Well you can't control the weather.  It rained on and off all afternoon so I didn't get to go to the market today.  Fortunately I still have plenty of time to go to the market another time.  Although in the end it didn't matter anyways as I soon learned I was not going to the market anyways today.  Today there was a birthday at the hotel.  One of the girls was turning 25 today and they were celebrating her birthday all day today.  So as I emerged downstairs today around lunch the cook was telling me to come out front for lunch.  It was strange because she wasn't asking me like usual, but telling me to follow her.  She was very insistent.  So I followed her outside and on my way I was told that it was a special birthday lunch for the birthday girl.  We started with salad and Thai seasoned beef steak.



Next we had Thai style spaghetti.  The spaghetti was cooked like regular spaghetti, but then it was lightly pan fried with some Thai peppers to give it a little spice.



The green thing is a piece of pepper.  Finally we had some local favor birthday cake.



The round things on top were like gummi balls and everyone must like them because I saw everyone make sure they got at least one.  The cake as you can see is green.  It was some kind of local fruit or root vegetable flavor.  To me it kind of tasted like taro (the purple starchy potatoish root vegetable from Hawaii).  At first I didn't care for the flavor, but after a few bites I started liking it more and more.  Before we ate the cake everyone sang happy birthday, but it was half English and half Thai.  I don't know if they started in English to allow me the opportunity to join in or if that is how it is always done here.  By the end of the song it was all Thai.  So after lunch since it was still raining I decided to read some more of my book.  When I came down for dinner everyone was outside again having a birthday dinner.  At first I headed for an outside table as I did not want to impose.  Even though they have been including me in special meals and stuff I have still been a bit separated from the group.  I would always get my own table or I would be eating at a different time from everybody else.  Like lunch today, some had already eaten and some were eating at different tables when I ate.  So not wanting to impose I started towards an outside table when they called out to me and told me to come and sit with them.  I was finally being fully included in the group.  We all sat at one table and had a family style soup buffet.



The red pot in the picture was used to cook the soup.  It would cook about 5 or 6 bowls of soup at a time.  So they were constantly added vegetables, broth, noodles, seafood, and chicken into the pot.  It was like a neverending pot of soup.  Everybody must of had like 4 or 5 bowls of soup.  It reminded me a lot of traditional Chinese soup cooking.  All throughout China I saw families eating soup meals just like this.  The soup was very good especially when you added the chili sauce to it.



The clear stuff you see in the middle next to the calamari (squid) is glass noodles.  They also had some red wine so we all were having a few drinks with dinner.  It was fun to watch them relax and just enjoy.  With each cup of wine they had they were getting more and more entertaining.  While we were sitting there they asked if I was going to come back next year and the cook lady said to me that I was like part of the hotel family and I needed to come back and visit.  She then asked me "aroi mai?" which means is it delicious?  I replied "aroi" which means delicious and everyone smiled and laughed.  The cook had heard me say it a million times after every meal she has prepared for me, but that was a first for everyone else.  They enjoyed hearing my limited Thai.  We sat around for awhile enjoying each other's company.  Even though I couldn't understand most of the conversations I enjoyed just seeing them be themselves.  Just another magical night here at Krabi Tropical Beach Resort.