Alistair in Thailand 2012 & 2013

THIS LATEST ENTRY COVERS MY SUMMER HOLIDAYS. I HOPE YOU ENJOY READING ABOUT MY TRAVELS AND EXPLORATIONS AND CHECK OUT THE MANY BEAUTIFUL PHOTOS IN MY GALLERY.

MARCH 12-14th UDON THANI

I decided to stay in Udon because I was unsure about making the flight to Chiang Mai on time on the day I left school because I was uncertain what time I’d be able to leave.

Every time I come to this city I see changes. The week before I arrived the new Tukcom opened with a big fanfare. There are Tukcoms in a few other Thai cities – they are computer/IT centres with dozens of related large and small stores inside plus some related stores and many different eateries. It is always interesting walking around such places to see what’s new and with Tukcom itself being new to Udon there were plenty of special opening offers.

Udon is also a good place to pick up some of the latest DVDs for 50 baht (around £1.20) which is far cheaper than anywhere else.

The shocking thing is that the baht is now very strong with the effect that one now gets only 43 point something baht for £1 whereas only a few weeks ago one got 46-48 baht per pound. Thailand is getting more and more expensive as the baht strengthens and the pound weakens.

CHIANG MAI: MARCH 14-21st and MARCH 28th – 4th APRIL

I flew to Chiang Mai from Udon with Nok Air Mini which, as the name implies, uses relatively small aircraft on their routes and today’s 75 minute flight was about three quarters full.

There are always plenty of public taxis waiting for passengers at the airport and the good thing is that there is a flat rate charge of 120 baht to go to the city centre. It’s good that there’s no fare hassle, but the flat rate is way over the top as it usually costs only 80 baht for the reverse journey.

When I got to my hotel, the Anoma Boutique House where I always stay, I was told that the hotel was full and the couple occupying my room had asked to stay another night and they had arranged for me to stay at a similar hotel opposite if that was ok with me. There was nothing I could do, so I agreed and someone from reception took me across to the Come Chiangmai hotel which I had seen being built a couple of years ago.

I checked in and was taken upstairs to my room which at first glance looked very nice but I came to think that the hotel designer didn’t try staying in rooms he/she’d designed because there were several impracticalities. The double doors leading into the room and into the bathroom were floor to ceiling wooden affairs. The room doors were secured on the outside with a padlock and on the inside with a wooden bar both of which meant a lot of fumbling.

The bathroom doors opened inwards and when fully opened you faced the wash basin but the doors thus blocked the way to the toilet on the right and to the shower on the left. See the crazy design photos in the gallery!

There appeared to be a nice double bed in the room but in reality it was just a mattress laid on a wooden platform built across a wide niche in the room. If you look at the photos you will see that the access space to the left of the mattress was tiny with most of the space taken up by a uselessly placed table and by a lamp. The only other way to get into bed was to scramble onto the platform and over the foot of the bed.

But there was one other oddity: the cupboard was a cut-down affair, a curious box that was useless for hanging anything but the smallest thing. Take a look at the photo and let me know what you think.

Next morning I was expecting to move out and into the Anoma but the receptionist came to visit me while I was having breakfast and explained apologetically that the same family had requested a further night in their room which meant I had to stay at Come Chiangmai for a second night. I didn’t mind though it meant I was unable to unpack or settle in properly.

One of the next things I did was to hire a Scoopyi motorbike/scooter which enabled me to get around easily and explore even more of the city. As you will doubtless recall, I have been to Chiang Mai many times and it is always a lovely city to be in. The difficulty I have is what photographs to take for you that you have not seen already in previous reports. This time I decided to focus on flowering trees of which there are many at this time of year and you can see the result in my gallery along with some other pictures. I have managed to discover the names for some of the trees but not all so if you can fill a gap let me know via a comment.

As I have also mentioned before, I have been searching for either a Thong Laang (or Coral Tree) sapling or its seeds. I am looking for the variety Erythrina Poeppigiana, which grows in many places in Thailand. This is why I went to Kham Tiam, a vast area of nurseries and gardening stores. I rode slowly around it on my bike and it was fascinating. I did find some Thong Laang but the saplings were far too big for me to carry around on my travels. My Plan B is to import some seeds and I have found a supplier online and will order some when I get back to school.

Thanks to the motorbike I rode around exploring various unseen extremities of the city which were very interesting. I also went in search of a 2lb loaf tin in which to bake the cake I am planning for when I get back to Sai Moon so I visited a Baking Supplies shop which has everything you can imagine for baking as well as other things like coffee making machines, baking ingredients and decorative items. One of the items I found were rubberised cake moulds – have you seen these ? They look like thick floppy rubber in various cake mould shapes which, apparently, can withstand high oven temperatures but make extracting a finished cake very easy.

One evening I went to a German restaurant with a couple of farang friends. On the night we were there there was no a la carte menu only a vast buffet selection to choose from featuring every German dish and dessert you can think of and more. It was hard to avoid filling one’s plate to capacity because everything looked so tempting, but I managed to do that and have one of the excellent desserts too.
On another evening I met up with a student who had just completed her TEFL course in the city and we went to dinner. She contacted me before her course started to seek advice having been given my address by the school at which I did my own course in Phuket and I was able to answer all her questions over many emails. For dinner, we went to Chiang Mai’s hip district aka Nimmenhaeman road which is full of trendy cafes and restaurants, expensive hotels, designer guest houses and quirky shops. I chose Cafe Nimman after some googling and it was excellent with a really interesting menu and, unusually, some appealing desserts and not too expensive.

Another day I revisited the zoo with a Thai friend to see some of the parts of the huge complex I didn’t see on my last visit such as the bird sanctuary and aquarium. The Bird Park is huge and contains many different species of tropical birds but it can be very hard spotting them and even when you do it is even harder to take a decent photo as they keep darting around, but it was fun trying though and my feeble efforts are in the gallery. Can you name any of the birds there ? There also some interesting flowers around and a few of these are in my gallery as well.

I also revisited Saturday Walking Street which is always entertaining and full of interest and I took more photos of some of the quirky things there. I came across a stall offering chilled sugar cane juice and squeezing the cane to order. I’d never tried it before and very nice - thirst quenching and, er, sweet. See the pic in my gallery.

MARCH 21-28th PAI, MAE HONG SON PROVINCE

I split my two weeks in Chiang Mai with a week in Pai, Mae Hong Son province.
I had to wait for more than an hour at the bus station for a seat on one of the regular minibuses that go over the mountains to Pai to the west of Chiang Mai. After leaving the city the bus passes through Mae Rim district and what caught my eye was a succession of army barracks to our left. There must have been about a dozen of them and it struck me as odd to have so many next door to each other. Each had a grand entrance way with a large regimental sign, some in Thai and English a few just in Thai but they all had the Thai national flag flying atop a big flagpole as well as regimental flags and mounted insignia.

I have mentioned before that one rarely sees a horse anywhere but in Mae Rim I saw hundreds grazing in two separate fields not far from the barracks though I don’t think there is a connection between the two. What the horses were for remains a mystery.

The minibus journey to Pai took three hours with a stopover half way which is just as well because anyone of a nervous disposition or prone to carsickness could have a break from the 762 bends along the way. I had been told the best seats for pictures were on the left and I duly booked such a seat but in the event it was a bit too smoky for any meaningful photos so I missed the chance.

My guest house was excellent and the result of lots of googling. It was the family owned and run Ban Nai Wiang which only opened last October. The family told me they used a local architect who’d trained in Bangkok and the result was very appealing. My room was large and comfortable with a nice bathroom attached.

Once organised, I went off to hire a motorbike and chose a great looking Fino which was to serve me very well. Pai is a small town set in a valley surrounded by mountains with stunning scenery whichever way you look. Pai used to be a remote hippie hangout and you still see a few bedraggled hippies around town and they look as if they have just emerged from a 1960/70s time warp and there are still one or two street vendors selling woolly bobble hats in Rasta (ie Jamaican) colours. Apparently the police had a crackdown on the drug scene a couple of years ago which drove out most of the hippies and the dealers etc. It is now a very pleasant town which has recently seen a large increase in visitors from China after Pai was featured in a Chinese film called Lost in Thailand. There are lots of quirky and trendy shops, cafes, restaurants, bakeries and there seems to have been a competitive edge to finding the right innovative name for these outlets but the one that caught my eye was Queen Burger....get it??? If not, check out the photo and you may see something familiar.

In conversation with one of the owners of the guest house it turned out she was an ex-teacher and she invited me to join her and two friends for lunch: one who was an owner of a private primary school and the other who was the Deputy Mayor and also a former teacher. The trio go out to lunch regularly and take it in turns to pay the bill. We had lunch at a simple looking thatched hut restaurant out of town and a range of different dishes were ordered (see photo in the gallery) which were delicious. One dish in particular was my favourite – a simple plate of hot and large roasted cashew nuts – I just can’t resist them!

After lunch we drove round an area of the outskirts of the town called the Beverley Hills of Pai where there are lots of nice houses, some smart hotels, and guesthouses. Little roads led towards the mountains and I made a mental mote to explore further when i got the chance.

I spent most of my week in Pai exploring. One day I went to see the Memorial Bridge which is a bit of a tourist con as one is given the impression from brochures that the bridge is the original one but in fact it was built in 1975 on the site of the original bridge. The history of the bridge is interesting so I took a photo of the info board for you which is in my gallery.

Next stop was Pai Canyon a unique geological structure featuring a series of high narrow ridges and deep bowl-like canyons and if you are brave enough you can walk round the biggest one and this is what I decided to attempt. There was an easy stroll round to the far side but to progress meant descending down a near vertical narrow gritty path in my flipflops. Yes!! I know what you’re thinking! While I was standing there poised to take my first step the neckstrap of my Nikon camera came slipped from the buckle and the camera crashed to the ground smashing the lens. Luckily I had a UV filter fitted and it was this that smashed and not the actual lens. Lucky, too, that the camera didn’t drop a few minutes later when it would have been lost for good. Even so, you can imagine my loud curses!

Anyway, I managed to get to the bottom of this part of the pathway where there is a small wooden bridge across an abyss. Looking up I could now see that the ascent the other side was a lot more difficult than it looked from above. Not only that, but there were sheer drops either side and there appeared to be no margin for error but I had no option now. I was at the bottom, no one else was around; I was alone and had to make my way back up to the top.

