In the grounds of Gecko Villa you cannot fail to notice our large "Traveller's Palms" (Ravenala Madagascarienis) - each with an impressive fan of thick leaves. These resemble enormous paddles and can grow up to 3 metres in length.

The astonishing symmetry of the plant, in conjunction with its distinctive shape and size, make this one of the tropics' most emblematic and dramatic trees, although they are in fact not palms, but are related to the orange-blossomed Bird of Paradise flowers you see around our Thai house (so both part of the Strelitziaceae family.)

The plant came to bear the mantle of the "Traveller's Palm" for reasons that are twofold. In hot and sunny climes, a weary traveller seeking to quench his thirst would know that the leaves of the tree act as giant funnels channeling fresh rainwater into the trunk of the plant, where it is stored. Slaking one's thirst was easy, as the base of the leaves could each hold around a litre of water.

In addition, if you walk around the gardens and grounds of Gecko Villa and concentrate on the palms, you may notice another of their peculiarities: the fans grow along an arc from east to west, acting as a natural compass.

Some believe that the tree has special powers, and that if one makes a wish whilst standing in front of it, this wish will be granted. When your next travel to Thailand to holiday at Gecko Villa, you may want to investigate this!

Gai Yang (grilled chicken) is popular throughout Thailand and is a native dish of Northeast Thailand, where it is often accompanied by a spicy green papaya salad (som tam) and sticky rice. The marinade helps infuse flavour into the chicken and to keep it plump and succulent when grilled on a charcoal or wood fired grill (often in bamboo pincers.)

Ingredients for the marinade:

3 cloves garlic 
3 birds eye chillies
A good pinch of rock salt
2 tsps black peppercorns
2 tbs chopped coriander root, minced

1 stalk of lemongrass, finely chopped
2 tbs fish sauce
1 cup coconut milk

1.5 kilos chicken legs / thighs

The marinade is traditionally ground in the Thai kitchen in with a pestle and mortar, although a food processor may  be used. Pound the dry ingredients to a paste, before adding the coconut milk and fish sauce. Use this to marinate the chicken pieces in a bag or bowl for around 6 hours. Then grill the chicken, using the marinade to baste/brush the chicken until cooked.

Those with a more "American" tooth can add 1-2 tsp sugar to the marinade. If you do so, we would also recommend you add 2 tsps tamarind paste to enhance the flavour even further.

Bangkokians and many foreigners like to eat Thai barbecued chicken  with a sweet chilli dipping sauce, although the time honoured  Isan accompaniment is the grilled meat dipping sauce  in our earlier blog.

 The film "Kru Bannok", or "The Village Teacher", was a blockbuster back in the late Seventies. In it, teacher Piya, imbued with idealstic notions of change and equality, uncovers high level corruption and is assasinated when he tries to counter it.

The film’s director, Surasee Patham (himself a son of Isan) had been swept up in the tsunami of political activism countering the military dictatorship at the time, and fled at nineteen into the jungles of Isan, emerging only seven months later to craft a film depicting the struggle of Northeastern Thai villagers against unruly capitalists and a failed justice system.

Now he has remade the film, and its imminent release is causing some consternation, coming as it does at a time of political turmoil, and unleashed as it will be upon a generation deemed by some to be  less interested by the ideals it espouses.

Surasee is nothing if not bold, and with the spirit of the jungle fighter of the Seventies declares: ''The audience may not want to see socially conscious movies, but to me, the problems faced by the rural people haven't changed in the past 31 years. It's actually getting worse. Now the exploitation of the poor has been systematized and integrated. Before, we fought capitalists, middle-men, politicians and corrupt civil servants. Now, they all work together, or worse, they're from the same family. Business and politics become the same, and their goal is to totally deprive villagers of power. Capitalism forces people to leave their homes to come and serve it in the city, while the government - any government - doesn't seem to be interested in empowering rural people, besides giving hand-outs. I think it's scarier than when I made my first film 31 years ago. Things haven't changed for the better at all.''

Interestingly, the Thai Ministry of Culture supports the new film and has stated that it's message is a good one. 

The moral high ground has lost none of its appeal, although we may be led to question who occupies it.

One of the most fragrant flowering shrubs in Thailand, officially called "Rah-Tree" but known colloquially as "Hohm Duk" (or "Perfumed at Night"), is Cestrum Nocturnum. We grow this at Gecko Villa, where its clumped masses of tiny, tubular apple-white flowers bloom periodically after sunset, like shooting stars, and cast a perfumed spell upon the dark night air...

In Burma's olden days, the shrub would be planted around the bedrooms of palace ladies, as it was assumed that should any furtive lover sneak into such a perfumed chamber, the illicit couple would faint on the spot. The Burmese name for the plant loosely means "the Bane of Unfaithful Wives." Perhaps it is no coincidence that the sweet and heady perfume of this delicate flowering plant  belies the nature of its white berries - the shrubs own poisonous fruit.

There are many other fragrant flowers aroud our Thai holiday house, but none can enchant nor infuse romance into the night air like the "Queen of the Night".

As you stroll around the grounds at Gecko Villa, keep an eye open for the brown, fat, cucumber-shaped fruit of the climbing loofah vine. If you pick one of these, then crack it open and peel back the dry, woody skin, you will quite readily be able to extract the internal sponge - a natural, sustainable, eco-friendly garden spa product!

