Touristy Bangkok

Well, it's only taken over 4 years of living in this country, but I finally had to succumb and do the rather embarrassing thing and become a Bangkok tourist. There are so many things to do and see in this city yet I have done so few of them. I suppose it's always the case that when you live somewhere you'd rather not spend your free time traipsing around in the heat, with crowds of often irritating and ignorant tourists who just add to the Thai understanding of foreigner equals stupid person who's easy to rip off. Also it's very easy to put these visits off when you are tired and you know there's always going to be another occasion to go.

Saying all this however, when Nick's mum Val came to stay we felt that it was the perfect opportunity to see some of Bangkok's best sites. We were on holiday at the time so figured we'd have more patience for the whole malarkey, not having had to shout at kids all week.

From the morning Val arrived we had a jam packed itinerary planned. Not sure how it happened, but it seemed to revolve more around eating than anything else. Eating with the odd temple and a fair amount of shopping thrown in. Val landed at about 7.30 and after getting a taxi back to the apartment and barely having chance to get her bearings we were out and on our way to a huge plant market that specializes in orchids. Now I've never been much of a flower person, but the colour and shapes of the masses of orchids that are hung in shops at head height are an incredible site. It's also pretty cool to wander through the jungle of plant shops there. After lunch out we headed home to rest up before going out again for dinner.

The next day was the one I had been dreading most. We were going up to the grand palace and this meant lots of tourists, touts and the annoying fact that we had to wear closed shoes, long sleeved tops and cover our knees, all in midday sun. The day didn't really start that well with us being misdirected a number of times by 'helpful' locals telling us that the palace was in fact closed today and was only open to Thais, or that the palace was open but not for the next hour as it was lunchtime. Although I've learnt to not listen to strange people who pull you over in the street and tell you things like this, it did get quite annoying listening to all the excuses as to why we couldn't go in and peoples 'helpful' and 'innocent' range of suggestions as to where we should go instead. Eventually though we found the main entrance, clearly distinguished by the heard of 'farangs' or 'white people' going in. Beside the entrance there was a huge information sign, at the bottom of which it stated in bold writing 'beware of wily strangers'. Getting into the grounds of the palace was just the start. Once there we found that while girls could in fact show so much leg they couldn't really call what they are wearing 'a skirt', guys had to wear long trousers. Nick's 3/4 length trousers didn't make the grade so we had to wait while he went in and borrowed trousers. Now most people don't know this but in Thailand they have something we call 300 % employment, meaning they have 3 people to do one person's job. Nick had to go in, get a slip of paper off one person, pay money to another person, collect trousers from another person and then hand in the slip elsewhere, or something to that effect. Obviously when you add in the number of people queueing to get clothes, it only takes one confused person to send the whole thing into chaos. As you can imagine by the time we finally got into the palace we were more than a little harassed and Nick was most definitely not in the touristy mood.



I am pleased to say though, the Grand Palace was well worth all the hassle of getting there. It is like walking inside a life size jewelry box. There is more bling than you can imagine. What was most surprising, is that after getting around the first corner, you can find whole areas without a single person to walk across your pics which is usually the norm in places like this. As you can see by the photos, it really is quite amazing.


The next thing we had planned was slightly less touristy. We had arranged to do a bike tour of a part of Bangkok that is actually on an island surrounded by the Chao Praya River. This island has been made into a kind of nature reserve, with few roads and many raised narrow walkways. To get to the island we had to first ride along and across 4-6 lanes of traffic, getting up close and personal with Bangkok's unpredictable truck and taxi drivers. We then put our bikes in a long tail boat and went across the river to Bang Kra Jao. We then followed our guide along quiet leafy lanes and then rather precariously along paths about 3 feet wide and up to 7 feet off the ground. Now biking has never been one of my stronger skills and when you combine this with the fact that I have appalling balance when standing on two feet let alone on a bike with a 7 foot drop on either side, I spent the whole time praying that I'd not end up in the canal or swamp below. Thankfully though, I was spared this embarrassment, and it was the rather arrogant stockbroker from Sydney who came off his bike instead. And he was riding along a flat bit of road. (And yes, I know I look stupid with a cycling helmet, but I have learnt the hard way about not wearing protective headgear for sports I'm not that good at.)