I admit I was scared and my legs wobbled while I tried to dismiss thoughts of what would happen if I slipped. It wasn’t just the thought of possible death, it was the thought that my slip would be unseen and I would not be found for some time since no one knew I was there.

I scrambled up the slippery blade of a path while fixing my gaze on the next foothold and not on the drop on either side of me. Step by step I got higher but at the top the path became narrower still though it was now level but there was also a breeze. I needed to look down at the path to choose my steps carefully but I had to close my mind off to the naked abyss on either side. There were a few other people at the top viewpoint now which made me even more determined not to make an ass of myself. It was a huge relief to make it across and I felt proud that I had managed it after seeing so many other people recoiled in horror when they saw the narrowness of the final ridge.

My next stop was the Pembok Waterfall which I reached several kilometers down a narrow track. It was a good waterfall only spoiled photographically by a few farang swimming in the pool below it. According to a large signpost the same track led to ‘the best viewpoint in Pai’ so I decided to continue up the track to find it. But as has happened before in Thailand there were no further signs so I had to guess which way to go at junctions and in the end I never found the viewpoint. On the plus side I passed through some interesting hamlets and spotted some different flowering trees/shrubs.

On the way back to the main road I stopped off at a makeshift cafe for a chilled Roselle juice which I had never had before and it was delicious. Roselle is another name for Sorrel according to google. What was surprising was that the owner provided some nice snack food including nuts, bananas, banana chips to go with the Roselle jam and a glass of the alcoholic version of Roselle juice for free in return for a donation. Also advertised but not available when I visited was fresh passion fruit juice squeezed from fruit grown in the garden which interested me as I have never seen p/f growing before and there’s a photo in my gallery.

Also at the cafe were a group of five Chinese, probably students, and the owner had asked them to compose and write a sign in Chinese characters to display on a tree by the cafe entrance. It was funny listening to them discuss which words and characters to use and how best to write the words vertically. There is a photo of this in my gallery also.

SUNDAY 24th MARCH, PAI

After breakfast I set off once again on my trusty Mio Fino for the Stone Forest. I had spotted a small roadside sign for this a day or two before and wondered what it could be. Petrified tree stumps perhaps ?

The first thing I noticed when I turned off the road onto the track was the great number of large elephant droppings. Evidently this was a popular route taken by elephants from one of the nearby camps. I also noticed some people collecting the droppings left by the side of the road presumably as a fertiliser but I couldn’t help noticing that all the droppings by the road and along the path seemed to be made up of partly chewed grass and nothing more.

After riding along the path for about a mile I came across a signboard in Thai which I assumed to be about the Forest. There were no petrified trees, only a large collection of vast rocks scattered over a couple of hillsides amongst varied trees. They and the wooden hillsides were very scenic and I left my bike parked followed a faint path around the main outcrop. I was totally alone and it was very relaxing and peaceful as you can see in the photos I hope.

On the way back along the path on the bike I came up close to an elephant with handler and two female Americans riders heading where I had just come from.
A bit later I stopped off for a coffee at a very attractive looking place called the Tree House Cafe where you really do climb up wooden steps into a large tree house attached to a building. The coffee was really good and do were the views over the gardens and I took a number of photos for you. They also had a small shop where I bought a small bottle of locally made Strawberry wine to take back to school.

In the afternoon I headed to the Mae Yen waterfall one of several around Pai. You can ride so far and then you have to walk the rest of the way. It didn’t look very far on the map. My plan was to see the waterfall and then have lunch. What a joke!!

Getting off my motorbike I noticed someone else doing the same and I introduced myself and he said he was from Rome and we decided to walk to the waterfall together. Lorenzo had pretty good English so we had a good chat as we walked....and walked....and walked and scrambled up and down over rocks and fallen trees and crossed the shallow crystal clear river numerous times. After an hour and a half I was beginning to question if the small falls we’d seen were all there was to see. We passed a lone walker, a German, heading back to the start but he said he gave up and did a u-turn about 45 minutes before. We thought, a German giving up, whatever next ?

The path then rose up above the river and looking down we could see two women bathing. We walked on but a few hundred meters later the same two women caught up with and joined us. They turned out to be from Biel, Switzerland and were overjoyed when I said I’d been there as they had never met another tourist claiming the same thing. In passing, Biel is unusual in that it is both French and German, Biel being the German name for it and Bienne being the other and as a consequence everyone speaks at least two languages and most people speak English as well, as did Nadine and Veryan, the two who joined us.

The further along the path we walked the scrambling got tougher and the river became faster and the bed more rock strewn. Despite all my efforts to stay upright I fell over on one crossing, my foot sliding off a submerged rock. Luckily my watch is waterproof and so is my camera bag. The phone in my pocket got a dunking but still worked. Around 4.15 we decided to call it a day and turned back. It was now two hours since Lorenzo and I parked our motorbikes and we decided we had to leave now if we wanted to walk back in daylight. It took ages to get back and I was whacked but we all went for something to eat and drink as soon as we got back to Pai and it was a fun evening.

Monday 25th March, Pai

The next day my thigh muscles ached and it was hard to walk properly so I had a quiet unadventurous day. I was supposed to meet Veryan and Nadine in the late afternoon in order to see the sunset from a certain hillside temple but Nadine was feeling sick and needed to be near a loo so we changed tack and went to Pai Canyon to see the sunset which would have been amazing if it had not been so smoky. Back in town we had dinner a drink and a chat at the Buffalo restaurant which was good.

Tuesday 26th March, Pai

Today I went to the Mhor Phaeng waterfall which has two good waterfalls and three pools and a lovely rock slide. Local boys were having a lot of fun and there were two farang women with flaxen haired kids about 5 or 6 years old. What was interesting to see was that the local boys were fearless and scampered around on the steep smooth wet rocky surfaces sometimes in flipflops and sometimes barefoot. They baited and teased each other but always in fun whereas the farang kids gingerly paddled in the pool at the bottom of a small rock slide, didn’t get out of the way when the local kids wanted to slide down, and cried and mewled when one of their fair haired friends took a stick or a stone away. I took some photos which are in my gallery.

From there I headed further uphill on my motorbike to a viewpoint which had the best view over the Pai valley that I have seen so far but, again, the smoky haze obscured the distant mountains. The very steep narrow road passed through Chinese and Lisu villages and it was tough on my Mio Fino to reach the peak but my bike made it. I had to pay a 20 baht entry fee to see the view and in return was served a pot of nice Chinese tea and a very small cup to drink it out of and I took some photos to share with you.

On the way down I stopped at one of the cafes for a cooling iced coffee and when I told the lady owner that I had failed to reach the Mae Yen waterfall she exclaimed joyfully that she’d walked there herself but she went on to say she began her walk at 5.30 in the morning and took all day!

Further along the road at the bottom I spotted some boys clearing weeds from a muddy pond in a garden and having great fun splashing around and cooling off in the blazing hot afternoon sun. The scene looked very photogenic so I stopped to take some pictures and the boys immediately urged me to join them, but I declined.

Wednesday 27th March, Pai

This morning I decided to revisit the Mhor Phaeng waterfall in an effort to get better photos. When I got there a different set of local boys were splashing around and laughing at each others’ antics. Too soon, a farang appeared with a locally dressed girl friend. He wore pink-rimmed dark glasses and had a Rasta-style bobble hat on. He stripped off to his boxers and leapt into the pool and at the same moment all the local boys vanished and I decided to leave too.

I set off for the remaining unexplored area around Pai riding along narrow concrete roads past nice house and pleasant countryside. I tried in vain to find a widely advertised gallery but in the process discovered small almost hidden hamlets. I stopped off at a small smart looking coffee shop and had an iced coffee and long chat with the owner who used to work for Shell in Bangkok but decided to resign and set up his own resort in Pai.

Alas, this evening I had to hand back my Fino and take to walking again and I browsed the bookshop and bought some stamps, not at the post office, but at a small shop selling sets of stamps featuring nice photos of Pai scenes and local flowers which I plan to send to my friend in Tokyo when I get back to Chiang Mai. The shop owner very kindly gave me a small handmade cloth bag for the stamps for free.

Thursday 28th March, Pai

I had breakfast and packed my bags. I was sorry to be leaving Pai. I can well understand why people like to live there surrounded by mountains and greenery and stunning views. There’s much more to discover in Mae Hong Son province so I hope I can return one day.

I caught the 12.00 minibus for the three hour 150 baht (about £1.80) ride back to Chiang Mai. The journey was uneventful and when I arrived at the bus station a cluster of tuk tuk drivers approached me hoping I would choose one of them to take me to my hotel. These tuk tuk drivers are a greedy bunch and they collaborate to quote a uniformly high fare. I tried to haggle one of them down but he just laughed at me and with his mates. I walked off towards the newer half of the bus station and found a tuk tuk happy to take me to my hotel for half the price of the other one. Yes, I know, the amount is small either way but I object to being ripped off, don’t you ?

APRIL 4th-11th CHIANG RAI

A tuk tuk took me from my Chiang Mai hotel to the new bus station where I got a Green Line bus to Chiang Rai. The Green Line bus company operates smart air conditioned buses on a number of routes but mostly in north Thailand. I got a slightly more expensive VIP seat which is a single very comfortable armchair-like seat by a window and a hostess comes round with small bottles of chilled water and a packet of biscuits which are very nice.

I arrived about an hour and a half later and got a tuk tuk to my hotel not realising it was just around the corner and I could have walked there easily. I had found the hotel on the internet where pictures of it looked very nice. The reality was that it was fairly basic but it was adequate and, anyway, I was only staying a week.

In many ways Chiang Rai is like a smaller version of Chiang Mai: it has a number of nice cafes and restaurants; a vibrant Night Bazaar; a Saturday Walking Street and a very ornate city clock though CM doesn’t have one of those.

One of my first tasks was to hire a motorbike but, unlike CM, bikes for rent are not available on every street. I eventually found a large rental outlet and discovered that the per day cost was 200 baht per day, a 50 baht per day increase on Chiang Mai. Once again, I chose a good looking Fino.

I walked the full length of the Walking Street market and enjoyed looking at the enormous variety of things on sale. I wanted to take some photos for you but I didn’t want to simply repeat shots I’d taken in Chiang Mai so I chose a rather special theme. Looking at the Chiang Rai photos, can you spot the theme ???
The subject of the theme has become very fashionable, iconic even, in Thailand and ones sees whatever ‘it’ is everywhere these days.

