Dinner with some Thais

I had a kinda second dinner at the hotel yesterday. Ja's sisters showed up to the hotel (as it seems they do a few times a week) and brought some food. They basically set up on one of the tables by the pool... and its late enough that enough that Ja doesn't really need to watch the desk (but can still see it from the pool). Ja's boyfriend, who also lives at the hotel, came down to join them as well. I was sitting down in the lobby at the time so they invited me to eat with them. This was definitely an odd meal (food was good though).

Ja speaks pretty basic English.. but I can have decent conversation with her with little trouble, the older of her two younger sister has a very good English vocabulary... but can't really pronounce much, and the other two speak very little English. This made conversations very.... tedious, but still possible and quite fun.

I tried to sit back and watch as much as I could before eating.... so that I (hopefully) wouldn't do anything stupid..... you know.. like actually eat with the fork. I will try to explain the set up we had.... there was a dish of very spicy veggies and other things, a kinda spicy seafood soup, a fish, some fried eggs, and two plates of rice. We each had a plate and a spoon and a fork. Ja's boyfriend (whos name is also Ja.... ya.. that got confusing quick) took one plate of rice(which he shared with Ja).. and the other one stayed in the middle of the table.

Everyone uses the fork to push rice onto their spoon and moves some rice to their plate. Lin put rice on my plate for me... then started pulling the meet off of the fish and passing some to each persons plate. It was pretty impressive how she managed to work around the bones of the fish. All of the other dishes we were supposed to just scoop the stuff onto our spoon with our fork and then just move it to our own plate.. add it to some rice.. .and then eat from the spoon. I had been wondering why we got a spoon and a fork at every restaurant I had been to.

They were very nice and always offering me more... and I would occasionally turn away from my plate for a second and when I turned back around there would be more food on my plate.

It was a lot of fun and a learned a few more Thai words :)

Ja

All of the staff at the hotel are really nice... and most speak at least some English (many get an English lesson from us each month). There is one that for some reason became our favorite in the first week there, Ja. For the first few weeks we didn't really talk to her much, but she would see us walking towards the hotel and have our keys out on the counter by the time we got there, and she would be just sitting behind the counter smiling at us.

When we got the assignment to teach an English lesson to someone that doesn't attend classes at the school ... I decided to ask her. She was very excited to get a lesson. Since she works the evening shift at the hotel, I was able to teach her while she was working (during a time when she wasn't busy). I did my lesson mostly on objects around the hotel room (just took a bunch of pictures and used my laptop during the lesson). It went very well and she seemed to learn a lot of new things.

Since the lesson I have talked to her a good bit. She has helped me teach the kids around the hotel how to hoop (by being kind of a translator).... on a side note.. finally got her to hoop yesterday. We determined the other day that there were more kids around the hotel trying to hoop then I had hoops for.... I still had a bunch of piping left.. but no connectors. So while she wasn't working yesterday she took me to the pipping shop to buy the connectors. And then to see a couple of sites around Phuket town. One of which was a park on the ocean (not a beach).... which had very little shade.... but she tried to stay in the little bit she could find.
Side note for anyone that doesn't know..... and I don't know if you could tell from my motorbike video.... Thai girls don't like the sun.... they are very against getting tanned (or really, darker then they already are). So while riding around town in 90 degree weather.... they will be wearing jackets to keep the sun off their skin. Its pretty ridiculous and amusing all at the same time.

There is a dog that hangs out around the school.... an amazing dog actually. That follows us around all the time (and is typically allowed in most restaurants and things). Well the only problem with him is... he is a street dog... so he is really dirty and makes your hand smell bad and sometime turn black after petting him. So me and Veronica decided to give him a bath... picked up some dog shampoo and tried to turn a hose on him..... totally didn't work.
So.... Ja decided to help us out and lure him into the bathroom by the pool (pretty much all bathrooms have some sort of hose and a floor drain) and lock him in there.... and we bathed him in the bathroom. He didn't quite like the water at first.. but he loved the attention once we started scrubbing him. Ja was far more forceful at keeping him in there then we were.

