Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

Have a look here...

http://www.huahinfishing.com/home

'Arry is the 20kg Arapaima, and I think the really big one must be in one of the smaller photos.

I don't know nuffink abaht fishin'.

Are these fish on steroids, Philip?

Well, they're a bit bigger than the sticklebacks I used to catch on Wandsworth Common, I grant you!

Arjan ---- Yes , I have met fish with teeth --- My Sauna contains the jaw , complete with teeth, of a Blue Pointer Shark, which I got "Mano e Man0" with a speargun, off Port Sudan in the Red Sea !
The size of it gets bigger with the years,-------- but the truth is -- it was about 8ft ! !

NEILL THE NOTORIOUS wrote:Arjan ---- Yes , I have met fish with teeth --- My Sauna contains the jaw , complete with teeth, of a Blue Pointer Shark, which I got "Mano e Man0" with a speargun, off Port Sudan in the Red Sea !
The size of it gets bigger with the years,-------- but the truth is -- it was about 8ft ! !

This could be nicely misconstured, Neill, if one has a twisted mind!

Well ---- I don't want to boast !

When you live near a tourist resort, where do you go for a break?

To another tourist resort of course!

For our belated honeymoon we went to Koh Chang, which literally means 'Elephant Island'. There aren't that many elephants on the island - apparently they don't swim too well. It's called that because from the mainland some of the hills look like elephants. My count was 2 from many. That doesn't prevent the elephant theme playing havoc with everything that happens there. We managed to get away with a few elephant key rings, but others probably suffered worse.

The 6 days we spent there were fine. 'Fine' as in 'nice'. Frankly, I'd rather have stayed at home, but then again I find I'm rapidly turning into Victor Meldrew. It's an island with some lovely beaches, and three waterfalls. 20 years ago it was difficult to get to, but now there are no less than 4 ferry services running between the mainland and the island. Since the first ferry you come to is the shortest crossing I can't begin to imagine how the other three manage to survive, but obviously they do somehow.

We started off (for one night) in a 'budget' resort. One look was enough to convince me that I am no longer suited to budget accommodation, but we stayed there for one night out of politeness. Sometimes I'm too terribly English for my own good. The next day (at 8 a.m.) we found somewhere on the beach, no building site in the vicinity, twice the price (18 quid a night...) with breakfast included. The main bonus for me was that the satellite TV package included cricket for some unknown reason (most of the tourists seemed to be Russian or Scandinavian), and the timing meant that I could slot it in nicely in the evening between dinner and sleep. Dinner was surprisingly good, if you avoided the Thai attempt at Italian cuisine. There were two very good Indian restaurants not far from the hotel. It was quite tricky remembering to give them the order in English rather than Thai, but I managed.

Lovely beaches, but I have those five minutes from where I live. Six and a half hours to get there, 8 hours to get back, after losing my way and driving through Bangkok on a public holiday (HM the Kings's cousin's 13th wedding anniversary or something).

We had a lovely time.

Now we're home, with our girls (the dogs!), my books and my computer.

Thanks be....

Welcome back, Phil. When will we see some pictures? In the meantime, may you, Mrs Ajarn and the lovely dogs continue to be supremely happy!

I still haven't got all the photos, and those I do have are awful...

The dogs are fine, but it turns out that the father of the puppy Pat Thai is a German Shepherd - she's growing rapidly and at about 4 months is already as big as the terrier...

Anyway, today's glimpse.

Not a particularly happy one, but why should you only get the good stuff?

I'm in the middle of a pile of work with a deadline of 5 pm tomorrow. I lost most of yesterday to the bank, the immigration office and the post office, when all I wanted to do was send my passport to Bangkok for renewal. The bureacracy here is mind-boggling and seems largely to depend on the whim of the particular official you're dealing with. Banks in particular don't seem to have quite grasped that you are the customer paying for a service - they seem to think they are doing you a massive favour by letting you deposit your hard-earned cash with them.

Then this morning, I was about to switch on the computer and make some coffee when the power went off. I hoped this would be a short power cut and decided it was a good time to have a shower.

A shower. Brilliant idea. Of course, I forgot that the water is pumped into the house by an electric pump. There was just enough water to get myself soaped and shampooed from head to toe, then - pffft, dribble, plop - nothing. I can't begin to imagine what I looked like, but I was past caring. Shorts on, scoop in hand, it was off to the garden to the water tank, to finish off the shower by hand, so to speak.

Four hours later, no coffee, no computer, no wife to fan me lovingly with a palm leaf (I wish!), needing another shower because it's so hot and there's no breeze and no fan, dogs lolling under the pick-up in the shade, too hot to move, and the power comes back on. Could have been better, could have been worse, but now I have 3 days work to do in a day and a half.

The expats have a saying here: TIT (This is Thailand), usually accompanied by a shrug, a rueful grin or a raised eyebrow. Somehow I can't quite rise to the occasion today!

Can't stop, must crack on...

Better where you are Phil than spending 3 hours driving around the M25 to get into an overchoked London to find no parking and lose another hour....

This I don't do of course as I live in Luxemburg but for those who do....Thailand seems much more exoti than the bumpers
of Britsih traffic?

Chin up...you're an OB...you can get the deadline done!

Ajarn Philip wrote:The expats have a saying here: TIT (This is Thailand), usually accompanied by a shrug, a rueful grin or a raised eyebrow. Somehow I can't quite rise to the occasion today!

There must be quite a collection of these sayings. In West Africa it was WAWA - West Africa Wins Again. Can't remember any others at the moment but will no doubt do so in the middle of the night!

When I was in Sabah, North Borneo earlier this month several times I was heard to say that "Malay does not have any word which manages to convey the urgency of manana" This would be when waiting for lunch or some such urgent appointment.

We were lucky with weather this time, no rain at all during the Convention. Sadly we did not have a spectacular sunset the one night it was 'scheduled'. The whole group had gone to a seaside location for an al fresco Hospitality Evening, timed for all to arrive for the sunset - the clouds did not oblige. The following week it was pouring down and it would have meant a lot of rearranging.

We really enjoyed the Malaysian hospitality, the food and the friendship. The prawns are fantastic eating!

Arjan --- Which I understand is "Teacher" SAWAT DEECRAP !
After 33 years married to the Blessed Anne, (Missionary on Burma Border 5 years) My reportoir of Thai is restricted to the following ---
Rack Teur (Very important -- repeated daily !)
Do my hen (Constantly !)
Fon Dok (at the moment , with KNOBS ON !)

Ajarn Philip wrote:
A shower. Brilliant idea. Of course, I forgot that the water is pumped into the house by an electric pump. There was just enough water to get myself soaped and shampooed from head to toe, then - pffft, dribble, plop - nothing. I can't begin to imagine what I looked like, but I was past caring. Shorts on, scoop in hand, it was off to the garden to the water tank, to finish off the shower by hand, so to speak.

...

Oh Poor Phil

My daughter would sympathise: soaped and shampooed like you she checked the water pump (seemed fine) then the water tanks: empty. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Wander around looking for leaks until son-in-law got home. Yes, indeedy doo dee, tanks empty (actually they weren't: only the house tank; which was empty because father of daughter had been in Oz for the weekend and had closed a valve that prevented the back-up tanks from feeding down to the house tank. However, this wasn't discovered until son-in-law had kindly fetched a large bucket of water from one of the horse troughs for Jess to debubble herself).

xxx

Today's glimpse:

typetypesweat typetypesweat typetypecheckwatch - white rabbit imitation - typetypetype

TADAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!! - IT'S FINISHED!!!

Only two hours late...

Now, I think it's time for a little tipple of something...