I went on a number of trips including one to the Khun Kom waterfall about an hour’s ride outside Chiang Rai. On the way I spotted a giant size golden lion and I stopped to take a photo and wondered what it was. At first I thought it was something Bhuddist but then it dawned on me that it was actually the brand symbol of Singha beer.

I also passed a sign which directed one to turn right for the waterfall but the same sign stated that Holy Water was in the same direction. I didn’t see any further signs for Holy Water so I began to think the fall’s water was somehow sacred.

The waterfall was located in a National Park and, once again, one could ride so far on the motorbike and then one had to walk 1.2km to the falls. The path passed though some amazing stands of very tall bamboo and in some places the bamboo stalks were jumbled up ready for a game of spillikins. There were bamboo steps and bamboo bridges as the path rose up and up and then suddenly the sound of crashing water became clear and the dense trees opened up to reveal the waterfall in all its glory.

Before descending to the base of the falls I took my turn at a look out where I took a lovely photo. There were some Thai youngsters in front of me who each made an identical pose with the falls behind them for their friends to take on their cameras. As they finished, they poked their empty plastic bottle into gaps between trees in the vain hope, I suppose, that they would somehow disappear. I ticked them off and told them to take their rubbish home and I was mildly surprised that they actually obeyed me.

I was further surprised at the abundance of different species of butterflies at the base of the falls and I tried to photograph them but they always seemed to sense when my finger was about to press the button and flew off.

On another day, I went on a two hour trip to the Phu Sang waterfalls. Less spectacular than the Kuhn Kom falls but in a very attractive setting with an informative eco trail above the waterfall which had display boards explaining the different types of dry and wet forest one walked through.

Whilst in Chiang Rai I witnessed a boy of seven becoming a monk at a temple. At the beginning he sat very still and calm while one of the monks shaved his head. Then he went off to change into his new saffron robes which was followed by a ceremony inside the temple. He’ll only be a monk for a month and he will join a number of others his own age to learn the ropes and all the chanting that goes with being a monk.

The far north of Thailand is very mountainous with many distinct hill tribes living on the mountainsides. There are also tea and coffee plantations and I had hoped to visit the Doi Chaang coffee plantation but decided to abort my plan when I discovered that I wouldn’t see beans of any age on the coffee trees.

I had also thought about visiting a vineyard but because it was the wrong time of year aborted that plan as well. On the other hand, the area around Chiang Rai is also famous for fruit wines and there are roadside and other stalls everywhere. If you take a look at one of these stalls the owner will immediately offer you free tasting shots of half a dozen or more different fruit wines which are all distinctly alcoholic. I think one could easily get quite tipsy going from one such stall to the next!! All the ones I had had a really nice taste and weren’t too cloying or sweet. The one I liked the most was Lychee wine and I bought a bottle to talk back to school.

Another day I visited Wat Khun Rong which is the famous and fantastical white Wat, the only one in Thailand. Take a look at the photos and you will see why. It was actually my second visit as I had been there before in 2007 but it was nice to see it again.

The Night Bazaar is hugely popular with many different and interesting things for sale. I quite enjoy looking at the inventive and often very funny t-shirt designs and there were plenty of those to enjoy at the Bazaar.

Before I left Chiang Rai I came to realise that I was running out of space in my bags and I decided one way to create more would be to buy a laptop shoulder bag. I found some at the Night Bazaar but they were too narrow for my 15.5” wide laptop. On the morning of my departure I dashed over on my motorbike to the Central Plaza shopping mall thinking it opened at 10am only to find it opened an hour later so I had to hand around till then. Luckily, I soon found a modestly priced bag of the right size so I was soon on my way back to the hotel.

APRIL 11th – 13th MAE SAI, the northernmost point in Chiang Rai province

I caught a regular bus for the one hour journey to Mae Sai bus station where I had a dilemma because there are no tuk tuks or taxis there. I now had four items of luggage and I managed to hang on to them all on the back of a motorcycle taxi to ride the 7km into town.

I stayed at the Wanliya Resort slightly out of the town centre which has a number of rooms and chalets around a very nice shaded swimming pool. After settling in the owner very kindly rang for a m/c taxi to take me to the border crossing into Burma. My idea was to get the visa run out of the way then hire a motorbike to get back to the resort.

I exited Thailand and crossed the bridge into Myanmar and the town of Techilek with no problems. You have to leave your passport at immigration and collect it on your way back. Meanwhile, you are given an official entry card for the duration of your visit. There is a large market on the Burmese side which has expended a lot since my last visit in 2010. Wandering around I came across a very large DVD store selling every type of DVD you can imagine. All the music and other categories were well set out and the staff were very knowledgeable about their vast stock. I bought a number of DVDs there for just 25 baht (about 60p) apiece.

Back on the Thai side I got another m/c taxi to take me to the Honda store which had bikes to rent but it was closed so I had to delay hiring a bike until tomorrow. This evening I borrowed a m/c from the resort owner to allow me to get something to eat in town.

Next morning another m/c taxi took me back to the Honda store where I rented a manual gear Honda Wave and I set off for the Mae Fah Luang Gardens, a project started by the Thai Queen Mother to wean local growers off opium farming. The gardens are spectacular and I took so many photos that I have uploaded them to a separate online album which you can see here:

https://plus.google.com/photos/102059636004663132941/albums/5868146994684650865?authkey=CNnFldLn7_e3oAE

Do take a look as these gardens are simply amazing!!

I have mentioned dual pricing for Thais and farangs before where the farang usually pays double or more than the Thai price for entry into somewhere. At the gardens they offered discounts for those over 60 and I was astounded they gave it to me as such things are usually for Thais only so I paid half price, only 45 baht.

On leaving the gardens I came across a shop selling bulbs and plants from the gardens and I could resist buying something. I bought some dahlia bulbs – though I will be surprised if they survive in Kalasin – and a small sealed glass bottle containing a Lady’s Slipper orchid plantlet with its roots in a kind of jelly substance which can keep it alive for up to two months.

Also by the entrance to the gardens there is a small market which has locally grown fruit on sale where vendors give you samples and I tried a number of them. I tried a local peach which was so delicious I bought some for lunch along with some roast sweet potatoes. Further along there was a butcher on a bicycle selling meat from two panniers and some t-shirt sellers with some unwitting spelling mistakes.

From there I headed off to the Arboretum some 15km away and higher up the mountains where pine trees cover the mountainsides and it is reminiscent of Cyprus. The Arboretum is on a huge site and has acres of azaleas and rhododendrons though it was the wrong time of year to see them in flower but I did see a few late bloomers giving me a hint of what it looks like in season. There were many beautiful trees and flowers to be seen but I took too many photos to upload here. There is a photo taster in my gallery but to see the true wonder of the Arboretum go to:

https://plus.google.com/photos/102059636004663132941/albums/5874460383641399201?authkey=CLeJlNbkpayTYA

Enjoy!!!

I wanted to visit Chiang Saen, a well preserved ancient city, but with Songkran now in full swing it was impossible to get there without getting soaked. At the Golden Triangle I visited the very interesting and informative Opium Museum after which I let my m/c parked and walked round trying to find the side street leading to the top of the mountain from where you can see border nexus of Laos, Burma and Thailand. Failing to find it, I popped into a shop to buy a chilled Oishi green tea and the owning couple offered me a stool on which to sit and drink it in the shade. We got chatting and when they discovered I am a teacher they immediately brewed some herbal china tea and presented me with a pack of 7-herb tea and a book with English translations of Pali chants. I can’t imagine anything like that happening in any shop in the UK!!

APRIL 13th – 17th BANGKOK

Songkran for me this year started gently in Mae Sae as I mentioned but the Songkran weekend here in Bangkok was unbelievable. When in Bangkok I usually stay in the Silom district which happens to be one of two areas in the city where huge crowds gather to celebrate the new year. With some Thai friends I joined in the celebrations and it was great fun though I am sure you will think otherwise when I tell you that taking part means getting soaked repeatedly either by people with very large water pistols or people manning fire hoses attached to water hydrants and having your cheeks stroked repeatedly by other people as they apply a chalk based paste to your face. The entire half mile length of the northern half of Silom Road was jammed with people; the pavements jammed with food and drink sellers or vendors selling iced water (to refill water pistols, natch) and the dried paste pellets. The sale of alcohol was supposedly banned during Songkran but the edict was widely ignored though I did not see any drunkeness. It is really hard to describe the fun of it all, but just take my word for it, and, what’s more, it goes on all night!!

I did take some quick photos for you which are in my gallery. I had my compact camera in my pocket safely sealed inside a plastic bag but unfortunately the bag was of the wrong kind of plastic and it was impossible to avoid the crinkles impairing the photos but I did take the camera out of the plastic bag – difficult with wet hands and fingers covered with wet chalk paste – to take a few clear photos of the crowds and the mayhem. I cannot imagine anything like this being allowed to take place in risk-averse UK. The Health & Safety zealots would ban all the fun immediately.

After Songkran I bought some glacé orange and lemon slices with which to make my own mixed fruit for the cake when I get back to Sai Moon. All I have to do now is find some wholewheat flour and some sultanas which seem unavailable though raisins can easily be found.

I took Jasper’s non-functioning hard drive to a specialist data recovery firm in an area of the city called Bang Na and, with luck, they’ll be able to recover his documents and photos.

One evening I arranged to meet the Swiss friend I made when I was in Pai. Veryan was staying near Khao San Road and I agreed to meet her there. KSR, as it is commonly known, is a tourist hotspot and is like it was depicted in the film The Beach a few years ago only more so. I have only been there once before and that was in the daytime but at night its nightlife is really buzzing with farangs from around the world.

More interestingly, I got a motorcycle taxi to KSR and was taken through Bangkok’s Chinatown – an area I have only nibbled at the edges of in the daytime. At night, every pavement is occupied with street vendors mostly selling food, and cooking it on the spot, but many other items are on sale as well and, of course, there are lots of gold shops there too. It is a large district and half the population of Bangkok seemed to be eating there or browsing the shops.

Not far away there is the night flower market with street upon street lined with fresh flower vendors. You have to try and imagine the scene: stop and start traffic jams with my m/c taxi weaving around the cars and making some headway; people criss-crossing the road carrying vast bags of flowers; porters with trolleys creaking under the weight of stacked fresh flowers with each bud carefully wrapped in styrene ‘paper’ for protection; groups of people sitting on stools eating food at the small tables of the numerous food vendors; and then there the lighting – not from street lamps, but from hundreds of white bulbs strung between the many street stalls. Thais love night markets and they exist in every town and city across the country with many in Bangkok.