Some of the other things we did included eating and shopping at the night market, eating and shopping at the weekend market, visiting Khao San on a difficult 'bag with bells' shopping quest, visiting the giant reclining Buddha at Wat Po, going on a much more enjoyable dinner cruise along the river, eating at the famous Blue Elephant restaurant and a rather eventful trip to the Sky Bar where my first aid skills were called into action when the Thai girl next to me hit the deck and blacked out for a couple of minutes. Still not sure if it was the height, the alcohol or just a way of escaping her date, but it was a rather surreal experience anyway.


All in all, it was a very hectic 10 days. Thanks to Val we had the motivation to go and do both the usual and unusual sights in Bangkok, and I would be happy to do it all again. We did however decide that it would be quite some time before we ate out again, and maybe we'd done enough shopping to last us a while.

As far from relaxing as a trip can be...

After a most enjoyable diving trip to Lembeh we decided that it would be a waste to go all the way to Sulawesi and not see some of the sites above water.

We arranged to go up into the highlands to stay in the 'picturesque' town of Tomohon. Advertised as a peaceful retreat in a quaint town famed for its flowers and greenery, on the saddle of three volcanoes, a short 70 kilometre drive from the Airport.

That short 70 kilometre drive must have been as the crow flies, and seeing as 70 percent of our journey was up and along some of the windiest roads I've ever been on the 'short' journey took us a queasy 2 and a half hours. Also, when we arrived to Tomohon, we found that the 'quaint flowery town' was a sprawling and rather unattractive concrete mess.

We found all the afore mentioned flowers and greenery at the home stay we had booked in at. Set in a lush and pretty garden, it is a small home stay with only 4 'deluxe' (basic) bungalows. We even had a pond with fountain outside our room. Once upon a time our bungalow would have had volcano views, they just happened to be obscured by trees now. It seemed pretty laid back when we arrived, but after the long drive there we were happy just to kick back, relax and enjoy the peace and quiet.

I'm not sure if, in all my years of low budget traveling, bad locations and noisy generators, I have ever experienced a peaceful place that was so incredibly noisy. As soon as the sun went down the cicadas started going. They were soon to be completely drowned out by the frogs, who seemed to be in residence in our pond. Not content with all the noise, the neighbourhood dogs would also take their turn and begin howling at regular intervals. At some point they must have all quieted down enough for us to get some sleep as we were woken up at 4am by rather aggressive lecturing in Indonesian over a loud speaker. This went on, along with bouts of singing, at full blast until about 6 am. We then drifted back to sleep to be promptly woken again by oxen clattering along with rickety carts up and down the bumpy lane directly behind our bungalow.

Feeling far from fresh we weren't inspired to do much on the first day and only drummed up the enthusiasm to go for a wander late afternoon in search of some local delights for a late lunch. Within about 10 minutes we were caught in a torrential downpour and had to shelter in a plant shop on the side of the road for about 15 minutes. The rain let up enough to get a taxi van and we made it too a local supermarket (also noisy with music on so loud the staff couldn't hear you) to pick up some supplies. The rain started again so we admitted defeat and went next door to KFC for lunch. So much for sampling the local delights.

Thankfully the next night was slightly quieter, with the church preaching only going on till about 10pm and not starting again until about 7am. The next day we had arranged to hire a motorbike from the home stay and so we could do a bit of exploring. When the bike arrived we ended up with 3 different people telling us how to use the bike and deal with it's completely backward way of functioning. Of course when people are watching it always makes things harder and it took is a very frustrating 20 minutes of being told different things in different languages before we eventually got going. Due to the fact that the bike was finally started and seemed to stall when going below 20 kilometres an hour we we didn't dare stop for over an hour, by which point we'd realized the map we had been given was very inaccurate, we had forgotten to bring a camera and our bums were completely numb. Getting a bit lost was probably the best thing we could have done. We eventually found one of the big lakes we were looking for, but took a very winding route around it. We went past endless quaint, peaceful and flowery villages where it seemed that every man, woman, child and dog were in their Sunday best and either in church, on their way to church, or finished in church and on their way to the communal lunch gathering. I don't think I've ever been to a more religious place, even the smallest villages have a minimum of three churches. People seem to be praying morning, noon and night quite literally, not to mention in full voice at 4am.

