world. The smuggler, Henry Wickham, worked with others at Kew England, and they sent seeds to India, Singapore and Malaysia, all British colonies at that time. Today, Thailand is the largest rubber producer in the world. I will speak more on rubber at another time.
Today, Tuesday is a lesson on palm oil. These huge palm trees grow rapidly, and those here are about eight years old, and about three feet across at the base. Each tree produces from one to three huge clusters of fruit, each protected by huge extremely sharp needled fawns or branches about three inches wide, and four to ten feet long. Strong clothing, thick gloves and a strong back are essential.
The branches are hacked off with a razor sharp five foot long tool, to get to the fruit cluster. The cluster is hacked off the tree trunk, and carried to a cart. Each cluster weighs from five to ten kilos, and is loaded with fruit that looks almost like fresh dates, but are mostly reddish in color. The trees are about twenty five feet apart, and the fruit clusters are carried to a cart for removal from the forest.
Now, for the hairy part. Two people on a motor bike, a driver and a good friend drive the load to a buyer several kilometers away. The draw bar on this trailer, which has about 150 kilos of weight in the palms, is higher than the center of pull from the motor bike. The danger is that a touch too much speed from the bike, in a rough ground, as we have here, or going up a steep hill, the bike will tend to flip backwards...fast. When I pointed out what could happen, I was informed.....we know....one broken leg and two motor bikes show us!!!. I did not offer to hold the trailer pull rod.At the end of the day when the second load had been delivered to the buyer, they received 500 Baht, that's twenty Canadian dollars for five hundred kilos of the rough palm fruit. The refined palm oil is used for cooking oil, and many household items.
In my next posting, which I hope to do tomorrow, I will tell you more than you may want to know about rice farming...which we did yesterday. And to answer your next question, Yes, I am still having fun!.
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