Later that night we ended up sitting by the pool (with the dog of course) with Ja and a guy that also works at the hotel. The guy was playing a guitar and we were attempting to sing some songs in English.... then Ja and Joy (Malta's g/f) would sing some songs in Thai. They both sing really well (especially compared to the res of us). We had a lot of fun and ended up staying at the pool till almost 6am!

Tomorrow is Ja's birthday, so a few of us pitched in and bought her a cake and some candles. The guy with the guitar is going to help us.. and we are all going to sing happy birthday (maybe in multiple languages(hopefully)) to her tomorrow... should be fun.

So we have spent some time hanging out with some of the hotel staff recently and its been pretty cool. The staff here are really nice. Though it has to be interesting for them. Ja was showing me some pictures of her hanging out with some of the students from previous courses.... going to the beach and other random stuff. So... basically every month they have a few weeks of the students getting used to them... then a week or two of hanging out with the students........ then the students leave and the new people show up. .......must be odd.

Completed the course

Course is done!!! I have my certification, with my 99 exam grade listed and my teaching evaluated as good (which is above satisfactory.. which most people got). Its interesting listening to everyone's plans for the next few days... most people are running off in their own directions. I will be doing a little beach/island hoping for the next week. One of the guys from the course and his g/f might be joining me for the first few days.

There are only a few people that have jobs lined up after the course... and many that will be looking for awhile. One of the couples that took the course together just got a job in Changchun, Jilin, China......... so that puts them an hour and a half way from me :) They wont be going until mid march.

We are all pretty happy to have the course done...... but we have all gotten pretty used to the day to day routine here. Even a lot of the people that had been around other parts of Thailand before but did not like phuket, have now changed their mind on it and are quite fond of the place.

If I ever come back to Phuket or talk to anyone that is coming here... I will definitely suggest the Roongrawee Mansion Hotel to them. I will post a bit more about the hotel and its staff at some point, it's definitely a unique place.

busy busy busy

So... things are kinda wrapping up on the course. I have taught 5 classes now and will teach my 6th in a couple of hours. All of them have gone pretty well. I will teach at least once next week.... maybe twice.

I am working doing my "Student Profile" which is basically a private lesson with some random person (of our choice). I am going to teach one of the receptionists at the hotel for an hour. I have already done the level test with her and have pretty much decided what my lesson is going to be on... I just need to make some worksheets and write up the lesson.........and of course actually do it.

I finally figured out what I am going to make for my game that is due next Thursday. It is going to be very similar to scrabble, except that instead of making words they will be making sentences. I have to do it with this/that these/those and common objects (like mobile, stamps, keys). I thought that I was going to have to make the board and everything from scratch because... why would they sell English scrabble here. Well I was kinda right. I was able to find scrabble in Thai.......not very helpful (they right vowels above and below the main line) because the squares were all funky. Surprisingly though... I found math scrabble!!! Which is set up exactly like English scrabble..... totally just covering the pieces to it. It only cost me like 80baht to :)

I tried playing math scrabble with Joy (Malta's Thai g/f)... and it didn't go very well. The rules were written in English and Thai... but she still wasn't exactly sure what to do. The receptionist at the hotel tried to help her out some.. but she didn't really get it either.. then the hotel manager came over.... so..... it was the 3 of them against me... and I was still helping them make equations... I figured after the first 2 or so they would get it.. but ya... the game didn't exactly go well. Granted... the game has some SERIOUS flaws.. that I think will also exist in my game. If you end up with all number and no = + - * / ... your kinda screwed and just have to switch some pieces for that turn.

I had my practice grammar test today (no phonology).... it went pretty well... I know the areas I need to study.... luckily I am teaching a class on one of those areas tonight... so I pretty much know it now :) I got a 66/75 on the practice test.... which is basically an 88. I think I know most of the phonology stuff well enough that I should do pretty well on most of it...... so the test shouldn't be to bad. (the real one is on Monday!!)

Next week will hopefully be a bit slower of a week (depends on how much on get done on my game this weekend).

Bugs!!!

Should have waited a few days to do that post on food. We went to the big weekend night market tonight and it was pretty amazing. The market is full of all kinda random trinket shops and cloths shops..... but the really awesome part is the food.

