Legendary Tennis!

Having watched many exciting tennis matches in the late 1970's and early 1980's involving Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe, Doris and I were thrilled to have the opportunity to see these two tennis legends play each other in an exhibition here in Bangkok last Saturday. Okay, so they aren't exactly in their prime anymore, but it was still neat. McEnroe, of course, protested several line calls by throwing his racket and berating the linesmen or chair umpire, but as most tennis fans know, maturity finally settled in some years ago, and McEnroe's tantrums now are really nothing more than tongue-in-cheek crowd pleasers. As for Bjorn Borg, his personality is still as subdued as it always was.

I'm inserting some photos from the match . . .

. . . including one showing the routine McEnroe hands-on-hips slouch, indicating that a "You cannot be serious!" tirade is about to erupt:

The best part, though, involved several tennis balls that Borg and McEnroe hit into the crowd before the match started. Both players had autographed these balls earlier. Borg hit one into the section where Doris and I were sitting, and the ball sailed over my head.style=""> Over the years I've watched many fans at baseball games bobble homerun balls hit into the stands, so I turned around and patiently waited while the ball bounced off the fingers of numerous people in the rows above us. The ball eventually worked its way down and ended up in mid-air right in front of me, and while holding my camera in my right hand, I simply reached out and grabbed the ball with my left!

Being a sentimental guy, I checked e-Bay listings the next day to see what a tennis ball autographed by these two tennis greats would fetch at auction. I figured maybe this could be the start of our new retirement savings. Sadly, it looks like I could sell the famous ball for an amount roughly equivalent to what I paid for the exhibition match tickets.

Pool in Progress

I just concluded two enjoyable weeks in Austin with Doris. We made some new friends, unpacked boxes of our belongings, selected new furnishings for the house, etc. One of the more interesting things we did was simply watch the construction of our in-ground swimming pool, which coincidentally began upon my arrival in Texas from Bangkok. The whole process is projected to take three months, but I suspect the first couple of weeks will constitute the most interesting phase, since I finally could begin to visualize in three dimensions what I previously had seen only in a drawing.

I'm inserting below a bunch of pictures of the pool construction taken over the course of my visit. The bags of limestone shown in several of the photos made me wonder whether the contractor was building a bomb shelter, rather than a pool, but I believe the bags are intended to form a solid foundation for the pool, in order to minimize the risk of settling and cracking.

Also, several trees at the back edge of our property needed trimming, and we held our breath while watching one of the workers gingerly pick his way through one tree's dead branches with a chain saw:

A Lone Star State of Mind

Doris and I sampled some music last night in Austin, Texas, which bills itself as the "live music capital of the world." We enjoyed listening to an unsigned recording artist, Suzanne Smith, accompanied by another guitarist and a fiddle player, at an Irish pub called B.D. Riley's on 6th Street, where many of the live music acts perform. I'm posting a couple of self-explanatory pictures:

We hope last night will be the first of many enjoyable evenings spent savoring the musical talent that is so prevalent in Austin. Suzanne graciously performed two songs I requested. We especially liked her band's rendition of a Nanci Griffith tune "Lone Star State of Mind," since the lyrics describe the song writer's affection for memories formed in the "Lone Star" State of Texas. With the recent completion of our new house in Austin, Texas is now Doris' home state, and we expect it eventually will be mine, too.

Yes, last night was entertaining, but it was also educational. On the way to the pub, we passed a site bearing the plaque pictured below, describing its historical significance:

I've Been to the Bat Cave!

With Doris in Austin, I decided to take a trip by myself this weekend to Khao Yai National Park, Thailand's largest, which is located about a two-hour drive from Bangkok. I wasn't actually "by myself," since our driver, Khun Akkachai, took me there and was my friendly companion while touring the park. He proved to be an invaluable resource in many ways, including translating from Thai to English. One can get by speaking English (accompanied by plenty of arm waving to give charades-like clues) in the area in which I live in Bangkok, but in most other parts of Thailand, proficiency in Thai is essential to communication.

The highlight of the trip was a visit to the Bat Cave. I was skeptical that it would live up to its advance billing, but it actually far exceeded my expectations. We're not talking about the residence of the Caped Crusader here but a cave in which roughly 4 million bats reside and from which they emerge every evening at dusk. About an hour before sunset, I hired a guide and drove to the base of the mountain in which the cave is located. As you can see from the pictures, we parked in a farmer's sugar cane field and waited.

As the sun began dipping towards the horizon and I was snapping photos of yet another sunset (I've surely taken enough of these over the years, but who can resist?), a stream of bats suddenly started pouring out of the mountainside. For those of you who have high-speed internet connections, I'm inserting a short video of this remarkable phenomenon. For those who don't, I'm posting a few still pictures. So, okay, I've taken too many sunset photos over the years, but these are the first showing swarms of bats in the foreground.

Incredibly, this river of bats kept pouring out of the cave, even as we were leaving the farmer's field in the dark about 45 minutes later. The guide told us that it takes about two hours for all 4 million bats to exit in an orderly manner. I'm not so sure about orderly . I can only imagine what it must be like in the cave itself, with all these creatures flapping and jockeying for position at the opening. Once they're out of the cave, the bats head off in search of their meals of insects and have been known to travel well over a hundred miles before returning one-by-one to the cave before sunrise. This assumes they aren't nabbed by hungry Thais. Our guide told us that residents in the area love to snack on bat meat roasted with garlic.

Other highlights of the trip:

-- encountering a huge lizard—about four feet long—on the road while driving through the park. Unfortunately, he moved so fast, despite his size, that all the photos I took of him before he scampered into the brush were blurry.

-- meeting a family of wild elephants by the side of the road (there are about 250 altogether in the park):

-- hiking to a large waterfall that required climbing up and down the steepest and narrowest stairs I've ever seen at a tourist attraction anywhere in the world:

-- finding a group of other tourists peering into the jungle at the side of the path to the waterfall and taking pictures. At first I couldn't see what they were photographing, so they had to point out the huge tarantula—the size of a man's hand—idling the time away in his web:

Before getting to the waterfall, we encountered yet another tarantula at a different location, likewise waiting patiently in his web, perhaps for an unsuspecting tourist to wander off the beaten path. These sightings only reinforced my reluctance to do more hiking in the park. Materials that I read in preparation for my visit recommended the wearing of "leech socks" to prevent leeches from securing themselves to one's ankles and sucking blood. I mentioned this to Khun Akkachai, who demonstrated a very relaxed attitude in reply. "Mister, I not scared. Leeches need blood, so I don't mind. I help them." Good for him, but I can’t fathom having the same attitude. Also, I have a friend in Bangkok who is recovering from dengue fever, a tropical disease that is transmitted by mosquitoes and can cause spasms so severe that a victim's bones sometimes break. With this in mind, I decided to stick to only the more well-developed paths in the park and avoid getting too adventurous.

One more thing: there's marble beneath the ground, and sometimes above the ground, in Khao Yai. Lots of it. Trucks haul enormous pieces of the stone, chewing up the roads and creating large potholes that we drove through. There is so much marble in the area that the owner of the hotel I stayed in went wild with the stuff. I'm posting a couple of pictures of my room, showing a marble floor, a marble counter in the living area (the bed’s mattress also rested on marble), and a bathroom made almost entirely of marble. The owner apparently drew the line at installing a marble toilet.

There’s so much marble in the area that the owner even arranged to have a square piece of art work hung on the wall, comprised entirely of—you guessed it—marble:

The Beatles Revisited

Quite some time ago, I wrote about attending a performance by a Beatles tribute band in Bangkok called the Beaters. Last Friday night, I went with a friend of mine, Matt Totsky, to hear another Beatles tribute band, The Better. They were excellent, and Beatles songs have been playing in my head. Some pics of the band, as well as of Matt:

And where else but in Bangkok could you walk out of a pub and encounter an elephant on the street?

More Language Humor

I truly admire how hard people work at overcoming the language barriers that divide them, and how often their efforts succeed, despite the use of less-than-elegant communications. Two examples from Thailand that struck my funny bone:

While riding on the Bangkok sky train recently, I discreetly peered over the shoulder of a Thai woman to read the English dialogue she was studying and practicing intently. The lesson was entitled, "Discourse with an Old." Since the lesson was accompanied by a sketch of a Western-looking geezer, I surmised that the phrase "an Old" was intended to refer to an elderly person. The dialogue began with the Thai speaker asking, "How old you?" (English teachers in Thailand, as well as writers of English language texts, often are Thais with limited English skills themselves.) After the elderly man responded, the next question is the one that really got me giggling: "You have cataract on your eye globes, is that not right?" (Can you just imagine all the readers of the dialogue eagerly awaiting an opportunity to practice this exciting phrase on an unsuspecting Western man?!)

The second example comes from our Thai driver, who told me recently about another driver's attempt to explain to his boss that he needed time off from his driving duties in order to attend the cremation of his recently deceased father. The only problem was that the Thai didn't know the English word "cremation," so he told his boss he needed time off to "barbecue" his father. Despite this awkward phrasing, the boss quickly grasped what the driver was saying and agreed to the request.

Hello Bali!

Doris and I have just returned from a glorious week at a resort in Bali. We now know a lot more about this tropical paradise, which is one of roughly 13,000 islands comprising Indonesia. We spent a good deal of time just lounging on the beach or around the pool at the resort, sipping tropical drinks:

. . . but we also hired a car and driver and took some excursions. Some of the more interesting things we learned during our visit:

-- It's difficult to adjust to Indonesian currency. It felt truly weird to give, as a tip, a piece of paper currency with "10,000" written on it, despite continually reminding ourselves that this equated to a little more than one US dollar.

-- Bali is 90% Hindu and 10% Muslim, resulting in a very tolerant environment, which is in considerable contrast to some other parts of Indonesia, where religious violence instigated by Islamic fundamentalists is a recurring problem.

-- Kite flying is a routine source of entertainment for the locals. The wind blows almost continuously in Bali, so we often would see one or more kites somewhere in the sky.

We also learned that the Balinese consider monkeys to be sacred. In fact, we visited a "sacred monkey forest," populated by more than 400 wild monkeys of all sizes. At one point during our tour of the forest, as I was fiddling with my camera, an adult monkey leapt onto my shoulders.

Doris kept her cool and snapped some photos (these could have come in handy when filing a life insurance claim), while I tried to remain calm, pretending I didn't mind having an animal on my back. I had read the sign at the entrance to the forest, warning against touching or playing with the monkeys, as they might react in an unpredictable manner and could pose a health risk. My biggest worry was getting bitten. Fortunately, I avoided this fate, although I had to spend the rest of the day touring with a lot of dirty paw prints all over my t-shirt.

Pictured below is a graveyard in the monkey forest. No, this doesn't contain the bodies of rabies-infested tourists. It does include the grave of our tour guide's mother, however:

Our guide explained that people are buried only temporarily, until the town's next cremation ceremony is scheduled, at which point the bodies are exhumed and burned. I'm inserting a photo showing the temple area in which the bodies are prepared for cremation.

A stone statue next to the entrance shows an evil spirit devouring a child. Now, how inviting is that?!

