Home away from home
The pictures are from the foray to the Cambodian islands, described in Annie's blog at http://siamchronicles.blogspot.com/:
Annie and Alex are finally settling in. Here is her description:
Well, we've finally settled on a place! We're pretty happy about it - the owner is great, the location can't be beat, and the best part is that it's built to cater to western long-term visitors (so the bathroom is more than a hole in the floor and there are screens on the windows and no roaches in sight). We've seen loads of places over the last few days, and we're really glad to be finished with the hunt. The bad bits are that its very small and that it is under construction for the next month (right now its only one room but they're adding a small front room) - we're moving in anyway though so we'll see how that goes. The only other bad thing is that it's a self-contained apartment in the landlord's house - and he apparently hosts the Hmong tribe reunions for the villages every year, so that could be a bit of a stinker, but then again it could be quite fun. He's apparently some sort of expert in Lao coffee, so that should make Alex happy.
What did you think of the newest blog entry? Did you like it or too heavy handed?
Lao is a fun language, and it's actually pretty darn simple. The grammar is terribly rudimentary, and most words are just combos of other words (like "milk" is the words "mother water" placed together, etc) so the vocab isn't that extensive. The only tricky bit is that it's tonal, but most people know what you mean if you intone "i am a spare tire" instead of "i am happy" as I have done on more than one occasion.
Other bad news - I lost my Laos journal in Vientiene. I'm pretty darn bummed about it. Luckily not my sketchbook, but I had done quite a number of sketches in the journal too as well as loads of collages and photos (you know how my journals get - kind of like scrapbooks). Ah well, you win some you lose others.
It's been intensely HOT here the last two days, so I've been trying to hole up inside and move as little as possible.
There is a teeny kitchen (no oven and a propane tank with burner attachment for the rest) - cooking is difficult (as I learned today) because you have to constantly stop to clean up any tiny dribble or suddenly you're being carried back to the lair by a wave of super prescient ants. We timed it - if you dribble a drop of rambutan juice on the floor, in less than fifteen minutes it will be black with ants. We also have many adorable lizards living in the kitchen, they are just so cute but I worry they are not getting enough to eat. There is a shower - praguestyle handheld but better than a hose. It's tiny, but they are building a third room onto it now (hammer inthe morning, hammer in the evening, hammer hammer hammer hammer damn the hammer) and once that's finished, it should be an AWESOME place - and I'll have room to finally set up my studio. I did paint for some hours today, but I was cramped into a ball on the linoleum in the corner and it was deucedly uncomfortable.
Lao coffee is excellent. Ask Alex, he's the expert, but they like is STRONG and DARK here, you'd approve. You add a bunch of sugar and it's heavenly. We sent some to Bruce for his Birthday a few months back - never got word on whether they enjoyed it or no...
We're not quite clear on our address yet - we'll ask today about mail and all that. We're finally finished with the big push of getting all our household stuff - it took many, many trips to the dingy stall markets on the four corners of town to get stuff like knives, cutting boards, water tap for fresh water from the weekly water cooler deliveries, plates, pots, cooking supplies, towels, sheets, blankets, etc etc etc. Glad that's over with, it's hard enough haggling in your own language. The basic furniture is provided though, which is nice, although we currently have to eat our meals picnic style on the bed until the room is finished (which should be beginning of October - these guys work FAST).
We're eating a LOT of herb omlettes and bagettes. I finally found a stall yesterday outside of town that had a fridge full of grime covered cheddar cheese for $1.50, so I was transported into a full-blown ecstasy, and lugged it home for sandwiches. Last night I made a tomato-basil-garlic-eggplant tapanade (is that the right term? a cold mixture to be used for bruschetta?) in large quantities, I feel we will be subsisting on something like this for a long time as we have no oven, so basically anything that can be stuffed into a bagette. We've also found some tuna for this purpose, but no mayo or anything so it's not terribly appealing.
Alex's first day of teaching was wacky - after calling both brothers' house and cell phones all day sunday then visiting their houses, schools and shops he still couldn't find them to tell him WHERE he was teaching or WHEN. So, he huffed off early Monday, but ended up at the wrong school. Then none of the students have the books they are supposed to (they can't afford them) and the school can't afford to let Alex make photocopies and there are 40 students per class, so his first lesson plan (supposed to be a "reading" lesson) was shot. Instead he tried to have them play an ESL version of tic-tac-toe but it took them forever to make the grid because they were all using rulers to draw out the lines and measuring them very precisely, and if it wasn't perfect they'd erase and start again. The classes are getting easier though, although he got the advice from a student who works at the first guest house we stayed at here months ago, Seda, that he should not smile at the female students. Apparently, it breaks them up into helpless giggles that they cannot surpress throughout the duration of the class.
Alex is getting really sick right now - he's been feeling poorly for the last few days and now he's just a mass of sniffles and coughing and sore throat. We're pumping him with vitamin C and veggies, but it looks like it's a lingerer.
I just finished a big wall-sized watercolor yesterday for our bedroom, I love it but you'd probably hate it as it's a cartoony penguin demanding a specimen in french. I'll take a pic anyway, I think it's hilarious.
