Cabbages and Condoms

I swear to god I'm not making this up.

I was sitting all lonely at the little cafe thing (because my fabulous friend Adley left me!) just doing my homework and blah like a good little college student. I happened to be reading my environmental studies book. It's...a decent textbook. Not too boring.

This particular chapter was about population growth...kinda boring. But ...it had a case study that was anything but boring.

It was titled "Family Planning is Thailand: A Success Story" . Alright...sounds a little cheesy...but I gotta read it.

Turns out it was all about this cafe named..... "Cabbages and Condoms".

That's right, not only does it sell spicy thai food, but it hands out condoms. This entire restaurant is dedicated to birth control.

Oh no it gets better.

So they have an adjoining gift shop. They sell t-shirts. The t-shirts proudly proclaim things like:

"A condom a day keeps the doctor away"

and my personal favorite

"Our food is guaranteed not to cause pregnancy"

Of course the gift shop also sells all sorts of crafts and condoms.

ok ok ok and get this: unintentionally the organization that runs the businesses is called PDA. I kid you not.

It's not over yet.

To promote the whole birth control yay, PDA:
-hands out condoms whenever there are crowds (????)
-held a condom balloon blowing contest for government officials
-teaches children a fun little tune called "Too many children make you poor"
-paints birth control ads on water buffalo (again ????)

Lastly, the guy who kinda started this whole deal, Mechai, is lovingly recognized for his actions. How? The slang for condoms in thailand is "mechais".

dude....the slang for condoms is HIS NAME.

So yeah....good thing I read that early on in the night. Any later and I fear I would have mistaken it for a hallucination.

That is all.

~AM