Apart from the noise and the incredibly temperamental bike, the trip did end up being quite relaxing. There was a lot of time for reading, sudoku, and losing at backgammon. We never did manage to get the camera out, so the pics are from the home stay website.

Lembeh Straits

Ok, so have been really lazy recently and not been able to keep up to date with everything that’s been happening.
After what felt like an absolute age, we finally made it to the end of Semester One (no mean feat as it’s the longer of the two with less holidays). It’s been a pretty uneventful year of teaching so far, apart from having to watch one inept member of staff repeatedly perform unprecedented acts of ignorance and stupidity. Not even going to go there as he’s been ranted about more than enough. Anyway, after sitting around twiddling our thumbs for a week after the kids were allowed to go on holiday, we were finally released.

(If you’re not a fish person read no further…..!!)

Nick and I had decided to treat ourselves to a slightly more expensive dive trip as we had less time than usual for our hols. In the diving world (especially out here) you hear about Lembeh Straits a lot; it’s supposed to be the place to be for ‘muck’ diving. Now the idea of swimming around in poor visibility picking through trash and looking for things that hide in dark places, has never quite taken my fancy before. After a year of intensive wall and coral diving with 20-30m vis in Roatan we were up for something a little bit different.

We stayed in a small resort on the island of Lembeh which is off the north-east side of Sulawesi in Indonesia. The area is incredibly volcanic, with one of the nearby volcanoes having only erupted 2 months ago. 90% of the diving is done over black volcanic sand. The visibility is poor, although we were quite lucky, getting 5-10m. The water at 27 degrees, felt arctic to me. I know that I am setting myself up to be totally ridiculed for that but hey, I get cold, and my wetsuit is ancient, squished to about 1.5 mil and patchy. The worst part of it was that the dives were long and as most people know cold water creates the need to pee, as I refuse to ‘go’ in my wetsuit, it got to be quite painful at times.

Surprisingly though, although the dives were long and most of the time we were just swimming over flat expanses of dirty black sand, interspersed evenly with coral and trash, it never really got boring. Every day we’d see something new in the book and ask our guide to find it. He’d then choose the best dive site for it and would search up and down until he found it. He’d often lose us as we’d have our head in the sand but would be able to find us again then lead us back to whatever it was we were looking for without the aid of any bottom markers or compass. It makes me realize that I’ve never really needed to learn proper navigational skills for anywhere else I’ve been, you take it for granted when you have reef to follow.

While we were there, we ticked off most of our wish list. We got to see most things twice and more nudibranchs than I could have hoped for. Some of the best bits were (in photo order); a small Wonderpus trying to eat a big Wonderpus (either that or something rude), Pygmy seahorses, Mandarin fish, Ornate Ghost Pipefish, giant frogfish, Hairy frogfish, 10-15 inch nudis, mantis shrimp, flamboyant cuttlefish and Paddle-flap Scorpionfish . The best way I can describe the diving here, is that it’s like going out into the woods and turning over stones to see all the creepy crawlies underneath. Quite a lot of the time I didn’t like the way the guides interacted with the fish; moving them to be seen and shaking out hessian sacking and brambles so stuff comes out. However, I kind of understand that this is the way that they do it out there, and that they are used to having to push things out in the open long enough for everybody to get their photos. Our guide was good though and soon realized that we didn’t approve.

The diving part of the holiday went well beyond expectations, the place we stayed was beautiful; the food great, the staff accommodating. We were really lucky to be given our own guide and put on the boat with less people and smaller groups each time. They took us wherever we wanted, whenever we wanted and would do a night dive for one person without complaint even when they had already done 3 dives that day.

I would love to take credit for all these pics, but sadly my housing has died. All these photos were taken by Nick, I've never mastered the patience required anyway!!

A different way to do dinner

One of the things that I looked forward to most about coming out to Thailand was the fact that I'd be able to afford to eat out more. Whether it's at cheapy street vendor places or by treating ourselves to a night out at one of the many slightly more expensive (but still ridiculously cheap) restaurants in our area, we have been eating at least once a week. We have been trying to do something I've never been able to do elsewhere, and that's work our way down the substantial list of local restaurants.

As Nick and I recently passed our 2 year milestone, we decided to do something a little bit different to celebrate. When I first came to Thailand many years ago, my dad took me on one of the old Thai rice barge dinner cruises. You get a set Thai food or Seafood dinner and it is served to you while you slowly chug up river past all the illuminated temples, hotels, and the Grand Palace.

