Not much news....

Not much is happening down here. But i have to admit that i haven't done much on updating the pages here as you all probably have noticed by now... I'll try and do better soon. Tomorrow Kyaw Kyaw and Sandra have planned to go to the immigration office and see what can be done with visas and stuff. Depending on the outcome plans wil be made.. Frans & I will see...

Moved

Today Frans, Kyaw Kyaw, Sandra and me moved to new diggs. We've found a small room, even smaller bathroom and tiny balcony for 2.500 bath a month. That is around 50 euro. We'll need to pay a little extra for electricity, water and the like but it'll be ok for a while. KK has started with his english books. Sandra found a coursebook + cd's in a bookshop here to learn burmese. We'll see how that goes. Frans & me aren't doing much. We play pool sometimes. And many an afternoon we play scrabble. We've got this really nice travel scrabble set that we're by now quite addicted to. Sometimes Kyaw Kyaw & Sandra play it too. And it is good practise for Kyaw Kyaw. Although we're all sometimes amased at the words he knows. Hoe, foe, quid are a few i can remember of the top of my head. The dictionaries are suddenly used a lot. For the rest it is Frans & me talking about what we can do next. And there are talks of going to Malaysia & Singapore and fly from there to Burma. We (Frans & me that is) can't wait.....

Tonight.... Thai boxing

Something i always wanted to see. At least once. So i know what it'll be like. Sandra is not so keen. And Kyaw Kyaw is looking forward to it. Though he keeps saying that if the Thai and the Burmese fight each other (there is such a thing as Burmese boxing) the Burmese usually win. Frans so far hasn't expressed an opinion. I think he is a bit overwelmed with all the colours, smells, tastes and all that of Thailand. It'll be a Swede and 2 Spaniards against Thai opponents. Before that, some nice curry or so. To get the gastric juices flowing ;-)

Soon i'll be posting all the pictures from our Europe-trip. I promise. Most faithfully....

Denied on the bus

Kyaw Kyaw and Sanda as bough tickets for the bus to Chiang Mai. One of the VIP buses that leave from Khao San Rd. Frans & me were safely and snugly tucked away in our traveling bag. And we were waiting in our hotel for the person who would take us to the bus. The woman from the travel agency in the hotel hang around a while longer then normal. And we had, against all former habits, decided to pay a half day more and keep our room till 6 (we would have the bus at 6.30). An australian woman was also waiting for that bus and she had been working for a while in Burma doing eye operations via a monastery (with a charity organisation). So you can imagine it was an interesting time. Finally the girl showed up to take us to the bus. First she demanded in not such a nice way to see KK's passport. Since Thai weren't allowed on the bus. And then when she saw his passport she said 'bye bye'. Which turned out to mean that he couldn't come along. OF course we were upset And a bit fustrated. She was argueing with the travel agancy's lady. And KK was talking to Sandra. And suddenly she lashed out to KK telling him to keep his mounth shut. We were all quiet for 10 seconds before Sandra, KK and the travel agency's lady began shuting at her. She'd been already so rude and then this. Anyway, we didn't get on the bus. Nw we have tickets for a government run bus tomorrow morning. SO we'll have to get up real early (not one of my favorite things). Ok, of to my fried rice with pineapple...

New developments

Who showed up yesterday evening completely unexpected.....? Kyaw Kyaw. He managed to get a last minute ticket that day with Thail airways and it was hardly more expensive then flying with air asia... So Sandra is really happy. And Frans & me are equally so but of course for an altogether other reason. Finally something is happening so we'll probably be doing something soon... Kyaw Kyaw managed to get a 3 month visa so that chances things completely. They are now thinking about going to Chiang Mai and stay there a while (rent an appartment/studio if that is possible) so Sandra can get her TEFL-certificate (teaching english as a foreign language) so it'll be easier for her to get teaching jobs. Me and Frans are thinking about doing a massage course. It might help us bonding with cute girls. Kyaw Kyaw doesn't know yet what he will do. Massages are not really his thing unless he receives them. But while in Burma he got some usefull info so who knows what comes his way.. We'll see and of course keep track of it.

