I have been quite remiss in not taking and subsequently posting pics of the resort and what we are doing. I was going to do it today, but it rained on and off all day and I wanted some sunshine. Thavorn and I are going to the gym daily as Jit, (Bai Derry's grandma) is visit and is willing and able to look after Jaidan as well for the hour we spend in the gym. The gym is great!
We have been also spending a couple of hours pool side in the children's pool and Jaidan is loving it. He feels very comfortable in the water and is now ducking his head under it for a second. All good in learning to swim eventually. The pool also has a nice fast slide he likes going down.
We missed out on the pool today and therefore headed off to the local pub Bill Bradley's, if I remember correctly and ordered up some BBQ pork ribs which Thavorn loves for some reason (not spicy but sour) and insists eating at least once while we are at the Marriott resort.
Hopefully the sun will shine tomorrow and we will be back at the pool and I will get some pics.
The ocean beach has had the red flag up due to strong waves and jelly fish at this time of year.
Tonight is my last Saturday night out in Bangkok for a week so I thought I would head out about 4:30 in search of some challenging games of pool a few beers with some pretty ladies. Not that it will be a long night as we are up early, about 7 am to head off by taxi to Don Muang airport for our 10:30 am flight to Phuket.
Phuket has a brand new terminal so I am anxious to see it. Thavorn's sister and BF will pick us up at the airport and drive us to the Marriott. As I type this blog Thavorn is mercilessly teasing her sister as she eats red grapes and drinks a red wine cooler and shares the experience over LINE video as her sister can afford neither. However they own a truck and I might as well pay them the 600 baht transfer fee than some taxi :-)
Phuket is an international airport because it is a major tourist destination with easy access to Phi Phi and Krabi which the Scandinavians enjoy.
A typical night out for pool which actually consists of 20 baht per game, 2 jugs of Singha beer for myself, and a couple of lady drinks and a 100 baht tip for my pool lady usually comes to about 1,000 baht for 4 hours of entertainment which is about $35 CDN. All in all, a good night's entertainment and even more so if I win.
Bangkok has a plethora of beer bars, with salaried and free lancers, gogo dance bars with gogo girls and coyote dancers, and my favorite, pool bars with pool girls. Beer bars and pool bars often come with live music as well. There is also no shortage of wine bars and high end hotel bars and roof top bars for the hi-rollers out there but I find them somewhat stuffy and no cheaper than back in North America.
Don't forget, when you are tired and all played out there are the massage parlors both legit and discreet to wind down in.
If you can't enjoy yourself in Bangkok then there is something wrong with you :-)
Not the kind you swim in but the kind you play. I love to play pool but unfortunately do not have the chance to play or practice as much as I like but nevertheless, at times, I play well. Yesterday Thavorn, Jaidan and I headed off to Country Road for a few jugs of Singha and a chance to play pool. Dum, whom we normally play with had a day off. Dum would be the resident #3 player and plays a decent game. May, is the resident #2 player but I have not seen her for a while.
That left only #1 who I normally avoid as she is very, very good. Thavorn started off and managed managed 5 games and ended up losing 3 games to 2 but one of her wins was when #1 scratched after sinking the 8 ball. She did have a legitimate win which was really quite good for her.
Couple of pics of Thai girls playing pool, from the net .. not mine ..
Classic Thai form
It was getting late, about 6 ish and we were asked to leave before 7 pm as the army was coming in at 7 pm to run a check on the bars and Jaidan is not 20 tears of age or older and we did not want to get the bar in trouble. After 2 jugs of beer I was ready to take on #1 (for the life of me I can not remember her name). The whole key with #1 is to make sure she is never left with an easy shot. An easy shot for #1 is pretty well everything that does not require a bank or combination. I managed to that for the game and ended up with the cue ball on the rail and the 8 ball closest to the side pocket which was not ideal, but I made the shot and that now makes me #1 in the bar as I have beaten her twice now :-)
However, I am sure if I played her for 10 games that the score would be 6-4 or even 7-3 for #1. When I play well, I am very good, but I do not get enough practice to play well most of the time.
It is Friday night and I would love to head out and play pool but I have been caring for Jaidan, most of the day and I am tired, so not tonight. Maybe Saturday night :-)
Above article was published in 2011 but is still relevant although the Sportsman has moved to Sukhumvit Soi 13
Tomorrow being Saturday, we have to do some washes and get packed for our early morning flight to Phuket, which reminds me I should check in on the web to save some time at the airport.
A couple of shots of Jaidan sitting on Darryl's (RIP) motorbike and side car outside of Dollhouse on Soi Cowboy. Darryl was well liked by all the staff of Dollhouse before he fell off the balcony at his condo. Seems to be a common occurrence in Thailand.
I have been using my phone's data plan as my primary internet connection for mobile as well as my computers working off of the phone's wifi hotspot sharing. I was using a prepaid sim that gave me 20 GB of download a month for 1,799 baht.
I now have a Thai bank account that lets me purchase a post paid plan. For a farang to have a post paid plan they need a passport and one of a work permit or Thai bank account.
My post paid plan costs me 1,888 baht a month but gives me 75 GBs a month at very fast speeds.
Here is my latest speed result:
The other great part of this plan is that I can piggy back up to 4 more AIS (provider) phone numbers onto the plan and share the voice minutes and data access. I can go online and track the usage to see who is using what and add and delete numbers at will. Just a great plan.