I am not even sure what everything I ate was..... from one table I at least know it came from a chicken....who knows past that. I got a really tasty drink that was basically made from squeezing the juice out of sugar cane........ and best of all... I ate some bugs :) well just grasshoppers... I looked at a couple of the other ones... maybe another time.

I put the pictures from the market on facebook.

Hoops Hoops Hoops

Ok... a lot to post about from this weekend... its been quite a full one.

I got up Saturday morning and decided to ask the hotel owner if he knew were to find irrigation pipe. Had google translate the words for me, then brought up some pictures. He figured out what i was asking about pretty quickly and called over the hotels maintenance guy. He told him to take me to some shop... few minutes later we were on his motorbike off down the road! The shop isn't all that far (maybe a 20-30 minute walk) and all it sells is piping. I grabbed 50meter of the pipe I wanted for about $20 (after cutting a few hoops... I thought about how long 50 meters actually was and really should have had them cut it down to maybe 25). I throw the tubing over my shoulder and we were back on the motorbike..... carrying that actually wasn't as hard as I thought it would be.

Got back to the hotel and the hotel manager helped me cut the pipe (they let me barrow a saw for the blade I bought to cut the pipe). I asked him if we should cut it outside.... but he was perfectly fine with me doing it in the middle of the lobby. As soon as we finished one of the ladies that works behind the desk swept up the mess.

Once we finished cutting the hoops he boiled some water for me and we put them together.... and he had some boy that might be his kid get a cloth and some ice to cool the pipe after we got the connector in... not really necessary but eee.

So... to sum it up.... the hotel staff here is really nice. I thanked them a lot and then headed of to House Works (Lowes) and Big C to find some tape. Couldn't find any gapher.. but I found cloth tape which seems somewhat decent. While I was at Big C I stopped by the Mr Doughnut and grabbed a dozen random doughnuts to take back to the hotel staff..... I think the doughnuts were more annoying to carry on the motorbike then the tubing was....

I tapped a few hoops this weekend. I made one for Malta's thai g/f ( she seemed really attached to my hoop while we were wonder Putong). One for Veronica, one of another guy in the course who said he was interested in learning, one of the daughter of one of the hotel staff (she is like 8 and always running around the hotel), and one for Rachel. Of course the ones for non-locals are collapsible... and the connectors here seem to work really well for collapsing.

Another night in Patong

This trip to Patong was a good bit cheaper than the last. First off I decided that as long as most of the people in our group had bought drinks… it wasn’t that important for me to (you just get asked constantly by the waitresses if you want a drink). Also we finally got Malta to go with us, and he brought his very shy Thai g/f (but I think she is getting used to us). She was able to get us great rates on the tuk tuks. So I only ended up spending about 300baht(about $10) for the entire night.

This time I decided that I was going to go all out, wore my performance pants and took my LED hoop with me. We went back to the same Irish Pub that we went to before, the band that sings there is really good. As soon as we got there the waitress and Irish started fighting again… it didn’t take long for Irish to be walking around with a note on his back that said “kiss my ass pls”, which I guess is better than the one last week that said “I’m a lady boy!”. Throughout the night I got a most of the waitresses to hoop J.

We watched the band for awhile and I noticed that the lead singer was looking at us a lot… so during a song where the other singer was doing all the singing she got off stage and walked towards us pointing at my hoop… so I turned it on and handed it to her and she started hooping next to the stage. I was quite shocked when she brought it from her waist to her neck by sticking one arm in (first person I have seen in Thailand that knows how to do more than just waits hoop). She handed the hoop back to me and motioned for me to hoop… so of course I did. The space was kinda limited so I just did a few basic on the body tricks and the one shoulder (except with my arm in it).

So I ended up randomly performing with the band for the rest of the night. For the last two songs the lead singer actually asked me to come up and hoop… it was pretty cool… and ya more videos and pictures of me hooping are going all over the world.