We passed many rice fields on our tour and watched some people harvesting rice:

We also visited a stone sculpting shop:

Pictured below is a beautifully carved piece depicting the Indonesian version of Romeo and Juliet:

We also stumbled upon an open-air performance by elementary school children. The little girl dancers were amazingly talented, and we enjoyed seeing the non-performing children just as much.

Speaking of little girls, it's really difficult to differentiate between very young girls and adult women in Indonesia. Man, these people are just so tiny compared to Americans! Here's a photo of Doris standing next to the sales lady in a Crocs shoe store:

We enjoyed watching women balance things on their heads—sometimes baskets and, in one surprising case, a load of lumber:

Near the end of the day, we toured a Hindu temple overlooking beautiful scenery:

The temple grounds, again, were populated by monkeys, including this blissfully incontinent mama:

These particular monkeys, though, had evolved beyond the simple pleasure of startling tourists by leaping on their backs and had engineered a profitable scam involving the Balinese grounds keepers. As one enters the temple grounds, a sign warns against wearing eyeglasses, jewelry, hats, etc. I suspect most tourists think these rules are designed to avoid offending the religious sensibilities of the Balinese people. As our tour guide explained, however, the warnings are aimed at the practice of monkeys in stealing these items from visitors. We saw this happen to a Japanese man. Before the man knew what was going on, the thieving monkey was sitting in a nearby tree, bending and chewing on the man's eyeglasses.

A grounds keeper quickly appeared and tossed a bag of peanuts to the monkey. The monkey took the peanuts in exchange for the glasses, and the grounds keeper then offered the glasses (broken lens and all) to the Japanese man in exchange for a monetary "reward," which the man readily paid.

We ended our day of touring by watching a Balinese play and fire dance. This lengthy, culturally significant performance by a large number of local men, involved a lot of rhythmic chanting, singing and yelling in Balinese and is difficult to describe. The best summary I can come up with is men's glee club meets high school marching band on acid:

The final scene in the play involves a Balinese man stomping out brush fires with his feet (see earlier reference to acid).

We felt reasonably safe throughout our trip, despite driving past "ground zero" at one point, marking the spot where, in 2002, an al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group detonated a car bomb and killed more than 200 people—many of them tourists. As our tour guide reminded us, when we avoid places because of past terrorist activities, the terrorists win, so I felt that, in some small way, we thumbed our noses at those whose aim is to instill fear.

Stalking Big Game in South Africa

Having spent all of last week in Pretoria, South Africa on business, I drove about two hours to Pilanesberg National Park on the weekend in hopes of seeing some big game animals. I had been to an "animal safari" in England with the family many years ago, but I always suspected it wasn't the same thing as seeing animals in their natural habitat. I can't remember precisely what creatures we saw in England, aside from monkeys that were fascinated by our windshield wipers. Whatever animals were involved, you have to wonder whether they were disappointed, having arrived in England, to discover they'd be living out their years in a cold, damp climate. All things considered, I think the typical animal safari has a lot more in common with a zoo than with the wild.

The Pilanesberg experience, on the other hand, lived up to my expectations. Over the course of four to five hours, I drove a vehicle throughout much of the park, which is quite large (more than 570 sq. km. in area). I've known others who spent two complete days touring the park, and they undoubtedly increased their chances of seeing what's known in Africa as the "Big Five" -- the five wild animals that hunters traditionally have coveted the most -- the lion, leopard, elephant, buffalo and rhino. I saw only two of the animals on the list, the rhino and the buffalo, but then hey, I saw giraffes, too, and why aren't they on the list? (On second thought, I guess mounting a giraffe's head on a game room wall wouldn't leave much space in the room for anyone else, so maybe the giraffe's omission isn't unfair after all.) I didn't hold out much hope for seeing a lion, and even less for seeing leopards, since they're nocturnal. As for elephants, I've seen many of these in Thailand, so I didn't mind missing them. Enough with the words. Here are my favorite photos:

My trip to Pilanesberg will always be etched in my mind for another reason: it's the first time in a long time that I went tent camping. I had tried to book a chalet in the park, but all of them had been reserved already, so I paid an extravagant price for two nights in a "safari tent."

It was advertised as being "electrified," which turned out to mean the tent had just one lightbulb hanging from the ceiling and no heat or electrical outlets. It also had blankets but no sleeping bag. It's winter in South Africa right now (southern hemisphere, of course), and while it's not cold in the same way as a Michigan winter is cold, temperatures fell from mid-80s during the day to the low-40s at night. So, here are the key lessons I learned from this camping experience:

1. No matter how frigid it feels in a tent in the morning, that's nothing compared to the bracing cold you encounter when you unzip the flaps and step outside.

2. In the dark of the African bush, you can easily spend 45 minutes weaving your way uncertainly back to your tent that you're shocked to discover in the morning is no more than 100 yards from the common toilets.

3. Despite having gone unobserved by me for more than 20 years, the Milky Way galaxy is still there.

4. When the only light bulb in your tent burns out when you're trying to pack your bag in the pre-dawn dark, the backlit feature on a Blackberry is invaluable.

Austin House Update

Progress continues on the house we're building in Austin. We're still trying to nail down a closing date, but it now looks like it's going to be around the end of June. Some pics of how things are going:

Didn't We Just Have a Two-Year-Old Ourselves?!

In April, Doris and I visited both of our sons and their families, in Mountain View, CA and Redmond, WA. The timing for our visit was driven by the second birthday of Peter, son of Kurt and Karen and our only grandchild at this point (though another one, courtesy of Jeff and Katy, is on the way). Yes, we took pictures of people and things other than Peter during our visit, but mostly we just couldn't stop fawning over Peter. So, here are a few pictures of the most photogenic member of our family, at least for the moment.

At his outdoor birthday party, I introduced Peter to the concept of trying to catch bubbles out of the air with your mouth.

Peter enjoyed the birthday balloons with his daddy, until the brisk wind whisked them away in one brief, unguarded moment.

Peter seemed duly awed by his presents.


Peter is fascinated by stickers at the moment, so he really enjoyed pasting some new ones onto his Omi (Doris).

Peter loved playing in the sand of a nearby park with his new beach tools.

Finally, we just love observing his passion and enthusiasm, captured here by Doris on one of the park structures.

One "Mann" in Bangkok

Okay, so the title to this entry is a blatant ripoff of the name of the blog maintained by my friend Matt (see the link at the right, near the top, to "My Friend Matt's Cool Blog."). I just couldn't resist, because Doris and I had an interesting and very enjoyable dinner in Bangkok last night with a new friend named Byron Mann, along with his Thai girlfriend Jeab. We met Byron and Jeab a week ago at a meeting of Newsong, the church we attend here, and we discovered that Byron is an accomplished actor who has co-starred in many TV shows and Hollywood movies. His co-stars have included Richard Gere, Steven Seagal and Tom Berenger. For those who don't recognize Byron's name but may remember his face, further details can be found at:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0542677/

Here's a photo of Byron and Jeab at the restaurant last night:

Baby Eames Visits Ford

As you may recall from an earlier blog entry, one of our Thai lawyers, Khun Sutathip, went on maternity leave at the end of last year. She visited my office with her baby, Eames, this week. Eames naturally was a big hit:

The photo above shows Eames with Sutathip, as well as Khun May, the more junior of our Thai lawyers. Eames also took a good look at me:

And, of course, there's nothing like a baby at work to attract admiring women...

Now It's Looking Like a House

Here are some photos showing the significant progress on our house in Austin. We just learned today that the insulation has been installed, and when Doris is in Texas in just a little over two weeks, the dry wall may be up by then.

Pale Mexicans at the "South of the Border" Ball

A few weeks ago, Doris and I attended a charity ball in Bangkok that was sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce in Thailand. The theme of the ball was "South of the Border," and attendees were encouraged to dress appropriately. Doris put a lot of effort into finding the right clothing and accessories for us to wear. This wasn't easy, because as you might imagine, Thai stores don't exactly have a Mexican clothing section, and the AmCham organizers evidently intended "South of the Border" to refer to Mexico, or at least Latin America. In the end, Doris did a great job of finding me a Mexican-looking hat, shirt and jeans, and I even bought my first pair of cowboy boots. Doris selected an outfit for herself that certainly had her looking like a genuine senora. Of course, we still were the palest people who ever attempted to pass themselves off as Mexicans. Here's a picture of us at the start of the ball:

About a week before the ball, we learned that many of the attendees were planning to come in black tie, instead of in costume, and of the ten people at the table that Ford had bought, Doris and I were the only ones looking even remotely Mexican -- GRRR!!!

Up She Goes!

Great progress has been made on the construction of our house in Austin over the last three weeks, as illustrated by the photos below that our builder e-mailed to us:


At this rate, you'd think the house would be ready in only another month or so, but the builder is continuing to estimate a completion date in July or August.

On the Verge of a Slab

After Doris and I finished the holiday celebrations with our sons and their families in California, we headed to Austin, Texas for a quick check on the status of our house construction. When we arrived in Austin, we discovered it was in the middle of a cold snap, with high temperatures in the upper 50s causing the locals to assure us that this was truly unusual. I admit to being a little skeptical, until it warmed back up to the mid-70s a couple of days later.

Most of the progress on our house to date has been of the invisible kind, with construction moving slowly through the final design and permit approval stages. When we left Austin on Sunday, Jan. 6, though, the slab for the house was on the verge of being poured.

Here are a couple of shots of the construction site, showing the foundation forms. In the first photo, taken from our street, that's Doris peering at the camera from the left, rear corner of the soon-to-be slab. And while you're at it, find Waldo...

This second shot is taken from the area that will be the back of the house:

Here's Doris inside the neighbor's house to the left of our lot, trying to visualize how our privacy wall will block the view to the pool we're planning to build in the back of the house:

And here's Doris walking at the rear of the house, in the area where the pool will be built:

The sales rep for the company building the house (Toll Brothers) estimates that the house itself could be finished as early as June, but more likely in August. Fortunately, our good friends Jerry and Carole Ducharme live nearby and have volunteered to keep a close eye on progress for us.

A "Cold" Christmas

Christmas 2007 was a "cold" Christmas for a couple of reasons.

First, Doris and I celebrated the holiday in Sunnyvale, California, where our son Kurt and his family live. Measured against typical temperatures in Michigan, where we have spent most of our Christmases, Sunnyvale's daytime highs in the low 50s F (roughly 10 degrees C) should have seemed downright balmy. Instead, I found myself clenching my teeth against the frigid air, having become"soft" from the tropical heat of Bangkok.

Second, everyone but me (Doris, Kurt, Karen, Peter, Jeff and Katy) promptly came down with colds. For whatever reason, I was exempted from the epidemic of runny noses, sneezes and body aches — until the day Doris and I departed California for a brief visit to Texas (more about this in an upcoming blog entry).