Still in Bangkok and bored stiff

We're still in Bangkok. The first days it was fun. We saw Ursula again (whom we'd met last year in Burma). And we hang out a bit with the american guy that we sat next to on the bus from the airport. But both have left now and Kyaw Kyaw hasn't shown up yet. He's spent the better part of the week waiting for his thai visa and of course he needed a day to get the special exit paper that he needs so he can leave Burma. And now there are no tickets and they give him a hard time about not booking a return flight (he needs a return flight to get into Thailand but of course we already have that part covered). Anyways, Sandra has spend most of her time in internet cafe's trying to sort things out and trying to call to Burma. Which is an exercise in patience and should be listed as a patience-training program somewhere. Then again it would probably be too expensive since even if you have no connection you're charged for trying to get through (after hotel and food it must register as the most expensive item on our expenses list. And definitely the item with the worst cost/quality ratio). And even if you get through it seems quite frustrated. I 've seen Sandra bang her head on the table a few times since she got through and then got someone on the line who spoke just enough english to not understand a thing and still keep on trying...

It seems like we'll soon start to see the end of this ordeal though. Hopefully Kyaw Kyaw will arrive tomorrow or the day after. If nothing goes wrong of course. Sandra will not think it over until she actually sees him coming through the doors at the airport. She thinks customs might just as easily give him a hard time... We (Frans & me) have tried to convince her that we could of course go to Yangon. But she claims she has way to much stuff and is surely not allowed to carry all that on the plane. We tried to tell her that she could of course leave some here in Bangkok and pick it up next month when she has to do a visa run. But she has heard rumors that it is possible again to extend a visa for anther month and since she doesn't like flying she prefers to wait. No matter how boring it is here. So we try to stick it out *sigh*

Back in Bangkok

Thankfully it isn't terribly hot here at the moment. A nice 25 c or so i'd say. We're in a small hotel just of Khao San rd. Sandra doesn't really care much for this popular backpacker street but i like to watch people there. It is so much fun. And of course i have to show the 'real' backpacker life to Frans. He's the new addition to our crew. He's french so a bit pecular but good company non the less. He's just a bit too warmly dressed for this weather. Anyways, the flights weren't nearly as bad as we'd assumed. And much to our, and especially Sandra' s, dissapointment we were not 'left behind' in Bahrain. We had a very unexperienced lady checking us in at Charles de Gaulle airport. And since our flightplan had changed (to our advantage but done by the airline company) she did everything wrong. It took at least 3 bagtickets before she got the correct one (with help from a supervisor). And we got both boarding passes, the one from Paris to Bahrain and onwards from there to Bangkok. The second one Sandra stowed away for later use. On the plane we found that me and Frans had to get back into our bag since the whole plane was fully booked (and then some we found out later). The french guy that occupied the seat turned out to be much fun so it wasn't so bad. But Frans and me did miss the nice views we could have had. With 2 hours waiting in Bahrain we drank loads of coffee. In the company of the french guy and 2 other french guys with whom he had been on the stand-by list. The plane was that full. While in line for boarding Sandra looked on her boarding pass online to find that it says the 4th of january. And it was the 3rd! Sandra quickly went to talk with one of the ground staff and indeed we were booked for the 4th... They thought she'd be terribly upset of course (she being the only one booked for the 4th) but of course she thought it the best joke ever. And when they informed her that the airline company would provide the hotel she told them not to search to hard for a possibility to get her on that plane. We'd never visited Bahrain before and this seemed such an excellent opportunity.... The only thing they needed to do was to make sure her luggage was not on that plane (as if Sandra would have cared if her backpack had arrived in Bangkok before she did). So we waited while everybody checked in and we had a blast with the ground staff. Unfortunately just before the last people went through the message came through that our luggage was already on the plane. And with the security rules it meant that we had to be on that plane too. Or the whole flight would be cancelled. We were all so dissapointed! We'd already 'adjusted' ourselves to the idea of spending a whole day in Bahrain and having a good look around there. But well, we could hardly refuse to go on that plane and postpone everybody else's holiday.. But deep in our hearts we were definitely thinking about it

Happy new year!

We all wish you a very good 2007. Filled with love, family, friends, laughter, good health and of course chocolate!