atomic dog

There are a lot of things in Korea that folks in the States would probably find foreign and interesting, but I just take for granted. Then I act like there's nothing to blog about, but there is.

In Korea, they paint their dogs.


(This one would not turn around to show its pink cheeks!)

You see a lot of fluffy little white dogs with pastel ears or tails. Last summer around Kyungsung University, there was also a big fluffy white dog dyed to look like a panda. I never took a picture.

Also, soup. In America, I took it for granted that I could dig into a bowl of soup with a spoon and eat whatever I retrieved. In Korea, one is expected to take out cow bones, clam shells, or half a crab and dissect it at the table before eating.

This soup was pretty good.

sleeping on the sidewalk

I had the brilliant idea of playing with sidewalk chalk down by the beach, but it doesn't seem to exist in Korea. I checked a couple of craft stores and asked my students if they'd ever heard of it, and they hadn't. I didn't give up.

Plaster is a cheap, easy way to make your own, so with the help of the art department at Neungdong Middle School, I ordered a bag.

It was 55 pounds. This seemed like a reasonable amount at the time, until it was delivered next to my desk and another English teacher had to enlist the help of a "very handsome PE teacher" to get it home for me. I have a feeling she was looking for a reason to talk to the very handsome PE teacher.


When I got it home, I mixed the plaster with poster paint and used dixie cups as molds.


Here is the finished chalk in a few colors.


Pete and I took the chalk out on a cold, sunny day at the beach.


We drew quite a crowd, and one fella asked me to draw him while he posed on the beach. It would look better if he was fighting something, so Pete drew a dinosaur.


Lots of kids came up and played with us too. I think this will be more fun when the weather warms up.

we'd just eat more

This post is just a recap of the most memorable meals from my trip. I tend to take pictures of my food.


This was the strangest airplane meal(?) I've ever seen. It included hickory bits, dried radish, onion cookies(!) and chocolate covered wafers. This was from the flight from Shanghai to Bangkok.


The first night in Bangkok, my friend Jason showed me a great German restaurant. I had goulash, hefeweizen, and this. Sauerkraut is not at all like kimchi, except for the part where it's rotten cabbage.


Rice comes in shapes in Thailand. This was at the Hippie De Bar on Khao San Road. I think I had Pad Kapow (fried basil leaves and chili peppers--with shrimp in my case) with it. Yum.


Twice at Jep's on Ko Samet I have ordered Panang Talay (Panang curry with seafood) and gotten Panang Gai (gai is chicken.) Whatever. It's good.


This is the Christie's Mak Mak. I don't know if anyone ever ordered this cocktail before me. It's pretty, though.


But fried red curry with prawns and long beans at Bedrock is the best meal in the world. I felt sorry for everyone around me whose tongues had not just experienced what my tongue had just experienced.


And this was what Elle ordered for dessert on my last night. It's at a fancy place in Bangkok called Spring Summer. It's cake, which is thick and chewy like a brownie, baked into a cup with ice cream on top. Amazing. I ordered a chocolate souffle cake. It was not as good as this.

to Bangkok

I spent my last night in Bangkok in this guesthouse room that is so very typical that I had to take a picture to show you exactly where you'll stay if you stay on Khao San Road.

(This is actually the Star Dome Inn on Rambuttri Road, one block from Khao San. It's much quieter and prettier and cobblestoney.)

This is the very typical view from my typical room.

Khao San Road runs left to right in front of that short, rusty roof.

I spent my last day at the park on the river that's near Khao San. There was some sort of school camp going on. These girls have pigtails with big yellow ribbons as part of their uniform.



In the evening, I had dinner and dessert with Elle! Do you remember Elle? She is one of the girls I went to Cambodia with last October. She's still working in Bangkok.


That dessert place was amazing, but honestly I took pictures of about 2/3 of all the meals I ate on this trip, so tomorrow I think I'll recap my gastronomical adventures.