Despite these bouts of sickness, we spent a very enjoyable time together. When it was over, I found myself reflecting on the absence of stress that often accompanies family holiday celebrations. I'd been particularly concerned that my recent decision, purely for health reasons, to take a more serious approach to vegetarianism and adopt a vegan diet (no milk, no cheese) would put a damper on our meals together. Instead, Doris and our kids kindly prepared meal after meal that was appropriate and delicious, in most cases using entirely new recipes. I came away from the holidays feeling a deep sense of gratitude for the gracious, accommodating attitudes of family members.

I'm inserting below some of my favourite photos from our celebration together:

And what would Christmas be without the occasional death-defying trick? Some of you may recall that, early on the morning of Christmas day 1991, I built a fire in our new house in Ann Arbor, Michigan, only to forget to get the air flowing up the chimney flue first. This resulted in heavy smoke pouring out of the fireplace into the house, despite my futile efforts to stop it, and an impressive, 12-inch-thick white cloud clinging to the ceiling of our family room for quite some time afterwards. Evidently destined to repeat this experience this year, I embarked on the task of building a fire in the fireplace of the two-story, lofted hotel room we had rented in Sunnyvale. Having purchased a couple of artificial logs from the hotel front desk, I opened the chimney flue and lit the fire, not really expecting a problem in getting the chimney to draw the smoke adequately. To my shock, I once again experienced the panic of smoke billowing uncontrollably into the room and threatening to gas us all. The hotel's smoke alarms went off, and amid the panic and shouting and running around, I finally managed to adjust the flue properly with the fireplace tongs. Here's a picture of Doris and Katy frantically waving pillows in front of the upstairs smoke alarm to clear the smoke and get the alarm to stop its piercing sound:

Finally, we all went to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which is the most amazing and awe-inspiring aquarium I've ever seen, and I've been to some that are world-class. The following are just a few photos of the place, which frankly don't do it justice. If you ever get a chance to visit, don't miss it.

A Delightful Lunch with Thai Staff

Yesterday was the last day in the office for awhile for Khun Sutathip, the senior of the two Thai lawyers who work for me. She is due to have her first baby within the next week or so, and she will be taking a three-month maternity leave. Her departure coincides with the upcoming holiday break, so I took her and our junior lawyer (Khun May) and our administrative assistant (Khun Lee) out to lunch at a nearby Japanese restaurant.

Before we headed for lunch, I presented K. Sutathip with a "playpen" for her baby. Here are a couple of pictures of her opening the gift in my office.

We had a nice time at lunch, much of which was devoted to talk of Sutathip's baby. I asked whether Sutathip and her husband had picked out a name yet for their anticipated daughter. Sutathip explained that it's not common to select the proper Thai name for a child until some time after the birth, but they already had selected the baby's nickname. A little background is required here.

All Thais have a nickname that typically is much shorter and easier to pronounce than their formal name. Sutathip's nickname is Koi, while her full name is Sutathip Kallayawinai. Since her first name isn't too difficult to say, I've never used her nickname, but in most cases, a Thai's nickname is much easier for everyone to remember and pronounce. For example, we have a close friend whose proper name is Chawanlak Kriengparinyakij, but her nickname (thankfully) is Lydia.

So, back to Sutathip's baby. Sutathip informed us that the nickname she and her husband had selected for their daughter is Eames. I asked how they had come to choose this name, thinking it perhaps is the surname of one of their relatives. Not so. It turns out this is the name of the furniture company that makes her husband's favorite chair. I was a bit taken aback at this explanation and couldn't help but wonder whether they might have named their baby "Lazy Boy" had they been expecting a son, but hey, it's their culture, so who are we to judge?!

Another topic we discussed at length over lunch are cultural differences between Thais and Westerners about what are acceptable topics for conversation. Quite a few of our Western friends have reported being flabbergasted and dismayed to have Thais casually observe, to their face, that they are overweight, as when a friend of mine returned to the office from vacation and a member of Thai staff smiled broadly and said, "Khun Bob, you look fat!" My friend wasn't at all pleased to hear this, and as you can imagine, Western women are usually even more emotionally distraught to hear such comments made about them. Sutathip, May and Lee all assured me that such statements are made without any malice. Sometimes, they actually are intended to be positive observations that the "fat" person clearly is prosperous and must be enjoying a good life. Mostly, though, they are just honest assessments that Thais don't hesitate to make aloud. They will even make frank comments about their own weight, such as refusing an offer of food by saying, "Sorry, cannot--I'm too fat!" I've had Thais express genuine curiosity about why Westerners don't feel free to say what they believe, and Khun May even defended her friends' practice of commenting on her own weight by saying that, if her friends didn't point out when she was getting fat, she might overlook this herself.

Here's a couple more pictures from our very enjoyable lunch, which left all of us, I think, with a better understanding of our respective cultures:

That's K. May on the left and K. Sutathip on the right, with neither of them sporting an ounce of fat--except for Sutathip's temporary pregnancy weight, of course. And below is a photo of Khun Lee, who is a terrific assistant and just a delight to work with.

A Taste of China

Can one get an accurate impression of a country after visiting it for only a short period? Probably not, but Doris and I feel as though we know quite a bit more about China and its people, having just completed an eight-day tour of Shanghai, Beijing and Xi'an.

We started our visit in Shanghai, where I had two days of business meetings. Normally, I get to see very little of the cities to which I travel on business, and my sightseeing is typically limited to what I can observe from car windows while travelling between hotels and office buildings. So, Doris and I got to Shanghai on the Saturday before my business meetings began, with the objective of seeing the highlights of the City on Sunday.

Shanghai is known as China's business center, and it's experiencing phenomenal growth. Building construction seems to be going on everywhere. One startling statistic I heard from a Chinese friend of mine is that more skyscrapers are being built in Shanghai in one year than all the skyscrapers presently in existence on the island of Manhattan. Here are some photos that illustrate just how dense the forest of tall buildings is:

The skyscrapers aren't just numerous -- they're stylish, too…

Doris and I had a relaxing dinner on the "Bund," a beautifully lit area of restaurants and shops along the river. Here's a photo taken from our restaurant:

Our walk in this area after dinner was frequently interrupted by beggars, who exist in much greater numbers and are far more aggressive than panhandlers in Bangkok. After getting over the culture shock of this, we grew used to brushing them aside, although one man who had been pestering me to let him give me a shoe shine got my undivided attention when he squished a dollop of polishing cream on my shoe as I was trying to get away! I wasn't too pleased and ordered him to wipe it off. I stopped him from doing more than just a quick clean, since I was sure he otherwise would claim he had rendered a service for which I owed money.

Shanghai is very international and cosmopolitan, and one of our favourite areas is the "French concession" area of the city, which consists of many European-style boutiques and restaurants. Some of the streets look as though they would fit well in Paris…

Although quite a few foreigners now live in Shanghai, Doris and I were surprised at how often people stopped us on the street to say hello and ask us where we were from, took photos of us, or sometimes asked if they could have their picture taken with us.

We had lunch in Yu Garden, a beautiful park with a tea house…

at which we sampled different teas...

and ate quail eggs and tofu...

and considered eating a few other things we never did succeed in identifying.

Speaking of eating, Doris joined me for a couple of business dinners, including one with almost the entire Ford China legal team, pictured (with me) below.

After three days in Shanghai, Doris and I flew to Beijing, the political center of China, visiting the Forbidden City…

We encountered many tour groups from across China. Our guide told us that tour organizers issue red caps to participants, because many participants are visiting Beijing for the first time from the countryside and easily become lost. Of course, I'm not sure how it's supposed to be easier to find people from your own group, when literally thousands of tourists are all wearing red caps.

Somewhere along the way, I got a tummy bug (virus? food poisoning? who knows?), so by the time we got to the acrobatics show we had booked for the evening, I wasn't feeling well at all. In retrospect, it probably wasn't a good idea to watch people somersaulting through the air when my stomach was trying to do the same thing. After about only 20 minutes of the show, I had to climb quickly past all the people in our row of seats and make a beeline for the bathroom. I will provide no further details of what happened next, other than to say I got to see the squat toilet (essentially a porcelain-lined hole in the floor) from an unplanned perspective. Fortunately, Doris got to stay in her seat and see the whole show…

The highlight of the Beijing area, though, was the Great Wall. It's truly mammoth and awe-inspiring and requires much more climbing than we had imagined. We could numb you with statistics, but the most impressive are that the Wall was built over a span of about 2,000 years and is roughly 4,000 miles long. Beyond that, we'll let the following pictures do the talking:

We also visited the Summer Palace…

and Tiananmen Square, the political heart of Beijing, which is bordered by the building housing the Chinese Communist Party Congress, the Mao Zedong mausoleum, etc.

Interestingly, our Chinese guard gave us a blank look when I asked her about the infamous student democracy push that occurred on the Square in 1989. She told us quietly that she had heard about this only from foreigners, because the Chinese government treats this as a forbidden topic, and no information on the subject appears in Chinese media. This put into perspective the comments of another guide in the Forbidden City, who tried to persuade us that complete freedom of speech is allowed in China. Without getting too political, I'll also note here that everyone I asked for an opinion about Chairman Mao told me the same thing: Mao is still revered as a great revolutionary and founder of modern China, but the Cultural Revolution was a disaster.

The last stop on our tour was Xi'an, China's oldest city and home of the terra cotta warriors—roughly 7,000 life-sized soldiers cast out of clay and buried by an emperor over 2,000 years ago to guard him in the afterlife. The pictures below are rather dark, because the displays are all indoors, and the light coming in through the museum windows was very limited, since we visited on a day when rain was coming down in sheets.

Here's a picture of Doris standing with the warriors, illustrating that the figures actually are life-sized. From the photos above, you might think they're miniatures. And no, Doris didn't scale the walls and stand among the actual warriors. These imitation versions are on display in the museum's souvenir shop.

Interesting sidelight: our tour guide told us that the Chinese government compensated the three farmers who discovered these buried treasures in 1974 with the equivalent of only one yuan each in today's currency (equal to roughly 13 cents)--which was double their daily wage! One of the three farmers is still living. We met him at the museum in which the warriors are displayed, and he autographed a guide book that we bought. According to our guide, he has become quite wealthy through this activity.

"Ringo is parking the car."

John Lennon offered this explanation last night for the delayed start of his band's performance. He wasn't actually John Lennon, of course, but rather the John impersonator in a Beatles tribute band called "The Beaters." The band, comprised of Thai performers dressed in Beatles garb and wigs, plays Beatles music every Wednesday night at a restaurant/bar in Bangkok. And doesn't it somehow seem appropriate that Ringo would be the band member given the job of parking the car?!

My friend Matt was there with a camera crew to film the band's performance and an interview with John, for a segment on a local cable TV show called "Destination: Thailand." Matt is trying his hand at narrating visits to interesting sights in Thailand, as well as suggesting the destinations to the show's producers and writing his own script for the show.

What follows are a few pictures from last night's taping.

