Flights booked!

Flights booked for Borneo and Cambodia!!! Then onwards to Vietnam, Laos and we finish off back in Thailand! After that...we will see you all in South Africa!!!

Washing the bikes!!!

The bikes getting a much needed wash!

Pete's mean looking roadster!!!

Amanda's retro looking Vespa, commonly known as 'Angus'!!!

This is Thailand!

Sitting watching Pete sweat a small ocean while playing badminton and listening to the pigeons coo and fly across the courts. Oblivious to an impending bomb drop from above, the players continue their game. Only semi aware of the 2 year old running across the courts with a sosatie stick in his mouth. Have just eaten a dinner of freshly fried wantons and an unidentifiable squidgy spinach thing followed by spicy papaya salad that has set my mouth ablaze. So much for the "nit noi ped, ka" (little spicy, please) request to the Som Tham (Papaya Salad) lady at the night bazaar! Oh well, nothing that a strawberry and pineapple smoothy filled with sugar water can't cure. Feel a bit bad about the number of bees we saw floating in the sugar water, but just hoping I don't crunch down on one before this drink saves my mouth! Saw a pug this afternoon riding on the back of a scooter as its owner weaved between the traffic. Four little puggy legs clinging to the leather seat and a very dismal expression on an already pretty dismal face. Ai, Thailand!

Fruit Lady in Chaiyaphum Market

Been a good week filled with exciting sensory experiences (as always). The markets continue to captivate. From the pigs' heads on display to ladies clubbing live catfish to death and popping heads off baby frogs like bubble wrap. Not to mention the fresh honey on offer outside the mechanics store or the kaleidoscope of colours sprawled across the veggie ladies' stall. Two weekends ago, in Khon Kaen, we had our first opportunity to see flash fried insects of every shape and colour for sale. Cicadas, crickets, silk worms and grasshoppers...like a pick and mix candy store, we could fill a bag to snack on for the trip home. Hmmm....no thanks. Might give that one a skip! 

 

Pigs' heads...enough said

Poor live (soon-to-be-dead) fish

At school today, a half blind lady came into the teachers office with two reed baskets, one filled with green sticks and another a white bag. Thinking she was selling food, I asked to see inside. Low and behold, out she pulls an array of LIVE TURTLES!!! Big ones, small ones, water and land ones - you name it, she had it. "To gin?" (eat) I say in broken Thai. "Mai mai" comes the reply. Apparently, you can buy these poor reptiles and set them free. A quick and easy way to earn brownie points if you're buddhist. Good for your karma. Not so good for the turtles. Apparently, where the turtles are set free is also where they are captured. The great circle of life? Hmm, nope. Just Thailand.

Back at the apartments and Mum calls us over to point out tiny little specks of light flittering over the dark marshy ground next door. FirefRies!! (Nope. Fireflies, but try get a Thai person to say that sound combination!) Hundreds of the little guys sparking around just long enough to think we can catch them. Chasing fireflies at the end of the day. What a day. Now THAT'S Thailand!!

Some more photos. Some to make you smile. Others to make you cringe!

A tailor and his old Singer sewing machine complete with manual pedal.

Cicadas...

...Crickets...

...and Silkworms! Yum yum!!

Mushroom sellers...

...and their mushrooms

Even the graffiti is fun!

A little Thai visitor from the land of smiles.

Interesting poster on the wall!

Was showing the kids where South Africa is on the atlas and discovered this little conundrum...

There's getting it wrong and then there's this!!...(note the name under the flag too!)

Happy children in class

Weekends, Waterfalls, Elephants & BBQ's (a.k.a Braai)

Incredible weekend that started out with a feast of a Korean Barbeque (little bit like a fondue with hot coals on the table and a soup bowel on the coals) and ended with a South African braai complete with toasties done on the fire by "Braaimeester" Pete. Met an elephant in the parking lot after dinner on Friday evening that played the harmonica. Tickled his trunk while we fed him sugar cane. Such incredible animals that have literally been put out of commission by the government in favour of modern farming machinery. Tragically, these powerful creatures are now burdens to their owners who can do little with them except use them as a tourist attraction. But even denied of their local purpose, these magnificent animals continue to instill a sense of awe. Absolute power under absolute control. Smaller than the African elephant with piercing black and yellow eyes, the feeling of their wrinkly skin, tough as leather, is difficult to forget.