After the band was finished the lead singer(Rachel) asked me to teach her a few tricks… and damn did she learn them fast. I spent about 10 minutes outside teacher her a lift, how to chest hoop, and how to knee hoop. I was trying to teach her to bring it back onto her body from hand hooping about the head… but some damn drunk Scottish guy that we couldn’t figure out a word he was saying kept coming out and getting in the way and then REALLY failing at hooping when he would pick it up.

I told Rachel that I would probably come back out to Patong again before I leave and teach her a few more tricks. So it looks like there will be more adventures in Patong.

We tried to go to a disco like last time… but they wouldn’t let me in with the hoop. We really need to get away from the main strip (not sure if there are any discos away from the main strip… but we will look) The Irish pub is luckily a good ways off of the main strip… so it isn’t one of the places that’s whole purpose is to sell Thai women.

So we ended up calling it an early night and came back around 3am. Though I didn’t get to dance at one of the discos this time… I think this was my favorite trip to Patong so far (hooping makes anything better).

I didn't have my camera with me last night... so hopefully Irish made it back last night and I can get the pictures from him, but here are a few of the band the last time we were there.

Iced Tea!

So.. mom asked me to do a post on food at some point..... .not really sure what to right.. so far its been nice, cheap, and tasty.

I usually eat for anyone from 40 - 80baht ($1~3). I usually eat rice or noodles with some sort of meat it, for some reason it is typically pork. If I get noodles its fried noodles, sometimes in soup form.. and sometimes just on a plate... with pork.

I have ordered the cashew chicken a few times.. and it is really good. I got a seafood soup at one point.... but the cut up crab legs in it kinda annoyed me... they were really hard to get the meat out of... and really you shouldn't be grabbing stuff out of your soup and then having to force it open with your hands... something just seems wrong with that.

I have also ate at this place called Cha Cha Cha..... which is probably the worst restaurant I have been to so far. It is WAY over priced... and the food isn't very good... but for some reason the other people in the course keep going back.

And for the fun note.... a few of the other people in the course have ordered iced tea occasionally and told me that is was pretty good.. but warned me that it was pretty sweet...(I am the only southerner from the US)... so I decided to randomly order it the other day to see how it was... and ya its pretty comparable to southern sweet tea.... I mean... its not hooligans sweet tea, but that shit could kill someone. yay sweet tea!!!

Karaoke!

After our observation on Monday night we decided to go down town again to pick up some stuff from the market. So as usual we flagged down a motorbike taxi...... for one person its usually 40baht to get downtown..... so we occasionally have trouble finding one that will take two for less then 80baht... but since it was a time of day with lots of taxis around.. we probably should have kept trying till we got it for 60... eee.. o well.

I had forgotten to grab my camera that day but Veronica had hers and had commented on wanting to remember to take some pictures. So while on the motorbike taxi I borrowed her camera and took a video of us heading down town. It looks pretty cool and I hope it can give some of you a feeling for what the taxi is like. I need to take a picture on my way to Big C... its a bit more of an exciting ride. There is also a second video... but I haven't shrunk it down and put it up yet.

We did our shopping....weighed ourselves on a random scale for 1baht... and then got our fortune told.... though we have no clue what it means (we got some people to translate if for us.. but all they could say is that mine was good and Veronica's was only so so)...and got a little lesson on colours in Thai.

We found an arcade that had a shit ton of karaoke boxes/booths..... we watched some of the Thais sing for awhile... we were actually a little surprised that all the songs were in Thai. We scanned through one of the books and found a few pages of songs listed in English and most of them were sung in English. So after a little fumbling around we finally figured out how to work the machines and decided to sing a few songs :)

Because we had listened to Abba- Dancing Queen earlier that day in class (don't ask)... we decided to sing that first. Then randomly we did Britney Spears- Toxic ... hehe that one was pretty fun. Then Las Ketchup - Asereje ... a song in Spanish that I didn't sing but attempted to do the dance to......and failed. We recorded all the karaoke songs (unfortunately).... I am working on shrinking those down and they might be up at some point...... MIGHT.

All in all it was a good day.

Three lessons down.

This week has been especially busy. We did observations on Monday (so we had to be here all day). I taught a 1 on 1 lesson on Tuesday night which was actually a lot of fun. And I just finished teaching a starter level class (the lowest lvl).