Nick and I booked ourselves onto one of the small traditional converted teak rice barges called the 'Wan Fah' boat. We met the boat at about 18.45 (unfortunately just too late for sunset at this time of year), and were taken up river to see all the sites while food was served. Dinner was accompanied by a smiling Thai percussionist positioned at the front of the boat, who was subjected to paparazzi style photography when we had passed all the temples and stuff.

After dinner was finished and we were on our way back down river, a traditional Thai dance show was performed, where both male and female characters wear the most glittering and ornate costumes and masks. The show was great, the touristy part at the end where they try and get you to dance was not. I managed to avoid this, but was subjected to that cringing embarrassment of others making idiots of themselves.

The trip was lovely and is a must for those visiting Bangkok, if only to see the river lit up at night. At that time of day you can't see the brown milky colour of the water so it looks quite pretty. The only downside of the night was the fact that the dinner was so rushed. We were served our first dish before we'd even left the pier, and all the other dishes were served at speed. We were trying to eat at a relaxing pace and every time I put my spoon back in my bowl someone tried to whip my soup away. I ended up having to wave my spoon in the air every time anyone neared the table.

A little incentive....

I recently decided that it'd be a good idea to get fit. I was feeling rather sluggish and substantially overweight and was simply waiting for inspiration to get moving. I went out for dinner and a friend of a friend mentioned that they have started training for the Bangkok mini marathon in November. Where as most people murmured words like 'crazy', 'fool' and 'smog, heat, pollution' I thought it was quite a good idea.

I have undertaken to get properly fit on a few occasions in my life and each time it has resulted in a somewhat 'obsessive' approach to exercise. It seems that I can't motivate myself to do it unless I do it everyday. Then it seems that when I don't do it I don't feel right so I'm more able to keep going.

Over the last month I have been running on the treadmill a lot, doing yoga, interval training and other such energetic things. This all takes place in the small and meagerly furnished gym in our apartment. Here the treadmill is so old that you have to make sure you foot hits it with backward propulsion or it stops dead and you fall off. It took me about 3 sessions to master the technique. I had managed to get up to about 5 kilometres a session within 2 weeks. However I am very aware that running on a treadmill is nothing like proper outdoor running so I started to look for somewhere nearby to go running outside. I live about 3 kilometres from the biggest park in Bangkok that is a sea of exercise enthusiasts morning and night, but I don't fancy the ride there and back on the back of a motorbike through rush hour traffic, especially not the way back when I'm all sweaty, and I'm certainly not such an enthusiast to run 5-10k and then walk 3k home.

One of my colleagues mentioned that he goes running right behind my apartment. Much to my surprise, one of the most popular exercise spots in the area is the largest Chinese Cemetery in Bangkok. I went down there last week for the first time and found that not only does the cemetery have a marked running track, but it also has areas for basketball, Taikwando, badminton, Thai-chi, aerobics, learning the 'Cha-Cha' and a huge weight park all surrounded by the thousands of traditional grass covered, waist high mounds of the Chinese tombs. Not only are there hundreds of people who choose to go there to get fit, there are those who go there to join one of the many games of chequers, to relax, eat and watch TV, or just to sit on the grass and watch everybody else get fit. Yesterday I even saw runners taking a break to sing karaoke. It's hard to know who there's more of; those above ground or those below.

I never thought that what is technically a graveyard could be such a social place. Everybody is really friendly and seems to know everyone else. The number of people old and young who are there getting fit is a big encouragement, but there is no better incentive than the surroundings themselves to make you want to get fit. I am now up to running 8k!!

The pic above is not one of the cemetery I go to but I've not been brave enough to take me camera.

My new favourite place

As I mentioned on the last update, the Thai government obviously feels that we've been overworked this month what with having 2 bank holidays, and had decided to give us a third bank holiday on the spur of the moment. What was nice about this one was that it was so people could go back to their home town and vote, meaning that going away on a break was a reasonably stress free event.
For this weekend we had arranged to go to the closest island to Bangkok, a little known island called Koh Sichang. This small island which can be more or less explored on a bike in a day is often dropped from most peoples holiday considerations as it is located close to the mouth of the Chao Phrya; the dirty great river that flows out through Bangkok. I only know about this island as I was taken there by some long-term expats in 2001. As I recalled the island was low key and relaxing while also being pretty easy to get to. However, the price you pay for convenience and quiet is that it lacks the crystal clear waters and the bars to go to.

