LATEST ON AVAILABILITY HERE: http://www.thailandfriends.com/index.php?name=Journal&view=journal&juid=69044&jid=71740 The date: Sunday 3rd October. The time: 08:30 The place: Charlie Brown's, Sukhumvit Soi 11. The plan: Hire two minibuses, and depart from Charlie Brown's, Soi 11, (where we can stock up with ice, soft drinks etc.), around 8:30am. to Ayudthaya to see the sites, take photos, and lunch in a nice restaurant by the river. After lunch, more sightseeing. There are admission
Am now back in Samui, after my trip to Vietnam, and short stay in BKK. I stayed in a nice little place called Sasha's Hotel UNO on Soi 19. 2,500THB for a deluxe room B&B, with free internet. Has a new tuk tuk parked outside, which they use to run guests around locally.
From Halong Bay, I had a six and a half hour car journey back through Hanoi, and to the south west of the city to Mai Chau.
Mai Chau is a small provincial town, that is surrounded by mountains. It sits in a deep valley covered with paddy fields, and is home to various hill tribes: White Thai, Black Thai, Hmong, and various others. I stayed with a White Thai family, in their wooden stilt house.
Here are some pics:
Above is the house I slept in, and below, the interior of the same house.
I
Well Hoi An turned out not such a great experience for me, for one reason and another, including a bout of gastro enteritis.
A UNESCO World Heritage site, it reminds me of Luang Prabang, but a lot hotter ( L.P. was freezing when I was there). Also, there seems to be a party scene going on, with late night bars and clubs, once you get out of the old town. Had some clothes made, and a pair of one off Onitsuka Tigers. Done in 24 hours. :-)
Anyway, here are some pics:
I can be a lazy git, and its easy for me to plonk myself by the pool with a book. So on this trip, I have got a travel agent to organize a bit of sightseeing in several different places. Today is Saigon, so here are a few shots from my day:
I flew into BKK from Samui today, then had to go through immigration on my way to Saigon.
Normally when I pass through, all the booths are open, and the queues are long. It takes forever.
Today, only four booths open, and about five or six people in the queue for each booth. I don't know if I just caught them at a quiet time, but I have never seen it like that before.
Also Samui is very quiet. Tourist numbers are well down this year.
Just leaving for the airport to fly out.
The looks people have given me this week when I have told them I am going to Thailand.
Shock! Horror! Are you sure its safe? Why would you go there? Its dangerous! Be careful!
Anyway, I will be in Samui this time tomorrow.
The new iPhone will have Apple's own A4 chip and a larger battery that will offer 40% more talk time than the previous model. It will also be capable of HSDPA/HSUPA speeds of 7.2Mbps down and 5.8Mbs up. Surprisingly, the iPhone will not see a storage bump in this generation, maxing out at 32GB like the current iPhone 3GS.
Other new additions include 802.11n Wi-Fi, a gyroscope to detect motion on 6 axes, as well as an LED flash to supplement the new 5-megapixel auto-focus lens. The update
CANNES, France — On Sunday evening the 63rd Cannes Film Festival came to a shocking, exhilarating close with the Palme d’Or going to “Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives” from the Thai filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul. Surely the only Palme winner to feature sex between a princess and a thrashing catfish, “Boonmee” is a fantastical tale about a dying man whose past lives — and ghostly relatives — enraptured some critics while turning others off. The speculation that it might appeal to
Model elephants have been appearing all over London recently.
The life-sized artworks formed part of a collection of 260 model elephants taking over the English capital this summer for the London Elephant Parade 2010.
Julien Macdonald, Alice Temperley, Diane von Furstenberg, Lulu Guinness, Marc Quinn and John Rocha are also among those who have taken part in the initiative, raising awareness of the plight of Asian elephants. Among the works marching on Trafalgar Square today
I have been trying to book flights on Air Asia all day. I keep getting the message that they are busy. They can't be so busy that I can't get through all day, surely.
Anyone else had this problem? Its driving me mad. I might try again later tonight when most of asia is sleeping. Grrrrr
If you have any lying around in your garage, you could probably make a few quid. LOL
This stuff is very rare indeed.
I was reading this article on www.wired.com
Helium-3 Shortage Could Mean Nuke Detection ‘Disaster’
Stopping nuclear smuggling is already tough. But it’s about to get a lot harder. Helium-3, a crucial ingredient in neutron-particle-detection technology, is in extremely short supply.
Rep. Brad Miller (D-North Carolina), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Inves
I was walking through the city today, and came upon the end of the St George's day parade.
Grabbed a few quick snaps showing the King, and the Paras, with their mascot "Pegasus" the Shetland pony.
Couldn't take much as the police were moving people on.
Just some more pics from the Songkran celebrations here in London last Sunday.
The M.C. for the Mini Miss Songkran contest was someone called Cookie. Apparently she is a minor celebrity because she was one of the Big Brother contestants. Here she is in the following pic
The Mini Miss Songkran contestants:
Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves:
a couple of pics from the older Miss Songkran contest. I only took a couple as I was off to get more food.
The Monk's house. Not
A new type of scam has emerged to get money from people that use torrents.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/04/ransomware/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29
Well I went along to the Songkran celebrations in Wimbledon, London yesterday afternoon. the weather was fine, and it didn't take me long to get stuck in to all that lovely Thai food. Here are some snaps from the afternoon. The first one is the original house where I presume the monks now live.
Below: Som Tum (industrial size)
It didn't take long to finish that lot:
It was very busy around the food stalls:
and by the stage, for the Miss Songkran competitions:
Anyway, after e
