Category: Work

Welcome home

I was greeted with the following exchange upon returning home to bring my sick kids (who choose to play hooky in unison) lunch:

MAX: Daddy, are you going to work again?
DADDY: Hello, Max. I brought you some noodles.
MAX: DADDY, ARE YOU GOING TO WORK AGAIN, DADDY?
DADDY: Why?
MAX: I want you to go make a lot of money! GO TO WORK AGAIN, PLEASE, DADDY!
MINA: YEAH DADDY, GO TO WORK!

The monsters have grown too powerful to control.

One Tablet PC Per Child Tablet PC aka “iPad10”

I got to test out a number of Tablet PCs at one of the education projects I’m helping out. My opinion is that they are complete crap and even worse than I expected at the 81 USD price mark, for several reasons:

  • Of 6 units I tested, 2 were obviously defective (one would not charge past 12% and one constantly emitted a high-pitch squeal)
  • Overall build quality is poor
  • Devices show deep scratches, bubbles under the protective film, and other physical damage as delivered
  • Most of the cases I saw (I only checked a dozen or so out of 40 units delivered) were black or white, with some hot pink thrown in. This is a horrible thing for distributing to a group of kids.
  • Battery life is the worst I’ve ever heard of for any tablet PC – under 30 minutes of normal use
  • The touch screen is unresponsive and frustrating (removing the protective film made it a bit better, but resulted in really bad smudging)
  • Even though the battery capacity is so limited, charging time from near empty is around 80 minutes
  • Even the power adapters are crap; they get very hot and the cords are too short
  • This tablet is the second slowest I’ve ever used – the first being a very similar Chinese unit I tested two years ago
  • This tablet features perhaps the only graphical user interface I’ve ever used that doesn’t support drag and drop
  • The Android OS loads so slow, it has time to show off 3 boot screens/loading sequences

On the positive side:

  • The accessories for the tablets are good. The case, USB keyboard, and USB/ethernet dongle work just fine.
  • The product markings make for a fine conversation piece (iPad5, iPad6, iPad10, 4G, 64GB)

 

Software info:

Study level: Bad Asian

Me: Your speaking topic is about something you would like to own. Please speak about this for one minute.

Student: I would like to own my hair.

Me: … What?

Student: My hair.

Me: WHO OWNS YOUR HAIR NOW?

Student: I want to color it red.

Me: Well, I guess you should own your hair first before you dye it.

Student: …

Hin Suay Nam Sai Resort, Rayong

image

I’m in Rayong with 110 students and 10 teachers on a business English education project. It’s hot and sunny here, but these are some of my favorite beaches in Thailand.
For me, Rayong is the perfect mix of convenience, desolation, and value for money. You can eat fresh seafood under the tall shade trees running almost all 12 kilometres up the coast, then run down to the water and pretty much be alone for hours, if you’ve chosen a good spot. The one hour separation from the fleshpots of Pattaya keeps most farang away, and Rayong is primarily a resort town for Thais – this fact in itself makes Rayong appealing, but it also serves to keep prices down and keep parasitic vendors, taxis, and ladyboy hordes away.
Anyway, I’m here for work. My unofficial role, as always, is as facilitator, so I’m about to go facilitate the hell out of the breakfast buffet followed by a facilitative facilitation of a morning swim in the sea.
This resort, which literally translates as Pretty Rock Clear Water Resort, is an interesting mix of crusty old failed bubble venture and competent staff. The climb to and from the beach is a bit hard for young kids, otherwise I’d think about bringing the family here some time.

“…credible and meaningful in foreign cultures.”

The university where I teach, Rajabhat Maha Sarakham, used to be a teacher’s training college. My uni is just one Rajabhat institute of about 40 spread all over Thailand, that were turned into universities by the king with something called the Rajabhat Act in 1995. Therefore, when we clean up, move, or renovate offices and I see asset tags with “teacher’s college” or the like, I know I’ve found something at least 17 years old, and sometimes much older.

The last time somebody cleaned out a storage room on the 3rd floor, above my office on the 2nd floor, a bunch of cool old stuff was put out to be thrown away. I’ve started documenting what I’ve saved, and this is one of my coolest finds:

 

I’d never even heard of the United States Information Agency before, and I can only assume that “U.S. Information Service” was an alternative name for the agency.

———————

Now if I can only find a working 16mm film projector!