Summarized well at the Irrawaddy: Thailand’s Insect Farms Creating a Buzz
I still prefer bacon to fried grasshoppers, but not by much.
Category: Around Mahasarakham
Sarakham Music
Taro came over a few weeks ago, and we stopped by a recently-opened music shop while the kids were at Tae Kwon Do. It’s the largest music store in Sarakham with possibly legit big brand stock, and also has 5 studio rooms in the back. The owner is super-friendly and let Taro try out the gaudiest German electric I’ve ever seen.
(I took this photo with T’s camera)
Thai Jaeger – The Golden Buddha Mech
Somewhere between the Chiang Yuen and Sam Sung districts on a two-lane highway lined with rice paddies and stands of vines and overgrowth, there is a secret Jaeger base under construction.
When completed, this powerful addition to the Pacific Rim forces will boast three powerful weapons to fight the scourge of Kaijus: Tree Falling in Forest Kick, Cosmic Bodhisattva Blast, and Spinning Lotus Beam.
Babyblade CBR fun
My friend Ben just bought a used 2011 Honda CBR250R w/ABS in Pattaya and brought it back to Sarakham. I helped him out a little with the details of the transaction and choice of bike, so of course, I got to try it out. Perhaps today wasn’t the best day since it was drizzling and quite windy out on the highway, but that did not deter us.
The bike was lighter and more refined than I expected – I would say it’s more tame than beast. The single-cylinder engine is very smooth and steady, and the bike is very quiet with the stock exhaust (even if it is wrapped with a faux carbon fiber sticker – which according to the internet, grants about 3 extra hp). In my mind, the CBR 150 is more fun at lower speeds, but the 250 is great for cruising on the highway (and probably even more fun when the wind isn’t kicking grit into your face at high speed).
Until this point, I had been riding the CBR around town and Ben was following on my scooter. When we stopped, Ben said he wanted he wanted to ride bitch to “see how girls felt,” so he got on the back and I pretended to be a twenty-something French guy on a glorious circuit around the Maha Sarakham bypass. Getting into the role of a racer-playboy, I recommended embedding a switch-activated vibrator in the rear seat cushion for increased high-speed thrills. For his part as a scared young Thai girl, Ben kept saying, “slow down, Ajarn, slow down!” (I was actually riding very slowly since I’m no longer invincibly young).
It was a lot of fun.
and the wind whispers
Rainbow on the Bypass (Maha Sarakham)
A fortuitous sign right at the start of our journey…
Maha Sarakham Restaurant Review – Little Tokyo
Went to a new Japanese restaurant opening today with Tong. It wasn’t crowded at all, and my first impression was bad because it reeked of fresh paint inside.
I don’t want to go into much detail, because we only had a few dishes, but what we did have was enough to lure me back again to try some other things.
Overall, I give this place a 6/10 (so far) – worth going to check out. The food had problems, but hopefully they will be ironed out soon.
Strengths: Reasonably priced (much cheaper than Japanese restaurants in Sermthai Complex). Has at least a couple strong dishes; soup gyoza is pretty good (tried two dishes with it).
Weaknesses: Smells of paint. Bad noodles (unforgivable for Japanese ramen). Bad sushi (not pictured above). Not much parking. Iced green tea is tooth-dissolvingly sweet. Hot tea is cheap and flavorless.
The place is located next to the copy shop on the corner of Highway 208 and Nakorn Sawan Soi 18 (the street that goes down to N&N 2 and Med Side) next to the copy shop.
http://goo.gl/maps/4E53T
Golden Shower at New City Hall, Maha Sarakham
The Rachapreuk tree has naughty names (only for perverted minds?) in English (golden shower tree), Latin (Cassia fistula), Spanish (caña fistula), and translated Chinese (sausage tree). It’s name in Ayurvedic medicine is aragvadha, or “disease killer,” and it’s the national Flower of Thailand as well as the state flower of Kerala, India. It blooms at the hottest time of year here in Thailand, and I think serious modern research into its medicinal properties is long overdue.
Keeping termite nests
A couple months back, we visited a small restaurant in neighboring Kosum Phisai, on one of the two main routes to Khon Kaen from Maha Sarakham. This place advertises along the highway as serving spaghetti and pork steak, the local iterations of which are invariably disappointing… but I bever order that crap anyway, so it didn’t really bother me. What did bother me was what I found on the bathroom wall:
Nam reported that the same could be found in the women’s restroom as well (the man’s and women’s were separated by a wall, so it was probably connected through cracks or something.
This was one of the more disturbing sights at a restaurant last year, somebody caring for the termite nests.
It finally cooled down…
Just a little present for Christmas I suppose. Usually we have a month or two of cool weather here, but it stayed hot for the longest time I’ve ever seen. Fucking global warming. It’s only 20°C (68°F) right now, but I’m sure most of my students will be dressed for skiing this week.