Annie and Alex are finally settling in. Here is her description:
Well, we've finally settled on a place! We're pretty happy about it - the owner is great, the location can't be beat, and the best part is that it's built to cater to western long-term visitors (so the bathroom is more than a hole in the floor and there are screens on the windows and no roaches in sight). We've seen loads of places over the last few days, and we're really glad to be finished with the hunt. The bad bits are that its very small and that it is under construction for the next month (right now its only one room but they're adding a small front room) - we're moving in anyway though so we'll see how that goes. The only other bad thing is that it's a self-contained apartment in the landlord's house - and he apparently hosts the Hmong tribe reunions for the villages every year, so that could be a bit of a stinker, but then again it could be quite fun. He's apparently some sort of expert in Lao coffee, so that should make Alex happy.
What did you think of the newest blog entry? Did you like it or too heavy handed?
Lao is a fun language, and it's actually pretty darn simple. The grammar is terribly rudimentary, and most words are just combos of other words (like "milk" is the words "mother water" placed together, etc) so the vocab isn't that extensive. The only tricky bit is that it's tonal, but most people know what you mean if you intone "i am a spare tire" instead of "i am happy" as I have done on more than one occasion.
Other bad news - I lost my Laos journal in Vientiene. I'm pretty darn bummed about it. Luckily not my sketchbook, but I had done quite a number of sketches in the journal too as well as loads of collages and photos (you know how my journals get - kind of like scrapbooks). Ah well, you win some you lose others.
It's been intensely HOT here the last two days, so I've been trying to hole up inside and move as little as possible.
There is a teeny kitchen (no oven and a propane tank with burner attachment for the rest) - cooking is difficult (as I learned today) because you have to constantly stop to clean up any tiny dribble or suddenly you're being carried back to the lair by a wave of super prescient ants. We timed it - if you dribble a drop of rambutan juice on the floor, in less than fifteen minutes it will be black with ants. We also have many adorable lizards living in the kitchen, they are just so cute but I worry they are not getting enough to eat. There is a shower - praguestyle handheld but better than a hose. It's tiny, but they are building a third room onto it now (hammer inthe morning, hammer in the evening, hammer hammer hammer hammer damn the hammer) and once that's finished, it should be an AWESOME place - and I'll have room to finally set up my studio. I did paint for some hours today, but I was cramped into a ball on the linoleum in the corner and it was deucedly uncomfortable.
Lao coffee is excellent. Ask Alex, he's the expert, but they like is STRONG and DARK here, you'd approve. You add a bunch of sugar and it's heavenly. We sent some to Bruce for his Birthday a few months back - never got word on whether they enjoyed it or no...
We're not quite clear on our address yet - we'll ask today about mail and all that. We're finally finished with the big push of getting all our household stuff - it took many, many trips to the dingy stall markets on the four corners of town to get stuff like knives, cutting boards, water tap for fresh water from the weekly water cooler deliveries, plates, pots, cooking supplies, towels, sheets, blankets, etc etc etc. Glad that's over with, it's hard enough haggling in your own language. The basic furniture is provided though, which is nice, although we currently have to eat our meals picnic style on the bed until the room is finished (which should be beginning of October - these guys work FAST).
We're eating a LOT of herb omlettes and bagettes. I finally found a stall yesterday outside of town that had a fridge full of grime covered cheddar cheese for $1.50, so I was transported into a full-blown ecstasy, and lugged it home for sandwiches. Last night I made a tomato-basil-garlic-eggplant tapanade (is that the right term? a cold mixture to be used for bruschetta?) in large quantities, I feel we will be subsisting on something like this for a long time as we have no oven, so basically anything that can be stuffed into a bagette. We've also found some tuna for this purpose, but no mayo or anything so it's not terribly appealing.
Alex's first day of teaching was wacky - after calling both brothers' house and cell phones all day sunday then visiting their houses, schools and shops he still couldn't find them to tell him WHERE he was teaching or WHEN. So, he huffed off early Monday, but ended up at the wrong school. Then none of the students have the books they are supposed to (they can't afford them) and the school can't afford to let Alex make photocopies and there are 40 students per class, so his first lesson plan (supposed to be a "reading" lesson) was shot. Instead he tried to have them play an ESL version of tic-tac-toe but it took them forever to make the grid because they were all using rulers to draw out the lines and measuring them very precisely, and if it wasn't perfect they'd erase and start again. The classes are getting easier though, although he got the advice from a student who works at the first guest house we stayed at here months ago, Seda, that he should not smile at the female students. Apparently, it breaks them up into helpless giggles that they cannot surpress throughout the duration of the class.
Alex is getting really sick right now - he's been feeling poorly for the last few days and now he's just a mass of sniffles and coughing and sore throat. We're pumping him with vitamin C and veggies, but it looks like it's a lingerer.
I just finished a big wall-sized watercolor yesterday for our bedroom, I love it but you'd probably hate it as it's a cartoony penguin demanding a specimen in french. I'll take a pic anyway, I think it's hilarious.
posted by Mooms at 11:55 AM
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