As another day dawns work continues on the house, and good progress is being made. It's a little frustrating not being on the site, but I'm sure we'd just be a pain and sometimes its best to let people get on with things. I'm not really in a position to comment on the rights and wrongs of this stage of building anyway, and that's when trusting the people employed to do the difficult stuff comes into play.
Anyone who has spent time in Thailand and built anything, or tried to build anything, will know putting trust in some of these guys is a leap of faith. I've heard all sorts of stories while I've been here of houses taking years rather than months to finish, budgets being blown out of the water - to the extent houses are left unfinished - and buildings degrading quickly due to poor quality workmanship. Will we be able to avoid these? Only time will tell, but we've tried to minimise the risk by building a prefab that has fixed pricing, a clear timeline, and most of all, it is designed and built by people we believe we can trust.
Being eight hours or so drive from the sight, trust is essential. Regular updates and photos are being sent to us, and while that doesn't replace being on site, it does help. Hana's brother is also nearby to keep an eye on things, and, as you have seen, he can turn his hand to most things.
Over the next couple of months we'll make a couple of trips to the village to see how things are going, and to sign off on various stages. We can't wait.
So what can we expect to happen from now on?
All going well, the house will be finished by the end of May. The vast majority of 'heavy lifting' will be done by mid-April, just before Thailand's New Year Songkran festival. There will be a break at that point to let workers go home and spend time with their families, and after the break we'll finish plumbing, tiling and painting.
The end of May...
It's not far away - 17 weeks away.
Damn, we have an awful lot of work to do between now and then!!