Building Yet Again

When we moved to Thailand in 2005, we sold our house in Ann Arbor, MI and became apartment dwellers in Bangkok, owning no real estate of any kind anywhere. Since then, we've entertained many different ideas of where we'd like eventually to own a house in the States. For quite awhile, we were seriously thinking about buying property in Las Vegas. We even made a low-ball offer on an existing house, which (thank goodness, in retrospect) was rejected by the seller. We later had a change of heart about Las Vegas after thinking more about just how hot it is there during the summer and just how dry it is. Mind you, we're not fans of high humidity, but Doris became concerned about the health effects of living year round in a climate more conducive to mummification than everyday life.

Las Vegas did offer some important pluses, in addition to weather nicer than Michigan's (at least in our opinion). It's relatively close to Sunnyvale, CA and Seattle, WA, where our children and their families live, and the cheap air fares to and from Vegas would make it easy for us to get almost anywhere easily and inexpensively to visit. It wasn't easy to find a sensible alternative, but we eventually decided to explore Austin, TX, where some of our friends live and which we already had visited several times.

Austin intrigued us because of its nice, warm, but not-blasting-hot weather (with supposedly 300 days of sunshine per year and moderate humidity), and its reputation as a university town offering lots of cultural activities for residents to enjoy, including plenty of live music. It's also reasonably well-located as a home base for Doris to use while making extended visits to the States to see our children and their families, for as long as I continue to work overseas.

So, near the end of August, Doris spent two hectic weeks in Austin, searching for a house to buy. I couldn't help much, due to work commitments, so Doris took the lead in house hunting. We consulted frequently by phone, and within a relatively short period of time, we had decided to build a house just west of Austin. It's likely to take 9-12 months for construction to be completed, and when the house is finished, we plan immediately to undertake the building of an in-ground pool in the backyard.

The pictures that follow will provide some idea of the development in which we're building and the surrounding area:

The entrance to the development (named The Ridge at Alta Vista)

The development's Community Center, which houses an exercise facility and includes a swimming pool and tennis courts

Doris standing at the rear of the lot on which our house will be built

The view from the back of our lot, which borders a bird sanctuary

As you can see from the picture below, the development is set in wooded, rolling hills

Since we obviously can't show you a picture of our yet-unbuilt house, I'm including a few snapshots showing representative houses elsewhere in the development. Ours will have a painted, stucco exterior.

A Week in Paradise

We've just finished a very enjoyable week with friends and relatives as part of our home leave for 2007. George and Ann Tucker, parents of our daughter-in-law Katy, generously invited us to join them and their family at a Marriott timeshare at Ko Olina on Oahu. Some of my favorite pics of the week:

Jeff and Katy aboard a catamaran, en route to a snorkeling site.

Doris in front of Waimea Falls, which she later swam under.

We fed hammerhead sharks in a pool from behind a protective barrier. . .

. . . and handled a variety of unusual sea creatures.

Several of us toured the USS Missouri, the last (and biggest ever) battleship and the site of the Japanese surrender to end WWII.

. . . and we all watched from the comfort of a beach as Katy's niece Beth and her friend Sarah took surfing lessons.

English As She Is Not Meant to Be Spoken

Overcoming the language barrier is a daily challenge here. To cite just one example, I give you a conversation I had this morning with our driver, Khun Akkachai, as he drove me to work after being off yesterday for a public holiday in Thailand:

Me: "So, Khun Akkachai, did you enjoy your day off with your family?"

Akkachai: "Yes, mister. My daughter, she about take activity in the water."

(long pause by me... staring blankly out the window, baffled)


Me: "Ah! She went swimming?"

Akkachai: "Yes, mister. Thank you."

A "Stair-Master" Vacation in Koh Samui

Doris and I enjoyed a week-long getaway this April to Koh Samui, an island in the south of Thailand located about an hour by plane from Bangkok. We were taking advantage of several days off because of the Thai New Year, also known as Songkran. Our trip will always be memorable for me, for several unexpected reasons.

We started off staying in a hotel that Doris had found and booked online. The room was quite nice and was near the beach, even though we didn't have much of a view. We probably would have stayed there all week, except for the computer bugs we experienced on the first day. No, I'm not talking about computer viruses. I'm referring to the many microscopic bugs that were crawling over the keyboard of my laptop every time we tried to check our e-mail. When I also found some of them crawling on my arms while lying in bed and watching TV, we started thinking about finding a new hotel.

The following morning, we negotiated a release from our week-long booking and headed off to a new accommodation. Doris found a nice place overlooking the Bay of Thailand, called Cliff View Resort. The hotel lives up to its name by clinging to the side of a steep cliff, so not surprisingly, the rooms are accessible only by many, many wooden stairs. With the help of staff, we lugged our bags all the way to the bottom for a beachfront room. After we spent an hour or so unpacking and getting settled in, I discovered that the advertised wireless internet access wasn't functioning. The hotel's so-called "IT help" wasn't able to solve the problem, and they suggested the signal might be stronger higher up. So, we packed up again and moved to a new room, scaling our way halfway up the cliff we had just come down. Sadly, we discovered after making the move that the signal there wasn't any better, but we decided to stay anyway.

A little while later, I went into the bathroom, which wasn't air conditioned. The reason appeared to be that it wasn't very well sealed off from the outside, and the disadvantages of this soon became clear. Immediately after I finished using and flushing the toilet, a HUGE spider appeared in the swirling water. He apparently had been lurking under the edge of the toilet bowl, and he was now frantically trying to climb his way out of the whirlpool. How huge was he? Look at the palm of your hand (and I'm talking to adults now). Imagine a spider whose legs reach to the outer edges of your palm, whose body is thick and meaty, and who is black as night. I let out a yell and kept flushing that toilet until my racing heartbeat returned to normal. A little while later, I joined Doris at the pool and told her of my epic battle against the biggest and baddest living spider I'd ever seen. We decided this kind of thing was inevitable in the tropics and brushed the incident off (though I made a silent vow to flush the toilet each time BEFORE using it).

Climbing the stairs back to our room after leaving the pool, we encountered a female member of the hotel staff who had been trying to deliver something to our room. As we were approaching, she let out a few screams while waving her arms excitedly, and when we pressed her for an explanation, she told us she had just seen a snake slithering in the brush next to the staircase leading to our room. We weren't too thrilled about this.

To make a long story short, we changed rooms yet again, to one located nearer to the top of the cliff. Honestly, the change had nothing—well, almost nothing—to do with the spider and snake. The new room still had its share of bugs, but that's to be expected in the tropics (we kept telling ourselves), and the wireless internet access still was hopeless. The most important feature of the new room, though, was that it was relatively close to both the lobby at the top of the cliff and the pool, thus reducing the number of stairs we routinely had to climb.

I'm inserting below several pictures of the resort, none of which captures very well just how steep the cliff is and how many stairs the resort has, but maybe you'll get some idea. All things considered, I'd say the spectacular views were well worth the effort one usually reserves only for a Stair-Master exercise machine.

These are not ALL the stairs, but only one section of many...

The view from the bed in our room

View from the pool area -- about halfway up the cliff

View of the pool from our balcony

A Thank You to Staff Members

In March, Doris and I hosted a dinner at a nearby restaurant for the two Thai lawyers who work for me at Ford, Khun Sutathip and Khun May, as a thank you for all their invaluable service at the office. K. Sutathip was accompanied by her husband, Pite, and May brought her boyfriend, Ake. The four of them are pictured below (from left to right: Ake, May, Pite and Sutathip). If it weren't for Sutathip and May, I would be insanely overwhelmed with work, and I can't imagine more pleasant personalities than the two of them have.

DDR Party

In mid-March, we invited a few friends to our apartment to play a game called "Dance Dance Revolution." For those of you who, like us, missed out on this craze the first time around, the game involves moving your feet around on a grid of squares on a floor pad, as instructed on a video screen, in beat to background music of various speeds -- most of it pretty frantic. It's not easy to do and initially makes one feel like a dreadfully clumsy dancer. Doris has gotten very good at the game in a short period of time and enjoys using it as a means of exercise. We invited friends to try their hand (actually feet) at this, and watching them hop around maniacally on the game pads was as much fun as actually playing the game ourselves.


After getting everyone a bit worn out physically, we moved to a more sedate game -- Quelf.


The cards drawn in this board game ask participants to do some rather strange things. On their turn, our friends Fong and Kaew were told to construct a face mask in a short period of time, using items around the house. Fong's creation was tastefully fashioned from a plastic garbage bag...

Vietnam Revisited

I was on business in both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City last week and found a notable change since Doris and I visited Vietnam in October 2005. The prosperity of the country continues to grow rapidly, so there are a lot more cars on the road than before. As the pictures below illustrate, though, motor bikes still predominate.

Traffic lights aren't common, and it's quite difficult to cross the road, given the endless stream of bikes barreling past. Several people reminded me on this trip that the only safe way to get across a road is to close your eyes and walk straight ahead, without flinching. The "no flinching" rule is very important, because the slightest hesitation would risk disrupting the biker's carefully timed plan to avoid killing you.

Our senior in-house lawyer in Vietnam, Dinh Thi Thanh Huyen, who uses just the name "Huyen" in everyday life, is pictured below in her office.

As usual, Huyen took excellent care of me during my visit. One night, she and her husband Duc took me to dinner at a beautiful restaurant in which he owns a minority interest, in addition to holding down a job with the government. I'm inserting a picture of Huyen and Duc taken inside the restaurant. As you'll notice, Huyen is expecting another child very soon and specifically asked me to take this picture in "portrait," rather than "landscape," mode so that her baby would be included in the photo.

Since Huyen's baby is due at the end of March, she was unable to accompany me by plane to Ho Chi Minh City on the next leg of my trip. Vietnam Airlines wouldn't allow her to fly at this late stage in her pregnancy. Huyen arranged instead for Ford Vietnam's junior lawyer, Hang, to go with me. (There's a lesson to be learned, by the way, from giving a city a name as long as "Ho Chi Minh City." I'm told that many Vietnamese still refer to the city as Saigon, its former name, because the official name just takes too long to say.)

Hang's husband Tuan works for the government's Ministry of Culture, and he coincidentally was on a business trip in Saigon at the same time as Hang and I were. After our work was done last Friday, we met up with Tuan and spent a pleasant afternoon visiting some key tourist sites in Saigon.

One of the highlights for me was our tour of the War Remnants Museum, which catalogues the war that Americans refer to as the "Vietnam War" but that Vietnamese understandably call the "American War." I'm inserting a few snapshots of the exhibits. The downed helicopter in particular evoked strong emotions in me, since I know several people who either lost their lives flying choppers in Vietnam or told me of their horrific experiences in them.

Here's a picture of Hang in front of some of the many war photos on display.

The museum adopts a perspective on the war that differs from what most Americans probably would have, but I don't believe we have any right to tell an invaded country what they should think. Fortunately, about two thirds of the existing Vietnamese population was born after the war ended, so they bear no ill will towards Americans.

We also toured a Vietnamese history museum that included a statute of Ho Chi Minh, whom the Vietnamese truly revere. Here's a photo of Hang and Tuan posing in front of Uncle Ho.

"I Got to Pet a Tiger on His Tummy!"

