Photos – Page 85 – C. Buddha's Hasty Musings

DORAEMAX

Who’s that blue robot cat from the future with the Homer Simpson eyes?

Knockoffs sometimes (unintentionally?) kick more ass than the original items.

Recent Baby Updates

After I returned home from my uni’s “International Camp” last Thursday I was surprised to find the boy hadn’t waited for me to pass some milestones:

His first tooth came out (lower left incisor). I found this out when he grabbed my finger and bit down on it. Hard.
He now fits into the white baby Nikes (pictured above) cousin Kana gave me in Japan almost ten years ago as a birthday present (Her simple explanation: “You and Nam should make a baby.”). Somebody in Nara please pass this factoid on to Kana.
He can now laugh properly but prefers to do this wheezing, gacking chuckle kinda thing that’s both disturbing and hilarious. He can carry on with this sound for several seconds and it somewhat resembles a baby pterodactyl call.
He now holds out both hands when he wants me to pull him to his feet and stiffens his neck in anticipation.
He has almost grown out of size S Mammypoko diapers (he previously wore size Newborn and will be moving up to size M soon).
I saved the most important milestone for last (I wasn’t even aware this was humanly possible): He can fart, belch, and cough at the same time, with the hiccups!

In the Shadow of the Golden Buddha

Yesterday we want to a local temple for mommy’s birthday. Maxie stared at the big buddha for a long time, and then he started fussing because he was hungry.

End Respite

We’ve been busy.
I am preparing many photos for posting here.
In the meantime, be happy that I’ve found proof of indigenous cowboys in Thailand:

Last week a few of us teachers were asked to visit some classes being taught on a volunteer basis by our Business English major students out in Kalasin. We went out without much info and assumed these were classes being taught at a school. As it turned out, one of our student’s family had created an ad hoc classroom outside their house and was hosting free lessons for two weeks since schools are mostly on holiday during October. Children from their village as well as neighboring villages attended, with younger kids coming in the morning and older ones in the afternoon, perhaps 30 kids per session.
The classes were being taught by a few of our students who stayed at the house for the duration of the project.
We went and basically had a lot of fun thinking up activities on the spot… I sweat a lot as it was a really hot day, so I can honestly say that I contributed a lot of salt to my polo shirt.
Our student’s house/farm has a shrimp pond out back, so our reward for lunch was huge platters of steamed prawns, raw prawns with garlic, and epic tom yum goong with shrimp the size of mini-lobsters in it.
We also helped out with the afternoon class and took a quick trip to a popular “beach” up the road just a couple kilos, at the Lampao Dam reservoir.
All in all it was a great day, and the dedication of our students really impressed us. When asked why they were doing it, they said they didn’t want to just waste their holidays away. Well done!

Our New Thai House Part 3 – Groundwork

Timeline: End of July to mid-August 2007
The foundations have been set to floor level (one meter off the ground) and are being extended to roof level.

In this photo, our site is located at the four columns wrapped in wooden supports visible between the man in the blue shirt at the approximate middle of the photo and the first power pole to his right.

The beginnings of our house. Notice the use of eucalyptus as framework; this is standard building practice all throughout Thailand for all types of buildings. In other Asian countries, they tend to use more bamboo but there’s not so much of that here.

A couple weeks later, the eucalyptus framework has been replaced with cinder blocks, the stairs and pavilion have been added, and all foundations have been extended to roof level.

Ski mask welding in stifling weather, against a beautiful sunset sky. Most of these guys don’t bother with eye protection for arc welding. This guy sure didn’t.