Baan Jochim Phuket

This was taken last night while I visited Joy on the eve of our trip to Kamphaeng Phet and is definitely in my top three favorite photos I’ve taken of her. I’d planned a quiet evening relaxing at home but she called requesting my travel-packing expertise; trying to fit everything a lady needs for a 10-day trip into one very small suitcase is no easy task. But it turned out she’d done very well — the only thing that worried me was the jar of strawberry jam (which she’d purchased to “take care” of me) so we jettisoned that.
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The end of the first school term is rapidly approaching.  Indeed, today is the last day of final exams and we have three days of finishing assessments and other assorted paperwork before going on holiday Friday.  I hope to be finished tonight (once I begin marking exams I don’t like to stop until they are all finished and the grades recorded in my spreadsheet).  I don’t know what I’ll do tomorrow, Thursday, or Friday at school but I do know it will be constructive (perhaps I’ll get a jump on the Phonics books I’m supposed to write during the upcoming “Special Course”).
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From today’s Phuket Gazette:

PM Samak Forced to Step Down

Bangkok (The Nation): Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej has lost his post and his cabinet will function as a caretaker cabinet following this afternoon’s Constitution Court verdict that the PM is guilty of violating the nation‘s charter.

Six judges considered Samak to be the “employee” while three others considered him a “business partner” of a TV studio, a constitutional offence in both cases.

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I’d almost forgotten how much I do enjoy planning trips.  With Joy’s and my sojourn to Kamphaeng Phet (กำแพงเพชร) less than three weeks away, I’m rediscovering long-unused skills.

I always seem to have a knack in finding interesting accommodations (at low costs) and this journey is no exception; in a previous entry I mentioned that we would be staying at Three J’s Guesthouse in KPP. But I didn’t mention that we would be paying 300 baht (USD $8.68) per night for a fan-cooled room with en suite hot-water bathroom. I also found the same rate for our guesthouses in both Sukhothai and Bangkok. The latter location is conveniently located very close to the Mo Chit Bus Station (where we will arrive from KPP), the famous Chatuchak Weekend Market (the world’s largest!), and adjacent to the Skytrain. It’s also about 20 minutes (in good traffic conditions) from Don Mueang Airport, although I’ve just noticed that apparently we’ll by flying in to/out of Suvarnabhumi Airport (it’s confusing having two international airports in the same city). Oh, well. The proximity to the bus station is the important part but we’ll have to take a couple of expensive taxi trips at the beginning and end of the trip (I’m budgeting 500 baht each).
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Today, before noon, I wrote two final exams for P4 (Listening Comprehension and Reading Comprehension), made a cover and weekly word list for the Term 2 P3 Phonics textbook I’ve been commissioned to create, had a thirty-minute “orientation” meeting with a new teacher who has been assigned to instruct ESL for P5 through M1, taught a P3 class, read two chapters of Charlotte’s Web, and wrote/photocopied the two comprehension worksheets for those chapters. Whew! After lunch, I will teach a double-lesson in M1 EP as a substitute (which will cancel out a P3 Reading class). I really enjoy days like this as it makes me feel good when I can cross everything off of my “to do” list between my actual classroom time…

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From today’s Bangkok Post:

State of Emergency Declared in Bangkok

Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej on Tuesday imposed a state of emergency after overnight clashes between pro- and anti-government protesters left one person dead and dozens injured. The military has full police powers effective immediately, and army commander Gen Anupong Paojinda is in charge of security.

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I met Joy exactly two months ago — on the evening of 2 July. I cannot believe how close we’ve become in those sixty-two days. In another twenty-five days we will actually be traveling north and west together on a trip which will take me to meet her parents. Yet, we are taking things very slowly as Western concepts of time are somewhat distorted in Thailand. I don’t believe I’m “on the rebound” but Joy has certainly made me feel very good about myself at a time when I needed just that.

Despite working in a place that might have a dubious reputation among the uninformed (and, perhaps, some of the “informed” as well) she is one of the most genuine people I’ve met in a very long time; the more I learn about her the more I feel I can completely trust her. She is so unassuming and gracious and, oh, that smile! In every turn Joy shows signs of truly caring about my health and well-being, often in unexpected ways. Even with somewhat of a language barrier (she certainly speaks better English than when I first met my ex-wife), she expresses her fondness for me fairly profoundly yet with a shyness and tenderness that is genuinely old-fashioned and endearing. Perhaps best of all, she is even more budget-conscious than I am (a MAJOR change from my last relationship!) often offering to pay my way rather than the other way around. I’m still cautious but I’m also pretty much head-over-heels full of her right now.
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From today’s Phuket Gazette:

Monday, September 1, 2008

Lost in Transit: airport closure cost B250m a day

PHUKET AIRPORT: Losses of an estimated 250 million baht per day have been reported to an ad-hoc committee set up to monitor and control safety at Phuket International Airport following the Peoples Alliance for Democracy (PAD) anti-government protests.

Phuket International Airport was closed at 4:50 pm on Friday and did not re-open until 11 am yesterday. Marking the return to normal services was the first departing flight, THAI Airways flight TG213 at 2:10 pm, and the first inbound flight arriving at 3:30 pm.

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It’s now “official”. I, accompanied by my girlfriend of two months, will spend ten days traveling together at the end of this month and the beginning of next month. Our ultimate destination is Kamphaeng Phet with it’s Sukhothai-style ruins in addition to being her hometown. I’ve booked the airline tickets between Phuket and Bangkok (getting a great deal on Thai Air Asia). Joy has made the accommodation arrangements for our evening in the capital (the plane arrives just after midnight and we’ll be on the first bus west in the morning) as well as confirming with her mom exactly which Thai foods this particular eater can handle. A welcoming barbecue is also being planned. We’ll probably stay at Three J Guesthouse in Kamphaeng Phet as I’ve heard nothing but good things about this place and it’s fairly close to her parent’s home. I’m not sure if we’ll stay there for part of the week and then spend a couple of days in Sukhothai or, perhaps, we’ll spend the entire holiday in her city before returning to Bangkok.
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Our school recently began offering my second favorite Thai treat (after fried banana) about once a week during the snack breaks. Pa Thong Ko (ปาท่องโก๋) is basically just fried dough (the Thais call it a “doughnut” despite it resembling fat fingers and sometimes a pudgy “X”) but the taste is similar to that of a fritter. I think it would be ideal with honey drizzled over it or made with crushed apples mixed in with the dough. In fact, I didn’t even know what it was called until another teacher pointed out an excellent article that appeared in Friday’s Bangkok Post (which I reprint below). I managed to find a couple of recipes here and here, while Jamie Monk and ImportFood.com write about the vendors themselves. Once tried, they are hard to resist and you certainly cannot eat just five or so (which is what they give the kids).
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