Blogs from Singburi, Central Thailand, Thailand, Asia

Day 3 of our Chai Nat adventure continued. When I woke up this morning I slowly rolled over to grab my phone to see how much time I had left before the 5am Music Fest. I almost couldn’t believe it when I saw it was 530. A break at last, turns out yesterday was either a 1 day event or I just so happened to get here on day 99 of the 100 days of mourning. We started the day by greeting the monks on the street with some fresh rice and ramen. After we put the food in the pot they were carrying, we bowed down and they blessed us, which I figure can’t hurt when you are in a new city. Our first stop today was to a pre-school. Now let me tell you, ... read more

So today we embark on an epic adventure to try to teach 15 students the true meaning of Thai culture. Who better to lead them on said adventure than yours truly (along with 2 other Thai teachers). I've been given very little information before we began. I had an itinerary that had been translated for me and a note that said to be at the school by 9am on Saturday morning. I motorbiked in right at 9 to find half of my group already assembled. We waited for a few stragglers to catch up, but we eventually took off 5 students short of our roster. I started to ask questions, but then I remembered I was in Thailand and figured I'd be better served to sit back and just let it all unfold. As it turns ... read more

Had a quiet few days really at the end of this week. On Thursday we just went for a three hour bike ride around the local area. It was really nice actually to get out and about and not be in the bus. It is very relaxing and it is all very flat around here so it wasn that difficult. We rode along one side of the river and then back along the other, and it wasn too sunny so we only melted a bit. In the afternoon we just relaxed back at the house and then to the bar at night. On Friday we went to the local zoo and a hundred year old market. The zoo was okay but the animals were all in pretty small cages, not really what you want to see. ... read more

Wednesday started with a Thai language lesson which was a good laugh. We all got the basics I think although most people do talk basic English here so you can get by, but saying hello to the locals always goes down well. We then went out at about 11am to the 'Heroes' monument which is a statue to remember all of the Thais who fell in the war against the Burmese back in the late 1700's, the war in which Thialand won their independence. After this we went to a Temple which had statues illustrating the story of Singburi, the town we are staying near. Singburi translates as the 'Lion city' or 'City of the Lion' and is named after a story of a lion who was killed by his son, but then the son repented ... read more

Bangkok Before heading off on our weeks voluntary placement we had a few days in Bangkok. On the Saturday we headed off to the floating markets. Shops lined the banks of the canal along with numerous floating markets. Floating along with vendors grabbing hold of your boats to sell you there produce was great fun. There was a real buzz to the place. As with everything else in South East Asia there appeared to be no rules on the river resulting in some entertaining situations with boats. I thought that I had been quite adventurous with my food out here and had sampled a lot of the Thai cuisine. However, after seeing the produce a number of the vendors had on sale I was sadly mistaken. The smells were incredible and I could have stayed ... read more