Rosalee and Brent, Lumphini Park, Bangkok, Thailand, March 2006. 

Green curry, sun, and oh-so-much relaxin'!

Howdy, all!

We're back from hot and muggy Thailand: burned by the sun, kissed by the food, spoiled by the hospitality.

Brent's blogging presentation went really well. His seminar room was packed out with about 50 bodies and, despite the inevitable computer crash, initial reports are very positive about his spiel. Chalk up another professional development credit, eh?

And Thailand is still fabulous, with cheap entertainment, shopping, and food galore--if you haven't been yet, you should go, as it really is an amazing place. B&R took (almost) full advantage of Bangkok, eating some of the best--and spiciest--food in the world, and relaxing and shopping throught myriad markets and such, and goofing off, interspersed with some professional learning and collegiality.

After Bangkok, we headed to phuket for three days of concentrated R&R. It rained every night, but thankfully the days were clear, and we were able to beach ourselves in Karon and do some neat snorkelling on Thailand's Coral island. Amazing.

And oh, the food. (Did we mention the food?) Streetside 30-cent pork and chicken satay, Panaeng curry salmon, green/red/yellow coconut curry, crispy pork salad, lemongrass beef, Tom Yam soup, cocunut chicken, cashew stir-fry, fresh tropical fruits of all descriptions, fresh Pad Thai, calamari... in other words, we ate, and ate, and ate.

A good vacation, to be sure. Now it's back to our students and life Kuwait-style.

Thanks for all your prayers and support!

B&R

Coral Island, Thailand.

 

on our way from Phuket to Coral Island for a day of snorkelling and beaching. 

 

Lumphini Park, Bangkok

 

Pad-Thai

Rosale and Brent stopped for some lunch at yet another street food market. Pad-Thai this time... if you think Pad-Thai is good at home, you have to try it in Thailand. 

Brent's seminar-room

This is the e-sign outside Brent's seminar room at the Shangri-La where he gave his presentation on blogging as a classroom tool. Despite some minor technical issues, the seminar went really well; we did, however, forget to take pictures in the actual presentation. Whoops! 

 

 

Waiting for the turn...

 

Bangkok Gridlock

 

Buddhist blessing flower-chain, bus #504, Bangkok. 

Bus stop, Bangkok. 

Sticky Rice

On his way to the airport to meet Rosalee (who arrived the day after Brent did), Brent picked up some banana-leaf wrapped coconut and banana sticky-rice from a very nice street vendor. Mmmm... sweet-rice... sooooooooo good... 

Sky-Train

Bangkok has an elevated subway--or Sky-Train--that goes to most of the stops you'd want to visit in Bangkok. Nighttime sees commuter-craziness, and this shot was taken on an outing for Thai food and Thai massage. 

Street-Meat...

...at its finest. 

Dave

Brent went out for a streetside chat and beer with Dave McKnight, a colleague who also presented at NESA. They had just spent an hour scouring the streets around the Shangri-La Hotel looking for some cheap laundry service. They finally found one, not realizing that on a side street adjacent to the hotel (the only street they didn't walk down), there was a bevvy of little laundry shops.

Oh, well. But who needs an excuse to drink in some excellent Bangkok culture anyhow, right? 

Streetside eats

This is a typical streetside food vendor, where the bold Bangkok traveller can--if they can get past the "real" surroundings--get some of the best food in the world for about 25 baht (less than a buck). 

A couple of Thai gentlemen passing time wth Bangkok's favourite recreational activities: eating, smoking, and having very, very cheap Thai whiskey and Pepsi. 

Views...

The view from the Shangri-La Hotel river lounge... this was the hotel where the NESA conference was being held. 

 

Tuk-tuks and traffic

 

Sorry, Dennis!

My brother urged me to put more photos up, so I tried. However, it looks as though the feature isn't working today.

So an observation instead: last night I dreamed of a YMCA in Kuwait that was demanding 12KD (about $48cdn) for monthly family membership fees. Now, I've dreamt about teaching, of course, but this is a first culture-specific dream. Which is, apparently, a big-people step towards being completely immersed--the next will be to dream in KD without actually converting to dollars!

And there are no YMCA's in Kuwait offering such reasonable fees... that may be the real concern here.

Spring training

Spring is here, a brief period of stunning weather--highs around 27--before the scorching summer heat sets in.

Brent is coaching the junior varsity (gr. 9/10) boys softball team. It's a brief season, about seven weeks long, culminating in a tournament at the nearby American School of Kuwait (ASK, not to be confused with our school, the American International School).

Now, I've been playing various forms of baseball for over twenty years, so there are many things that are second-nature to me. For example, when someone says, "Oh, I popped out to right field," I don't have to think about it too much. But I've learned that baseball/softball is not widely played here, so I have to work with a bunch of guys about half of whom don't know their throwing from their catching hand. (Seriously, the first guy to try out bought a glove in his enthusiasm, only to find that one shouldn't buy a glove for one's throwing hand!) It'll be a challenge, all right. Yesterday's practice was "whiffle-ball softball" on a smaller diamond so that the kids could get to know the positions they'll be playing.

We'll keep you posted.

National/Liberation Day

Feb. 25 is National Day and Feb. 26 is Liberation Day.

Liberation Day marks the liberation of Iraq-held Kuwait in '91, and was started as a huge celebration along the Arabian Gulf St. (which traces the coast all the way downtown) after the Allies declared an end to hostilities. People came out of their homes and were able to be in the open for the first time since the start of the occupation, some seven months later.

Nowadays, Kuwaitis--and whoever else owns a car--drive along Gulf St. every Feb. 26, honking their horns and making peaceful mayhem, playing music loud and squirting each other with party foam (where the foam tradition came from is a bit of a mystery). It's a rather interesting way to celebrate: teenagers, adults, and their children are all encouraged to dart between moving vehicles and spray others with foam. Very festive, albeit strange.

Only eight months later...

...we finally received our permanent marriage certificate from our good neighbour the Government of Ontario.

Now the trick is to find a suitable place to store our temporary one. It has some history, it does, from being torn on the register table, stapled in a kind of strange metal-and-paper-macromet, presented hither and yon for name-change stuff and Middle-Eastern politics...

We'll miss it.

But the paper they use on the permanent one is pretty spiffy. And it means we're fully legal in the eyes of the government. Amazing what weight a piece of paper can lend, eh?