Receiving Incredible Gifts in Pai, Thailand at “The Split”

In 2008 a seismic event created a literal “split” in a part of the land in the northwest of Thailand outside of a small village called Pai.  This is now a minor tourist attraction.

When you ride up to the location, you are greeted by a family who runs a small farm on the village.  Upon arrival, they immediately started to offer their homemade Roselle juice, but we declined and entered the “split.”

This split is not the Grand Canyon but is still quite fascinating.  You can walk through and be amazed at how our seemingly stable land can split open it two.

Walking through the whole thing takes about 10 minutes.  When you exit, you are again greeted by the lovely family and with a sign offering the chance to give a donation.

Walking out, I offered a donation of 100 Baht (which is a little less than $3 USD) and walked away.  We were planning on heading out so I gave the donation and walked away.

Immediately, the owner runs over and insists that we sit.  He immediately brings over two drinks of Roselle (which taste slight less bitter than Cranberry juice).  We were pretty flattered, but he was not done.

More food came, including fresh sweet potato, banans, nuts, homemade jelly, plantain chips and nuts.  Wow!

While eating I noticed this book sitting next to us and I couldn’t agree more with its takeaway.  While a cynic could easily read this as asking for more money, it was obvious that this family just wanted to share what they had and create a deep bond (and memories) with the people that they served.

Having received this incredible gift and seeing this notebook, I asked myself “what more can I give?” and decided to leave an additional gift for him and his family. As we were walking away, I put a larger gift in the donation box and went to board the motorbike.  This wasn’t a life-changing gift for either  of us, but it was something I was drawn to do.

As we were about to ride away, he comes over again with more gifts!  This time he had two bags of stuff for us to take away.  In one bad was a can of homemade jelly, some plantain chips, and some nuts.  In another, a massive fresh Papaya.  Wow.

As I’ve embraced experiments in giving over the last year, I have continued to be blow away with the kindness and generosity of strangers.  In sharing this, I hope more people find out about this incredible man and his family who now have a place people come to because of a minor earthquake in 2008.

Isn’t life grand?