These enthusiastic words came from the grinning mouth of our daughter-in-law Katy at the end of our recent visit to the "Tiger Temple" in Kanchanaburi, Thailand. And here's a photo that captured her experience:


It was so neat to see Jeff and Katy, who love their own domestic cats back home in Seattle, enjoy playing with the really big cats at the tiger preserve we toured at the end of the recent visit to Thailand by Jeff, Katy, Kurt, Karen and Peter. Here are a few more pics taken at the unique Tiger Temple:


We were thrilled to have our children and their wives and, of course, our grandchild Peter, come visit us in Thailand. We spent a few days together touring some key sites in Bangkok, from the Grand Palace...


...to the floating market...


...to rooftop views...


...and a Thai cooking class that Doris arranged.


With four digital cameras among us, there wasn't much that went undocumented, and inevitably we sometimes took pictures of each other taking pictures:

Menus in Thailand require careful study:


...and then, as our kids discovered, you're often still not quite sure what you're going to get:


At one restaurant, for example, Karen discovered that her dish was looking back at her. She was grateful to have spotted and discarded this fish eye, rather than inadvertently eating it:


Occasionally, this led to a hankering for more familiar, Western-style fare:


When we weren't feeding ourselves, we were feeding the elephants:

After touring Bangkok, we flew to a seaside resort in Phuket, which featured perfect weather, facilities and scenery, for scuba diving, snorkeling and just plain relaxing for several days:


Peter turned out to be a big hit with Thai ladies wherever we went (I mean, what's not to like about this exceedingly pleasant little guy?!)...


Jeff and Katy were able to stay a couple of days longer than Kurt and Karen, so we did some elephant riding with them, as well as bathing the elephants in the River Kwai. As you'll see, the elephants got a bath, but Katy got a shower:

We'll never forget this wonderful time we had together as a family. Greetings to all of you, from all of us!

A Blast in California—and the Real Thing in Bangkok

While Doris and I were having a blast visiting family members in California over the holidays, Thailand was experiencing the real thing. Eight bombs exploded in several locations throughout Bangkok on New Year’s Eve, some of them not too far from our apartment. Three people died, and 42 were injured. Thai authorities cancelled all public celebrations for New Year’s Eve after the first devices went off. As I’m writing this, no one has yet claimed responsibility for the explosions. The most likely candidates are politicians who lost power in the coup that toppled the government last September, as well as Muslim insurgents from the three southernmost provinces in Thailand. The latter group has denied any involvement, and police investigations are continuing.

I frankly don’t feel too concerned about our safety here in Bangkok. I naturally hope the bombings don’t continue, and so far they haven’t. To put them in perspective, though, it’s worth considering that, according to the Bangkok Post, the number of people killed on highways throughout Thailand over four days of New Year’s celebrations totaled 275 (11 died in Bangkok alone), with an additional 3,067 people being hospitalized for injuries.

In any event, we're still glad we missed the excitement here in Bangkok. We instead were thoroughly enjoying visits with family members and friends in the States. We celebrated Christmas with Jeff/Katy, and Kurt/Karen/Peter, in Sunnyvale, California. I’m including a few pictures below from our time there. Our excruciatingly cute eight-month-old grandson Peter naturally was the focus of much of our attention.

We then traveled with Jeff and Katy to Lake Arrowhead, CA, where Katy’s parents (George and Ann) own a spacious and beautiful house in the mountains above Los Angeles. Among other things, we had some great meals together...

... watched the Rose Parade floats being constructed and attended the Rose Parade (in gorgeous but nippy weather) ...

... and endured watching on TV as UM lost another Rose Bowl game. We all were decked out in UM regalia, courtesy of George and Ann, but this obviously wasn't enough to prevent a humiliating performance against USC.

Cooking with Karaoke!

Last Sunday we had a small karaoke party at our apartment, for which one of our good friends Oiy made all the food. She spent most of the day in our kitchen, along with members of her family and friends, creating a bunch of delicious Thai dishes for us to try.

There isn’t much counter space in our kitchen, and certainly not enough for all the hours of food preparation that went on. So, the floor was put to good use.

Here's a close-up of several varieties of mushrooms used in preparing the food.

Doris and I are vegetarian, but not all guests at the party were, so Oiy prepared a curry for them, using these skewered fish as a key ingredient.

Even some of our younger guests helped with the cooking, which took hours and hours to complete.

Here are the finished products, along with a photo of all the contributors.

All the hard work evidently exhausted one of the cooks, who took a well-deserved snooze on our couch after dinner.

After everyone had their fill of the food, we launched into karaoke and an evening of fun.

A Trip to Chiang Mai

We recently spent a week vacationing in Chiang Mai, Thailand’s second-largest city, which is located in the northern part of the country. Some very good Thai friends of ours, Fong and Kaew (pictured below), accompanied us on the first part of the trip and did an outstanding job of navigating us around the city.

The key attraction in Chiang Mai at the moment is a huge floral exposition in honor of the king. We spent most of one day touring the expo with Fong and Kaew.

The umbrellas that you see are to ward off the baking hot sun, not rain.

This group of Thais in colorful costumes were part of a cultural show.

We did so much walking during our visit to Chiang Mai that, when we visited some nearby hot springs...

a soak in warm water followed by a foot massage was much needed and appreciated.

We also enjoyed shopping at the night bazaar...

visiting a crafts center where artisans produce hand-painted umbrellas...

and having a delicious Sukiyaki meal (our first), which you cook at your own table in boiling water, somewhat in the style of fondue. Fong and Kaew guided us through this new experience.

Later in the week, after Fong and Kaew had returned to Bangkok, Doris and I took a trip up Doi Suthip, a mountain overlooking Chiang Mai. There’s a temple at the summit...

where we took pictures of, among other things, monks taking pictures with their digital cameras. I don’t know why this strikes me as odd—it just does.

I’m told that the rows of bells outside the temple are rung by visiting Thai Buddhists in the belief that the pealing sound will grow and spread the individual’s fame and success.

We did our part to contribute to the health of the Chiang Mai economy by buying a carload of souvenirs, including a miniature, carved teak elephant (about two feet tall), a painting, a textile wall hanging, painted umbrellas, a marble vase and marble bird bath, a floor lamp, etc.

For our trip home, we just barely were able to squeeze all of our purchases into our Mazda van, pictured below with our latest (and hopefully now permanent) driver, Khun Akachai.

"Madame Lonely?"

I mentioned in an earlier blog entry the many challenges we face here every day in trying to communicate with Thai people, whether it’s in English or in Thai. We’ve had many funny experiences. Some seem funny only much later, after our frustration subsides and we regain our perspective and sense of humor. This past weekend, some Filipino friends of ours told us a thoroughly enjoyable story about their own difficulty in trying to transcend the language barrier.

The husband of the couple was out of the country on business, which the couple’s usual driver knew about, because the driver had taken the husband to the airport. One morning while the husband was gone, the wife of the couple got into the car and settled into the back seat. She got the usual “Good morning, Madame.” Drivers here have a variety of names for their male customers, such as “Mister,” “Boss,” or even “Master.” A woman customer, on the other hand, invariably seems to get called “Madame,” with a posh accent on the second syllable of the word.

So, after being greeted with “Good morning, Madame,” the wife noticed the driver intently looking at her in the rear-view mirror. The driver then said, “Madame lonely?” She found this a bit too personal a question and a serious intrusion on her privacy, so she decided to ignore him. He continued looking at her, though, and then expanded his question: “Madame lonely? 750 baht.” (The baht is the unit of currency in Thailand, and 750 baht equates to a little more than $20.) At this point, the wife became quite incensed at just what kind of proposition the driver was making. As she sat there fuming, unsure what to say or do next, the driver turned around in his seat, repeated his question and then produced for her examination a bill for 750 baht from a nearby laundry. It was only then that the wife realized he was trying to say “laundry” instead of “lonely," and was simply asking whether she wanted to go pick up and pay for her dry cleaning!

Party, Party!!

A week ago Sunday, we had about 50 people over to our apartment for a very memorable music party. We have so many good friends who are phenomenal musicians that we decided we just had to get everyone together, with their instruments, for an afternoon and evening of musical performances and plain old jamming. For an additional element of interest, we encouraged everyone to come dressed as a pop star or rock star. (Actually, a few of our friends actually were pop/rock stars just a few years ago, so it wasn’t that much of a stretch for them.) As you can see from the photo below, many came wearing a costume, and some were barely recognizable to us.

Yes, that’s me in the front row dressed as Jimi Hendrix. It seemed like a natural choice, given my mane of thick, curly black hair. And that’s Doris the flower child next to me.

Poom and I performed a couple of songs together, though the tunes definitely were much tamer than the ones Jimi used to play.

One of our friends, Ton, brought his complete drum set along and accompanied many of the musicians. The drums also enticed a lot of others to try out their own drumming skills.

Doris and our very talented friend Fern played some classical music for us.

Some of our friends helped Doris with food preparation, and we arranged for the rest to be catered in.

And virtually everyone took a shot at performing karaoke, using a new system I recently purchased in the Philippines (with much appreciated help from friends). I’m inserting below several pictures of people enthusiastically belting out tunes while the words appeared on our TV screen.

We provided supervision in a separate room for the children, and here are some of the kids, a few of whom took great delight in trying to look like pop stars, too.

I have to say that the talent displayed by our guests was truly astounding. I’ve sat through quite a few talent shows and “open mic” nights when the audience collectively stares at its shoes during performances by determined but musically challenged amateurs. In contrast, we happily would have paid good money to hear the songs that our friends performed. Here are a few more photos of our friends playing and singing and enjoying music.

Finally, I'm inserting photos of some of the very best rock-star looks, though many others deserve to be featured here, too.

Phuket Scouting Mission

Two weeks ago, Doris and I went to Phuket, Thailand for a few days. Phuket (careful—it’s pronounced “Poo Ket”) is only about an hour plane ride south of Bangkok and has some of the most beautiful beaches we’ve ever seen. Our main purpose for going, though, wasn’t to loll around on the beaches, but rather to scout the surrounding area out for a trip we plan to make there again next February. That’s when Kurt/Karen/Peter and Jeff/Katy are coming to Thailand for a visit. We will spend a few days in Bangkok and then head to Phuket to enjoy the scenery together.

One of the highlights of our trip was the sunsets and rolling waves that we enjoyed watching. I got a little carried away with snapping pictures of these, and I’m inserting only a few of the many I took.

That's Doris in the picture on the right, standing next to a lifeguard hut.

We went snorkeling on a day-long trip to Phi Phi Island (yes, it’s pronounced “Pee Pee”), during which we also visited some of the nicest beaches we had ever seen.

In the picture below, Doris is feeding the fish off the side of the boat.

The shots above and below are of the resort we stayed in.

Rodents Remain Tempting Treat

This was the startling title of an article in today’s Bangkok Post, one of the leading English-language newspapers here in Bangkok. The title naturally caught my eye, and I expected it would be a humorous piece—at least intentionally. Not so. I’m inserting into my blog some excerpts:

“Despite outbreaks of leptospirosis in the wake of major flooding in many areas of the country, the trade in roasted farm rats in Chachoengsao seems to be unaffected. The 30 or 40 makeshift shops selling roasted farm rats along the Chachoengsao-Onnuj Road in the eastern area of the town remain very busy, with vendors struggling to meet demand.