The journey down to the island was reasonably uneventful. We left school at 15.00 and were on the bus and moving by 16.00, just over 2 hours later we were sitting on the top of an old Thai ferry with an amused collection of Thais. I have been told many times that you should never trust a Thai boat and it's always wise to sit out in the open or on the top deck, definitely not down below where they usually try and shove you. The boat ride out to the island was an interesting 45 minutes; in the dark with only the occasional use of a spotlight, in slightly big swell, you slalom in and out of the many giant tankers and cargo ships that are waiting to be unloaded with the goods for Bangkok. You never quite realize just how big those things are until you're running along the side of one in a decrepit old wooden boat. The journey was a little bit hair-raising at times but we arrived at the pier safely and were met by the owner of the resort we were staying in.

From our last trip away I was fully prepared this time for the resort to be a bit of a disappointment and not as nice as the pictures. I am very happy to say that this time I had no reason to worry. No photos can really do this location justice. Not only that, but the owners went out of their way to make us feel welcome. As we were taken to our hut which was slightly back from the water but still with a good view, we were told that we would be able to move to one of the other huts later. Then we were taken down to a mat that was laid out for us to eat and drink on the top of the rocks overlooking the sea. The resort we stayed in was called Malee Blue and is owned by an architect and a landscaper. They are a lovely couple and they have put thoughtful touches everywhere. Most places I go in Thailand I always end up saying 'now why did they put that there...?' Or 'what we could just do with is a....' This wasn't the case here. The owners (much to the amusement and criticism from the other people living on the island) tried to make it as un-resort like as possible. They wanted to make it feel like a fishing village, completely natural, without any concrete and in a remote place away from the pier. While building it they were often told they were crazy and they should build on the road and make concrete apartments. Thankfully they did not listen and they now have the most popular and beautiful place to stay on the island. There are only 11 huts and the place has the feeling of a community. In the evening most guests end up fishing for squid off the rocks and it means you end up talking to far more people than you usually would, be it in pidgin English or Thai. While I was staying there my Thai improved a lot, one evening I commented on some of the food we ate, the next day they took me in the kitchen and taught me how to cook it. With my basic Thai it was very entertaining for all (I think most of the staff and family came to watch!).

Apart from having somewhere so nice to stay the weekend was also really enjoyable due to the fact we hired a motorbike for most of the time we were there. I explored more of the island this time than in all the previous visits combined. Our first visit was to an old Chinese shrine built in a temple on the hillside. The best thing about the Khao Yai Spirit Shrine was probably the view, but the shrine itself was quite interesting, set in a cave that had been painted completely gold and had a figure carved into the wall. We continued up the hill from the shrine another 300 steps to see the imprint of the Buddha's footprint and a rather well dressed rock. The steep climb in noon heat nearly killed us but the view from the top was worth it, as was the cooling breeze!!
Next stop was to the old Phra Chuthathut Palace. This was once used by the royals when on holidays from Bangkok. Most of the buildings have gone now but a few pretty ones remain and the grounds are still well kept. Our main reason for going there was to walk up the white chedi that stands on the hill. Apparently one of the kings had this chedi specially designed to be hollow so that he could go inside and meditate. We had the place to ourselves and were kindly allowed to go inside. It's in a fantastic location and is really peaceful.

Even when we weren't going anywhere in particular it was just nice to explore the island's quiet tracks and roads on the bike. Koh Sichang is unlike most other Thai islands and is rocky, craggy and slightly windswept. It's more like Scotland than Phi Phi or Samui. We went down to the only beach on the island and had a drink, but didn't stay there long as the beach had rubbish on it and the water wasn't very clean. We then took a bit of a wrong turn on the way back and ended up driving through a disused quarry and up a small track on the other side. Along here we found a lady and her herd of goats chilling out under some trees and a very small and rocky beach with nice clean inviting water. No tourists and absolutely no umbrellas.

All in all, this was one of the most rewarding and relaxing trips I have been on. What with the cool breeze, nice surroundings, good food and friendly people, I was really sad to have to leave. I can't wait to go back. Hopefully I only have to wait till next month!

