all sound a bit hecktic and ecxiting for us. we usually have a day pottering around, and then head to bed around 6ish with a hot milk and a good book!!!! we’ll spice things up for when you get here though!!! We’ll do all the culture stuff then, but geoff is saving the ‘death railway’ for you. Not an ecxiting train journey as you might imagin, but a railway built by POW in the 2nd ww under viscious japonese conditions!!! Well, of to gussle another pomelo now. dod and mama, we are going to bangkok on the morow, and i will try and ring about 6ish (11amish your time) providing i can find a phone that works. It is suposed yop be quite cheap here.

Sounds fine to me bunyip! Get the card sorted quick speed, and don’t take any jip of the money grabbers!!

WQE are in Ko Samet, which is a very nice island. The only draw back is that it is a national park, which essentially meant that they get to charge foreigners 200B to go in!!! Grinding the old teeth a bit, but resigning oursenves to this payment, i was most pleased that geoff found an alternative. When looking for a some way cheaper room than a fiver a night, he stumbled across a pathway that bypasses the pay booth and leads you onto the jolly old beach. Most usefull, we used it today. Our philosophy in cheating the old natives like this is that everything is so expensive here that any thai that comes here on holiday, and there are loads of them, more than westerners, can afford to pay as much as uys surely???? It used to be 20B, but they jacked it up last year, pirates!!\

WE are staying in an english owned place. He used to live in Kendle!!!! He informed us that to get through the pay booth all you had to do was walk past without a bag and look confidently like you had parted with your 200B. I didn’t have the crust to do this so we sneaked round!!! He is obviously no fan of the double standard pricing round here. All major monuments or parks have a standard 200B enrence fee!!

Oh yes, when in chandaburi we met up with an old thei who had been iworking for the british to get rid of the japonese. he was most friendly, and walked round the market with us, purchasing local delicacies at random and giving them to us for a tast (no time for him to slip andy drungs in!) He got most exited at a stall, and ushered us all in. Yum i thought, i fancied a nice bowl of thai soup for brekki. He insisted on getting us the local speciality, and as he was paying, we could hardly refuse. I wished i had. It was still quite early, and i fancied somethiung light and tasty for the old tum. What i was presented with was a bowl of broth with bits in it. Some vegetables (leaves mostly) and an assotment of animals organs andf gibbli!!!!! I mean to say, the poor old tum squirmed uneasily, esspecially when it reaslised that this kind old man was looking at us all expectantly! He was busy descibing the merits of boiled liver, tripe, kidney, what looked like chopped up pigs ear, and a brown jelly type thing which he reverently described as ‘pigs blood’. Not what the poor old tum needed. However, one must always be polite, and i slurped as much as i could down without retching!!! All part of the fun. Mama would have liked it!!!

Well, just let me know when you would like to come over jul. It is no problem, and if you find you want to stay longer, we can always wait for you on one of the manyb handy islands!!! By the way, do you want to see the main palace in Bangkok (the customary 200B to get in .3 squid 50ish) or shal we do the cultural stuff without you???

See you asll soon,

Lova Tanya

Liv, good luch on the old job hunting. Thailand much better than the nam, though i am glad i went there for a looksee. any other interviews?? When are you going home to Gainsford?? Geoff says if no job yet, why not try out the scenic delights of coventry???

hi all, just showed your pictures to an american grafic art student, and he said that they were great!!!!! He’d never seen anything like them before!!!! Good egg i say!
I like the bicicling one, how about horse riding???? or bouncing on clouds, thats always one of my dreams. WE are going to get some more doxicycline for the north of thailand and laos, It is not that bed i don;t think, and julio could easilt get some if he wanted to join in, but if he doesn’t, and is having fun in nz, then he should probably make the most of it. Sounds like you have met some groovy peole jul. What are your plans, how long are you going to work for???

Mama, don’t encourage him to take it easy!!!! He has been taking it too easy recently!