Boonta Sumthong, a vendor aged 30 in Bang Bo district of Samut Prakan, said the leptospirosis outbreak, covered by the media for the past several days, had not affected local farm-rat consumption. Many customers continued to visit her shop to buy the meat for consumption. More surprisingly, she said, the daily supply of farm rats was now insufficient as hunters were finding it difficult to find the large rodents due to the flooding. Currently, her shop is only open for half of the day due to limited stock. The roasted rats sell for 120 to 140 baht each [equivalent to about $3.50] depending on size and weight.

Sanoh Boon-oui, 55, a resident of Bang Lamung district of Chon Buri province, said roasted farm rat was one of her favourite foods. She preferred to purchase the rodents from shops in the Bang Bo district because they were reputed to be the most delicious. She said she had eaten roasted farm rat since her childhood and was not afraid of contracting leptospirosis. Properly roasted meat should be free of any disease, she said, adding she always fried them first before eating them, just to be sure.”

Are we sick yet?

Our First Coup!

I never thought I'd have a reason to make that statement, but there you have it. It's not as exciting as the first kiss or the first grandchild, but it's nevertheless a milestone of sorts.

We stared in amazement at the TV late last night as news of the coup unfolded. We were relieved to hear that it was non-violent—and it has stayed that way, at least so far. A short while later, all TV broadcasting was interrupted, as the military tried to restrict access to opposing political views. TV shows were replaced by a notice informing viewers of the military takeover and apologizing "for any inconvenience." (The Thai people are unfailingly polite.)

I'm pasting into my blog a couple of photos from last night. And no, I wasn't crazy enough myself to go out on the street to take these pictures. I've downloaded them from other sources.



I went to work this morning as normal. Traffic was light for a change, since most Thais stayed home, with schools, banks and government offices being closed. It's important to keep this coup in context. Believe it or not, there have been 19 military coups since 1932, so overthrowing the government here is more of a yawner than it would be in the States. We're hoping that life will return to normal tomorrow, or at least as normal as it can be under martial law.

My Experience with Muay Thai Boxing

Last July (okay, so I’m a little behind in updating my blog), I went to a professional Muay Thai boxing match in Bangkok with a colleague from work, Gerry Dube, and a Thai friend, Seng.

Muay Thai (which means "Thai boxing" in the Thai language) is the national sport of Thailand. Considering how peaceful the culture is, the popularity of this brutal sport is a bit of a mystery to me. I’m sure I’m leaving a lot of important rules out when I say that the only restriction I observed in the match was “no biting.” Virtually everything else appears to be allowed: kicking, elbowing, shoving, kneeing, head butting, and, of course, punching.


Seng was an excellent guide, since he’s producing a reality TV show involving Muay Thai and is very knowledgeable and enthusiastic about the sport. He got us ringside seats (right behind the officials) and patiently commented on what was going on throughout the night. Several things were particularly memorable:

• Seng explained that all the fighters we saw were only 14, 15 or 16 years old. Anyone older is generally considered to be over the hill, due to a slowing of reflexes with age. (It also occurs to me that, as fighters get a little wiser with age, they might start wondering whether routinely getting kicked in the head is such a hot idea after all.)

• Throughout the match, the fighting is accompanied by instrumental music performed by a small group of musicians (pictured below) who play traditional Thai instruments and match the pace and intensity of the tunes to the action in the ring.

• Lumpinee Stadium, where the fights were staged, is the premier Muay Thai boxing venue in Thailand, but in typical Thai fashion, the facilities aren’t elaborate. On the way to the restroom, for example, one must walk through the fighters’ changing room, where fighters are getting dressed, being taped, receiving massages and getting medical treatment after their matches.

A Birthday Spent with Thai Friends

I'm belatedly loading some pictures from a get-together at our apartment that coincided with my birthday at the end of July. A group of us got together to practice some songs we hope to perform at a music party that Doris and I plan to host in September. It was nice to have a bunch of my Thai friends over on my birthday, especially since Doris and the rest of my family weren't here to help me celebrate.

We crowded into my study, so we could play along with some songs I had recorded onto my computer. Going clockwise around the room, you have Fink, Lon, Poom, me and Whim. The picture was taken by Ton, who is a drum player. I'm truly humbled by these amazingly gifted musicians, some of whom play or have played professionally, and I'm thrilled that they put up with my relatively poor guitar skills.

















These are some individual pictures of me, Poom, Lon and Whim.












When our practice was over, Ton lined us up for a group photo in our living room, where some other friends had waited patiently for us to finish. From L to R: Ink, Oi, Fink, Whim, Robin, me, Poom and Lon. They then joined in a chorus of "happy birthday," which surprisingly has the same melody as the version we sing in the States!

A Violent Place

I went on a business trip to South Africa this week, spending all my time working in the Ford South Africa offices near Pretoria. I had many interesting experiences, but none more so than the quick tour I was given of the Ford assembly plant. My assigned tour guide was a very nice Public Affairs manager. What made the tour special were the many candid comments she made about what it's like to live and work in South Africa.

Her one remark that keeps ringing in my ears was that many members of the younger generation of South Africans have "no respect for life." She backed this up with hair-raising stories about senseless violence in and around the City of Pretoria, especially towards older, more vulnerable individuals. She told a heart-rending, personal story about friends of hers being shot and killed in their home by thugs, who also bludgeoned the family's dogs to death. The only family member spared was their small child. The PA lady speculated that, although the child had been threatened with a gun, she had been left alive, because even the most violent South Africans still have affection for children. She told of having to respond to repeated questions about this tragic incident from her own father, who is elderly and keeps asking over and over why these friends were killed, when there appeared to be no motive. Nothing of value had been taken from the house. Perhaps nothing scares people more than what they can't understand.

My tour guide described many other "random acts of violence" that are routinely perpetrated in her neighborhood. Her own parents live in a house nearby to hers, and she worries constantly about their safety. She mentioned that her own house had been broken into five times in the last two years! After the first few incidents, she had replaced the stolen goods, but the criminals had returned each time and completely cleaned her out. She said her house is presently bare of furnishings, because there's no point in keeping anything of value in it. Theft and vandalism are so rampant that insurance companies no longer provide coverage. She now carries a gun in her vehicle for protection.

These stories naturally started to make me feel very uneasy about walking around in the plant, but she assured me that I was safe, because the average age of the employees there is about 45 years old. The older generation of South Africans, she said, still respects human dignity and follows the custom of caring for family members and generously sharing with neighbors in times of need. She indicated that the average Ford plant employee feeds and takes care of 16 people. Unemployment is so high that many people in an employee's extended family must be supported or face starvation.

Fortunately, I didn't experience any violent incidents myself during my visit. I stayed in a hotel protected by a fence and security guards, and I was ferried to and from the Ford offices by our local lawyer, who drives a very large Land Rover model appropriately named "The Defender." The lawyer selected it as her vehicle because it's intimidating- looking and could pass for something that "Aahnold" Schwarzenegger would drive in one of his action movies. Even so, the lawyer urged me to conceal my laptop computer on the floor of the vehicle, so a thug passing by wouldn't be tempted to smash through the window and grab it. I was told that this "smash and grab" activity is commonplace.

The biggest tourist attractions in South Africa are the wildlife preserves, where you can hike into the bush and see animals in their natural habitat. In fact, several people told me that I should have been able to hear the roar of wild lions from my hotel room in the early morning hours, though I never did. I recognize that it's impossible to form an accurate view of any place based on a visit of just a few days, but my impression at the moment is that the streets and neighborhoods of Pretoria may be just as dangerous as the nearby bush.

Trip to New Zealand and Australia

Doris came with me on a recent business trip to New Zealand and Australia. We started out in Auckland, where Ford New Zealand's offices are, but when my business was finished there, we flew to the south island. This is the most picturesque part of New Zealand, and we were blown away by its unspoiled, breath-taking, desolate beauty. We rented a car and drove from Christchurch to Queenstown, and we were very impressed by the lack of billboards and developments (vacation resorts, shopping malls, restaurants, etc.) along the way. It struck me that this is probably what Colorado looked like before being overrun by tourists. I'm including just a few of the many pictures we took.

An interesting statistic about New Zealand is that there are just four million people, but 50 million sheep! So, not surprisingly, we encountered huge flocks wherever we drove.

Queenstown itself was gorgeous, and the pictures below were taken from a mountain peak overlooking Queenstown, which we accessed by cable car. We really enjoyed watching tourists paraglide off the mountain into the valley below.




We didn't try paragliding ourselves, but as you can see we did take a downhill "luge" ride on the mountain—on asphalt, though, rather than ice.

After our mini-vacation in New Zealand, we headed to Melbourne, where Ford Australia's offices are located. Doris enjoyed shopping while I worked. We then headed to Sydney for a few more days of vacation. The highlight there was the Sydney Sky Tower. Many cities around the world now have observation towers that look much like the Space Needle in Seattle. The one in Sydney, however, is unique, since visitors are able (starting only about six months ago) to walk OUTSIDE the top of the tower, rather than just view the city through thick Plexiglas windows. I'm posting a couple of pictures showing the amazing views we had on a spectacularly clear day. (Please ignore, if you can, the fact that the cap and strap I'm wearing to keep my sunglasses from falling off the tower make me look like Rocky the Flying Squirrel.)


Other memories from our trip:

• It was so nice to be in English-speaking countries again. The struggle to communicate in Thailand does wear on you after awhile.

• While driving from Christchurch to Queenstown, we passed a sign saying we were at the 45th parallel. I recall a similar sign in Michigan, but that, of course, referred to being 45 degrees NORTH of the equator. Looking at a world map, I doubt we'll ever get as far south again as we did while in southern New Zealand.

• We were in Australia when it was time to change clocks to account for DST. This is confusing enough when the month of April signals spring. In the southern hemisphere, April brings fall, not spring. Nevertheless, we chanted the "spring forward, fall back" mantra until we figured out which way to adjust our clocks.

"Copy watch? Copy watch, sir?"

Doris and I recently visited Hong Kong for the first time, in connection with one of my business trips. Doris actually saw the city in much more depth than I did, because she had time to tour while I spoke at a lawyers' conference. So, Doris took most of the pictures I'm posting to this blog.

I came to Hong Kong expecting to see swarthy Chinese men skulking around the waterfront and shadowy underworld figures smuggling heroin ashore from junks anchored in the harbor. (Okay, so maybe I've read too many thrillers set in Hong Kong.) The reality was quite different. Hong Kong is a very clean, efficient, generic, business-oriented city, with an incredible number of skyscrapers crammed into very limited space. We found it to be quite expensive compared to Bangkok, but then almost every other city is. We didn't have the best weather, which made getting good views problematic, since fog hung over the city and harbor during most of our visit.

Some examples of the interesting buildings comprising the impressive skyline:



























The vast majority of food available outside the
western-style hotels was...well, genuine Chinese.

The Chinese do love their signs!