PATTAYA APRIL 18th – May 7th

I had a longer than usual stay in Pattaya simply because I ran out of convenient and inexpensive ideas for the holiday. I spent most afternoons on the beach which was very nice and relaxing. I also bought the other ingredients for the cake I am planning to bake; in fact, I bought sufficient ingredients to make two cakes.

I discovered, also, that there is no difference between wholemeal flour and wholewheat flour. It turns out that the latter term was invented a decade or two ago to boost flour sales and it stuck but it must cause a lot of confusion. The only difference between the two terms is whether one or other is strong flour or not. I need strong flour for my cake.

I have not been able to find sultanas but a google search tells me that there is little difference, other than colour, between the two so my mixed fruit for the cake will be made entirely of raisins and glacé citrus fruit.

Most afternoons I spent on the beach reading the Bangkok Post and/or watching the world go by very pleasantly. Refreshments are just a finger click away and it’s interesting watching the banana boats, paragliders and jet skis weaving around beyond the protected swimming area. And, yes, before you ask, I did swim and that was fun as well.

Today, May 7th, I took a taxi to Bangkok airport. When I checked in I discovered that there had been a mix-up over the flight date and to their credit Thai Airways happily changed the date from May 3rd to today's date without asking me to buy a new ticket. The snag was that economy c;lass was already full but there were 4 seats left in Business Class. They suggested I go on the Standby List and if there was still a Business Class seat left 20 minutes before boarding I could have it. Although that sounded good I didn't want to miss the flight as I had already made arrangements to get to Kranuan and then to get to school so I paid the extra £30 to be upgraded. Business Class was very nice - much more room and a nice full service meal/snack with a mini linen table cloth, napkin, china plates and proper cutlery. I flew to Khon Kaen where another tame taxi driver took me to Kranuan where Jasper collected me and drove me to school.

So here I am back at school and wondering what the new term will bring when school opens on Monday.

MONDAY 18th FEBRUARY

There was a teacher’s meeting this afternoon starting just before the students left for home and it went on for almost 90 minutes. One of the main points was
a report by the new Deputy Director following the course he had just completed about revising the curriculum which will be implemented in time for the start of the new academic year in May.

TUESDAY 19th FEBRUARY

A scorching hot day today from sun up till sun down and it is a great relief to change into something casual and cooler after I finish teaching and go home.

WEDNESDAY 20th FEBRUARY

Jasper and I went into Kranuan this morning principally to buy some DVDs because the Director asked me to burn the contents of his camera’s memory card onto one but we also needed some more cat food because the local Tesco Lotus at Kham Yai had run out.

The Director has decided there needs to be a fax machine in the office so Mr Weang went out to buy a Panasonic Laser Fax which he has now installed in gthe main office. The only snag is that the school doesn’t have a phone line so he called TOT (Telecom of Thailand) today to get one installed. It will be interesting to see how quickly they can do this given that the next nearest landline is at a phonebox in the village about one and a half kilometers away and the nearest exchange is miles away.

But quite why the Director wants a fax machine is unknown since all Windows Operating Systems (OS) up to and including XP come with fax creating and receiving software and with newer OS like Windows Vista and Windows 7 and 8 you can easily use an external USB fax modem, about the size of a pack of cigarettes and cost about 500 baht (about £10), which would enable you to send and receive and store copies of as many faxes as you wish.

The thing is that Thais, in general, would never consider asking a foreigner for any kind of advice or information. They universally think that Thailand is great and Thailand is No.1 in the world so why should they ask any foreigner anything and this little example of the fax machine extends upwards to every level including ministries and the government as a whole. The consequence is that things in Thailand get tackled back to front and enormous and costly mistakes are common.

THURSDAY 21st FEBRUARY

Ajarn Tippakorn spent the morning filling forms and writing documents for herself and Ajarns Weang and Yor to apply for school transfers nearer to their respective homes: Nong Khai, Yasoton and Ayuthaya respectively. Once the forms are submitted to the Or Bor Jor (the Education Dept) in Kalasin city it will take about three months for a decision to be made. If it is a yes for any of them then they will move to new schools next year.

I have decided to postpone my trip to Burma until the October holiday. This partly because the Burmese equivalent of Songkhran known as the Water Festival gets in the way. Another reason is that the weather in October will be a bit cooler and more pleasant.

Diethelm Travel, the company I am planning to go to Burma with, have a very interesting sounding 11-day Colonial Tour package which covers everything and more that I would like to see and do in Myanmar. The only downside that I can see is that the itinerary doesn’t extend south to Mawlamyine (formerly Moulmein) which is where my Gordon grandfather represented the Bank of Bengal in the 1880/90s and I thought it would be nice to visit.

I went to Global House, a poor Thai version of a B & Q store near Kalasin city. B & Q has everything you can possibly imagine and more for home improvements whereas Global has a much smaller range and many things you’d expect to find aren’t stocked. However I did manage to buy most of the items I needed to decorate my room.

One item Global House did not have was matt black paint for the skirting board, the interior of the window frames and the ceiling border. All of these had been painted black previously and I thought it simpler to keep these areas black. With Jasper in his car we called at several stores in Kranuan all of whom had gloss black and no one could suggest where we might buy matt black. Eventually we found some matt black lacquer and I decided to go with that as the least worst option.

I also bought some more insect netting for the windows since the netting put up soon after I arrived at Sai Moon left gaps which delighted the insects and it had also been holed in a couple of places. The fine plastic netting was only 49 baht (about £2) per meter compared to some ridiculous price of £21++ I’d seen in the UK online.

FRIDAY 22nd – 25th FEBRUARY

Monday was Makha Bucha Day which is an important Buddhist festival in Thailand on the full moon day of the third lunar month commemorating the Buddha’s teaching of Ovada Patimokkha. So it was a nice 4-day weekend and I decided, finally, to get down to it and decorate my room at the teacher’s house the walls of which had probably not felt a paint brush since the day they were built.

A former student came to help me paint the walls a light sky blue colour and Jasper helped paint some of the ceiling. I concentrated on the corners which were unreachable by roller and on filling holes including the mouseholes. I also varnished all the wooden areas – the six shutters and both sides of the door – which improved the look of the woodwork enormously.

Jasper cut the netting to size and stapled it to the wooden frame that held the old netting to the windows but he mistakenly stapled it to the wrong side of the frame leaving the same big gaps as before so I had to buy some more.

By Saturday afternoon the single one gallon container of blue emulsion paint had run out so we had to return to Global House again which was just as well because more insect netting was needed as well as some more paint brushes – Thai brushes are very poor quality – and sandpaper.

To do the painting I had removed almost everything from my room apart from the wardrobe. One major deficiency at Global House was dust sheets so I bought some black bin bags and by cutting them open and stapling them together I created some workable dust sheets to keep paint being splattered everywhere and one of these was draped over the wardrobe.

The filler I used to block the mouseholes in the ceiling was acrylic, the first time I’d used it, and using it was like trying to spread molten chewing gum, it was very sticky and glutinous and I wished I had found some plaster of Paris instead.

Working as fast as we could in my baking hot room all the major work was finished by Monday afternoon when I went round touching up. Despite the dust sheets some paint did get onto the wooden floor of my room and I had to spend a long time scraping or rubbing it off and generally cleaning up. It must be remembered that Thais by and large do not spend any time maintaining their homes and they are not house proud like westerners so paint spatterings here and there in my room didn’t matter to my students helpers and they created more cleaning up work which took me a long time.

Late Monday afternoon I got everything finished and started moving things back into my room. Though I don’t have enough proper storage space for everything my room now looks far better than before and I am happy with the result.

TUESDAY 26th FEBRUARY

After school today Ajarn Sompon started lighting a series of bonfires next to the other teacher’s house and, sure enough, the billowing smoke drifted across to my teacher’s house and into my room through the window. At the time I was doing things on my laptop and the last thing I wanted was to work in a room full of smoke. I went over to him and told him it burning was not a good idea and that it was filling my room with smoke. He very sensibly decided to quench the fires with water which was just as well because I was not a happy bunny!

WEDNESDAY 27th FEBRUARY

The Director decided today that M6, the senior class who are about to leave Sai Moon for good, should work on the path laying project outside the Sala for the rest of this week. For some time now there has been a problem with the sandy soil when it rains and it runs over the concrete path next to the Sala which is at a lower level. The project now is to raise the level of this path thus removing the problem and thus providing a kerb to contain the sand within the flower beds.

Sacks of cement, loads of sand and gravel had already been delivered when M6 went to work mixing the concrete and I took some photos which are in my gallery.

THURSDAY 28th FEBRUARY

Another scorching hot day today – 35c!

After lunch this morning I went to Nong Kung Sri with Director in order to cash cheques, in my case a portion of my salary. There were a lot of people at the bank but they have a numbered queuing system, comfortable seats to relax on, and a water cooler should one feel thirsty.

This afternoon we had another round of Oral Tests for every class. I devised a series of questions for the students to answer – one set for the junior classes and a slightly harder set for the senior classes. Most students did well but the ones who don’t normally pay attention in class didn’t do well at all and will have to resit.

FRIDAY 1st MARCH

There is definitely an end of term feel at school now. It’s hard to keep to the teaching syllabus when it is like this so I try and make the lessons into a game which then become much more fun.

SATURDAY 2nd MARCH

I spent much of today making bookings for my summer holidays. I’ve left it later this year than ever before because of the uncertainty over dates. I asked the Director again this week if he could confirm the school closing and opening dates but he didn’t know because the Or Bor Jor (Education Authority in Kalasin city) haven’t notified him of the dates yet. This simply confirms my opinion, expressed here before, that the people at the Or Bor Jor are totally incompetent and unfit for purpose.

With two month of holiday time to fill it is, believe it or not, hard to think of interesting and different things to do that don’t cost the earth. This holiday my first stop is Udon Thani for two nights, Chiang Mai for 7 nights, Mae Hong Son 7 nights, Chaing Mai 7 nights, Chiang Rai 7 nights, Mae Sai 3 nights, Bangkok 4 nights and finishing up in Pattaya for two weeks before flying to Khon Kaen and back to school about a week before term is likely to start.

Believe it or not, Ajarn Yor started a bonfire next to our teacher’s house this afternoon and, not for the first time, I had to tell him that with the smoke drifting round to the rear of the house my room was full of smoke again. It amazes me that my fellow Thai teachers simply will not learn or use common sense. And why burn leaves anyway ? He is an obsessive leaf sweeper sweeping every day and creating a cloud of dust in the process. To dispose of the leaves all anyone has to do is to take them over to the stand of trees (about 20ft away) where nobody goes and add them to the layer of leaves already there where they will decompose by themselves without burning.