Harmonica playing elephant!

Korean BBQ

Woke up early on Saturday morning, packed a picnic and headed out on the scooters to nearby Tadtone Waterfall. An incredibly beautiful waterfall, surrounded by jungle and filled with butterflies of all shapes and sizes. Blood red splashes across ebony wings, golden yellow dots flitting across your vision and striking turquoise glowing at your feet. These fairy wings were everywhere and landed on us throughout the morning as we swam in the pools and lay in the shade. Spent the morning there, exploring the river and its banks and sneaking as close as we dared to the 5m high fall. Got a big skrik when we saw a fish try to dart its way up. Tried our best to avoid the "Slippering Ruote" as Gandalf led us across the river with his bamboo staff (thanks, Pete) :) Met some of the locals, and not so locals ( far too many old men with very young looking Thai wives and children), and watched them all as they watched us. Thailand continues to be a land of contradictions with a number of ladyboys flitting around, but everyone swimming fully clothed. (Bikinis got a little bit too much attention here!).

All in all an amazing day. A good dose of vitamin D and a swim at last! Spent the rest of the evening doing some research on diving in Borneo and watching Pete dance around the room with nerves as SA nearly got pipped at the post by England in the rugby.

One of the many unique spellings of Tat Tone Waterfall

Gandolf 'The White' showing the way

Interesting spelling!

A butterfly!

A beautiful view from below the waterfall.

4 weeks already...

It's weekend!!! Amazing to think that we have 4 weeks of teaching under our belts... Kids driving us crazy but very satisfying at the end of a tiresome day. Hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!

Teacher Respect Day

14.06.2012

Fascinating day at school today. Thai people seem to love respecting each other at every opportunity so today was dedicated to teachers. We were asked to be at school by 7am in order to get blessed by some very grumpy looking monks dressed in saffron coloured robes who threw some water on us as we fed them rice. Then half the school day was dedicated to an assembly that saw every child bow on their knees before us and present all the teachers with flower wrapped in banana leaf cones. Pete and I sat on the boys side of the room and giggled our way through the director's unintelligible speech watching the bored little guys tearing up their flowers, sticking them down each others' shirts or into their friends' ears. Ai, boys! 

The flowers, however, were stunning! Arrangements like we have never seen. Swans made of banana leaves. Pandas made out of tiny purple and white flowers, all pinned individually to polystyrene cones resting on gold and silver bases. Marigolds everywhere and even some signs of the Siam Tulip (a.k.a Dok Krachio) that is about to bloom like the Namaqualand Daisies in the national parks surrounding Chaiyaphum. All in all a very interesting event. If only we understood more Thai!!

Grumpy Monks and their rice bowls

Chanting and praying for us

Some of the flowers presented to the teachers

Pretty sure this cheeky chap has some African ancestry...???

Lining up to present the flowers on bended knee to the director

Pete and I with P. Maem, a Thai English teacher

(More photos on Pete's facebook if you like)

Teacher Malit (Jasmine)

Teacher Malit (Jasmine) marking some Happy, Sad and Angry faces!!!

Caught up at last.... Chaiyaphum and School Life

Was riding back from school today and nearly rode over 1.5m long snake slithering across the rode!!! The wildlife in Thailand certainly is never far away. Even as I type this, little black flies are trying to eat me alive. Went for a stunning run last night around the nearby lakes while the sun was setting. They have big skies here, similar to Africa. The colours are stunning and the clouds are ginormous!


 A hitchhiker on our bike helmets one morning. 