Long weekend away

So…. After 8 full weeks of teaching without one of Thailand’s many bank holidays last weekend we finally got to take a short break and go away for 4 days. Nick and I were joined by a friend from work and his girlfriend and we headed out for some R ‘n’ R in the back of beyond.

We had decided that we wanted to do something a little different and avoid the regular tourist areas; places within driving distance of Bangkok end up absolutely crawling over bank hols and it can end up taking over 5 hours longer than usual to get there and back. For this bank hol Nick had found a resort that was in a little known area called Kung Wiman about 40 kilometres from Chantaburi.

Our journey down there was surprisingly easy for a bank hol, we seemed to avoid all the traffic. We got to the resort, a new ‘eco’ spa retreat, and it felt like we were the only ones there. In fact, by the time we had eaten breakfast (a single option of bacon and eggs to be consumed everyday for four days!) the next day, we still hadn’t seen anyone else. The resort was not far from the beach and we got stared at quite a lot when we walked down there. There were no tourists Thai or otherwise anywhere to be seen. Over the course of the next four days we didn’t see another foreigner in the area, it is definitely the most ‘Thai’ experience I’ve ever had. Kung Wiman seems quite new to the hol scene and when we hired the bikes we did see busier areas, but it was kinda nice that things were so quiet around us. We got to enjoy the beaches without jet skis and banana boats.

The break was mainly eating, reading and playing cards. The food was fantastic but limited. We ate seafood more or less straight for 4 days, and for someone who is reasonably new to eating fish, prawns and crabs (especially the type you have to peel, crack or de-leg) it was quite an experience. By the time I got back to Bangkok I was desperate to eat steak or bangers and mash. However, if it hadn’t been for our Thai friend who came with us our menu would have been even more limited as everywhere we went the menus where only in Thai and my food ordering is far from up to scratch.

On our day exploring the area (on rather decrepit mopeds), we checked out another beach, visited a local temple and went around the local mangrove forest. The King here is very environmentally minded and has set up an educational tour around the plantation that is constantly being extended. It’s all free and really well set out. You can see new areas being planted and also oysters being grown. While we were down there I tried oysters for the first time (cold, de-shelled and over ice, definitely not to my taste), we got around 50 oysters for less than 1 pound 50.

The place we stayed was set in really lush tropical gardens with waterfall, pool and lookout point over the surrounding area. We did find that although the rooms were nice and the people there very friendly, that they were not really set up for guests. In the pictures posted on the internet all of the terraces are decked out with cushions, mats and plants to make them look nice and inviting. When we got there the terraces were more or less bare with not a plant or mat to be seen. Me being the ‘pushing demanding foreigner’ that I am, obviously was not ready to let this slip as most Thai visitors would and went and asked for cushions and mats so we could sit outside. It took 3 attempts before the staff went and raided the proprietor’s house for stuff. This was obviously a case of dressing the place up for pictures, and while I understand that this takes place everywhere, there is a limit. I hope that they now realize that people will come to expect what is advertised and they need to be a little more prepared. On a better note, the spa treatments were professionally done and the massage was well worth it.

After our 4 day weekend we have now returned to work and are just about to take another 3 day weekend. Even better than this, is the fact that somebody high up the chain of command has just decided that 2 bank holidays in a month isn’t enough and that we need one more. We have just had a week on Monday confirmed as ‘Referendum Day’ and we have another day off.

The pictures are from around the garden, our explorations, and our room. You get the nicely presented brochure picture of our room. After much pestering we got some resemblance of this.

Football Madness...

Currently Bangkok is holding some of the football matches for the AFC Asian Cup. Somehow somebody managed to convince me that it was a good idea to go watch the Thailand V Australia game. The idea seemed a good one at first; give Nick a chance to watch footie and go support the locals and all that, also any sporting event involving Aussies is usually a laugh. However, when it came to the day of the event and we were trying to work out how to get to this new international stadium, we found that there was no way of getting clear directions of how to get there, no website (including the organizers of the competition) had a map for directions. The only things we did quickly learn was that there was no form of public transport to anywhere in the region of the ground, and that every person you ask or site you search gives you different instructions on how to get there.