SUNDAY 3rd MARCH

A friend in Bangkok has asked me to help a friend of his by checking the English in his thesis. It sounds simple enough but the topic is about how heavy metals contaminate aquatic organisms which makes reading and correcting heavy going and I spent most of the day making corrections.

The weather seems to be on the change because it tried to rain today and for a few days now the sky has been overcast.

During the evening, until about 10pm, M5 students were making and constructing three archways near the Sala to be used as photo backdrops tomorrow.

MONDAY 4th MARCH

It rained this morning quite heavily but not for long enough to make any difference and it stopped by 8am.

There were no classes today as it was devoted to the goodbye ceremony for M6 and M3. After assembly, the finishing touches were made to the arches, balloons were blown and placed, and congratulatory signs were written, cut out, and attached to the arches.

At the ceremony, M5 took care of M6 and a number of mothers attended as well though not nearly as many as last year. There were VIP guests from the Or Bor Dor (the local Council located next to the school) and all the teachers were present too. The ceremony opened with some traditional dancing and a video of this and parts of the rest of the ceremony are on youtube at http://youtu.be/WkvlnhgKHn4

The local priest (for want of a better word) presided over the religious part of the ceremony which ended with a water ‘blessing’ for each of the students. The came the tying of lengths of wool around the wrists of each of the students by the Director and all the teachers accompanied by words of congratulation and good wishes. After this students exchanged friendship necklaces – formed by a wool thread around the neck with a small see-through plastic envelope attached with a message on the outside and containing a sweet/s.

And then there were photocalls for M6 and M3. Although all of M6 will leave school for the real world outside I don’t know if any M3 students are thinking of leaving for another school or leaving education altogether. It was all over by lunchtime and the students went home and Jasper and I went to Kham Yai to have lunch.

TUESDAY 5th MARCH

The Director decreed that there should be no classes today to give all the students the chance to revise for the exams at home. When I heard about this I thought it was a misguided decision since I doubted that many students would do any revising at home. A very few of the poochai (boys) might open a book but many more pooying (girls) are likely to since they are generally the better and more serious students.

Many of the Thai teachers spent today frantically writing exam papers for their subject. Typical really, since Thais always leave things till the last minute and have great difficulty thinking ahead. I wrote mine two weeks ago so I had a free day.

This evening, I was in my room working on my laptop when I heard loud crackling noises. I have become used to these sounds now and knew that a farmer nearby must be burning his sugar cane. When the crackling became louder and louder I realised the burning must be closer than I thought and went outside to look fearing that, perhaps, the burning had got out of control and that my teacher’s house and all I owned here might be in danger. Sure enough, wild flames were raging about 50 meters from the house and I wondered what I could do if they came closer to consuming the mostly wooden building. Not much, I concluded but, luckily, the breeze was blowing away from the house and although it was a very scary moment I knew that the dead and very dry sugar cane leaves and undergrowth always burned furiously leaving the cane stems untouched. And so it turned out. There are some flaming photos in my gallery.

WEDNESDAY 6th MARCH

No classes to day as all the students taking the first batch of exams. I had a free day because the Thai teachers always do the invigilating despite the fact I have much experience invigilating university exams.

Ajarn Weang told me today that TOT (Telecom of Thailand) do not want to lay a phone line for the school to allow the new fax machine to be connected. I am going to speak to the Director about this at the next opportunity because, as mentioned before, a cheap USB fax modem can do all that is required if, that is, the school really does need to receive and send faxes.

THURSDAY 7th MARCH

A number of senior students were absent from assembly this morning which caused Ajarn Tuk to make an ad hoc pronouncement that those students will not be permitted to take today’s exams.

As it is exam time here I thought you’d be interested in a story that hit the national news this week. The news item was about a test taken by would-be Assistant Teachers in sixty different provinces around Thailand. The exam’s objective was to select 2,000 candidates for assistant teaching positions paying 9,000 baht per month (about £200 at today’s exchange rates).

After the test it was found that 486 test-takers achieved a perfect or near-perfect score. On investigation it was thought that some had paid between 200,000 and 300,000 baht for the test answers. It may seem strange to you that someone would pay so much up front to succeed in an exam for a job paying only 9,000 baht per month.

The answer lies in the fact that an Assistant Teacher’s job is the first step to getting a full time permanent civil service position and thus access to much more money, by fair means or foul (think corruption), later on. Why else would someone pay around a quarter of a million baht for a job paying so little ?

A full scale investigation in now underway though I would have thought a re-sit with different questions and proper exam paper security and invigilation would have sufficed since it is possible that the 486 candidates really did get their good marks without cheating as there is no proof, as yet, that any cheating actually took place. It is only a suspicion after all, but then This Is Thailand.

In passing, would-be policemen have been known to pay 1m baht (about £21,000) for test questions. This is another job which pays peanuts, but policemen make their money by extorting in unrecorded ‘fines’ for all kinds of petty offences or even made-up offences.

FRIDAY 8th MARCH

The last day of exams and the last day of term. The students who didn’t turn up for assembly on Thursday are going to have to take their remaining exams on Monday but I hope the Thai teachers have considered that these students will probably chat to their classmates who have already taken the exam and discover the answers.

At this time last year I took M6 out to a buffet dinner at Kranuan Thani but this year’s M6 are quite different. The old M6 were fun and went around together and were part of everything. The current M6 boys are a lazy bunch who don’t take part in anything; the girls are much better and studious in class and they get involved with anything that’s going on. I won’t be taking M6 out to dinner this year and they are not expecting me to either which is just as well.

SATURDAY 9th MARCH

The school was busy today with Gor Sor Nor (adult education) students taking exams which continue tomorrow. They rolled up to school on their motorbikes and cars and parked all over the place and many had their families in tow. The students are mostly people in their thirties and forties though some are older still. There are usually some younger 18+ ones too. Most enrol at the Gor Sor Nor school in Kham Yai, which I was told is very well equipped with all the technology and so on, to catch up on exams they flunked or failed when at school; some enrol for social reasons and some for job related reasons.

I was a bit annoyed this morning with Ajarn Narongsak, one of the sharers of my teacher’s house, because he spent the whole morning from soon after 8am till about 12.30 faffing around washing his laundry which meant no one else was able to do any.

Also this morning, I was uploading photos to a web album when I noticed the upload speed was the fastest I had ever seen it. The photos were being uploaded in a flash whereas it normally take forever. Later, I got an sms message from dtac (my Air Card service provider) to say my 3G allowance had expired but if I wanted to extend it I could pay 150 baht for another seven days.

SUNDAY 10th MARCH

A very cloudy windless start to this morning and I thought there’s not much hope of any laundry drying today but an hour or so later the sun emerged and I decided to take a chance on it staying out to dry things.

I went to Tesco Lotus in Kham Yai to put some more credit on my Air Card to get the 3G extension but I am not sure that it is making much difference today. Despite what the call centre said which was that the 150 baht (£3) 3G extension would last a month it will in fact only last seven days.

I have recently been trying to discover where I can buy some seeds of the Erythrina Poeppigiana tree. As I have mentioned before, this is the famous Coral Tree which has masses of crimson flowers at this time of year and can be seen in many regions of Thailand but nowhere near Sai Moon. If you remember, when I was in Bangkok recently I tried and failed to find a seedling and bought a Jacaranda plant instead.

I have now found a source for the seeds of this variety of Erythrina – there are more than 100 different varieties and I will make my purchase after I return to school in May. In passing, this tree has a number of different names including Flame Tree.

MONDAY 11th MARCH

The students who failed to turn up at assembly last Thursday morning took their Final Tests today meanwhile I spent most of the day marking the test papers for M4, M5 and M6 and most students managed to get above 50% which is not too bad.

M6 students, boys and girls, were also given the task of creating beds and planting some roses in front of the office building. There are some photos in my gallery but I am not confident that the roses will be alive and healthy when I get back to school after the holidays. We’ll see!!

TUESDAY 12th MARCH

I spent much of this morning getting things ready and packing my bags so I didn’t go down to the school until 11am and, by chance, as I hadn’t heard about it, I was just in time for a teacher’s meeting in the Director’s office. The main topic was the proposed teacher’s trip to Chiang Mai but for some reason the destination has changed. I had wondered why Ajarn Wanida was taking more than two weeks to come up with an itinerary when I felt sure I could do it in about 30 minutes.

A discussion followed about other destinations and eventually they all settled on Sattahip which is about one hour along the coast from Pattaya on an attractive peninsular with a very long beach. Sattahip is where the students at my first school, Ban Chad, went for their annual trip. There is also a large naval base nearby where Thailand’s one and only aircraft carrier is moored which I was banned from boarding when all the other teachers and students toured the vessel. The reason given was that I was a foreigner and there was something top secret on the ship. When I got the chance I googled the name of the ship and very quickly discovered what this so-called secret was – the ship has a cabin reserved for the King and his family should there be a national crisis of some sort. Wow!!

After the meeting I packed my bags in Jasper’s car and we set off for Kham Yai where we had some lunch and we then drove to Nam Phong where I caught a bus for Udon Thani and the start of my summer holiday tour which will take in Udon Thani, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, Mae Sai and a border crossing, Bangkok and Pattaya. I’m looking forward to it.

MONDAY 4th FEBRUARY

A busy day tying up many loose ends before I left including packing up the aforementioned book and taking it down to the post office and ironing and packing and so on.

I also went to the nearest branch of Natwest bank in Covent Garden to withdraw all the money raised by my Amazing Give-a-Dictionary Campaign which I will convert to Thai baht in Bangkok where I will get a much more favourable exchange rate than in the UK.

Talking of exchange rates, the baht is very strong so the exchange rate against the pound (and other currencies) is pretty miserable right now. It is 46 point something to one pound whereas for most of the last two years the rate has been hovering between 48 and 49 baht. When I first visited Thailand in 2006 there were 68 baht to one pound making Thailand a cheap destination but that is certainly not the case now.

Fast forward to the present - I left my flat at 7pm having booked a cab to take me to Heathrow – this time the fare was £40 – but I hadn’t reckoned on the higher than normal volume of Friday evening traffic and it took us an hour to reach Hammersmith. Fortunately, once we hit the motorway traffic speeded up and I arrived at Terminal 3 only 15 minutes later than I had planned which was a miracle really and I breathed a huge sigh of relief as at one time, crawling along in the traffic, I had wondered what to do if I missed my flight!

