No, we didn’t take this picture… I’ve been trying to get a shot of the Mynas who are scoping out our gutters for possible nesting sites, but they’re all agitated and flighty these days. They’ve been so vocal lately as they fight over nesting territory; really the most beautiful and diverse bird calls. I’m not sure why everyone here keeps Red-whiskered Bulbuls in cages for their pretty songs (they even have singing competitions!). In my opinion the so-called pests, the Common Mynas, sound just as interesting.

You could say Colin has also been flitting around various activities. He has taken up bouldering, as much as one can do it without climbing shoes anyway, and he’s starting to build up calouses on his fingertips for the first time in years. Photography is still going strong; he’s even started referring to the Flickr account has his portfolio. :) And today he’s out kiteboarding again and thinking about buying the equipment now that the season of optimum wind has started.

And I’ve been… writing a game! You may remember Beeble World, a webbased game that Colin and a few friends worked on several years ago. Well this is a webbased mmorpg of the same name, but is otherwise completely unrelated. ;) This is something I’ve always wanted to do and is even more fun than I’d imagined. Plus I’m learning a lot about Java, Flash and game design. I’ll let you know when there is something to show.

Lastly, the dogs live! Well most of them do; sadly Rope was killed by a truck a few weeks ago. But I thought they’d all been poisoned or something when they disappeared in mid-January. Turns out a visiting French couple have taken on the duty of feeding and caring for them. We went up to their place last night and practiced our French; it’s remarkable how much harder it became as I got tired; maybe this is why I did so poorly at French in High School?

Laurence has a friend who was recently offered a job teaching english in Thailand. He asked me about our experience thus far so I wrute the following email. After writing it I thought it was probably a good summary of the events thus far so:

Hullo!

You are a much more experienced traveler than I am and I am well into
my second gin and tonic so remember that as I try to find something
useful to say.

I have not been to Rayong. As you know from the travel journal (not a
blog!) we are living on a southern island in the gulf.

I found the transition easier than I had expected. Thai people are
outwardly very friendly with a good command of english. We have
learned next to no Thai and have had no problem with tasks as varried
as setting up stalite internet and buying squid at the local market (a
good command of numbers is useful).

On the other hand we have made very few Thai friends. Here, at least,
friendship between Thais goes only so far. Thanksin’s major political
party was, afterall, ‘Thai Rak Thai’ or Thais love Thais. Not Thais
love people, or Thais love the world. Comming from a Canadian
perspective of multiculturalism this took me by surprise.

That being said, a friend of mine taught englush in a northern
mountain village and had the opposite experience. I can put you in
touch with her if you like.

Living on the Gulf of Thailand is extremely pleasent. As I write
this, in the dead of the Thai winter, I am slung, shirtless, in a
hamock connected to our internet connection wirelessly drinking a gin
and tonic listening to the lap of waves on the beach. The temperature
stays near about 30 degrees all year. It is essentially a paradise.
I’m sure Rayong is similarly blessed.

I know Rayong is close to Pattaya, which is a popular beach due to
it’s proximity to Bangkok. Locals here do not speak highly of it.
They also don’t speak well of Bangkok, which I can personally atest is
a smelly, foul city very unlike the rest of Thailand. Still, living
within striking distance of Bangkok will be usefull for those hard to
hard-to-find items.

In terms of money: we spend 15,000 baht a month on an air-conditioned
house right on the beach with a full kitchen and western style toilet.
A place to live can be obtained much more inexpensively. If prices
in Rayong are similar to prices here I would guess that 5000
baht/month would get you a small 3 room place with no
air-conditionaling near the beach.

Food costs vey little. Thai food eaten out cost 40~60 baht for a
really great Thai curry. Western food costs more like 100~200 baht.
Beer in a restaurant goes for 60 baht a bottle and is half that in a
store. We go to the vegetable market a few times a week and buy an
armload of fresh Thai produce to cook our own curries for basically
nothing.

It is probably possible to survive on 5000 baht a month but
comfortably on 15000 and exhorbitantly (like us) on 25000.

