Gone Fishin'

I saw a lady fishing one day. She was fishing with a net in a muddy ditch. The fish are tiny. They really don't look that tasty either.

Thai wedding

I went to a Thai wedding awhile back. Here are some pictures. Notice the strings tied around the wrists of the bride and groom. Those are tied on by individuals for good luck. I got to dance with the sister of the groom and later got our picture taken together.

Lumber yard

There is really not much wood used in construction here except for really old buildings or the "pole" type structures. You can get poles and grass mats to make a shop for instance. See these pictures taken last year as we got materials to build the food shop we had. It is gone now. The materials shown on the vehicle cost about $16.

Thai Massage anyone?

Thai Massage at this shop across the street from my former food shop. This shop is in fact closed now. Businesses come and go quickly. Another business moved in there yesterday. I am not sure what they will be doing. The signs say Thai massage 100 baht for 1 hour. That's somewhere between $2.80 and $3.

Today I begin a new career

I have been investigating a teaching job here in Thailand. By Thai standards I can make vast amounts of money. Well, a lot. I have been talking with a company here that places teachers. Some of the pay schemes I have seen are 20 hours a week at 20,000b per month. That's around $600USD. As the dollar weakens the pay goes up. To this end I have begun an online course called TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages). The class costs $295USD and lasts about 4 weeks. A new unit of instruction is sent to me everyday (if I want it that way) and I complete a work sheet and send it back to an online tutor that grades and comments. At the end I get a TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) Certification. I completed my first unit today. I wish I were back in Japan. I know that this could be quite lucrative there.

Smallest Gecko I have seen

Geckos are everywhere. They are inside the house but you don't see them much. They leave little presents on the walls that look like a grey kernel of wheat in the hull. What is nice is that they keep the mosquitos at bay. These things are extremely fast. Yesterday I put my hand on the wall ouside my house and a gecko jumped onto my hand. He seemed comfortable there and stayed with me for awhile. I finally put him on a plant outside.

Bull in the streets

Just a couple of pictures of a bull that wanders the streets. I have NEVER seen anyone with the bull. No one appears to own it or care for it. It is tame and basically ignores people, cars and trucks. It goes where it wants to and no one tells it otherwise.

Dogs rule

Dogs rule in Thailand. Overall they are the worst example of an animal on the planet. They are usually very dirty and most are all scarred up from battles with other dogs. A great percentage have hideous wounds from encounters with vehicles. Sometimes eyes are missing and most dogs limp some how. Tails can be broken and ears lopped over where they should not. But... Dogs go where they want and have the right in the road. There are exceptions and those are the dogs that people keep in the yard, inside the fence. There are a lot of cats. They are rarely seen but the majority of them have shortened tails. I think that is mostly because a dog has bitten it off. So generally cats stay out of sight. In the two months I have been here, I have seen one dog on a leash. Dogs are in the streets everwhere. They will sleep in the street. Cars must watch out for them and drive around them. Having said all that, Thais love their dogs. They have plenty of them. Most homes have 2 or 3. I saw one home that had about 20. The people that lived nearby called that guy crazy. When I used to walk by his house (I don't anymore) one of his dogs might bark and it set them all off. It sounded like a visit to the kennel where I used to board my dog when I went on vacation (in the USA). Some people ask me "Don't they eat them?". The answer is, "No." If you mention eating a dog most Thais make a face. They are sickened by the thought. It has been reported to me in a place not far from here called Sakornakon that they do in fact eat dogs. When our dog Tony is bad I threaten to send him there.

Met some water buffalo

I saw the biggest water buffalo yesterday as I was walking along the road. The Thais raise these for food. They are sold just like cattle. I think time was when they were used to help plow the paddies but not any more. Now they have these cool tractors. I'll have to get a pic of one of them some time.

This water buffalo looked like a VW on legs coming down the road. The pic here does not do it justice. I saw a pile of dung that it left on the road that would have surely stopped a motorbike.

Click on the picture to get a better view.