I flew with British Airways to Bangkok from Terminal 3 which I think is the worst airport terminal in the world, a quart squashed into a pint size space with not enough proper room for anything and long dismal narrow corridors on departure and even worse welcoming one on arrival.

Unfortunately I didn’t get an upgrade when I checked in this time unlike last year which was a really nice gesture. This time, the queues in the security hall were short though the actual process itself was very slow. I checked out the Duty Free price for a litre bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label which I planned to give to the Director but having also checked the prices before leaving Bangkok I realised that Heathrow’s prices were £10 more expensive per bottle!

The worst feature of Heathrow in my opinion is the lounge/waiting area where one is surrounded by shops and more shops of every description each of them with special offers which are always more expensive than when purchased on the high street at home. Some of the shops may well be ‘duty free’ but they are certainly not profit free.

I had quite a long wait form flight to be called as the gate opening time was put back twice because the plane had been into the ‘garage’ for an extra check for some worrisome reason. The gate, when it opened, was at the furthest extremity of all the ramps – now, why is it that all my flights in or to or from Thailand always seem to be boarded at distant gates making for a long dreary walk to get there.

The departure lounge was a good example of the poor design of Terminal 3. It had seats for around ninety passengers but a modern 747 has many times that number. I got a seat but most people were packed in like sardines and had to stand while waiting to board. When an announcement came on calling for passengers in seats number 20-45 to board there was a rush forward and I was one of them. But where to go ?? The only exit from the lounge had a large Emergency Only Exit sign above the door, surely this wasn’t an emergency ?

Amid all the confusion a BA steward pushed her way through the crowd to tell everyone that the announcement we heard was actually for the next door Virgin lounge and not for us. So everyone who had seats, like me, tried to return to them only to find they’d already gone so we had to stand and wait. And wait.

Eventually, we boarded and, yes, we had to go through the emergency exit down a long very narrow corridor permitting only two abreast. We hadn’t gone far when a steward was forcing his way through the passengers with an empty wheelchair and a short while later returned with a passenger in the chair. The whole thing was chaotic and I feel BA staff have a lot to learn which they could do very simply by listening to the Virgin announcements next door and realising what a good idea it is to board by seat number blocks and requesting those needing wheelchairs etc to go first.

The flight itself was ok, and this time I had my requested aisle seat and the dinner was good as was the choice of new films but I felt so tired I couldn’t watch any and had a fitful sleep.

We arrived about twenty minutes ahead of schedule at 4pm local time having only taken 10 hours rather than the usual twelve. One of the quirks about this airport is that you can purchase duty free goods on arrival so this is where I bought a litre bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label whiskey for the Director.

At immigration they now have two long queues each with a steward at the front directing the next person to a vacant desk. Although the queue seems daunting at first it is a great improvement on the previous multi queuing system and I went through quickly, collected my case and got a metered cab to take me into central Bangkok – about 400 baht (around £8) for the 35km journey should you ask!

My first evening in Bangkok I was dazed with jetlag but I was determined not to go to bed too early. My time in Bangkok was short and I had a number of things to do such as collect and pay for the servicing of my Nikon D80 camera. During last year a misty bloom had appeared on an inaccessible (to me) inner glass of my zoom lens and there was also a spot on the display lens inside the camera body which can be faintly seen on every photo. All this cost me a reasonable 7,250 baht (about £150) and I am very pleased with the result.

Whilst at Nikon’s showroom I noticed they had some display cases upstairs containing old cameras, both Nikon and other makes, illustrating the development of photography. I was given permission to take a look and it was fascinating and I took some photos for you which are in my gallery.

I also collected the Jacaranda tree and the Amaryllis and Lily bulbs which a friend had been looking after for me while I was in London. (See photo of similar tree I saw in Lisbon)

TUESDAY 5th FEBRUARY

I flew from Bangkok to Khon Kaen where I had arranged for a cab to drive me to Kranuan where Jasper collected me and drove me to school arriving there about 3.15pm shortly before the students went home.

Everyone was pleased to see me and I retrieved the Fruit Tea Cake from my bag and shared it with the other teachers who seemed to like it. I also began to distribute the key rings which either had a photo of Big Ben or the word London with the Union Jack on the other side. These seemed to be popular as well.

The rest of the afternoon I spent unpacking and putting things away and getting my room in order. The small Jacaranda tree survived the journey as did the bulbs and I gave them to Mr Yor and explained what they are.

WEDNESDAY 6th FEBRUARY

My first full day back at school; several teachers were away on seminars including the Director so there was a very relaxed atmosphere.

I told the other teachers about the successful fund raising for my Give-a-Dictionary Campaign and they were genuinely very happy to hear about it. I can now try and get a discount from the publishers for a bulk order.

This afternoon there was an election for the next Bataan (literally, President of the School Students but, in practice, nearer Head Boy/Girl and there are some photos of the event in my gallery. The outgoing Bataan is an M6 ‘pooying’ (girl in Thai, in case you’d forgotten the meaning!) so she will be leaving school for good next month. As it happens, she is also in the early stages of a pregnancy so I hope everything goes well for her.

At the teacher’s house after school a friend of Mr Kay’s came to see him and I went over to say hello. After asking in hesitant English how I am, she asked: “Do you have parents ?” What did she expect me to say ?

THURSDAY 7th FEBRUARY

All the students were taken to the village this morning where we eventually joined up with a procession at the far end which had just begun to walk through the village. The procession ended up at the temple where a table had been thoughtfully set up with some free cold soft drinks which some of our students served to locals. When the time came, everyone went into the temple and there followed what I can only describe as a series of photo opps around the Abbott. Different groups, beginning with various class groups from my school posed next to the Abbott who sat unruffled in his chair. I took some photos for you which are in my gallery but, sadly, the flowers were all artificial

The event was to celebrate the local Abbott’s elevation to a doctorate. I have never spoken to him even though he teaches Buddhism to the youngest two classes and his class often precedes my English class but he often finishes late cutting off time from my allotted 50 minutes which is annoying.

I went with Mr Noi and Mr Jasper to Nong Kung Sri in the afternoon to cash the cheque I was given before I went to London and to have lunch.

FRIDAY 8th FEBRUARY

The Director was back at school this morning having finished his seminar and I gave him the litre bottle of J.W. Black Label and a key ring and a piece of my cake which he said he enjoyed very much.

All this week the most senior class, M6, have been having O-Net revision in the mornings and this morning as well except that Jasper and I were only told this morning that we had to give them English revision. This left us with little time to prepare any material that would last the morning. We pulled some ideas together and were about to enter the classroom when Ajarn Tippakorn told us the plan had been changed because a former Sai Moon student, who has a doctorate in technology, arrived to address the M5 and M6 classes.

M6 take their O-Net exam this weekend in Huai Mek which leaves time only for last minute revision. It is not as though they haven’t had any revision but that the M6 O-Net paper always uses some difficult words and confuses students with multiple choice answers that are similar but only one is correct.

In the event, Jasper and I weren’t required to give M6 any English revision because the visiting speaker took up most of the morning and the Thai teachers wanted their revision slots. So Jasper and I had almost nothing to do for most of the day.

One of the cats has had an infection in her left eye for the last couple of days so this evening Jasper and I took her to a vet in Kranuan who examined her prescribed some eye drops for the princely sum of 56 baht.

SATURDAY 8th – SUNDAY 9th FEBRUARY

A quiet weekend getting back into the routine again. While I was away my Scoopyi was locked away in a disused office and it had become very dusty so when Chokchai, an M2 student, volunteered to clean it for me in the hope of earning some money I readily agreed. He did a good job and my Scoopyi looks like new again.

Sai Moon’s M6 students joined other M6 students from nearby schools taking their O-Net exam in Huai Mek and Mr Yor was one of the invigilators. He told me that this year the students from each school were separated and not seated together and that all phones, including those of teachers, had to be left outside the exam room. All six exam subjects were taken over the weekend so it was quite a long slog for the students and the invigilating teachers.

The cat’s eye is almost back to normal now which is a good thing.

MONDAY 10th FEBRUARY

There was a short teacher’s meeting behind the students during assembly this morning – short meetings are often held like this with no notes and no papers so one has to commit dates and events etc to instant memory.

I had a discussion today with Ajarns Bpui and Tuk about my salary. The former was away all last week and she organises cheques and keeps records etc. There was some confusion at first about what I had and hadn’t been paid to date but, in the end, it was agreed that I was owed 7,000 baht (about £140) from December. Because so much depends on the Director’s authorisation Bpui and Tuk were unsure about his intentions for January’s salary and they asked me to ask the Director in such a way that he would explain everything to me and then I could let them know as well. He was away in Kalasin city with Mr Noi in the morning so I had to await his return but I am hoping he pays me for the whole of January even though I was away in London for some of it.

Why ? Because my trip was to get a new visa to enable me to return to Sai Moon for another year and it seems reasonable that the full salary of 10,000 baht (about £200) should be paid to offset, if only by a small fraction, the £951 (almost 10,000 baht) it cost me for the new return air ticket not to mention the £125 (just over 6,000 baht) fee for the new visa. What do you think ???

TUESDAY 11th FEBRUARY

I know I have only been back at school a week but I must start to think seriously about what to do for the upcoming holidays which will start about mid-March and continue until May 1st when the new academic year starts.

I have had the idea of going to Burma (Myanmar) for some time now and the coming holiday seems a good time to finally take the plunge before massive change takes place in the country following recent political developments. My Gordon great grandfather wrote a book about a trip he made to Burma from his posting in India which was published in 1875 (and republished in 2002) in which there were several photographs and I would like to revisit the same places to see what if anything has changed.

Work started today converting a large storage room into a meeting/performance/community room. The Or Bor Dor in Kalasin city has given Sai Moon the money for the building work though the budget is so small all of the work will be done by Sai Moon’s two handymen/gardeners. Lorry loads of sandy soil arrived and a low front retaining wall to the new stage was built. Some of the soil was placed behind this wall to fill the space and create a foundation for the stage itself.

I took some photos of the work in progress so you can see what it looks like. I expect it will be finished in a week or two. While I was there I chatted to the Director and made the point that over the last year there has been a greater outflow of students leaving for a variety of reasons than the number of new M1 students that arrived when school opened on May 1st and that if this trend continues then eventually there will be too few students at Sai Moon and the Kalasin education authority will be forced to close the school.