The 1 on 1 lessons are done almost exactly like the big classes as far as planning goes. For the this one we only have half an hour instead of 43 minutes, so we have to cut everything down a little bit... but it works better that way because there is a lot of time where you are trying to get students to talk to each other.. which you can't really do in a 1 on 1. It was really like doing the lesson as a conversation. I got very good marks on this lesson..... I only hit a few words that were to high lvl for him. I think the best description I have heard for the 1 on 1 lessons is "Its like and awkward first date.... with your mom in the room watching"

The starter lesson I did tonight was very hard. You have to be very careful of what you say so that you don't say to much in English that is way over their heads.... because then they just sit there looking confused (also a good thing to remember anytime you are trying to talk to anyone that's English is bad). I actually did pretty well at this part.... but it was the part i was fearing. Most of the classes so far has surprised me at how fast they pick things up and how much English they know.... this one... I expected to catch on faster then they did. I got through everything I had planned on for the lesson, with the exception of one worksheet.. but that third worksheet is there IF time permits. Everyone seemed to understand what was going on at the end of the lesson.. and I got a good review on it.... so I would say that it went well.

We are starting to have stuff to do outside of the time when we are at the school... and lots of write ups to do, but nothing to overwhelming.... We just got an assignment to find a student somewhere outside of the school and have one 1hour lesson with them 1 on 1. We have met lots of Thais that I think would agree to doing an English lesson with me... hehe some of them have been giving us random Thai lessons :)

I learned most of the colours in Thai the other day while we were shopping and looking for something in a particular colour... but didn't know how to ask for it.... so in our attempts we just kept asking pointing at things in the shop and they would tell us the colour of them. Don't have a clue how to write any of these words..... but eee... could still be useful to know how to say the colours.

Patong

...... where to start....... Patong is the craziest place on the island, and probably the most expensive as well. Its the big tourist area that also has all your stereo types of the Thai prostitutes and strange things like pingpong shows (if you don't know what it is... don't look it up.. just assume you don't want to know). That being said it is also pretty much the only place to find a dance club.

We started off our night with 6 people, sadly we lost one before we even left phuket town. So our actual adventure started out with a 65 year old guy from the US(who is hilarious), a 40 something year old guy from the US (who is maybe more than little slow), a girl from Spain tha'ts two months younger then me, a guy from Ireland that's about my age, and of course me. We were going to meet up with a few other people from the course that were already down but found out our phones couldn't call the Australian number that they had.

We were warned that we would be swarmed by Thai girls when we got there... but it actually didn't really happen. We started out by just hitting a random beer bar while the Irish guy called up some other Irish guys to meet. The beer bars are the ones where the are multiple waitresses for each table... because you can buy them some drinks.. and then pay the bar to take them home... our group must not have looked very inviting because the only person that guy swarmed by bar girls... was of course the 65 year old guy.... they go for old guys with money. Sadly he did buy one of them a few drinks.

We met up with a couple more Irish guys and finally left the beer bar to hit an Irish pub (so much better). On the way to the pub the two older guys decided they couldn't keep up with us quickly moving through the crowds and decided to leave. (down to 3 + a few extra Irish guys).

The pub was great... it was just a little off of the main strip and right across form the beach. It had live music by a Philipino band. I took a few pictures of the band that I will upload at some point. It was basically a cover band.... but they were pretty amazing in the rang of songs the two girls could sing. This was one of the cheaper places we found... 100 baht for a beer or a coke (which is about $3) ... which is insanely high for Thailand, I can usually by a coke for about 15 -25 baht.

Our Irish lads eventually ran off somewhere so we took a short walk along the beach. In the process we walked past a group of guys from India sitting on the beach drinking so the Spanish girl decided to say hello to them in Hindi. This definitely got their attention and we sat down and talked to them for awhile. She has quite the magnetic personality and ended up getting all of their numbers and being invited to go eat at the restaurant at some point.

