Safety First

One of the things that has always amazed me about Thailand is the traffic. Lanes are pretty much only a suggestion, and you can veer from one lane to the other or even straddle both lanes if you feel like it. There's no real right-of-way, and people will turn left right in front of you if they want to. There aren't really any speed limits, and Thai people generally seem to want to get where they're going as fast as possible. Even the trolley driver at the zoo drives like Jeff Gordon. Only in Thailand would you worry about getting into a crash as you're going by the zebra enclosure.

The most unbelievable thing of all is how many people and objects Thais will try to stuff into their vehicles or onto the back of their Honda Dreams. Just when I think I've seen it all, we'll be passed by a truck piled sky-high with cabbages and there will be thirteen workers casually stretched out on the very top of the pile. We've seen people speeding down the highway on motorbikes carrying tables, chairs, brooms, fishing rods, and bicycles. Entire families of five people ride on one motorbike, usually one kid in the front, another kid squeezed between Mommy and Daddy, and a baby in Mommy's arms. I have to admit, it makes me more than a little nervous to see helmet-less babies flying by me on bikes going 70 km/h or faster. I keep the camera with me at all times when we're in the car, and I have assembled a little collection of some of the crazier things I have managed to photograph from the backseat of our Suzuki Caribbean.

Here it is, the gallery of "Good God, What Are They Thinking?"

How come Mommy gets a helmet and I don't?





Hopefully we won't make any sudden stops





Who needs to hold on?



In case I need to sit down later



I'm pretty sure we could fit another couple of guys back here, don't you think?









Can't beat the view

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Tiger Kingdom

Yesterday we visited Tiger Kingdom, a brand-new attraction in Chiang Mai. For 300 baht, you have your choice of two options: you can play with one-month-old tiger cubs for half an hour, or you can enter the enclosure of some older (much more active) tigers and interact with them. Guess which option we chose?

We didn't feel much like cheating death yesterday, so we picked the baby tigers. First we got to see the mom and dad tigers in their rather small and sad cages:





There were four babies, and they were extremely cute, although my girls were still terrified and wouldn't go near them. Oh well. I guess it would be weird if they weren't scared of tigers. These guys aren't too scary, though:













Here are the older tigers. We did see some tourists go into the cage, and they emerged with all their limbs. I don't think I would do it, though.

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She's back, and still cancer-free!

Remember Benign Girl? Well, she's back! And now she has two new pals and her own line of cellphones!





And doesn't this look like a fun toy?





Isabella was actually pretty bummed out we wouldn't buy it for her.

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Posted in: Tinglish

Declare the Buffet!

On our last night in Phuket, we went to our hotel's Thai buffet night. Dave and I tried not to eat much during the day so we could really get our money's worth at the buffet. Unfortunately, we forgot that most normal people don't eat dinner at 4:45 like we do.

We thought the buffet opened at 6 pm and were chagrined to discover it wasn't open until 7. We paced around aimlessly for about 40 minutes, whining about our hunger and speculating about how many spring rolls we each thought we could eat. After that, we just circled the buffet like vultures until the staff got tired of seeing us staring at the food with our sad, hungry eyes and let us in.

We had a table close to the stage so that the girls would be able to see the musicians and dancers in the show. There was a program on our table that let us know it was time to "declare the buffet," which we were quite happy to do.



After eating large quantities of delicious food, it was time to "enjoy with the shows," and we did our best to do that, except the only show William wanted to enjoy was the one playing on the back of his eyelids. He fussed continuously and would only stop crying as long as I held him in front of a fan in a corner of the restaurant. So neither he nor I really "enjoyed with the shows," but the girls did. They are always interested in watching Thai dancers.







The staff at our hotel were all wonderful and extremely attentive. At one point, they even went so far as to crawl under our table and apply organic mosquito repellent to our legs. There was one young woman who took a shine to our girls, and they really loved her. I never did catch her name, but the girls ran to her every time we were in the lobby. On our last day there, she gave them presents: little pink purses and sequined headbands. Here she is with them showing off their gifts:

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Posted in: Phuket,Tinglish

Miscellaneous Phuket Photos

Playing in the hotel's park, aka the beach-toy dumping ground for parents who don't feel like bringing sand pails home when they leave


Mommy and William, self-portrait


Heading out to dinner

At every restaurant we went to in Phuket, the girls were given Connect Four boards to play with:



Relaxing in a hammock on the beach

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Posted in: Phuket

Dino Park

One rainy day, sick of the Scorpions concert they kept showing on TV in our room every time the satellite went out (which was often), we ventured out to Dino Park, a dinosaur-themed mini-golf course.

It was pouring rain, William was crying, and Isabella was terrified of the life-sized dinosaurs, so we weren't having too much fun, intially. But then William fell asleep, the rain stopped, and Isabella finally decided to take our word for it that the dinosaur statues wouldn't eat her. There was standing water on the ground and the holes were full of water, so we didn't exactly set any course records, but we had fun. Isabella lost interest in golfing after only one hole, but Olivia golfed all 18 and was actually pretty good at it.


Olivia with the dinosaur poop


Caught in the nest trap





Afterwards, we decided to save ourselves the 100 baht taxi fare and walk back to the hotel along this pretty street:


We got back just in time to beat the next rain storm and, to our surprise and delight, the Scorpions concert was still on! Rock me like a hurricane!

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Posted in: Phuket

The Beach

The weather in Phuket was quite rainy for the first three days we were there. As a result, the ocean was very wavy, and the red flags were up every day. It's too bad we couldn't really swim, because the beach and the water were beautiful.

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Posted in: Phuket