Animals

Here are some more pictures of some of the animals I see around the Wat.  Quite a few of the puppies as I try to visit them pretty well everyday.  A couple are gone now and I have no idea where they went.  Maybe some people took them home.  But one of them watches for me all the time at lunch to see if I ride my bike by and starts to chase me down for a treat.

Me trying to take a picture of a flying bat. You can see it faintly, this is right beside my cabin.

My toad that always comes back to my place.  I was going to put on my shoes and he thought he would try them on I guess.  I told him this is a good way to get squashed.

These dogs just walk around the roosters.

This is the runt of the litter, he decided to pose for me.

I've tried getting a picture of the bigger lizards here but they don't like to be around people.  This time he was stuck between me and a rooster so I guess I was less of a threat than the rooster.

They are getting bigger, The black on eon the left is the one that really likes me and chases me down.  I have taught him to sit now.

A frog wondering around 

The chickens getting bigger

Mr Toad hanging out.

This guy was crawling across my car port when I got home one night

This spider was hanging out on my roof above me one night.  I had to get him to move with the broom and I actually banged the broom beside him and he didn't move.  Ended up having to touch him with the end of the broom handle to get him to move.  

Update

So I had a bunch of stuff written but somehow blogger lost it. grrrr.  oh well I will write what I can remember.  So, Friday and Saturday were uneventful.  I basically relaxed around the Wat and headed into Damnoen a couple times to get some groceries and some food.  I am finally started to dig down into some books and learn to count in Thai which was interesting.  The funny thing is that during the week I handed the bus driver 15 baht and start to walk away and he start yelling "sip-sam, sip-sam" which is 13 in Thai so I turned around for my change.  I usually don't bother if I don't have the exact change, as the price seems to fluctuate from driver to driver.  Now if I would have learned the numbers, I don't think I would have even turned around.  LOL

On Sunday, I went to the minimart about a half hour before dusk to have some ice-cream.  On my way back it was pretty dark, I was just riding along and all the sudden a bird swooped down around my head.  I thought to myself, hmm must be close to its nest, until it happened a few more times andI looked back to see that it wasn't a bird, it was some bats.  Well I soon found out what the were doing, as it was like I was going trough a swarm of bugs all the way home.  I now know not to ride my bike at this time of night.  When I got home, I found that I had left my light on (who knows why) and there were tons of bugs flying around.  I had never seen this before and they were even in my room.  grrrrr.  So I tried to get the ones out of my room with a pale and a plastic divider, as we aren't suppose to kill anything here, but after a few tries it seemed pointless.  So I then decided I would just turn off all the lights, and go turn on the street light (yes, there is a switch on my house to control the street light) and stood on the road for about 10 minutes.  When I cam back, they were all gone.  Not sure what kind of bugs they were, as the seemed to loose their wings quite easily.  They were maybe 1.5 cm long but their wings were more like 2-2.5 cm long.  When I went into my place the were on the floor with no wings, so I sweated them up and put the gently outside.  I have yet to see them again, but I haven't forgot to turn my light off either.  I thought I was going to have to go sleep in the boys dorm that night, but luckily of got rid of them and I had my trusty bug net over my bed.

This picture does not show it to the full extent.  It was much worse that it looks.

Well on Monday, I woke up to a thunderstorm, some rain, and the start of a Sinus cold.  It rained all day Monday, so I had to get my raincoat out.  I found out that white pants aren't the best to be wearing when its raining as when they become wet they sorta become see through LOL. I only had to go out in the rain a couple of times and it was actually quite refreshing to not be so hot out.  I taught the Monks in the morning, but the kids class was cancelled due to the parents were too busy to get them there so I had the night off.  On Tuesday, I woke up my sinus cold being worse and nasty headache so I cancelled classes for the day as I barely wanted to leave the bed.  I basically slept all day and all night, well except for going to lunch.  The next day, I wasn't much better, but went to teach the monks.  Only had 1 monk that day so we just did some conversation practice for the class.  At the end of class, I went for lunch, and then straight to bed.  I woke up about 3 hours later feeling even worse so I canceled the Kids class again (poor kids) and so we also decided to cancel Thursdays class also so that I will be ready for next week.  How I hate having a cold when its nice out, it would be bad if it was -50 out, but +30. :) I basically slept the rest of the day Wednesday.  So on Thursday, I went into town to pick up some groceries and I was sitting there talking to my mom on the phone and guess what's walking down the street, a baby elephant.  It was really cute and people were feeding it.  It even tried reaching into a guy's pocket for some snacks.  Too funny.  Well after I got some groceries, I headed back home and basically slept the rest of the day away.