After deciding on a route and packing our rain macs we set off under an ominously darkening sky. After a bit of grumbling we managed to convince the first taxi driver that came along that the journey wouldn’t take too long and he should take us all the way. As the sky got darker and the traffic slowed, our driver began to mutter the word ‘traffic’ under his breathe with increasing frequency and started subtly pointing out the benefits and convenience of all the motorbike taxis going past us. It didn't take us long to realize that we’d chosen one of the most congested and roundabout ways we could have gone.

We arrived at the ground nearly two hours later and having paid nearly double the asking amount to the taxi driver for his reasonably quiet grumblings, the skies had well and truly opened and the rain looked set in to stay. It seems that the Thai approach to organization and safety at sporting events is predictably bad. The first gate into the stadium grounds that we walked past was closed and had men, women (many in high heels) and children climbing about 8 feet to get over. There were no officials around and we thought for one moment that perhaps this was the done things and that the gates had been closed early. After wandering around the ground we found the correct way in and then joined a queue to get into the stadium itself. I use the word 'queue' in the loosest sense of the term as it seems that in Asia that queue means that 30% of people stand in what could be called a line and happily ignore the other 70% who stroll straight up to form a widening mass at the front. Now being British and from a nation of expert queuers, I find this highly irritating, more for the fact that no-one else sees fit to stop others from doing this. Following that old 'if you can't beat them join them' rule, we abandoned the queue and walked to the front. We got there just at the point everybody else decided to do the same, the result being that around 200 people were all trying to cram through a gap about half a metre wide. Thanks to Nick we got through just at the point it looked like it was turning into a crush.

Once inside the stadium things were a little better. We quickly realized why our seats were so much cheaper than some of our friends, we had no roof and the rain was still falling. We were sat in the Aussie section but it seemed that there was little segregation between the Thai and Aussie areas, in fact they were pretty much mixed. The Aussie supporters were wearing yellow to match their team, but as it was Monday the Thais were all also wearing yellow even though their team colours are red (more about the yellow obsession some other time). It was hard to tell the supporters apart.

The match was better than we expected and the Thais actually played some pretty good football. It got really exciting in the second half and even though the Aussies were one up it looked like the Thais were going to score. Anyway, after 75 mins we decided to make an early exit to avoid a 2-3 hour journey home. In the last 15 minutes after we left Australia scored 3 more times. Shame we missed the goals, but glad we missed the noisy and rather obnoxious Aussie supporters next to us bragging. Missing the goals was worth it anyway when the journey that took us 2 hours on the way there took us 20 minutes on the way back.

A day in the life of an ESL teacher...

We’ve now been teaching for over 2 months and are settling into our daily routine as teachers in Bangkok, and it seems like a good time to let you know exactly what it is we do out here.

There is a whole range of teachers working in Bangkok in a vast variety of positions. It is possible to earn enough money to survive here just by working odd days teaching at language institutes. Here a teacher will teach a handful of different small classes but will only see each set of students once a week for a few hours. This option is great for those who aren’t in need of a large amount of money and the security of work permit. It means there is more freedom to do as you choose and there’s less time required on lesson planning. While these classes can be fun as they are mainly conversation based, you don’t really get to know you’re students that well.
There are also quite a lot of people who do only corporate work. They go from place to place offering seminars to different companies. I have had next to no experience of this type of teaching so don’t really know the details. From talking to friends though, I’ve learnt that it generally involves a great deal of planning and travelling around, and you can often end up just being a foreign face there more for show because the government requires it, than actually expected to teach people.
The large majority of teachers in the city are based within schools. Again, the variety of the work available is great. When I started teaching in 2001, I was based in an all girls’ government school. I had 27 classes a week with up to sixty students per class. Often there were not enough desks in the classroom, the girls knew very little English, and I was faced with stony expressions and very little desire to learn. On top of the 27 hours of teaching I had to mark (and usually complete) the worksheets each girl was expected to do in every class. That’s roughly 1600 worksheets. Basically this adds up to very long hours, very poor pay, absolutely no job satisfaction and just generally a horrific experience. I lasted a sum total of 3 weeks and 2 days in this position...just long enough to get my wages and run.

