Som – which means “orange” in Thai. Or angel if you’re me.

Som is the new Joi. The Joi of Lanna. She is beautiful, Thai and provides food, entertainment and love.

I met Som while we lived in Lampang – she had just opened a little restaurant that was attached to our building. She makes lovely little meals at cheap prices and hosts a crew of hippie Thais on a regular basis. In fact, it is a true hippie palace. It’s named Na Bob’s, as in Marley. Plus, she speaks great English and is fun to hang out with.

On a particularly restless night for me early in the trip, I decided to roll with this hippie crowd and let them take me to a “party,” which was really a chill group with a guitar, weed and whiskey, singing Bob Marley and Jack Johnson songs as best as their broken English could manage. My scene for sure.

They all chatted in Thai trying to put together one-liners in English. Versions of “I love you” and “You’re beautiful” were all they managed to come up with. Somehow, that never gets old. I’m ok with it.

After we moved to HangChat I didn’t see much of Som. Sadpants. But when we decided to crash in Lampang town for the night, I gave her a call to see what she was up to.

“You come to my house? We drink? I pick you up in five minutes.”

Pure.Love.

(Side note – Thai showers are heated by a little electric box that’s attached to the shower head. As punishment for taking so freakin’ long to shave his legs and making me wait until 8pm to eat dinner, I’ve just hit the switch on said water heater while Nate showers. Let’s see how long it takes him to notice.)

Back to Som.

Exactly 3 seconds into the ride, she turns around. “You want to drink or smoke weed?”

Wait, was that just a dream, or did she really ask me that question? It was hotter than that time that Matt Damon came up to me at the bar and said, “Your place or mine?”

So me, Nate, Som and a bunch of Thai dudes sat around and drank a whole freakin’ case of Chang 40’s. Which, that night, tasted like Singha. Because just being in Som’s presence makes things taste better. It was one of the best nights I’ve had here.

We sang some old-school Backstreet Boys, acoustic style, and that “Kiss Me” song that is so popular here. They only know a handful of American songs – why they like that one so much, I will never know. Then we bashed English women. Not because I like to, but because our new friend Thor has had his heart broken by 2 of them. He loves American girls, though.

The rest of the night passed blissfully, although a bit cloudy.

I’m sure you’ll hear more about this gem, Som. And I’ll take a picture sometime soon. Because she’s freakin’ adorable. She even texted me to tell me that the moon was smiling, which only appears every 4 years in Thailand. Or maybe every 100 years. The jury is still out on that one.



(Nate just noticed about the water heater. Not.amused.)

Time for dinner now.