Subtle it ain't!

OK, so here I am in Bangkok. Been here nearly 3 weeks now, so I'm clearly somewhat of an expert. I would therefore like to share some gross generalisations with you all:

1. Bangkok is big, busy and crowded.
2. The people really do smile ... a lot
3. Food is everywhere - you can't walk too far along a footpath without having to avoid a food stall
4. The food is incredibly good - just remember to say "pet nit noi" or your mouth will resemble a ring of fire (or at least its oral equivalent)
5. The food is incredibly cheap, as are taxis, beer (but not wine) and pirated dvd's
6. It's mostly quite hot and very humid
7. The music is mostly awful
8. The traffic really is pretty bad most of the time
9. The random smells that one encounters can be quite confronting at times (walking home today I had to endure a few minutes of Eau-de-mouldy fish)

So basically, I think the title of this post ("Subtle it ain't") kind of sums up Bangkok. There is a lot to explore here and I get the feeling it will rarely be boring.

Anyway, I know you'd rather be reading about me than Bangkok, so let me fill you in on some of the highs and lows that has been my life in BKK so far. I will even break it up into nice little sub-headings for you. (Just don't expect this kind of spoon-feeding all the time.)

Work

The bulk of my time here has been spent preparing for my new job. The first week was "induction", although most of us "inductees" came up with other words to describe it. I won't bore you with too many details, but there were about 30 new staff, mostly Brits, mostly very nice and mostly totally overwhelmed by the end of our "induction". Having visited the school for a week in June gave me a huge advantage over most others who were seeing the school for the first time. But the whole week was very much a seemingly non-stop barrage of get up early, try to find something to eat, wish I'd had time to do some proper shopping, drink some water instead, go to school, be grateful the school provided food, eat the food, attend lots of meetings, be inundated with info, meet new people, try to remember the names of the people I met yesterday, eat some more, hear more info, try not to look tired, more meetings, more food, more people, more info, drift into that semi-awake-focus-on-keeping-my-eyes-open state, drink some more water, finally get to go home, go home, rest briefly for a bit, find something else that's wrong with my new apartment (more on that later), get ready to go out, meet everyone downstairs, try to remember everyone's name again, get on the school buses to go out, end up at some nice restaurant somewhere, meet more people, drink, eat, talk, drink, drink, talk, feel exhausted, have one more drink, go home, panic that I've forgotten the electronic key for my apartment, find my key, shower, collapse, sleep, repeat. This happened pretty solidly for 8 days straight. We then had a weekend where we got to relax almost properly (although the frustration of not having much stuff in my apartment meant that I had to spend a fair bit of time shopping).

We are now in the second week of term and so far so good. The school is very efficient and well-run. I believe a bigger contrast with the school I was at in Abu Dhabi could not be possible. And if I thought my life as a counsellor in an expensive private school in Asia would be cruisy, I had a bit of a reality check this week. Obviously, I can't go into details, but I've seen 8 students already, 3 of them with pretty full-on situations, plus I have another 8 or so to follow up. I also have to prepare 2 programs - a basic counselling skills course for year 12's and some stress management workshops for year 11, both of which start in the next week. That might do for work - I'll certainly be providing updates about work as time goes on.

Apartment

My new home is adequate ... barely adequate in fact. Brand new, only 10 minutes walk from the school, right next to a local market. If you'll indulge me, here's a little virtual tour.

This is the main living area (well, only living area, unless you count the bathroom). The furniture was all supplied, including the TV. My balcony overlooks the local market.

The Marantz receiver and speakers weren't included - I bought them with my "settling in allowance". My justification for this is that music helps me de-stress after work. (Any derogatory comments that come into your head about this stem from petty-minded jealousy and you should be ashamed of yourself!)

This is my kitchen. Some might say kitchenette, but given I haven't done any cooking since I've arrived (would you cook when you can get delicious meals right next door for $1?), a kitchenette suits me fine.

Here is my bedroom with my king size bed. I hope you're all appreciating the hardships I'm enduring here.

This is a view of the local market at night from my balcony. It's quite fun and festive and as I said I can get very good, very cheap food there. Not to mention all the chicken feet, duck heads, and pig intestines I could ever need (seriously!)

OK, so I was exaggerating slightly when I said the apartment is adequate. It is a little bit more than adequate. And I haven't even included any photos of the pool, spa, gym or restaurant. Mainly because none of these things are actually finished yet, but when they are I'll be sure to share some photos. In the meantime we have to put up with walking through a construction zone to get into the building and a lot of noise from tools and heavy machinery while they continue working on everything.

So I guess it's becoming abundantly clear that my surroundings are fairly comfortable, and this is indeed true (hence the ironic reference to George Orwell's novel in the name of my blog). The one thing I do feel uncomfortable about is that our apartment building is mostly surrounded by buildings that range from hovels to downright slums. I live in the "outer suburbs" of Bangkok and apart from the school and the odd mansion, it is generally a very poor area. I guess one of the advantages of living in a Buddhist country is that at least the locals don't seem to begrudge us our good fortune (or at least shouldn't begrudge us if they don't want to end up as a malaria-ridden mosquito in the next life).

General

This blogging takes up more time than I anticipated so I'll be finishing up this first edition shortly. But generally speaking, I'm enjoying my time here. The people are nice, there are plans afoot for travel (I think I have 3 weekends away in the next 6 weeks or so) and the place is very interesting. I have the best intentions to keep this blog vaguely up to date in the hope that it might prove more appealing than just a bunch of mass emails. Expect photos, anecdotes, travel stories and even the odd video clip!

That might do for now. Cheers!