Buaphet Khuenkaew, 35, avoids working during the heat of the afternoon and dozes on the teak floor in front of the television that is showing one of her favorite Thai soap operas. The Khuenkaew family lives in a wooden 728-square-foot house on stilts, surrounded by rice fields in the Ban Muang Wa village, outside the northern town of Chiang Mai, in Thailand. Material World Project.