A visiting friend

I live in the boons. I live in a village where people don't even speak thai. I live in a village where the main restaurant is a noodleshop on the side of the highway and cows and chickens run where they please. I couldn't be happier. Last weekend, I had another exchange student friend come visit me. She's from the United States and lives in Udon Thani, 200 kilometers away. In the U.S. that would be about and hour and a half drive. In thailand, it takes 5 hours by bus. Thai buses stop in every single village. It's the milktruck (not literally).
She arrived at about 1 pm. My host family was shocked to see that she wasn't blond and tall like me. She's short and asian. "Same as thai!" They said excitedly. Every person we met and saw that weekend had to be told that my friend was actually japanese but that she moved to america. Colette (my friend) and I had the hardest time explaining that in the U.S. we have people from every country in the world. It doesn't make them less american. She's a fifth generation american, same as me. It just happens that every person in her family has been of japanese descent.

We click. We didn't drive into town once the entire weekend. My host brother, Colette and I traveled around the village on bicycles. We went to the school, the noodle shop, discovered the bubble tea shack, the crepe shop and the area in the market with punk 20 year olds making waffles over coals in a teracotta pot. I've never had so much fun in my village. Colette and I introduced my brother to The Princess Bride. He understands a little bit of english and the title seemed a little to girly for his tastes. This from the boy collecting cartoon robocat stickers from seven-eleven. WE convinced him to watch it with us with thai subtitles. He's now repeating, "My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die!"

Before my host father would let her visit, he wanted to know, "does she have a good heart?"
"Very good." I replied.
The whole family smiled.
"Suzanne has the best heart though."