I headed right from dessert to the airport, for a 2 am flight. My taxi driver...I think was drunk. He kept forgetting my name ("What you name teacher?") but he liked me enough that when he stopped at a light to buy a jasmine and rose garland for his rear view mirror (they satisfy the spirits of transportation) he bought one for me too! I tried to explain that I couldn't take flowers through customs, but he insisted, so I thanked him and then gave it to another taxi driver after he dropped me off. And then I came back to Korea where it was cold.

carnival

In Ban Phe, I stopped at Christies in Ban Phe for some curry and to say hello to Oui and Chan and everyone.


Look, it's Oui! I forgot how tall I am in Thailand.

I went to Bedrock for the fried red curry with prawns and long beans (this trip is about 90% about the food, I think.) I also saw Aum.


The carnival was in Ban Phe too. Unlike last time, the carnies constructed the roller coaster with no extra parts, and there was *not* a baby in a hammock underneath it. There was a ferris wheel.


Then I went back to Bangkok.

her footprints make you follow, where the sky loves the sea

Did I tell you about Fah?


Fah lives on the beach on Ko Samet, just past Jep's. She makes beautiful jewelry. And windsurfs. And has great hair.

I sat with her one afternoon and made a (very bad) bracelet and we ate fruit and talked.




Fah says that she pictures the kind of person who will wear each piece of jewelry she makes, and what kind of event they will wear it to. She has a gorgeous necklace she sees on an elegant woman in a black dress. I made a small bracelet that she says she'll try to sell for 100baht ($3) but I don't think anyone will pay that much. I asked her what sort of person she thought would pay 100baht for it, and she said "a tomboy--a girl who wears shorts and has short hair." It's a really ugly bracelet.



Then I took the ferry back to Ban Phe.

touch the distant sands

When I lived in Ban Phe, these islands taunted me. There is a cluster of islands east of Ko Samet, and one you can see from way out in Laem Mae Phim. Autumn and I schemed to build a boat or to kayak out to them and have an untouched, tropical paradise to ourselves for a weekend.

I'm glad we didn't.

This time around, I signed up for one of the speedboat tours offered from Ko Samet to the neighboring islands.

This is Ko Thalu, the one that's furthest east, by Laem Mae Phim.


Then you come around and it's full of speedboats. You can rent beach chairs for 20 baht. There is a restaurant.


The island tour was good, though. There was snorkeling between a couple of little rock islands in the cluster by Ko Samet.


Even there, we were not alone.


On one of the islands near Ko Samet (with bungalows and a mini shop,) there's a nice little hike.


The last part of the tour brought us to the Ko Samet Fish Farm, which looks like this:

Some of the boards are a little broken, but it's fine.

There was a shark, which was far less frightening than the prospect of losing my balance and my camera.

on an island in the sun

I caught the sunset ferry to Ko Samet.


And in the morning, I laid on the sand and practiced my "mai ao!" to all of the vendors walking up and down the beach, until she came by with coconuts and I asked her to slaughter one for me.


Oh, yes.


Then in the evening I had dinner at Jep's with a girl who's teaching English in China (and was on my flight from Shanghai!) we caught three fire shows.





And this is a ten-year-old Cambodian kid with a fire hoop around his neck. Because it's Thailand, and that's fine.

garden in the shade

Another thing I missed in Bangkok the first time around was Jim Thompson's House.

You can read about Jim Thompson here, but he was basically an American businessman who fell in love with Thailand, collected some old Thai houses from all over that he put here in Bangkok, revitalized the Thai silk industry, and then disappeared into the jungle in Malaysia, never to be seen again.

This is his house:

It's full of antiques and there are all sorts of silk things for sale.




The garden is lovely too.

night in Bangkok

I stayed on Khao San Road when I was in Bangkok. When you're on Khao San Road, you get your falafel here:


Notice the red Fanta for the spirits.

Also on Khao San Road you'll find some wacky performance art. I was out with Ryan, who used to work with me in Ban Phe, and we came upon this scene. I looked at the little baby doll (which is dancing to the music) and said, "wow, that's creepy." Ryan looked at the guy's white mask and said, "yeah, that's creepy." Then we each saw the other thing, and whoa!


Taxis in Bangkok sometimes have advisory stickers like this one:

That's no weapons, no sex, no animals, no alcohol, no durian, no cigarettes.

I still haven't tried durian. It's okay, since I think I'll always go back to Thailand.