We tried to find the Irish guy again... but he was obviously in a pub and didn't here his phone, so decided to go to a disco. The music was pretty decent but they had no real dance floor. Most of the view here was a lot less disturbing then the beer bars, at least here the guys that the Thai girls were with were mostly under 50. We found an area right in front of the DJ for dancing.. it wasn't exactly a dance floor.... more like a set of steps that were very wide. I really can't even think of how to describe this place and what you see while looking around....dancing was fun... but i don't really like the club. At one point we did get to dance with a katoy, 'she' came up to where we were dancing on the top step and grabbed one of each of our hands and danced with us for a song or two.... we were pretty amused.

We danced till about 4am and then decided it was time to head home. We never did end up finding the Irish guy... but he made it home on his own. I had a good time... and even with how expensive it is there.. and getting there and back is a little pricey... all and all I only spent about $22. Its definitely not a place I want to go every weekend.

I taught a class!

I taught my first lesson to Thai students yesterday. It was a bit nerve recking at first.. but I knew he material and I knew the pattern that I needed to follow, so it actually went very smoothly.

I taught for 43 minutes to a group of 6 Thai students all over the age of 40. It was an upper intermediate class so they were at the level where you could pretty much have a conversation with them. My lesson was a vocab lesson on "getting together" or "gatherings".

Overall the class went very well (in my opinion and he instructor's). I had a little bit of trouble explaining the last activity to them, even though I demoed it..... no one did the activity. They were supposed to tell a brief story about some experience at a gathering of the card they selected, but they ended up just defining the words to each other.. which I guess was pretty helpful in itself.

I will probably be teaching again on Monday or Tuesday. I don't know what I will be teaching or to what level. I think I find at least some of that information out Monday.

So far I have enjoyed the teaching, though I am still wondering if this is the same style of teaching that my school in China will want me to do.

Update on a class

I have now had my first two days of class and have observed two lessons. The course doesn’t seem too bad at this point. It will still be a lot of work, but the instructors seem really keen on making sure everyone knows what they need to know to pass. That being said, I am really glad that I read the grammar book that Kalayna gave me, because they are teaching exactly what is going to be on the grammar test.

They have explained the basic concepts of the teaching style that they use and teach. So far it seems pretty strait forward. I will be teaching my first class either Wednesday or Thursday. It should be interesting. They pretty much write our first lesson plan for us and by the 4^th lesson plan we are writing them completely ourselves.

Adventures with a Tuk Tuk driver

I decided yesterday that I wanted to explore down town Phuket. I didn't any place in particular that I wanted to see, just wanted to wonder around for awhile. The center of town is close enough to walk to but far enough away to not want to walk there. I flagged down a motor bike taxi and pulled out my map to show him where I wanted to go and as soon as I went to show him the map he said "no" and sped off. This was definitely the first time I had seen a taxi refuse and leave before even quoting a price. So I flagged down another taxi and got the same response. I assume they thought I was trying to ask for directions or something. So I looked at the map and chose a place in the middle of town and told the next taxi that place (keeping my map in my pocket) and was off.

I wondered around down town for just a bit then had a Tuk Tuk driving offering to take me to a few different places around town for only 100 baht (about $3). I of course told him no that I was just walking around. He showed me on my map the three places he waned to take me and it pretty much hit every corner of the city. So when he went down to 20baht I couldn't refuse.

He dropped me off at the first place and sat down on a bench to wait for me. It was a souvenir shop with a shit ton of jewelery and random over priced trinkets. I walked through the store very quickly and headed back out. I figured the places he wanted to take me wouldn't be very interesting, but I was getting to look at a good bit of the city without have to walk the whole thing.

When I got back to the Tuk Tuk he seemed surprised that I came out so soon, so I told him that I was a student not a tourist. He seemed to understand and asked me to please stay in the places for at least 10 minutes so that he could get a stamp for bringing me there. This deal ended up working out well for both of us, he took me anywhere I wanted to go around town and occasionally hit a shop where I had to act interested in buying stuff for 10 minutes or so. Definitely not something I care to do again, but it worked out well for getting to see a decent amount of Phuket Town.

Fire Dancers

I didn't end up getting a chance to post pictures yesterday, but I will try to ge those up this morning. I got to meet one of the instructors yesterday and about 4 more students briefly yesterday. I will probably get more of a chance to hang out with people today since a lot of them were just arriving last night or this morning.