At last I have caught up to the here and now with this blog thing. Still trying to get the hang of it, but fortunately Pete is on hand to fix my blupses. We have settled in very nicely to our little school routine  during the week and Pete has even started playing badminton in the evenings. (Although scoring is about the only thing they can communicate about at the moment. Hehe!) Early mornings are still rough though and I cant believe we used to get up for school everyday 18 years running at 6am!! Needless to say we sleep veeeeery well at night. Our school, Anubarn Chaiyaphum, is massive with over 2000 children from grade 1-6. They have assembly every morning where they sing the national anthem and raise the Thai flag. Uniforms are very popular and even the teachers wear prescribed outfits on certain days. Wednesdays is scouts day and there is a teacher who looks just like Yogi Bear in his wide brimmed hat and khaki shorts. Makes us giggle every time we see him! The anthem is very catchy though and raising the flag is a lovely tradition (except when the poor kids doing it get themselves so tangled in knots they don't get the flag to the top of the pole in time!).


Our classes have about 40-45 children each which is mostly fun, often loud, and sometimes very trying. They have streaming over here, so depending on the class number you can kind of gauge whether you've got the smart kids or not. (Although even the clever cookies are not always the best behaved!!) The teachers have mostly been lovely and all have tried to have broken English conversations with us. A LOT gets lost in translation, but then its a case of "mai pen lai" (Thai version of Hakuna Matata...No worries, no stress, chill out, it's fine....take your pick of meaning. They all fit.) Pete and I have both been given nicknames. Mine is teacher Malit, which means Jasmine, and Pete has become known as teacher Lock. It started out as teacher Rock, but the L and R sounds in Thai are completely interchangeable so now shouts of "TEACHER LOCK, HELLOO!!" ring out across the playground.

Morning assembly

Raising the flag while singing the national anthem

Scouts day

 Yogi Bear!!

Last catch up blog... Goodbye Bangkok!

At last! We are here!! Settled and unpacked for the 1st time since we left England. Arrived in Chaiyaphum yesterday after an easy 5 hour bus ride from BKK (made even easier by a movie watched on my new computer! :) Was sad to say goodbye to the majority of our TEFL Heaven crowd, but no-one is sad to be leaving Bangkok. Dengue fever, a drugged and robbed friend found in an alleyway and stolen purses are stories that plagued this 4 day stop over. BKK was literally picking us off one by one. A city characterised by noise, sweat and rotting garbage. A crossroads, not a destination.

However, even with all its negative connotations, Bangkok continues to hold some kind of enigmatic appeal. Like a shy courtesan, she only reveals her true colours in seductive tidbits that leave you breathless and wanting for more. The tall skyscrapers exude strength and power, competing for the skyline like squabbling heirs to an architectural throne. But these buildings are the distracting trinkets on the courtesan’s costume. The real Bangkok, the living, breathing, writhing Bangkok happens far below these monuments, at street level. Here, the noise and concrete mingle with the sickly sweet smell of street vendor’s food and rotting garbage. Here is where you are just as likely to be offered raw gems as you are to get bitten by a rabid dog. Bright lights draw you in. Chaos, traffic and dirt fend you away. Drink from the overflowing cup that is Bangkok and you will spend many heady days trying to recover from this opiate-like experience. 

Thank goodness it was only 4 days and now we can recover and prepare for our first day at school. Eeek!!

The view from a hospital room over BKK 

 

Hotel bed labelling...not really sure what to make of this...

 

Thai dancers welcoming us to Media Kids Orientation

 

Welcoming strings to bless us

The BKK Skytrain...amazing public transport system that rivals the tube even on its worst day! My new computer!! Yayeeee :)

 Suda Palace, the very old hotel in BKK

10.05.2012

Off to Bangkok today. Sad farewell to Koh Tao this morning before boarding a catamaran to Chumpon on the mainland. Eventful stop over waiting for the bus while escaping a MASSIVE thunderstorm and nursing some poor Canadian guy who had the sh*t beaten out of him by his brother. (Alcohol really is a demon drink!)

On the bus now. Should be in BKK by 9pm. Then straight to Suda Palace Hotel to check in for Media Kids Orientation. Last stop before Chaiyaphum and our new school which, we just found out, might be a nursery for 1600 3-6 year olds! Poor Pete!!!

Backtrack Blogging...