These days life is a little bit easier. We begin our day at 6.30 am, with a reasonably relaxed breakfast and shower (well relaxed by my usual 10 minute bed to door dash standards), before taking an 8 minute stroll to work. We get to work at about 7.20 and have to be ready to stand outside the classroom with the students for morning assembly, this includes singing the national anthem and the school song, mercifully teachers are not expected to join in. Classes then start at 8.00, break at 9.00-9.15, lunch at 11.05-12.00, break at 13.50-14.00, with regular classes then finishing at 3.00. Two days a week teachers also teach the extra ‘homework’ classes for those students paying for them. School then closes at 16.00.
As a grade one ‘homeroom’ teacher, I am expected to teach English, Science, Maths, Phonics and Conversation to 6-7 year olds. I teach my own class for sixteen 55 minute periods a week and am sometimes required to teach small conversation groups from other classes (though this has yet to happen this year). For an example of the standard of grade one at Bangkok Christian College; we are currently covering animals in Science and the students are now expected not only to be able to name animals, they must also talk about where they live, what they eat and classify them as mammals, reptiles, fish, amphibians or birds and talk about their life-cycles, all in a foriegn language. This is very different from anything I was learning as a six year old!!
If you’re lucky, you can be approached to teach privately after school. This is a pretty good money earner and means you can make nearly half your salary again for just an extra hours work a day. I teach for between one and two extra hours a day, which makes for a pretty long day but is worth it, especially as it’s really rewarding working one on one with students who are having difficulties.

Teaching is just about the only job that I can see myself doing long term. As long as it is interspersed with regular diving breaks that is!! You get great job satisfaction, constant variety, long paid hols, decent pay for living in a tropical place (if you’re lucky). I’m not going to mention all the lesson planning, marking, poster and worksheet making!!

The pictures are of my students pretending to be good and actually do some work.

Kanchanaburi

So...there’s one really bad thing I forgot about teaching, the fact that you’re sick more often than not. When you put 33 bodies into one small space, have them go outside, get hot and sweaty or wet from the rain before coming in to a nicely chilled air-conditioned classroom, there’s bound to be a lot of sickness, and we always one kid off at a time with something or other. The week before last I had a bad time in my class and seemed to do nothing but shout, by the end of the week I was off with a migraine. I felt like death and the headaches took about 3 days to go. Having recovered from this we decided that the following weekend we needed to take a break from the city and head out to the mountains of Kanchanaburi for some R ‘n’ R. We figured it would be a good idea to get some fresh air and chill out.

We have found an amazing place in Kanchanaburi; it is a small guesthouse on the banks of the River Kwai. We stay in a raft-house right on the river. About a kilometre up river is the bridge over the river Kwai. This is the famous bridge that was built during the Second World War when the Japanese wanted to link Thailand and Burma. It is estimated that 16,000 POWs and 100,000 Asian labourers died whilst working on the bridge, railway and the famous ‘Hellfire Pass’. I have been up to Kanchanaburi at least 15 times and most of those times have included a trip up to the bridge; when you can get a moment free of tourists (and there are many happy snapping visitors at all hours) you get to feel a little of the history of the place. Most of the time however, there are too many tourists having their pics taken so you just have to join in and look gormless with your camera. As you can see from the pictures though, the bridge has been left with a reasonably bare structure. Much to the entertainment of the local long-tail boat drivers, those with slightly less co-ordination and concentration have been known to step right through the gaps and drop 30 feet into the brown river below (not mentioning any names but for once it wasn’t me....).

This most recent trip to Kanchanaburi we decided we wanted to explore the hills a bit more. We hired a moped, stocked up on chicken fried rice and took off in the vague direction of the hills. When you leave the rather large and touristy town of Kanchanaburi behind, you soon get out into really scenic areas with people drying grasses in the road and farmers driving cattle and goats along the verges. The houses get fewer and further between and more and more rustic. It wasn’t until after an hour of riding in the baking sun that we realised we’d forgotten any form of drink and the chance of a shop was quite remote. After rehydrating at a random ‘Pepsi’ stop we then ate lunch under a tarpaulin while sheltering from the rain – very glam. On the way back to town we got caught again and ended up pulling up under a bus shelter as the rain hammered down. We started a trend and were soon joined by 4 others.

Anyway, after our rather wet and chilly drive back we have both spent over a week recovering. We both still have hacking coughs and sore throats, and due to the fact that I have to make myself heard amongst a class full of over-excited 6 year olds, I have been giving Marge Simpson a run for her money all week. So much for a healthy break from the city