This was a sign on the side of a bus, which for some reason struck me as funny. Maybe it was because the last character expressed how I felt.

We answered some questions for these Hong Kong schoolchildren, who were conducting a tourist survey as part of a school assignment. They then agreed to have their picture taken with Doris.

Here I am next to the hotel at which my lawyers' conference was held.

These three stony-faced Chinamen we encountered along the way vowed not to report to the police the incident described below.

My own most memorable experience occurred when I bought a Rolex watch. Well, not exactly. I had heard that tourists could buy cheap knockoffs of premium-brand watches, so I was hoping to find one. I needn't have worried. You have to take only a few steps into the city before being assaulted by numerous vendors stepping into your path and saying, "Copy watch, sir? How about a copy watch?" It's either that or someone offering to make you a tailored suit in a matter of hours. When my legal conference was over, I finally took up one of the offers to sell me a counterfeit watch. I didn't have the slightest twinge of conscience in making this purchase, because I'd never, ever pay $11,000 for a Rolex watch, and so my purchase of a counterfeit version certainly wasn't going to take a sale away from the genuine Rolex company.

Anyway, the street vendor to whom I said, "Yes, I would like a copy watch" eagerly delivered us into the hands of a colleague, who in turn led us through a maze of underground passages. Just about the time I was starting to wonder whether we were being enticed into a remote location so we could be mugged in privacy, we came upon a small shop. It had baby clothes taped to the display window, in a feeble effort to create the impression of a legitimate business. In the shop itself, there was nothing but an empty display counter and two chairs. The seller pulled a binder out from under the counter, and I flipped through pictures of genuine Rolex watches until I found one I liked. Another associate then went off to retrieve the fake Rolex from their stash. When he got back, I inspected the watch, noting that Rolex actually was spelled R-o-l-e-x, and not R-o-l-e-c-k-s, for example. We then began haggling over the price. The seller started at $120, which I immediately rejected. Doris and I had to threaten to leave several times, and actually leave once, before the price finally came down to the $40 I was willing to pay.

We flew back to Bangkok the next day, and I awoke that morning wondering whether my new watch still would be running. I was pleased to see it hadn't yet died, as I feared it might have. On the plane back to Thailand, though, I tried to adjust the time, only to discover I couldn't pry the watch stem away from the case to enable me to move the hands. At first Doris thought this might be because my fingernails weren't long enough, but she tried and failed herself. When we got back to Bangkok, I got out my tool box and used various screwdrivers and pliers in vain attempts to budge the stem. No luck. Finally Doris suggested that I take the watch to a nearby watch repair shop.

I went to the shop and did my best to explain to the Thai staff, using the usual pantomime routines, the problem I was having. Despite the language barrier, the sales girl understood my predicament and took the watch into the rear of the shop. Minutes later a watchmaker emerged and demonstrated that, in order to set the time on a Rolex (whether genuine or not), one must patiently unscrew, rather than pry, the watch stem away from the case. So, there you have it. It turns out that even counterfeit Rolex models have features designed to keep unsophisticated rubes like me from operating them!

"Can I Have Your Body?"

I'm constantly experiencing the challenge not only of learning the Thai language, but also of trying to understand what Thais are trying to say to me in English. One of the main difficulties in understanding English as spoken by Thais is their routine failure to pronounce the endings of English words. "Dance" becomes "dan," for example. In addition, Thais often are unfamiliar with the correct pronunciation of vowels or the proper accenting of words. This can lead to some truly baffling miscommunications.

The most recent example occurred a couple of days ago. I wanted to have Citibank here in Thailand issue a credit card to me to replace an existing one that I had damaged accidentally. Having undergone lengthy and excruciating torture by Citibank over many weeks just to get a Thai credit card in the first place, I decided to enlist the help of my Thai secretary, Khun Air, to get a replacement. Khun Air, who speaks English quite well, agreed, but after a few minutes of speaking to Citibank on the phone, she came into my office and said, "Khun Paul, Citibank wants to speak to you." I went to Khun Air's desk, picked up the phone, and prepared to answer questions aimed at verifying my identity.

To my surprise, the woman from Citibank asked me in English, with great care and clarity, "Can I have your body?" Thinking I surely had misunderstood, I asked her to repeat her question. Once again, she said, "Can I have your body?" At this point, being completely dumbfounded, I turned to Khun Air, who was standing at my side, and said, "She wants my body." Khun Air gave me a very puzzled frown and took the phone from me. After a few seconds of jabbering in Thai to the Citibank representative, Khun Air handled the phone back to me. Between barely controlled giggles, she explained: "Khun Paul, she wants your birthday!"

My King, My King!!

As a Westerner living and working in Bangkok, I've received the usual cultural sensitivity training. I take this stuff seriously, because I don't want to offend anyone, if I can help it. Some of the cautions can be baffling at first, such as a warning not to point your foot at a Buddha, since the foot is considered unclean and insulting in Thai culture. Of course, it's not my habit to use my foot to point at anything, so I figured I was pretty safe in this regard. When touring a Buddhist temple, however, I saw more explicit warnings. Recognizing that many visitors join Thais in sitting on the floor of the temple, the monks had posted signs warning specifically against sitting in a position such that, with legs extended forward or even with knees bent, one’s feet would "point" towards the Buddha at the front of the temple. I suspect there are many other ways one could stumble into an unintentional insult, and I did so today.

We've hired a new attorney in Ford Thailand, and I took her to lunch at a Thai restaurant on the occasion of her first day in the office. We finished eating, and I pulled a wad of Thai currency out of my pocket to pay the bill. When the waitress returned with my change, she pointed under the table and said, "Sir, you drop your money." Sure enough, there was a 20 Baht note lying on the floor, evidently having fallen from my pile of bills. Since I wasn't about to crawl under the table on my hands and knees, I reached with my foot and began pushing the note to where I could reach it. I had made two swipes at it, when the waitress cried out in a shrill voice and in great anguish, "My king, my king!!" and stooped under the table and grabbed the bill. I was stunned, and it was only when she placed the bill on the table and looked at me in dismay that I realized my grave error. By touching the note with my foot, I had dishonored the current Thai king whose face appears prominently on every piece of Thai currency! I apologized to the waitress. She smiled weakly, but the rest of her face betrayed her anger.

As much as I regret this cultural blunder, it could have been worse. In Thailand, the crime of “violating majesty,” which means offending the dignity of a reigning sovereign, carries a minimum sentence of three years imprisonment and a maximum of 15 years. Thailand is one of the few countries where offenses against such a law are still prosecuted. I’ve heard several times already a story illustrating the extremely high regard that Thais have for their beloved king. As the story goes, a Westerner in a Bangkok bar drops a coin and instinctively steps on it to keep it from rolling away. A Thai observing this is so outraged at the disrespect shown by the Westerner in stomping on the king’s head that the Thai pulls a gun and shoots the Westerner dead. I haven’t been able to determine whether this is a true story or an “urban myth,” but I hope never to find out first hand whether its message could be accurate.

It really IS a jungle out there!

A couple of weeks ago, I watched an elephant lumber down our street in Bangkok. He was led by a Thai man dressed in ordinary clothes, and there were no other signs of a parade or circus. Everyone acted as if nothing extraordinary was happening, and I probably was the only one watching in amazement. Bangkok's modern, urban environment had lulled me into forgetting that much of Thailand really is a tropical jungle. The reality of the "wild" environment outside of Bangkok became more apparent during our visit over the Christmas break to Kanchanaburi, a town located about a 2-1/2 hour drive from our apartment.

On the first day of our visit, Doris and I departed our resort, located on the River Kwai, and traveled in a well-worn 4x4 to the "Tiger Temple," a nearby conservation project run by Buddhist monks. The project rescues wild tigers from poachers---typically poor Thais who yield to the temptation of earning $2,500 from the sale of a dead tiger to buyers interested in their teeth, pelts, blood, etc.

Our tour of the temple started at the buildings housing the tigers, where posted signs ("Dangerous—don't turn your backs to the tigers!") removed any possible impression that the pacing animals behind the bars were just ultra-large, friendly cats. Then, a litter of cubs was turned loose to play among the visitors, volunteers and supervising monks. They tumbled around and growled with all the menace they could muster, and Doris and I carefully petted them, all the while bearing in mind the experience of Gretha, a Danish woman we had met the day before at our hotel. Gretha had proudly displayed to us the arm bruises and serious puncture wounds she had received while playing with the cubs during her own visit to the Tiger Temple. While she felt the experience had been well worth the wounds, her description of efforts to stop the bleeding and disinfect the bites had made us a little more cautious than we otherwise might have been.

After the cubs were returned to their cages, out came the adult tigers. The monks organized several of them into a walk down to a quarry. This gave the tigers an opportunity to exercise, and shade and drinking water were waiting for them at the bottom of the quarry. Along the way, Doris and I accepted invitations to pet the tigers. Petting a tiger bears virtually no similarity to petting a household cat. It feels more like stroking a scrub brush, and when you're done, your damp hand bears the pungent odor of tiger sweat. We naturally had our pictures taken doing this—see the sample photo below. And no, the following pictures aren't composite images created with photo-editing software---they're the real thing.

Speaking for myself, I confess to questioning my sanity! The tigers were huge, and the instructions provided by the monks ("Stand only beside or behind the tigers, never in front of them, and don't crouch—or they will attack you!") provided no reassurance. More than once during our visit, I thought about Sigfried and Roy, and the kind of surprise a supposedly tame tiger can spring. I'm not sure we would have wandered among tigers anywhere but in Thailand, where the cultivated peacefulness of the Thai people seems to influence and calm even the jungle beasts.

Once in the quarry, we had more opportunities to interact with the tigers, and I'm inserting below just a couple of our many photos.





To round out our mini-exploration of the jungles of Thailand, we visited an elephant camp and went for an elephant ride, as shown below. The ride turned out to be pretty much as expected, except for how much the platform on which we sat shifted from side to side as the elephant walked. Neither Doris nor I seemed to be sitting directly on top of the elephant's back but rather were balanced precariously over each side. This produced some anxious moments even on level ground, such as when the elephant lowered his head to uproot and eat some bamboo. When the elephant headed down a steep incline, though, that's when Doris and I really began hanging on for dear life. It's a looooong way down to the ground from the top of an elephant, and I started making disaster plans, such as, would I be better off falling into the thorny undergrowth or aiming for a pile of elephant dung to cushion the impact?!

Finally, a word about what Kanchanaburi and the River Kwai are most well-known for: the building of the famous bridge by POWs while being horribly mistreated by the Japanese in WWII. As you probably kn0w, this was portrayed in the award-winning book and movie "The Bridge on the River Kwai." We learned that the novel and movie were "based on a true story" but certainly didn't adhere to it faithfully. The POWs involved in the bridge building have denounced the book for inaccurately portraying the events and characters, and the bridge itself was destroyed by allied air attacks, not blown to smithereens by a heroic demolitions expert as described at the end of the fictional account. Even the name of the river itself was changed; it's actually the River Kwae" (pronounced "kway"). One of our tour guides shrugged her shoulders and said she didn't know why it was changed for the story, but that most Thais had adopted the revised spelling so as not to confuse tourists. Local sites of historical interest that are, in fact, genuine are the "death railway" and the related museum and cemeteries. We visited these and contemplated the many thousands of prisoners, both Western and Asian, who died in forced labor while building a railway through the jungles of Thailand to support the Japanese war effort in Burma (now Myanmar). These visits were sobering experiences, and we left determined to remember the atrocities committed here, despite the fact that the POW camps have been replaced with tourist resorts.