I was also due a phone upgrade from my business revenues as my last business phone, a Samsung Note 3 was over 3 years old and had died 4 months ago. Of course a Samsung Note 7 was out of the question due to its battery problems so I purchased a Note 5 which is actually a great phone with a great camera. It was going for 21,990 baht at the local TeleWiz store which sells AIS services and has staff that actually understand English :-)
Today's song is: Nights in White Satin .. Moody Blues
We are slowly settling into a routine that is ruled mostly by the boss, Jaidan. We are seriously thinking of enrolling Jaidan in the local Thai school. Apparently they can do so anytime after their 2nd birthday. Hard to believe, but we will check it out.
It would be good to put Jaidan in school as it would give Thavorn and I some free time to go to the gym or simply go for a coffee without always having to chase down whatever Jaidan is up to. He is definitely ADHD like his half brother Jordan.
I may have an opportunity to coach some basketball at an international school and it would be great if it came with a work permit as that would enable many things in Thailand that all seem to revolve around having a work permit such as purchasing a vehicle.
This Sunday we fly to Phuket to stay at the marriot Beach Resort for a week to celebrate our birthdays and give Thavorn a chance to see her daughter who lives with her ex's family in Phang Nga, in Southern Thailand, about 90 mins out of Phuket. This is where the major tsunami hit years ago.
The resort is beautiful and we seem to visit it about twice a year.
We are flying Air Asia and Jaidan has flown about 3 times already but I doubt if he remembers. Hopefully he will remember this time as it is the first time I have to purchase a seat for him as children under 2 years of age fly for free but sit on mama or poppa.
Here are some pics of the resort. I must remember to take my gym stuff as it has a great exercise facility.
We have managed to get out a few times in Bangkok, sometimes all three of us, sometimes separately. We are looking forward to having Thavorn's older children Tai and Dun come visit for the month of October as they will babysit Jaidan and let us go out to have a few beers and enjoy some music. We usually arrive home about 1 am to find the 3 of them watching television :-)
It is amazing how long it has taken us to get our apartment back in order. Dish drainers, cutlery drawers, glasses, mops, mop buckets, pillows, etc. all had to be purchased to replace what got trashed in the village. We also left behind rice cookers, microwaves, etc. to help out Thavorn's family back in the village.
I took 2 last pics before leaving the village:
The poorest of the poor live here, but still have a satellite dish.
This house in the village rents for 1,000 baht a month .. about $35 Canadian a month
The big news is that I have finally managed to open a Thai bank account on my third try. This, after a lot of research on internet. I originally tried to open an account with Thavorn's bank, thinking that would be easier. I tried in the village, thinking, 'Where everyone knows your name', but the village banker was not keen on a farang opening an account. I then tried Thavorn's bank in the big city but the gate keeper (trumped up security guard) stated I need a work permit, so no go. I then tried the Bangkok Bank and was rolling along with the account opened, 10,000 baht deposited, a bank book and debit card when the next person down the approval line stated I need a form from the Canadian embassy. So I made an appointment with the embassy for 2 days later.
When I arrived at the embassy and asked to have the banking form stamped and approved I was asked which bank and do you have the form. I said the Bangkok Bank and they did not give me a form. The young lady said, they always forget to give you the form. Go back to the ground floor and you will find a branch of the Bangkok branch and ask them for the form. I do so, and then take the form up to the embassy and fill it out and they stamp it and charge me 1,400 baht for their efforts.
Back to the Exchange Plaza which is where I opened the account (closest to my apartment) and I handed the form to the appropriate person and he checked it out and lo and behold gave me my bankbook and debit card. Yippee kai yai :-)
I will now be able to transfer money from Canada to my Thai account and avoid the many fees except for the exchange rate and $10 transaction fee. Contrast that with the 200 baht foreign debit fee plus the 2.5% Canadian banks tack on at their end as well. Taking money out at the Thai bank's atm is free.
Down the road, now that I am building a credit history with a Thai bank will make it easier to buy a vehicle or house down the road. At least I hope so.
This Friday night, the 3 kings (Arthur, John, and James) and little John (recently retired from England) will head out bar hopping to celebrate King John's PhD graduation which, I guess also makes him Dr. John :-)
The move was uneventful except our pickup truck arrived at 6 am rather than the designated 8 am. Go figure, meant we had no time to shower or have a coffee. Thai time is variable at best.
Tacky arrived to help us move in. Mostly she welcomed us back by chatting and helping me finish off the bottle of 'welcome back red wine' that I bought for myself.
When we arrived Jaidan was a little apprehensive but when we entered our apartment he did his little happy dance as he recognized it from the first 2 years of his life. He has since settled in extremely well and is high fiving all the staff and the resident motorcycle taxi drivers who all seemed happy to see him back on soi 22.
This afternoon I will probably head off to Rumors Bar with Jaidan to say hello to everyone in that outdoor bar. I am sure they will find a big change in Jaidan.
I decided I needed a bigger work desk for my computer equipment so off we went to Office Mate (Depot) and I bought a desk on sale for 3,000 baht. Unfortunately when we brought it back in a tuk tuk, I discovered it was completely unassembled, but 4 hours later Thavorn and I had it all together, and so far, it is meeting my needs as it has quite a bit of storage inside it, for my many backup drives and cables.
My existing work chair has self destructed and I am simply using one of the regular apartment chairs. If my butt protests I will find a new work chair.
We have been to Big C twice now, buying supplies for the apartment, almost starting from scratch as much of our stuff was trashed over the past 4 months in the village. It was time for new pillows (175 baht on sale) as sweat stains are not that enjoyable to look at when changing pillow cases.
I am also going to install my own dedicated internet as Windows 10 updates are killing my 20 GB download cap on my cell phone. I have the equivalent of 5 Win 10 computers although some are virtual.