Chanthaburi : not a tourist in sight. No other westerners at all. no one speaks english, and the only other tourist here is derk the american. Nice easu going bloke, and not at all loud! WE had a mini cook your own bbq for supper, with soup and cook your own veg as well. It came with a mini clay pot with a fire inside, and a grill at the top. you put the meat on a grill, and the soup and veg round the outside of the clay pot in a sort of rim for it to cook as well. lot of fun, and most tasy!! Tried to bargain for some pomeloes, but they don’t seem to bargain here, so maybe they are giving us a fair price to begin with because there are not many tourist around.

WE got through the borger, and as the local bus station was way out of town, we decided to take the tourist bus here, but after that travel properly. we were tired and hot and had had as mush as we could take after the six hour (meant to be three) journet to the border, and just wanted to get here. we bargained the price down to 200 barth each, which is epensive, but not overly for the lack of hassle. We should have knw better. the bus took a lot longer than they said, and then it stopped on the side of a huge main road, and the driver said ‘this chandaburi’ and signaled for us to get out. we spent ages asking him to drop us in the centre, but he didn’t speak a work of english, and looked lost anyway. geoff was all for asserting his authority and demanding to be droped of in town, but the other people in the bus, a surly looking english coule and some moody germany began to grumble. The english about how they had to catch the ferry, and the germany said ;were the hell you want to go, this is chandaburi! I’m sure if it had benn them they would not have liked to be dropped of on the main road. bloody rude and inconsiderate, and i hope they missed their ferry. anyway, we got out for a quiet life, and took a jeep to the centre (4km away, the cheating toad, so much for a cheerful and happy wencome to thailand!!)

Oh well, the people seem nive here appart from that.

Best be of as it’s late.

Love tanya

PS. Dod, geoff seems somhow to have inherited the good old goat stench!!! Most amusing i find it!!!!!

Tara
Tanya

Haul fester, what price the timing of arival in thailand?????

Well, as you have not dained to reply blast you, we shall continue as planned. We are heading out of cambodia tomorow, and then down to ko Samet, one of the islands of the coast, south east of bangkok. WE were planning to chill there ’till you arrived, but if you are planning a prolonged stay, we will get on with the itinarary. The plan was to meet you, head up to khao yai national park, spot a few other things of interest on the way. WE were thinking of then going into laos as it seemes a shame to miss it, and coming out at the top of thailand, heading to chiang mai for a cookery course perchance, and then working our way south, atking in all the local sights on the way to bangkok, whic should take about a week up to laos border, week in laos and perhaps one to two weeks going down to bangkok. If you wanted to do this with us you wouls probable do fine by sticking to the original dates (7th was it??? wot time???) or if you wanted to stay and do a bit more fish slautering with the bloodthirsty caroline, you could meet us on our way back down, baring in mind that this would be three weeks later than originally planned. WE then plan to head south along the beachy coast!!!! wel, we wil mail wen we either get to chanthaburi ( the capital of that area) or ko samet (the classy island. That will e tomorrow of the day after. Get back soonish so we know what time we have to play with squirtlet. Mayhaps get dod to look into things, he might have a good idea. Have you a good list of non touristy things to do??

By the way, what happened to that bloke???

Gotta go, getting the bus in the morn, and we got up to se the sunset over ankor wat this morn at 5am. Needless to say it was well and truly clouded over. more about that later.

Love to all,
Tanya

Working you say???? most amazing. If you want to stay on feel free. WE are going to thailand ina couple of days, but have many options. namely the islands on the coast or the north or indead laos before we meet you in bankok so you name the date and we will be there old chap. Work for about three weeks, night shifts, party during the day and then have enough money to take you round thailand ect without digging further into the dwindling resources!!! who needs sleep anyway!

Dod – cheers for the pics. The rock is classy, exactly right, and da puddlings are most cozy!! Wot about a pic of you and the mama toiling in the garden????

It is raining monsoon style in siem reap today. WE are sheltering in the e-mail place. Will now get onto freeserve for the next instalment.
Love Tanya