My EA

Here is a photo of myself with my Educational Assistant, Vani. She has been born and raised in Singapore, however, her family is originally from Southern India. We get along great and she has taught me many things about things Singaporean and things Indian. She has worked at CIS for about five years and so is also very familiar with how things are run. Vani also has two couisins and one auntie that also work at the school.

Thanksgiving

This past Sunday, with the help of another teacher friend, I hosted a Thankgiving potluck for any and all from CIS wishing to attend a feast. There were thirty-three of us in total, and we sure had a marvelously warm, pool side feast with our new family and friends.

Prior to our guests’ arrival, decorations were layed out and created. I had bought a squash and collected leaves on a walk earlier in the day. Robyn brought some little pumpkins and dried corn. Andrea and Roger’s children helped cut out snowflakes for those of us missing colder Thanksgiving weather.

Our twenty-five pounds of turkey were ordered from Mr. Ho at the American School. This came cut up, with stuffing on the side and boat loads of gravy. Everyone signed up for a dish or two to bring. Everything was fantastic. Some of my favorites aside from the turkey were the cranberry sauce, a sweet potato/orange/walnut dish and a special death by chocolate dessert.

Even the little ones enjoyed the festivities!

Even though their decorations didn’t make the big leagues…Krista and Kim thoughtfully sent along special holiday napkins as reminders of home. These were much appreciated because I found ways they could be used

Krabi – Day Three

Well, our last full day in Krabi was definitely a goody. Carly and I signed up for a day-trip that took us to several islands around the area including the famous Phi Phi islands (one side of which was struck by the Tsunami last December) as well as a couple famous beaches. We hit up Maya beach which is where they shot DiCaprio’s film “The Beach”. Our tour operator noted that prior to the filming, this beach was not famous at all, and was a lot quieter.

At any rate, we were picked up at our hotel in the morning, and they drove us down to the beach from which we departed on a fairly large speed boat. We had 3 or so local Thai guide/driver/staff folks, and I would guess about 13 or so “tourists”. I heard a couple sitting beside us speaking in German, so I took my rusty Deutsch for a spin and the couple entertained me for a while before we both quite happily switched to English.

Our first couple of stops were some areas in which we did some snorkeling. Now, I haven’t done a lot of snorkeling in my day (once in Cuba, once in Malaysia) – but these snorkeling experiences here were by far the best. There were so many fish swimming around the boat that the only option for getting into the water was to jump in, and hope the fish got out of the way so you didn’t smash any of them. We tried to get a few pictures that could capture the sheer number of the fish, but it’s a bit hard unless you have an underwater camera.

I won’t give a mass running commentary about our day, but just try to touch on some highlights. Mostly because I can’t really remember the order in which we did things, or the names of all the places we went, so you’ll just have to look at the pictures, and maybe make up a story for yourself.

We stopped at one of the Phi Phi islands for some lunch, which was “ok”, and then proceeded to walk along with the German couple we met to the other side of the island where the Tsunami hit. Now, arriving to this side of the island was a little strange. Along our walk it was quite obvious that “Something Bad Happened” hear, mostly because of the tons of rubble and debris that still seemed to be all over the place. But when we actually got to the beach, and you just sorta look out at the palm trees and grass over towards the water, you can just feel that something “Not Good” happened hear. It was almost eerie how the life just seemed to have been sucked from everything. There weren’t many people on this side of the island, maybe a dozen or so that we saw at a few spots on the beach. There was quite a bit of building going on as I think they are still trying to restore a lot of the resorts and commercial establishments that once stood on this side of the island.

All in all, a fabulous day of beach trekking and snorkeling. We returned to Ao Nang, went home for a bit of a nap, and then met up with the German couple that we’d hung out with during the day for some dinner (any maybe a couple beers, too). Dinner was had at a beach-side Thai restaurant, just listening to the waves and enjoying the breeze.

Krabi – Day Two

Fewf. All of this typing and blog posting can be exhausting. Especially when you’re busy working, and trying to plan your trip to New Zealand at Christmas, and looking forward to the turkey dinner you’re gonna be having on the weekend. But I digress (I like that word, digress.). These first couple pictures here are a yummy fruit plate served to us for breakfast, followed by a shot that is taken just sorta outside the open reception area where our hotel is. That green roofed building was reception. This little road is the one we walked up and down between the hotel and the beach.

Day two in Krabi was awesome. A good portion of its awesome-ness stemmed from a fairly early morning wake-up, a good breakfast, and then being picked up by the Krabi Thai Cooking School folks where we were off for a half day of Thai cooking classes. I can not recommend this mini-course enough. The lady who runs it is absolutely fantastic (Ms. Ya). She’s been running the school herself (she’s quite the proprietor) for about 7 years now, she went to cooking school, and has held cooking positions in a few places around the world. She’s very kind, and fabulously entertaining. If you’re going to be in Krabi for any reason, call her up (phone number at bottom of page) or check out her web site.

At any rate, there were only four of us that day, Carly and myself, and an older couple from Wales. We had a stellar time.