Hold it upright to shake out the seeds to encourage further growth, then use the loofah in the shower or bathroom, or in the kitchen. As a natural sponge, when soaked in water and frothed up with soap, the loofah from the garden and grounds of Gecko Villa acts as a perfect exfoliant. 

If you'd like to take one home, soak it, flatten it and dry it in the sun. When you get back home after your holiday in Thailand, simply quench the sponge's memory with a good soak in water, and it  will puff back up to its original shape.

These fruit are in fact edible when harvested early in the season when they are still green, and you may here them referred to as Chinese Okra.

Beyond green papaya salad and barbecued chicken, the dish perhaps most redolent of Isan is the spicy meat salad written variously as Laab,  Larb or Laap. It is fresh, zingy, healthy and as Thai food goes, really very simple to concoct.  Eaten with raw vegetables, sticky rice and perhaps a "som tam", it makes a quick and appetizing meal.  Chicken, pork, venison or duck may be substituted for the beef.

A General Purpose Cleaner
Mix half a cup of distilled white vinegar and quarter of a cup of baking soda into half a gallon of water. This will clean almost any surface, including windows - which are best wiped down with old newspaper. Add a few of drops of colourless essential oil if you wish to perfume the solution. Avoid using on marble.

The Acid Test for Toilets
Simply squirt full-strength vinegar under the rim of the toilet bowl. Leave for 3 minutes, then scrub. The vinegar dissipates hard water stains.

Soft, Silky Sheets
Simply add a dash of vinegar at the rinse cycle instead of a standard fabric softener. This will remove any detergent residues.

Counter the Calcium
If your kettle or coffee pot has unappealing white calcium deposits, simply boil four cups of undiluted white vinegar in it. Repeat if required, then rinse thoroughly.

Exterminate Mould
Mould in bathrooms or similar areas may be killed with undiluted vinegar sprayed directly on it and left for around four hours before rinsing.

Flower Power
If you are going to pick flowers rather than pot them, then keep them fresh longer. Add 2 tablespoons of sugar and 2 tablespoons of white vinegar to a quart vase of water. Trim the stems and change the water every five days.

Try your own Thai style eco-friendly vinegar cleaner today, using sour grapes to ease your household chores,  and do away with the need for overly priced, excessively packaged products!

Palm sugar ("Nam Taan Bpeep") comes from the sap of the mature (over 20 year old) Sugar Palm. A villager will skillfully ascend the tall sugar palm to reach the flower buds, cut these with a large blade, and place a container underneath to collect the sap (a process not unlike rubber sap collection, although the latter is collected from the trunk after cutting the bark.) This sap is later collected and boiled in large woks, finally producing, through evaporation, the sticky brown sugar paste. Some of it may escape this treatment and be left to ferment, producing a very powerful alcohol!

As a natural and unrefined sugar, its colour will vary as will its consistency, depth of sweetness and flavour, depending upon the processes used and the time of year of the sap harvest.

At Gecko Villa we prefer to avoid the palm sugar sold as solid lumps: in our opinion these are over-dried and lack the fragrance and subtlety of the darker, richer and more gooey caramels. In addition, hardened is palm sugar is almost like a block of concrete and not easy to measure judiciously. Finding a bag of this palm sugar is easy in Thailand: overseas, you should be able to locate this in an Asian grocery shop - although again opt for a softer bag (with the consistency of smooth wet sand)  rather than a harder plastic tub or tin (and do not be misled into accepting coconut palm sugar which has a different taste!) Palm sugar may be kept in a cool dry place in its original bag, need not be refrigerated, and may be stored for very long periods without degradation.

Palm sugar adds a depth of flavour to many dishes, used generously in traditional sweets or sparingly in Thai curries (such as Panaeng), spicy salads (Som Tam) and sauces (Satay, or even "Son in Law Eggs".) The simple recipe below makes an attractive dessert that will leave your guests feeling you have been slaving in the kitchen for hours.

The Air Force base at Udon Thani (or Udorn) has a colourful past. During World War II, it served as an air force base for the Japanese, and was later home to the headquarters of Air America during the Vietnam War, as well as to the 432nd Tactical Reconnaissance Wing.

The base was closer to the enemy's command center in Hanoi than any U.S. base in Southeast Asia, and tactical aircraft could quickly fly to Hanoi or targets in northern Laos or along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. It was home to 6,500 American personnel and 3,500 Thais. This covert cargo airline, controlled and owned by the CIA, was later the subject of an eponymous film starring Mel Gibson. The base was eventually handed over to the Thai military in 1976, and the US Consulate in Udon Thani closed in 1995.

The 13th Air Force’s "Directorate of Information" presented all arriving personnel with a booklet outlining the facilities on base, the type of fatigues most suited to the tropics, and details of entertainment, shopping and recreational facilities in Udon Thani, also illustrating the various insignia for Thai Air Force and Army personnel so that the local ranks could more readily be established by newcomers. The pamphlet exhorted American forces to "Be an Ambassador" amongst their "intelligent and friendly" hosts, and encouraged them to study the Thai customs and language.

The tactical map of the landing routes for Air America clearly shows the alignments that flights to Udon Thani airport used, flying very close to Um Chan village, where the family that looks after Gecko Villa spent their childhood. Memories of the vast influx of Americans are still commonplace in and around Udon Thani, and many villagers can tell tales of their experiences during this tumultuous period in SE Asian history.