So, today I woke up and am actually feeling a bit better.  Actually feel like moving around.  Had some breakfast (oh, I finally bought some milk and cereal), talked to my mom and brother, then headed for lunch.   The lunch was quite interesting today.  I basically ate the broccoli, some veggies out of the soup, some of the beef stuff, and rice, which was delicious I may add but I wasn't going to eat the little fish that were looking at me, well not at less someone else was going to and I was the only one at the table.

Now, I guess I am finally up to date on this blog thing again.  I am sitting in the nice Air conditioned library writing this.  Not sure what in store for the weekend, probably head into Damnoen and maybe go back to the floating market tomorrow morning to explore it on my own. I guess the deciding factor is whether I'm finally over this cold or not.  Have a good weekend and I'll post some more updates next week.

Community Centre - Jan 27

Well, unfortunately I didn't get back to the fair before it packed up so I didn't get any pictures.  I guess I would just compare it to the Kid's part at a regular fair in Regina.  Not sure how else to describe it, it had a small ferris wheel, a kid's roller coaster, and one of those rides that you get in a 2 seated cart and it spun you around while going up and down.  Other than that there was darts you threw at balloons, balls you threw a cans, food venders, and some venders selling other stuff like plants, stuff animals, statues, and other small stuff.

On Friday Somwong, who I thought was a parent of one of the kids that attended my class but turns out he is like a alderman of their community so he picks up a bunch of the kids and parents and brings them to class,  picked me up as planned and took me to their community centre.  So, I guess every month, all the elderly people get together to have a meeting about their community and discuss any issues that are happening.  At this time, they all get their blood pressure taken (which I got mine taken also, and all is fine and dandy) and their weight recorded,  This is all recorded on a monthly basis, and I guess sometimes they even have a doctor come out to check everyone out.  I guess they also organize people to go out to the elderly that can't come, take them food and medicine, and they also take all the elderly on field trips to different areas of Thailand.  Their community has won many awards and has people come from other communities to share knowledge with each other.  On this particular day some government officials were also attending the gathering.

As you will see, the community grows its own herbs and from those herbs a pesticide to keep the bugs off the plants.  The also compress their own wood to make a coal-like substance for burning.  The drive the boats down the little canals (see pictures below) to water and treat the trees for bugs.  The boat actually takes water from below it and sprays it up onto the trees, the force of the water being sprayed actually propels the boat forward.  The only time the have to paddle or push the boat is around the corners.

So when I got there, I was introduced to the people there, I was told the basically wanted to hear me speak.  This was a bit nerve racking as thy asked me up to the front and then just handed me a microphone.  But Somwong asked me a few question and translated it to Thai as I don't believe a lot of them spoke English.  After that I went wondering around for a 2 hours while they had their meeting and what ever else they did.  When I returned, I met some government officials and some other people whom had arrived when I was exploring.  I was then again, handed a microphone and asked to introduce myself and speak as many people had arrived while I was gone.  We went through some stuff about the Canadian weather, the seasons, and where it was located.  Luckily Somwong had an Atlas with him that included some interesting facts about Canada.  After that, they all started to sing karaoke which the words were projected onto a screen for them which was fun to watch.  They tried getting me up there, but not a chance, for one thing I can't read or speak Thai, and for another I think I would have needed a bit of liquid courage LOL.  Then while people were singing, we got served some dinner which included some noodle soup, which was really delicious, and watermelon.

After lunch, we headed over to Somwong's house for some coffee and bananas with a bunch of government officials and security.  I ended up going in the government officials vehicle as he really wants to improve his English.  He is going to contact me sometime when he has time and take me around the area to show me around and to brush up on conversational English.  Somwong showed me around his farm, explaining how thing worked (wish I would have had a note pad).  His farm is about equivalent to 7 acres and he exports (I think the whole community does) bananas and guava to China.  I found out that when guava is about the size of small tomato they go around and put a plastic bag on it to protect it from the bugs, and a wrap it in newspaper to protect it from the sun.  Then after, I believe it was 28 days, they harvest it, and wrap it by hand in a netting and a bag, then package it into styrofoam containers for shipping.   It was a fun and interesting time and I look forward to going back.

Somwong invited me to come back, stay the night and help out, maybe even get to drive the boat :)  So I should be able to give much more information when I actually get to stay there for a day and not just a couple hours.  When I went to leave, Kong's parents ( a kid in my class), gave me a bag of guava to take with me.  Thanks.  And I only brought my iPhone with me on this trip as I didn't know what I would be taking pictures of.  If anything I have learned that I need to start taking me good camera.

The Community Centre

Inside the Community Centre

This is where the make their own fertilizer.

A Bike used to operate the pump to water the herb garden.

The herb garden

Coconut Tree around the community

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Baby Coconut trees

Boat used to water the plants

The roads are quite narrow

A banana Flower

Somwang's House and deck

Somwang's Fields

Guava harvested.

The people wrapping it.

The containers.