This evening Jasper and I and the Director went for dinner to a restaurant in Huai Mek which has a Thai and European menu. The Director likes spaghetti carbonara but I usually go for a Thai dish. On occasions like this it is possible to put across ideas to the Director and, following up my earlier conversation at the building site, I suggested we use our own students to chat with their friends at the schools we are going to visit this week to encourage them to enrol at Sai Moon and for every successful enrolment a student would receive a bonus of, say, 500 baht (about £10). He said it was a good idea, but said no more.

WEDNESDAY 12th FEBRUARY

It was gratifying this morning hearing the Director address the assembled students to announce my idea of last night. A round of happy applause broke out when he said that for every successful new enrolment, by a Sai Moon student, a bonus of 500 baht would be paid.

This morning I joined with four other teachers to go to two nearby primary schools to try and persuade their Prathom 6 students (12 year olds) to enrol at Sai Moon. As the first school, at Ban Sai Thong, also has a secondary section for M1, M2 and M3 students so our salesmanship was unlikely to be successful though a few students have come from this school in the past. Sai Thong school, like so many, is located some distance from the village and the students are probably well used to their existing routine and will not want to upsticks to come to Sai Moon unless they are unhappy where they are now or they have an older brother or sister studying at Sai Moon.

I took some photos for you which are in my gallery. Each teacher was introduced to the students in silence but when I was introduced the students burst into applause which was bother unexpected and nice. Each of the Thai teachers gave a spiel and then it was my turn. I introduced myself again and said I am from London but when I asked which country London is in I saw puzzlement on many faces. Everything I could say to promote the school had already been said so I got out of my chair and said hello to each student individually, asked them their name and shook their hand all of which caused some merriment and interest.

The second school, not far from the first, was much smaller and has a shortage of teachers resulting in some lessons being given via computer screen. There were only five eligible students who could come to Sai Moon and I think most will make the move. The free dictionaries were promoted at both schools to great interest though there are other factors for the students to consider as well.

By the time we finished with the second school it was time for lunch and we went to the restaurant on the road to Kranuan where the teachers Christmas party was held and where we exchanged presents. There seemed to be no other customers and our lunch was simple but very nice.

THURSDAY 14th FEBRUARY

This morning Ajarns Yor, Kat, Tuk, Tippakorn and I left school about 9am for the second day of recruiting students to Sai Moon. We visited Phimun school first and then Ban Hat Sai Moon school.

After two mornings promoting Sai Moon at other schools it is difficult to be sure how successful the exercise has been. We have been talking to the students, not to the parents, and a student’s idea of what he/she would like at a school might be very different from what we as teachers think might attract them so using our existing students as recruiting officers seemed obvious to me since they will see their friends at the other schools every day.

FRIDAY 15th FEBRUARY

Another problem with the internet today. It worked as normal until about 9.30 this morning and the cut off which suggests there is a problem at Nong Kung Sri which is the source of our long range wi-fi signal.

It wasn’t until much later today that I saw a news report about the internet outage which was caused by TOT’s (Telecom of Thailand) Bangkok servers breaking down cutting off the internet throughout the country.
At this time of year Mango trees are in flower though I wouldn’t hold your breath. Also in flower now is a small member of the Amaryllis family and there is a row of about twenty plants next to the Buddha shrine near the school gate which are a peachy-pink colour. At the teacher’s house is a shrub that looks like it could be a member of the banana tree family, but I don’t think it is. It does, however, have large leaves which are favoured by red ants for building their nests. Flowers stems on this shrub sprout up from below the soil and are pink. Photos of all three flowers are in my gallery.

SATURDAY 16th FEBRUARY

This evening there was a celebration in the village of the lives of two relatives of one of the M5 students who died recently. A couple of days ago all the teachers received a sort of invitation card for the event – photo in the gallery – and were expected to donate money to the family. I gave 100 baht (about £2.20) but some other teachers gave 500 baht.

The main event of this celebration was a Mor Lam performance and for this a large stage had been built at a crossroads inside the village. If you recall, the inner roads in most villages are on a grid pattern so there are many such crossroads. Siting the stage at the crossroads meant it had an approach road on which food and other stalls were erected and two side roads for access and parking etc. There was no need for chairs as people bring their own woven mats to lay on the ground and sit on.

I went to the Mor Lam about 10pm with Mr Jasper and many people were there including many Sai Moon students and I had a few beers and chatted to various people and listened to the music. It wasn’t the most engaging Mor Lam I have experienced but then I don’t think the event was intended to be a wild party. Around midnight close relatives of the recently deceased went on to the stage and for the next hour or so there were some traditional sung incantations by the singer and a small ceremony. It seemed to be going on for ever so Jasper and I went back to school. As we arrived I could hear that the music had changed and it was fun time again but the crowds had diminished considerably by then. I heard later that the show element of the evening cost about £1000.

SUNDAY 17th FEBRUARY

I passed by the site of last night’s Mor Lam this morning and there was almost no trace that anything had happened; everything had been cleared away and tidied up.

The temperatures has cranked up a lot now; it is scorching hot by lunchtime and as the sun comes round and beats onto the outside wall of my room making it as hot as an oven inside.

FIRST OF ALL, I APOLOGISE FOR BEING A BIT BEHIND THE TIMES WITH MY BLOG BUT IT WILL BE UP TO DATE VERY SOON. ALISTAIR

SATURDAY 12th-FRIDAY 17th JANUARY

I left Sai Moon this morning to go to Khon Kaen airport and fly to Bangkok and, luckily, Jasper drove me there. Luckily, because I temporarily lost the card the taxi driver gave me last time I returned to Sai Mon from Khon Kaen.

It was only a 50 minute flight to Bangkok and, as always in Thailand, the luggage claim carousel number was announced in the cabin before disembarking which is something that other airlines/airports could learn from.

My time is Bangkok was mostly spent shopping or trying to find things. I went via the Skytrain to Chatuchak Market, near Mo Chit, which normally only opens on the weekend and is a great place to find unusual or designer items. I went there on the Wednesday when there is a large flower and plant market because I wanted to try and buy a young Erythrina tree which has masses of bright red flowers at this time of year and is very spectacular. It has a number of different names including the Coral Tree and there is more information about Erythrina at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erythrina I want to try and buy the same variety that flowered so profusely at my very first school at Ban Chad in Khon Kaen province and there is a photo of this tree in my gallery.

Sadly, the none of the many outlets at the market seemed to have a Erythrina but I did spot a great substitute – a Jacaranda tree. I also spotted a section of the market specialising in bulbs and I decided to buy some to plant back at the teacher’s house at Sai Moon.

I returned to the plant market the next day with a Thai friend who helped me ensure I was buying what I thought I was buying. He is also going to look after the young Jacaranda and the bulbs until I return to Bangkok in two weeks’ time.

I also went to Klong Lod night market, near the Democracy Monument. It’s a large very busy seemingly disorganised place where you can buy everything from a power drill to a pretty dress. It was fascinating to see the wide variety of goods for sale at prices that make you blink because they are so much cheaper than elsewhere.

I also went book hunting in a number of bookshops to try and find a book titled Cooking With Poo which sounds pretty disgusting until you realise that Poo is the name of the author and she has gathered together a number of interesting Thai recipes in support of the Klong Toey Slum Charity and I thought my sister would like the book.

I was on the Skytrain platform when I spotted some interesting African themed activity going on in the square next to the Siam Paragon mall so I went down there to take a look. There were giraffes strutting around and there was a lovely waterfall and a tame gorilla...just check them out in my gallery.

One evening I went to see the new film Jack Reacher, with Tom Cruise, which is an intelligent and thoughtful thriller which will set you thinking you know what is happening when, in fact, you don’t!

Back on the Skytrain platform on my way back to the hotel I spotted some people gawping into a huge rooftop aquarium....see what you think in my gallery!!

My flight back to London departed at 00.05 on Friday 18th January and I caught a meter cab from my hotel in Silom to the airport in good time on Thursday evening. I had checked in online earlier in the day but when I checked in at the airport I didn’t notice that the seat number of the boarding pass was slightly different from the one I had reserved online. The result was that instead of an aisle seat, I now had a middle seat and on the aircraft I had a huge lady on my right who overflowed into my seat and a large guy on my left who wanted to stretch his right leg into my space.

On the plus side, dinner was very good and there is a photo of it in my gallery. It was delicious though the photo could have been much better. The midnight departure also ensured I felt tired enough to get some sleep during the flight which was fortunate.

THURSDAY 17th JANUARY – TUESDAY 31st JANUARY

We landed at Heathrow about 6am the same day and it didn’t take long to clear immigration though there was a long queue. The annoying thing about Heathrow, an airport I dislike, is that you have to walk miles to get anywhere down low-ceilinged dull corridors unlike Bangkok airport where there is a feeling of great spaciousness and corridors are cheerful.

After emerging into the public area I could not see my name on any of the cards held by the many cab drivers. I circled round again and again to no avail and I thought there had been a date/time mix up. Eventually, my driver did appear and he told me he had been waiting for me in his car in the car park....doh!!!

The journey into central London was fast despite the heavy traffic and it took only 40 minutes to get home. My days in London have been fairly hectic. I arrived with a long to-do list which has meant tube or bus rides in different directions almost every day. On top of this I had the old carpet in the hallway replaced with a very handsome bamboo floor which I purchased online from www.simplybamboo.com and I have finally bitten the bullet and ordered a washer/dryer machine. I had hoped to buy separate machines but my only suitable space was about 6cm short so I had no option. Unfortunately the mains water pipe the new machine had to be connected to was a copper one so my carefully laid plan to have it installed before I returned to Thailand misfired as such pipes are all plastic now and a special fitting was needed to link it to the copper pipe causing an unexpected delay.

However, my main objective in London was to get a new visa which will allow me to continue teaching in Thailand for another year. I had heard that the embassy were no longer issuing the kind of 12-month multiple entry visa I had last year and the year before but, in the event, everything went smoothly. The only difference was that whereas my previous visas were issued on the basis of being a volunteer the new one was issued because I am a pensioner. Either way, I was very relieved to get my visa with no hitches though it still cost me £125!!
I also spent a very nice twenty-four hours staying with my sister and brother-in-law in Wokingham over a weekend. It was great to see them again and to see my niece and her husband and their two children, Joseph and Olivia, my great niece and nephew. My sister very kindly cooked up an amazing Sunday lunch of slow roast pork with all the trimmings and a selection of amazing desserts. Yummy!! Thais don’t usually eat desserts and I miss them! I gave my sister the book I bought in Bangkok – Cooking With Poo – the title of which brought smiles all round.

