Ko Kret Island and Downtown Bangkok

On Friday 9/24, my friend, Delcie, and I went to Ko Kret Island. Ko Kret is a small island not far from our house that has been inhabited by villagers for many years that make beautiful clay pottery by hand. The people live on the island and the children go to school there. The only transportation on the island is by bicycle, motorbike, or foot, as the streets are too narrow to drive vehicles down. We took a short boat ride on the river to get to the island. It cost 5 baht to ride the boat, which is about 15 cents.

We were so disappointed when we got to the island and saw that most of it was flooded. We had to walk across sand bags to board the boat. We were looking so forward to watching the villagers make their pottery and of course making some purchases. Luckily, it's not far from our house and we'll be going back as soon as we can.

Unfortunately, it is still monsoon season here and we have had so much rain again this past week that the island is surely filled with water even more so. We have had the biggest crashes of thunder and the hugest downpoors of heavy rain that we've ever seen and heard. However, it only lasts for about an hour, so it does not ruin much of the day and then the sun is back out full blast. Usually, the rain is at 4:30 everyday. We did get to go to a huge pottery warehouse where pottery is exported out of; that was really cool and want to go back again. I bought three pieces of pottery for 500 baht, which is 15 dollars; very inexpensive. After that we went to an Italian restaurant, which was very nice inside, but the food was not good. I ordered seafood fettucine and to say the least it was not like it is back home at the Olive Garden. Totally Thai-style complete with real seashells and mussels in the shells. Yuck! By the time we were done eating the monsoon hit again and we drove back home in the heavy rain.

While on the island we watched the older school children sweeping up and scooping up flood water with buckets around their school. We saw a group of younger school children sitting in the tree on the playground because their playground is flooded. The Thai childrn learn basic English at a young age, so they were so happy to see us Americans and try out their English, even the high school kids would say Hi and hello and giggle. Giggling is what Thais do all the time when they're talking. One young Thai child asked us from the tree "how are you liking Thailand?"

On Saturday, Jim and I went downtown to pick up Paxton from his friend's house. He rode the bus home from school last Friday to spend the night. A very nice family that just arrived here also. They have traveled the world for many years. The mother is employed by the Canadian Embassy. She is Candadian and her husband is German, so they can relate to the cold weather that we're used to. We stopped at Hard Rock Cafe Bangkok for lunch for a much craved for American-style hamburger. A good burger is hard to find in Bangkok. Of course, there is a tuk-tuk coming out of the front of the Hard Rock. Our neighbors just purchased their own tuk-tuk. They have a set of twin boys. They look so cute on it with their sister.

The most interesting part of our trip downtown was witnessing a cement truck driver crawl on top of his truck and tie some wires up with his bare hands, so the shoot of the truck could pass under it. Wow! All the wires have to be above ground here because the ground is too soft to bury them, so you get quite a mess of ugly wiring that hangs very low in places. We figured my dad would find this amusing.

This is our house and yard in Samakee Place. We have a coconut tree and a mango tree. Haley can view the coconut tree from her bedroom window. Paxton has a good view of the pool from his window and our bedroom and Corbin's bedroom view out to the front yard. There are three streets (sois) in our gated development. There are also two guard houses that are staffed 24 hours with guards. The guards are very good about only letting in the people that need to be in here. We feel very safe here. There are about 20 other people that work full-time taking care of the yards and maintenance. Very nice staff. They even come and hung all my pictures on the walls and hung coconut lights outside and today they are installing some lights in the yard. The sun rises here at about 6 a.m. and sets at 7 p.m. all year long, so we thought it would be nice to have more lighting outside. There are also lights in the pool, which the boys enjoy. There are no daylight savings time changes.

ELEPHANT RIDE, FLOATING MARKET AND TRAVEL SHOW

On Saturday, September 4, we went on our first elephant ride. The boys kids have been anxious to do this, especially Corbin. We went up to Ayutthaya, the original capital of Thailand and where Jim's work is located. The elephants are so funny how they dance and put on a show. Very friendly. Nothing like riding an elephant into oncoming traffic! We rode around the area where there are ancient ruins. Very beautiful all the ancient ruins in Ayutthaya. We also went to a snake show, not so much enjoyed by us. Yuck! We also saw a tiger. We went on a ten-minute boat ride around the floating market. Paxton and I got stopped by a group of Thai college students who asked us some questions. They were excited to see American people and to be able to try out their English skills. They were reading off questions from paper and video recording us. In Ayutthaya the tuk tuks are pick-up shaped and the boys loved that and wanted to ride in one. Maybe next time.

On Sunday, Jim and I went to a travel show in Bangkok. We saw a booth with a fake snow hill and fake snow and the little Thai children were having so much fun on it. They didn't know what to do to get onto the sled. Too funny! There was also a fake snowman that people were taking their picture with. We saw beautiful Thai dancers getting ready to perform.

Yesterday, we couldn't believe our eyes when we saw an elephant just outside the gate to our develpment a little ways up the main road that goes from our house to the school with a person riding it. People from up-country will bring their elephants into Bangkok. We're more used to seeing chickens, goats, cows and soi (street) dogs and we've adjusted to the shock of seeing these animals in the city but now an elephant. The goat herder was herding his goats the other day and one goat almost hit the front of our car. No deer here but watch out for the goats!