It's all about the weekends

I know I had teased you all in my last blog with the promise of an update about my fascinating work life here in Bangkok, but I’ve decided it would be far more interesting to talk about my recent weekend activities, the most recent being a long weekend in Krabi, which is a province in the south of Thailand. Last Friday the school just decided to give everyone the day off. In theory this was because the summer holiday was a bit shorter than usual, but for us new staff it didn’t make any difference, so in essence we just get a few extra long weekends during the year – score! And the first one was this last weekend, so on Thursday afternoon about 10 of us new staff left school at 3pm and went straight to the airport to get our flight down to Krabi, then a bus to the coast, then a boat to Railay Bay. Because we arrived at low tide, we actually had to wade the last 100 metres from the boat to the shore, and then we got in golf carts to get driven to our hotel. We finally arrived about 7:30. Railay Bay is a very small but very beautiful peninsula which can only be reached by boat, as there are no roads there. There’s just a handful of bungalow-style hotels and a bunch of cliffy mountains (although I was assured by the smarty-pants teachers that they are too small to be called mountains, but they couldn’t be called hills – see the photo below and you’ll see what I mean).







It was a fantastic spot to spend a few days. The only disappointment was that we got a lot of rain while we were there. It didn’t stop us from swimming or relaxing or having massages or eating and drinking, but it did stop us from doing rock-climbing, which is one of the main attractions of the area. I did do one climb on the Saturday, which wasn’t a proper rock-climb, more a scramble up a steep rock face, which was really good. There was a great view from the top.


The trip back on Sunday was rather exciting. The weather was the worst it had been all weekend – very strong winds and very heavy rain – when we had to leave to head to the airport. So, we got in one of the little long-tail boats (like this one) to get back to the mainland.







We could only find one boat driver who was willing to take us, which we should have taken as a bad sign. We got some garbage bags from the hotel to put our bags in so they wouldn’t get soaked and we all put on some very cheap, pastel-coloured ponchos in a vain attempt to avoid getting too wet ourselves. Needless to say, they did nothing but make us look like idiots covered with coloured cling wrap – we still got soaked. The boat trip back was fairly rough-going. About 10 minutes into the trip, the boat engine died, leaving us rocking up and down rather helplessly in the waves. The boat driver tried several times to get the engine started again, to no avail. I had visions of us being stuck out there for a long time, as there were no other boats around (quite wisely it could be argued). However, just when things looked bleak, the engine started again and we were back on our way again. The rest of our cruise was less eventful, just ridiculously wet and windy. Once we got back on land, the rest of the trip back to Bangkok was a breeze. The only sobering moment was just after I got home and heard about the plane crash in Phuket – an awful tragedy that seems to have hit Thailand fairly hard. Phuket is not too far from where we had been staying and I couldn’t help but feel incredibly grateful that the fairly atrocious weather in that area had been no more than an inconvenience to us.


The previous weekend I got to play tourist and visited a couple of temples and the Grand Palace in Bangkok, which were all mighty impressive. You can see some photos of the huge Reclining Buddha statue below. You can see some more photos of this and of Railay Bay on my flickr page – see link to the right.









I also went to see a band – Funeral for a Friend. They were quite good. The mostly Thai crowd were very appreciative and there was a pond in the middle of the club, which was very Thai. Alas, I have been assured that seeing decent western bands in Bangkok is something of a rarity. This weekend I’m going away again with a big group from school to an island called Ko Samet, which is not too far from Bangkok. I know it’s sounding like life over here is all trips away and sight-seeing, but I am actually quite busy at work as well. However, I don’t want to ruin this blog entry by talking too much about work, so to all of you who only want to hear about work stuff, I’m going to dangle that particular carrot a little longer. Cheers!

Many Pros (and a few cons)

I'm discovering that there are many things that I can appreciate about Bangkok. I've already mentioned the quality and affordability of the food here, but there is more to Bangkok than just great food and swanky apartments. So, at the risk of establishing a precedent of including a list in each of my blog entries, here is a list of some of the things that I quite like about Bangkok:

• Massages - again, the quality and affordability of these is remarkable - about $6 for a one hour Thai massage or $12 for a one hour oil massage (no, it's NOT what you think; you get naked and someone massages oil all over your body - shame on you for thinking it might be something dodgy).
• Public Holidays - I thought Australians took their public holidays seriously, but they have about twice as many here in Thailand. Very civilised.
• Bars - I have already discovered some very nice bars in Bangkok and they are generally much more reasonably priced than Australia, but even when they're about the same price (some of the funkier bars tend to charge western-type prices), because I've saved so much money on food, I can justify drinking there.
• "Home Help" - someone is happy to come and clean my entire apartment for about $10 a week. I believe it's very important to contribute to the local economy.
• Live Music - I know I bagged out Thai music in my last blog entry, but I have since discovered some good Thai punk music and one or two places where I can see good live bands for free - joy! Although I must admit I've had some very unsatisfying live music experiences here as well - why do Asian people love bad cover versions of really bad western pop songs?
• The "Live and Let Live" Mentality - I'm assuming this is tied into the very strong Buddhist influence on Thai culture, but I really like the fact that people (and animals for that matter) tend to be just accepted here as they are. Whether it be a taxi blocking an entire street to drop someone off, a pack of stray dogs lying in front of the entrance to a restaurant, or one of the many transexuals just living their everyday life, people here tend to just accept everyone's right to be there as they are, without judgement and without the stigma that we would put on them in the more "cultured" western societies. I really respect that.
• Banks - I know in the past I have launched the odd impassioned tirade against banks, but in Bangkok they seem much more civilised, they don't charge ludicrous fees for just looking at an ATM, and they are open on Sundays!

(By the way, all prices quoted above are in Australian dollars and are fairly approximate conversions.)

Of course, it's not ALL positive unfortunately. There are a few things that I find a bit frustrating about Bangkok as well:

• The orange juice they sell here is so sickly sweet it's pretty much undrinkable.
• I can't speak fluent Thai yet.
• It's rather humid at times.

That's about it really. Some might suggest these are rather petty complaints and they may well have a point. The truth is that things are going remarkable well for me really and I don't have much to complain about. Work is going well. Non-work is also going well. Weekends have involved a fairly healthy mixture of relaxing and going out. There is seemingly no limit to the options for eating and drinking in this massive city, so my weekend nights have tended to be spent exploring some of these places with some of the other staff from school. Weekend days have tended to be spent vegging out, listening to music, reading, getting the afore-mentioned massages, swimming and watching cheap DVD's.

So I hope you have enjoyed this second edition of my little blog. I might write a bit more about work and the school in the next entry. Cheers.