On my first day in London I spent a while online ordering various things from amazon and the like including some Nike football boots for one of the Thai teachers which he is going to pay for on my return. He didn’t want to buy them in Thailand because he wasn’t certain of getting the genuine article. Luckily, I suppose, all the items I ordered online arrived safely and in good time.

I also had to return stacks of family history letters and photos that I borrowed for my 2008 book titled George Peters and His Descendants which covers my maternal family history. Some material had to be dropped off at Marble Arch and two other people very kindly came up to London to meet me and take other material off my hands. But one of those who came to London bought one of the three remaining copies of my book which was good though this did mean a trip to the post office and time spent in the inevitable queue.

There were also various maintenance jobs around the flat which kept me busy and then there was the difficult question about what to take back as gifts for the other teachers. One is expected to bring something and finally plumped for some rather nice key rings, I bought half a dozen showing Big Ben with the Union flag on the other side, and the same quantity of a different design modelled around the letters saying London on one side and the flag on the other. Hopefully they will like and use them.

At midnight on Sunday 27th January my Amazing Give-a-Dictionary Campaign finished online having just $10 short of my target of $1,900. Luckily, one of the cousins I had to return family history material to insisted on making a contribution which, happily, took the final sum raised $20 over the desired target which will all be used to buy the chosen dictionaries. If you contributed to the Campaign Fund then I would like to give you another big THANK YOU and I will be keeping you up to date with what happens next in my blog.

Tomorrow I fly back to Bangkok. It was a prey hectic two weeks in London and a freezing one to start with but it was nice to see so many people and to be able to cook one’s own food again and make a lovely cake. I am not sure what my third year at Sai Moon will be like but whatever it is like I will keep you posted here.

TUESDAY 1st JANUARY 2013

I would like to wish you all a very happy, fruitful, prosperous and healthy 2013, the Year of the Snake. I hope all your dreams come true!!

The beginning of another year though this one is probably my last in Thailand unless an amazing offer appears which I cannot refuse. It is not that I don’t like it here. The sense of freedom here and the weather are just two of the wonderful things that the country has to offer. It is true that the cost of living can be cheaper here than back in the UK providing one doesn’t feel the urge to live a fully westernised lifestyle. It is also considerably cheaper living in the countryside compared to living in, say, Bangkok or Chiang Mai. But even with a salary of about £200 per month it is hard to survive and I find myself having to draw upon my UK funds more and more often. So I begin this year with a strong sense that this one is my last in the Land of Smiles.

WEDNESDAY 2nd JANUARY

The first working day of the new year though at assembly this morning there were only twenty-five students present. This is no reflection on the students because today was always going to be optional for them. I don’t think school will really begin properly again until tomorrow.

The students went home at lunchtime and I spent the unexpected free time selecting and uploading the photos for the last blog entry.

About ten o’clock this evening Mr Yor returned from his long weekend at home in Ayuthaya and within a couple of minutes he’d set fire to the small pile of rubbish that had accumulated over the break most of which was plastic bags. I was very angry about this because the stinking carcinogenic smoke drifts into my room, and probably Mr Norongsak’s too, which is intensely annoying. Mr Yor’s room doesn’t get filled with smoke because it is forward of the fire and the other side of the building.

As soon as I discovered the fire I decided to extinguish it using a large plastic bowl to douse it with water and prevent it smouldering on. I can understand the need to dispose of the rubbish and, in the absence of any rubbish collection service, the need to burn it but I believe it should, first, be collected in a wheelie-type bin (there are several in school already) then wheeled well away from the living accommodation to be burned. To achieve this I would probably have to purchase a wheelie bin for the teacher’s house.

THURSDAY 3rd JANUARY

A usual complement of students at assembly this morning and everything was back to normal again. Ajarn Tippakorn to Jasper and I that the three of us are going to have to select one or two students to take part in the annual Kalasin schools competition in which events range from flower arranging to traditional dancing. The competitions we will take part in are Speech Making in English and Chinese; Spelling Bee, Crosswords, Dictionary Word Finding and Singing.

I will be responsible for the English speech and dictionary opening. The topic for the former is the King’s Self Sufficiency Economy – this is fortunate because I had to train a student for a speech on the same topic when I was at my last school in Loei and I still have the speech on file.

The dictionary opening event is a new one for me but I have noticed in the classroom that Thai students have great difficulty finding words in an English-Thai dictionary even when they have the English word written on the whiteboard or in their exercise book. So this competition might not be so easy for the competitors as it might seem at first and the dictionary used has to be the New Model Dictionary edition authored by So Sethaputhra. The school office has a rather ragged copy so I will try and buy a new one at the weekend.

Mr Yor went round the offices this morning bearing New Year gifts for everyone – a handsome hexagonal box of Mangosteen tea bags – which was a nice thought. He came into my office and gave me one as well and I took the opportunity to talk to him about the carcinogenic rubbish burning last night and he apologised and I told him I will be getting a wheelie-type bin for the rubbish and he agreed to burn it well away from the teacher’s houses in future. So all’s well in the end. Mr Yor’s a nice person but as with other Thais, and as Thais themselves admit, they rarely think how their actions will impinge on other people.

FRIDAY 4th JANUARY

I now have almost everything arranged for my trip back to London. I leave school a week tomorrow and I will stay in Bangkok for five nights before catching the midnight flight back to London (on January 18th) where I hope to get a new 12 month visa. I say ‘hope’ because I have heard that the type of visa I have had every year so far is no longer being issued in which case the best visa I can hope for is one valid for three months which I would have to renew every ninety days.

A few days ago the Director found 3 small puppies heartlessly abandoned by the road near the school and decided to rescue them. He then asked Mr Yor to take care of them and a large open pen has been constructed for them until such time as they can be let out on their own. I have no idea what type of dog they are and they verge on the ugly side though one has a nice smooth grey-ish coat of fur. They have yet to be introduced to the kittens so I hope they will be able to be friends.

SATURDAY 5th JANUARY

Jasper and I went into Kranuan to have lunch but our regular place was closed so we went elsewhere though it was not as nice. We also sought out an electrical shop to try and buy a new transformer for a modem. The transformer is about the same size as a phone charging device and the shop didn’t have a replacement but it did offer to repair it so we left it there.

We also tried to buy the New Model Dictionary for the Dictionary Competition. I had the school’s old copy with me but the only dedicated bookshop in Kranuan is a branch of Se-Ed Books inside Tesco Lotus which had plenty of dictionaries but not the right one. On the outskirts of Kranuan there is an education store which stocks everything a Thai school might need including textbooks but, it too, didn’t stock the right dictionary. I came to the conclusion that the student I have to train for the competition will have to make-do with the old tatty copy.

SUNDAY 6th JANUARY

This morning Jasper and I went to Global Village, a vast home furnishing warehouse on the outskirts of Kalasin city. Our objective was to get a wheelie bin for the teacher’s house rubbish which can then easily be taken well away from the house to be burned.

As it was our first ever visit to the store we walked around to see what they had. In the tools department it was a bit like stepping back in time to see proper wooden lathes and a whole variety of specialised tools which are hard to come by in the UK. We paused to look at electric shower units and I may well buy one next month as I can get it installed for free and I don’t have to worry about paying any electricity bills!

The wheelie bin, not the largest size but the next one down, was 1,400 baht (about £30) with a lid and wheels and it is a nice shade of dark green to distinguish it from the yellow school bins.

MONDAY 7th JANUARY

A full complement of students at school today and everything was back to normal with all the festivities beginning to seem a very long time ago.

TUESDAY 8th JANUARY

Here’s a little factoid for you about sugar cane: by the time sugar cane is ready to cut all the outer leaves have died so the gaps between the canes gets filled with these dead leaves which are still attached to the base of the cane stem. At this time of year flames can be seen leaping around the sugar cane fields at night as farmers burn off the dead leaves to clean the stems before delivery to the sugar factories which pay a premium to farmers for doing this.

WEDNESDAY 9th JANUARY

Disaster struck this afternoon when I discovered that the taxi business card I’d put into my pocket at lunchtime had vanished. Most likely it was pulled out of my pocket when taking out one of the pens I use in class. I checked the few places I’d been after lunch but couldn’t find it. Normally, something like this might easily be found in the classroom but the students were given cleaning tasks late this afternoon and the classroom in question had already been cleaned and the students hadn’t found anything when sweeping up.

This means my carefully thought out plan to get to Khon Kaen on Saturday is out of the window and I will have to ask Jasper to take me there instead.

THURSDAY 10th JANUARY

The students spent today cleaning up around the school and making props and decorations for tomorrow’s big event. Different classes were assigned different tasks so the necessary work was done under the supervision of teachers. One of the characteristics of Thai people, and Thai youngsters in general, is that when students are set tasks like this no one moans. Everything is fun so the students set about their assignments laughing and joking and joshing each other.

FRIDAY 11th JANUARY

National Children’s Day is actually tomorrow but Sai Moon celebrated it today with the emphasis on fun for everybody. Some older kindergarden students and students from nearly primary schools were invited and many came along with their mothers, and some with fathers too.

There was the usual opening ceremony and speeches by the VIP from the Education Dept in Kalasin city and Mr Supan, the head of the next door Or Bor Dor (local Council office). There then followed ‘dancing’ performances by each of the guest schools which were hilarious. The older primary school students from Phi Mun village (who potentially will be coming to my school next academic year starting May 1st) did an interesting dance routine with some natural dancers and you can see how youngsters in Thailand start their show careers young.

My school put on two shows, the first a drumming and dancing show by the youngest students from M1 (12/13 y.o.) and the second, the finale, by two M5 students who performed a wonderful cock fight dance.

In addition to performances on stage there was a giant bouncy castle, a train ride and various games for the younger ones plus, most importantly, lots of food. And every so often during the morning staff went round handing out ‘kanum’ (in this case packet food of biscuits or crisps or Lactasoy etc) which was very popular.

I have placed three videos on youtube.com and here are the links:

1. the Sai Moon Cock Fight http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3f0PkF7qSkQ

2. the Sai Moon Dance with Drums http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsniJ-l8llM

3. the Phimun Dancers http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8dElHO9MgM

I hope you visit and enjoy the short videos. Tomorrow I fly to Bangkok and will stay there a few days before flying to London. I hope everything goes ok.