Advanced diving certificate in Koh Tao

09.05.2012

So far, there have been few truly magical things left on the well trodden travel routes through Thailand. But last night we sat on the ocean floor and played with phosphorescence. Dressed like spacemen, in pitch darkness, with nothing but the sound of the bubbles from our regulators we waved our hands through the water and watched these tiny little organisms sparkle in ripples around us. Exquisite beauty with little purpose other than to be beautiful. Proof of a Creator with limitless imagination and an eye for minute detail in everything.

These weren't the only things to see. Four blue spotted stingrays rippling along the floor getting squiff-eyed by our torch beams, feather stars that curled up like tree ferns when exposed to light, and sleeping immobile fish lying on the floor or in rock crevices, their blank eyes staring at nothing. The underwater world is as captivating at night as during the day.

After completing the night dive last night, Pete and I, together with 4 others from our group, officially became Advanced Adventurer Divers qualified to navigate and dive shipwrecks, at night and to a depth of 30m! Completed 1 of each of these dives during the course. The shipwreck and night dive being the top 2 by far.

We were incredibly lucky with the shipwreck as the water was clear enough to see the whole thing as we descended. Known as the HMS Sattakut (pron. 'Shatakut'), this ship was responsible for sinking 6 Japanese boats in retaliation of the attack on Pearl Harbour in WWII. It was then donated to the Thai Navy who decommissioned it 2 years ago and donated it to Koh Tao to sink as an artificial reef. After a couple of attempts they eventually sank it right and now it serves as a great wreck training dive as well as a breeding ground for 100's of fish. It even has its front and rear guns still on deck which we pretended to shoot or surf on. Would have given a limb to have an underwater camera with us!

Exhausted and with a Chang beer in hand, we bid farwell to Mama G and headed into town for dinner at an open air Thai restaurant run by a lady named Jam (Thai names are deserving of their own post for this blog. They have been quite unusual). Delicious dinner of No Name Vegetables - needless to say I cant tell you what these actually were - and Green Curry. Ate our fill all while watching a cat try to catch a snake in the middle of the road! Eventually crashed into bed after watching some delayed Full Moon party goers from Koh Pangnang party their last ounce of energy out on the beach. Its comical/horrifying to watch the tourists become the tourist attraction!!

Eventually crashed into bed for a sticky humid night under the mosquito net, our sleep interrupted only by the sound of the geckos ("ge-ko").

Koh Tao catch up

07.05.2012

Well, no whale sharks as yet, but we are fully qualified SSI Scuba Divers! Have seen some incredible underwater sights so far and become so addicted that we've all signed up to do our advanced diving course. Starting today we spend the next 2 days learning how to dive to 30m, navigate underwater and control our buoyancy over, under and through a myriad of obstacles. Five dives are included in this course and we are still rubbing our nipples raw for a  whale shark. Went for a run early this morning and found a whale shark skeleton at one of the resorts. Incredibly beautiful and HUGE!!

We've got the option of a night dive and a wreck dive as part of the dives so, although a little nervous, it should be incredible! We are all sticking with our previous instructor, 'Mama G,' who continues to be a short Irish firecracker, but an extremely good instructor. She runs a tapas bar on the island in her free time called 'Moov' and appears to have connections to the local Thai mafia. (She has emphasized how 'safe' she is here, but has never said why.) Sadly some of our group got nailed in a scam when hiring a scooter and were forced to pay 10,000 Baht to get their passports back after being accused of making a scratch that was already there. Needless to say none of use have hired scooters on the island since!

Had a relaxing day yesterday with some snorkelling at Tanote Bay where Pete saw a black tipped reef shark and our taxi driver encouraged us to smother ourselves in banana to attract the fish! Ate a delicious Tapas dinner at Mama G's restaurant and saw a ladyboy cabaret show that made us want to poke our eyes out with a stick. Was an excellent laugh though and a few girls were even pulled up on stage to do a little dance!

 

Posing with one of the Ladyboys...she could have been on the cover of GQ!

 

Mama G's tapas bar "Moov"

 

Amazing palms (I think they're palms...)

 

Small statues everywhere!

 

Climbing the cliff for a view blocked by a tree...grrr!

 

Nothing like a 7-11 toastie to get a guy going in the morning!

           Beach along Koh Tao