Personally, the first three months went extremely quickly, but I will
be glad to move on to new scenery after six. The lack of deep
relationships with Thais makes me miss family and friends no matter
how heavenly the climate (and it is spectacularly pleasent).

Hope some of that is usefull. I’m happy to answer any specific
questions about our experiences.

Colin

but seriously: http://www.todayonline.com/articles/166274.asp

Taluka are gone. Off to Bangkok and then home for the first time in several months.

Their visit was much fun. We ate well and trotted off to various snorkling and beach destinations for 8 days. It was nice to have some friends around.

Now they have wandered off and life tries to find another rythm. The last few days have certainly been good ones. It was really fun to have Taluka here but without the impetus to find sure-fire entertainment we have turned back to exploration. Which, Sarah agrees, usually provides.

Today we found a public park? Mabey. It was a long and costly looking set of stairs down to a little rocky beach covered in detritus washed up by the sea.

I have no idea why such an expensive stariway exists. I suggest the government because governments seem the most likely to spend such large amounts of money on something with such a dubious purpose.

From there we wandered through a jungle path to the far edge of the Chaloklum beach and did some swimming. Then we wandered up the roads back to our bike to do some snorkling in Haad Salad. At Haad Salad we ate lunch (one of the best masaman curries ever) but as we supped the weather turned un-snorkle-friendly. In fact when it started to rain on us we hid in an abandoned bar (well it was abandoned till 7:00, when it opened) and played with a very well cared for cat.

From there we rode home and I had a nap. Then I prepped and posted the pictures you see on flickr. Sarah put some rice on and we finished our curry while watching Idiocracy. Now it’s time for sleep. In fact I’m writing this in bed while Sarah steals some bedding from me to shield her eyes from the glow of the laptop screen.

So that was our day. Yesterday was much the same. Tomorrow will be simmilar. This is pretty well paradise.

Idiocracy: I liked it, I thought parts of it were very funny. But I no longer buy the fox-barried-it-for-idiological/political-reasons argument. The movie just didn’t hold together like it should have. It wandered, the world seemed flat, and the characters didn’t seem to fit together. It doesn’t suprise me that fox didn’t put the money into a full realease.

We did spend an hour reading all the signs and adds peppered through the movie. The set dressers must have had a ball.

An interesting note: Beef Supreme was Futureman! Man those Wilson brothers are great.

We finally got some great snorkling in today! I still find the requirements for good snorkling visibility a little hard to pin down; even with nice calm and sunny weather sometimes it’s a little murky down there. But not today!

We headed up to Koh Ma / Mae Haad for lunch and a dip in the freakinwikked beautiful coral reef. Tabitha finally got some good use out of the waterproof container for her camera (we may post a few soon). I think it was the best day for snorkling we’ve had yet, though I admit the amazingness of being completely surrounded by tropical fish and corals is finally starting to wear off.

There is a new cicada or cricket this week that sounds exactly like a dentist drill. Thankfully it only does it’s thing for an hour around sunset, but good god that takes the cake for most annoying bug. Ooh, and speaking of bugs, Taluka found two massive spiders in their little bungalo. No pictures, but – spreads fingers out – they said they were that big.

Yesterday we finally took our first longtail trip (see picture) to visit Bottle Beach. The driver-captain-guy was awesome; if you ever need a boat from Chaloklum call Mr. Dan. Only 100 baht and smiles are included! ^_^

Despite being one of the hardest beaches to get to, or perhaps because of it, Bottle Beach is coated with bungaloes and teeming with tourists. Nice beach though; deep swimmable water with big fun waves that we could almost body surf in. Colin did some bouldering and found yet another abandoned bar out on the rocks. He fell through the ageing tile roof while climbing around on top but came away with just a few scrapes. He’s itching to start kiteboarding again in Baan Tai once the wind picks back up.

I’m itching to try the fancy-schmantzy but tragically named ME ‘N’ U restaurant tonight. Let you know how it goes..