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Good morning my friends, I hope you are well on this glorious Sunday morning.
Today is the much revered King's birthday in Thailand and I have awoken with a bit of a hangover and thought it a good opportunity to update you all on how my week and has gone since my last epic.
So last weekend we had planned a little BBQ in our beautiful surroundings for a few of the Ferang teachers. It was a bit of a chore gathering bricks and all the equipment we required to build the "Bray" as my South African friends refer to it, as despite having the sum total of 4 bikes to do so you can imagine the difficulty of bringing anything back of any size or weight. Eventually we had what we required and with the sun beating down on our frazzled bodies and minds the men set forth to do as we were born to, quibble and posture as to the best way to build, light and cook on a BBQ. It is always our time to shine ladies. We are in our element at these times, so leave us be.
Anyway, we were a successful in our quest and slowly but surely the expats arrived and the food was joyfully and deliciously cooked mainly by Calvin, the resident chef, and we all tucked into the succulent array of meats, not to mention the vast tsunami of beers and Thai whisky. We had anticipated a decent turnout having asked a few people to come in Johnnie's shack the previous night but to our surpise we were over-run with visitors, pleasantly surprised I have to say, as we all had a belting evening swapping stories and anedotes, laughing long into the night.
When the dust had settled and the hangovers died down Russ spearheaded the cleanup operation and found 76 large empty beer bottles and 12 empty whisky bottles, that was some going, and cracking business for the local shopkeepers.
That pretty much took up last weekend, though I annoyingly convinced myself it was a good idea to stay up late Sunday night and watch Liverpool lose in the last minutes of added time. A right kick in the spuds...
The rest of the week passed without much incident as it generally does. Work tends to dominate my week so nights usually pass quietly after the occasional hassle of rustling up some grub. There is a continual grievance I have with my school however, and from I have heard Thai schools in general. Their complete and utter lack of any kind of communication, especially when dealing with us "ferangs". A classic example being the king's birthday celebrations which take place today and should result in a National holiday tomorrow. Our school has only just informed us that we dont have tomorrow off at all, despite all schools elsewhere being closed. Not only that but for some baffling reason we are to teach Friday's timetable on Monday instead of a normal Monday's. Bizzare in the extreme and further annoying due to Friday being my busiest day.
Ho-hum, it does really wind me up as it is such a simple and crucial part of any workplace hat intends to work well as a team but while people still resignedly say "that is Thailand", then things will never change. This maybe Thailand but it is not an excuse to let things fly that could be improved and make their nation a better place to live. Attitude reflects leadership, captain.
That takes me to this weekend, where I had planned, along with a good few others, to visit the beautiful island of Koh Mook off the coast for a night on Saturday. So after a hesitantly early night on the Friday in anticipation we awoke to find out from a friend who owns a resort their tell us it was not worth coming due to a storm that would be hanging around all weekend. Gutted.com. I had really been looking forward to that, but it can happen any weekend I suppose, I will get there one day soon.
Hastily we decided that we would arrange another BBQ at our gaff in the same vein as last weekend. It seemed to down well then and the idea was met with approval again. Once again they arrived in their droves and much merriment was had by all, full bellies and hazy brains sloped off into the night from whence they had came. It was another belting evening and I fear we may becoming too accomodating in our hospitality, I hope that people dont believe this to be a weekly event!
That brings me to today, when I plan to as close to nothing as possible. The problem with being away is that you feel you constantly have to live life as if it were a holiday, when in fact this is no vacation, but my daily reality, so occasionally you just have to give yourself a day of nothing, and I am enjoying it thus far.
The week ahead is a short one, I have to do my Visa run on Thursday and get a new stamp in my passport good for another 90 days. Seeing as we re off school for an actual national holiday on the Friday and I only have two lessons on the Thursday which I have no rearranged I have decided to make a bit of a night of it. Heading down to the Malaysian border Thursday morning, get the stamp and then decide whether to spend the night in Hat Yai nearby or oin one of the Malysian border towns, which are an apparent hive of seediness and bars. Either way it will be nice to start a long weekend by seeing another place. Then perhaps a trip to one of the Trang islands come the actual weekend, good things await in the near future.
That about wraps up my musings for this episode, Thanks go to my mum for successfully sending me some giftwrapped presents for Christmas. They are staring at me with constant temptation but i shall hold out, it will be worth it to have something on the day itself. There is also talk of getting a little tree and some decorations for our littlw homesteads, give us a bit of the festive cheer you no doubt all have in abundance back home, though you can keep the snow thanks!
Tata for now.
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