I went to Kata Beach last night with an Australian couple in their early 50s. It took us a little while but we finally found Ska Bar, which is where the fire dancers are. Most of the fire dancers did staff and about 5 of them were under age 12. They did a kind of informal show that started at about 10pm. Two or three of the kids would usually go at once, but the adults would go one at a time. I had my LED hoop with me so they asked me if I wanted to get out there and perform a little... and of course I did. It was probably the most difficult place I have ever perormed. It was high tide during the performance last night so I was in about ankle deep water with occasionals waves bringing the water up about half way to my knees. It was a lot of fun though. They told me that they fire dance out there every friday night and it wont be high tide next time.

New Years

Happy New Year from the future!!

I am finally in Phuket after a very long plane ride, it wasn't to bad though. The first plane was pretty awesome, it had a screen on the back of every seat that you could control personally. It came with a little remote attached to your arm rest that let you choose music or movies or games(totally played some minesweeper). I didn't make any new friends sitting around me, but I did talk to some interesting people while hanging out by the bathrooms in the back of the plane :) I also took a few pictures of Alaska while I was back there.

The second flight I made a friend while waiting to get on the plane, he was headed to Thailand to be in a fighting competion. This plane didn't have the nice screens or anything, but at least I was sitting next to someone interesting this time, a half Portuguese half African nurse from Switzerland that spoke French. We talked for awhile, her English was pretty good, and played some of a game of politically correct war (swear you could spend the entire flight on one game of war).

Once I got to Thailand it took forever to get through Immigration, but I was lucky enough to make a good contact while I waited. I met a lady in her late 50s that has been teaching English in Phuket for about 5 years now. I got some good advise about the area from her, but most importantly she knows quite a few fire dancers on the island and is going to put me in contact with them. After finally getting through immigration I took a decently expensive taxi ride to my hotel, got online for a minute, took a few pictures of my room, and then promptly crashed at about 2am.

The sun came beeming through my window at about 6:30 this morning, and I suprisingly got up with no problem. It was rather nice outside this morning so I took the time to actually see my surroundings (couldn't see much the night before) and of course took a few pictures.

So far most of the food I have had has been right on par with what I expted from an asian country, rice with some sort of meat and a little veggie. I decided to spend a bit today walking around the area near the hotel just to see whats here. Sadly most things are closed today because of new years, but there are still plenty of food vendors around. The sidewalks are very very odd, sometimes they are part of the shop they are infront of and sometimes just missing entirely. I was suprised to see very few people walking up and do the streets but damn are there a lot of motorbikes.

I decided to go get a cell phone today, so I took a motorbike taxi to Big C. It is definitely easy to get a taxi and they are cheap but a bit scary. When the guy dropped me off at the mall offered to wait for me to take me back, but I told him I would be awhile. I spent a little while just walking around looking at all the shops, and then found a cheap cell phone and got a card. All together it cost me almost $30 for the phone and 215 minutes. The mall also had a walmart type store in it, it was pretty much what you would expect from that type of store except when i got to the meat area. There were tons of counters with fish on beds of ice, and you got most of your meat like we usually do our fruit. They had bags you just fill up with whatever chicken pieces you want from this big tray that is just kind of sitting out there.

On the way to the mall I had seen a lot of things that looked interesting, so I decided to walk back. I walked into another strip mall type thing down the street from Big C and found one of the strangest shops I have EVER seen. The shop (well really stand in the middle of the walkway) was called "Phuket Fish Spa". They had big fish tanks set up with rims around them that you could sit on and just put your feet and legs in the water. I am not sure what type of fish were in the tanks but they were tiny and there were TONs of then. It looked like the fish just swam up in swarms and started attaching themselves to the persons legs. It was very odd...

I have currently only met three other people that are in the course, but Most people haven't arrived yet. Four more people are arriving today and 10 more tomorrow. There are 24 people signed up for the course but doesn't mean they will all show up.

Wow... what a long post, but eee its the first day here.

I will work on putting some pictures in this later... for now they are on facebook.