Starting off, we made Red Curry Paste, Green Curry Paste and Penaeng Curry Paste from scratch. We got to cut all the vegetables and stuff ourselves. One of Ms. Ya’s favorite sayings was “Chop! Chop!”. We heard that a LOT. After making the curry pastes, we got to try them out with a bit of cucumber. Very tasty. After that, we carried on with our cooking endeavors and made Fried Rice, Pad Thai, Green Curry, Red Curry, Penaeng Curry, two types of Tom Yam soup, Coconut Chicken Soup, and last but not least, Green Papaya Salad.

Wow. This was a feast. We had an amazing type and the food was superb. Definite one of the top highlights of the trip.

Once our cooking time was finished, we headed back to the hotel, and then went for another walk down into Ao Nang to browse the shops a bit, and relax on the beach. We bumped into one of the teachers that Carly works with and chatted for a bit, picked up a couple of sarong’s from one of the local shops to use as beach towels, and read our books for a while.

A lady came along (chatting mostly) who wanted us to come to her shop for a massage. We’d already had enough Thai massage for the week, but that didn’t stop her from going back to her shop and bringing us back some really yummy fresh pineapple. We tried to pay her some money for it, but she politely refused.

For dinner we ended up walking down to Ao Nang again and had planned on meeting two of Carly’s co-worker-teachers for dinner. We ended up having Pizza. We were allowed, we’d had our Thai food allotment for the day.

After dinner we walked over to a little coffee shop for some dessert. It was 3 tiramisu’s for the ladies, while I had an espresso and some gelato. A pretty uneventful, but incredibly enjoyable day.

Krabi – Day One

So, this day actually started with a 5:45am Taxi ride to the domestic terminal at the Bangkok airport. Uneventful taxi ride, got us their quick at that time in the morning, and we sat down in the airport to have a bit of breakfast before jumping on our plane.

We flew Thai Airways from Bangkok to Krabi, and I just don’t know what to say. We had more legroom in this plane then I knew what to do with. Not that this is a very impressive statement since I have short stubby legs. But Carly happened to also have more legroom than she knew what to do with. This was something of a strange miracle, and we both kind of 1) stared at each other, then 2) looked at our knees, then 3) looked at the distance between our knees and the seats in front of us, then GOTO 1.

We got food on this flight, it was pretty yummy. Got off in Krabi and we had to go down the little stairs attached to the plane and got off on the tarmac where we jumped onto a bus. Now, you have to understand that the Airport in Krabi is small. Like really small. Um, it’s about as small as those 380 square foot apartments that they’re building on the West Side these days and charging $4 million dollars for (maybe not that small).

I think that the bus drove for about 13 seconds (maybe 100 meters, MAYBE) before it dropped us off at the door to the Arrival’s entrace. Once again Carly and I were reminded how most everyone here is deathly afraid to use their pedestrian abilities to walk from point A to point B.

At any rate, there was a friendly Thai guy there to pick us up and take us in a little van to our hotel. So far, we realize right away that Krabi is the complete and utter antithesis of Bangkok. It is quiet, quaint, relaxed, beautiful, and not densely populated. The drive from the airport to the town where we stayed (Ao Nang) took about 30 minutes, and the scenery was fabulous. Lush trees everywhere, limestone cliffs and rolling hills. Absolutely fantastic.

We arrived at our Hotel which had a really cool open-air reception area just on the side of this very small road. Just walking / driving on the road was an experience in itself. Very old-skewl small town homey feel to it. At any rate, the reception was great, a couple of super friendly Thai ladies checked us in, one brought us something yummy to drink (it was red, other than that, I have no clue), and then walked us down to our room.

We stayed at the Emerald Garden Resort, and the whole grounds here is absolutely stunning. They have two pools, trees and flowers everywhere, and well, yah. It was super.

Sad to say, this is the ONLY picture we took on our first day here (it’s a picture of our room, upon our arrival), because we were tired. Walking around Bangkok for three days made us want to do nothing but sit by the pool and read a book. So that’s what we did.

After several hours of maintaining a semi-vegetative state, we decided it was time to go get some food. Even though the hotel gave us 16 vouchers for free Tuk-Tuk rides town to the beach (where the food was), we walked. People couldn’t believe it. We walked. We walked TEN minutes down to the beach. But anyways.

We noticed right away that the little shop-owners (well, not really the shop owners, but the tailors) were a bit too pushy. Carly got a lot of “Hey lady, tall sizes, long sizes… HEY. Lady!” and I got a bunch of people with outstretched arm shaking my hand, calling me their “friend” and wanting to get my outfitted in a custom-tailored suit on the ASAP. After we passed all the tailor’s things were stellar. Very quaint little strip of restaurants and shops, ice cream and coffee places, a 7-11 (yes, a 7-11 here too) on one side of the street, and the Andaman Seaon the other side. The beach was beautiful, trees and cliffs, almost situated in a large bay. Several islands in the distance, and facing almost directly West, so it was an absolutely fabulous place to watch sunsets.

We grabbed a bite to eat at a Swiss/Italian/Thai place, and once again jumped into some “other” food that we were craving. We both had spaghetti and garlic toast.

I think that just about concludes our first day in Krabi. Very nice and relaxing compared to the busy-ness of Bangkok. Still more to come!