I can’t say I really know this region, but I have been coming to Southeast Asia pretty regularly since 1999. One of the reasons I keep coming back is that the cultural logic is just so foreign and surprising. I love being in a place where people’s reactions and responses to situations are just totally different than anything I could come up with.

Talking to one of the hotel staff today, she mentioned that every day she is happy because she has a job. “I’m so happy I have a good job, and am not just sitting at home singing.”

Singing? I clarified. Would your response to unemployment really be to sing all day?

She enunciated better this time, “Just be at home, singing songs.”

So too, this coffee house with feet on the table threw me for a loop.