Thanksgiving Celebration in California

Doris and I made a short trip to California for Thanksgiving this year to visit Kurt and Karen. Thanks to the international date line, we arrived at San Francisco airport about the same time on the same day as we left Bangkok, after roughly 24 tiring hours of being in transit. (I can’t help it—I’m still immaturely fascinated by this.) It was great, of course, to see family again, especially during such a family-oriented holiday. Sadly, we couldn’t also see Jeff and Katy. Living near Seattle, they normally would be only a stone’s throw (all right, quite a long throw) from where Kurt and Karen live, but they were attending the wedding of a close friend in Baltimore over the Thanksgiving weekend.

We had our first look at Sunnyvale, where Kurt and Karen moved this past summer. Neat name, and the weather was, in fact, quite sunny while we were there. Located roughly a half-hour drive south of San Francisco, Sunnyvale is a clean and growing community in the heart of Silicon Valley, and the astoundingly high real estate prices reflect this. Fortunately, Kurt and Karen found an attractive two-bedroom apartment that suits their needs at the moment quite nicely. They kindly shared their apartment with us, and an impressive portion of the holiday period was spent preparing and sharing delicious gourmet food.

Kurt, Doris and Karen had a lot of fun in the kitchen, whipping up some magnificent meals together, as these photos will illustrate.

























My role in these preparations was somewhat more limited—see the flattering photo below.


Most of you reading this already know that Karen is due next April. We couldn’t resist the urge to photograph her new profile, and she indulged us.


Kurt and Karen’s other new “baby” is Misha, a beautiful cat who won our hearts with her warm and friendly nature. Yes, I said warm and friendly—adjectives that aren’t typically used when talking about cats, at least not in describing their reactions to visitors they’ve never met before. Misha often would rub herself against our legs or jump up onto our laps, and even onto the keyboard of a computer resting on my lap! We have only a couple of good pictures of Misha, which I’m inserting. I’ve learned that flash pictures make cats’ eyes look like something out of a horror film, so it’s tough getting good photos of an indoor cat.















One of the highlights of our visit was the interesting tour of Google that Kurt gave us. The “campus” is modern and appealing, with lots of fun and conspicuous fringe benefits for employees to enjoy, as these photos reveal.










































Kurt says he occasionally sees one of the two ( now billionaire) founders of Google playing volleyball with other employees during the day.

Near the end of our tour, we enjoyed yet another delicious meal together—this time in the Google cafeteria.



I’m also including some pictures of Kurt in his work area. (Yeah, I forgot to mention—Google employees actually have to work hard, too.)



























The photo (below) of the “miniature beach” was taken in a nearby work area. Kurt tells us that the owner of this set-up had to miss a planned vacation in order to meet a deadline, so he created at the office the beach environment he would have enjoyed, had he been able to get away!


It was difficult to say goodbye again when we left…


but we’re eagerly looking forward to seeing our dear family next summer.

Cultural Lessons Learned in Vietnam (and Elsewhere)

Doris already has posted an entry in her blog (http://www.khundoris.blogspot.com) regarding our recent trip to Hanoi, so I won’t repeat those details here. What I’ll focus on instead are cultural lessons I’ve recently learned in Vietnam and here in Bangkok.

While the two-day cruise aboard a junk on Vietnam’s Ha Long Bay was thoroughly enjoyable (typical scene as shown in the photo), a couple of events occurred during the cruise that reminded me just how different the typical American environment is from that here in Asia.

The setting for this first lesson learned was the dining room on board the junk. Doris and I shared all our meals with a couple, Loke and Evelyn, who are about the same age as Doris and I are and who were visiting Vietnam from Singapore. We had gotten to know them a bit during the 3-1/2 hour drive to Ha Long Bay from Hanoi, so it was only natural that we would share a booth in the boat’s dining room (as pictured).

When our food arrived for our first meal, it was clear that the menu was going to be quite different than I expected. Doris had arranged in advance for vegetarian meals for herself, but I had decided I was going to eat whatever they put in front of me. To my surprise, almost every dish was comprised of some sort of shell fish. I recognized the prawns—not much of a shock there—although prawns in this part of the world usually are served still in their shells. Ditto for the crabs. Prying the little buggers out of their armor and removing their legs, heads, etc. was extremely messy, and Loke and Evelyn immediately recognized from my fumbling that I wasn’t used to doing this. By the time I had extracted the edible parts of the prawns and crabs, my hands looked and smelled pretty bad, so my appetite waned a bit. Then even more mysterious items began to appear. I snapped a photo of some of them—see below.


The pictured creatures are called mantis prawns and were about ten inches long, complete with eyes and antennae. Loke rescued me from wrestling with these things and cracked them open to expose flesh that tasted pretty much like lobster. Our dinner companions proved to be very proficient at tackling the various kinds of shell fish and absolutely loved all the food that was served. My own tastes may develop over time, but at this point in our stay here in Asia, I must say I would have preferred my seafood in a less exotic form, like in a tuna salad wrap, for example.

After dinner, we talked a lot with Loke and Evelyn and began thinking about what card games we might play. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted something walking (not running) across the floor on the opposite side of the dining room, which was only about 10 feet away. When I looked more carefully, I saw it was a rat. I tried to remain calm and pointed out the rat to the others in our group. Doris greeted this news with a piercing scream, as did Evelyn. Doris pulled her feet up on the bench, just as Loke calmly said, “Oh, look, there are three of them.” Several members of the crew meandered over to see what the deal was, and when told about the rats, they looked mystified about why we were so freaked out. They explained that rats inevitably board boats while they are docked, often climbing aboard along the mooring ropes, and that they were just looking for food. No kidding. Doris and I were pondering what to do next when one of the rats jumped onto the bench of the booth opposite us. This produced another couple of screams from Doris, since her perch on our bench now didn’t seem quite so safe. After a few minutes of commotion, the crew managed to coax one of the rats out an open window. Unfortunately, the window was right above our cabin, so when the rat jumped down to the deck below us, we immediately could imagine it squeezing through some crack and into our room. It took us awhile to work up the courage to head to our cabin for an early turn in. Loke was the only one in our group to remain unfazed. As he explained it, “You aren’t used to rats, because you didn’t grow up poor in Singapore, like I did. Rats are a normal part of life among the poor in this part of the world. You just get used to them.” I couldn’t argue with this but told him I was just glad to be wearing tennis shoes, rather than sandals. He then began saying, in all seriousness, “It’s true, you know. Rats really do like to bite toes. Really. I’m not making this up!” Somehow Doris and I managed to put the rats out of our minds and went to bed. And we didn’t even wear our shoes while sleeping.

The third experience I had recently that drove home the point about what a different world we’re living in here crept up on me unexpectedly. I was in a bank in Bangkok, filling out a deposit slip, when I looked up to see the current date displayed on an LED sign. It was showing the present year as “2548.” A bit jarring at first. Then I remembered that Thailand, along with other countries in this region, doesn’t use the Christian calendar. Its numbering is based on the population’s Buddhist beliefs. Fortunately, Thais also accommodate the Western way of denoting time, so for example, I haven’t had to do a math problem to figure out what year I was born, in order to fill out various forms. Hopefully they understand. Either that, or they must think I’m really, really old!

Who Says Americans Don't Adapt?

Americans sometimes get criticized for failing to adapt well to other cultures. Of course, sometimes we do, even in the oddest ways. Doris and I attended the Thai Open tennis tournament today in Bangkok, and while walking to our seats, we passed a McDonalds restaurant, America's best-known export to the rest of the world. To our amusement, the Ronald McDonald mascot in front of the store was executing a "wai," the friendly and respectful greeting that Thais use in place of a handshake.

And by the way, we watched Roger Federer beat Andy Murray in the finals.

Let's Talk Toilets

I haven't yet encountered the public toilet facilities that most westerners characterize as crude and very difficult to deal with, but I'm sure that's because I haven't yet strayed far outside the protective "bubble" of nearby Western-style malls, restaurants and office buildings. The mall within walking distance of our apartment, for example, has public bathrooms very similar to those one would find in the West. I'm sure we eventually will have some squalid "squatting" incident to share on this blog---well, on second thought, probably not---but for the time being, it's worth noting, especially for friends and family who might come for a visit, that even the most Western-style toilets are just a bit different than what we're used to.

The typical Western-style toilet here sports a rather intimidating-looking hose that's about four feet long - - see the photo.
Every toilet in our apartment has one, and it clips to a holder mounted on the wall when not in use. Having puzzled over this for some time, I finally consulted the internet. I’ve now read articles describing this device variously as a “water jet,” “water gun,” or “power washer,” and pointing out the intended use in place of toilet paper. One entry confidently proclaims, “After a few practice runs [poor choice of words], you'll probably wonder why American bathrooms don't offer this more civilized feature.” Maybe, but personally, I’m inclined to wait until I find myself somewhere where toilet paper isn’t available as an alternative. And for adventurous friends/family who visit us, let me just provide a gentle warning. While the water pressure is adjustable to suit your preference, the force of the water coming out of the hose at its present setting seems capable of stripping the paint off your sun deck.

Escalator Escapades

I realize it's easy to form false impressions of a culture if you make very limited observations, so after having written my comments last week about Thais and escalators, I began wondering whether I had leapt to the wrong conclusion. Based on two further experiences I had yesterday, though, I don't think so. I visited a huge electronics shopping complex to buy some computer supplies. As usual, the place was swimming in people, and two incidents made my jaw drop:

In the first, people were deftly sidestepping, adroitly maneuvering or clumsily stumbling (me) to avoid injuring anyone upon exiting an up escalator. The reason for the significant number of immobile Thais standing in the way of my graceful exit? A store was distributing flyers, right at the top of the escalator, to shoppers, who were stopping calmly to read them!

In the second incident, I encountered a Thai woman who came to a complete halt, and remained there for perhaps 15 seconds, just a step away from entering a down escalator. Escalators aren't as wide as they are in the States, so her blocking action presented a considerable obstacle for others trying to get on. She evidently was so engrossed in her mobile phone conversation that everything else became secondary, even though she was standing directly in front of an escalator. (Given how calm and patient Thais are, I don't think those American "Just Hang Up and Drive!" bumper stickers would sell over here.)

Initial Impressions of Bangkok

Well, I've been here in Bangkok for a little over four weeks now, and in order to focus on something other than missing Doris (she's finally due to arrive in 3-1/2 weeks!), I've made a few observations:

• Thais seem to be incredibly patient and peaceful. I haven't seen one hostile motorist in traffic---quite a feat, given how jammed the roads are with cars---or one angry person, period!

• A quality that perhaps goes hand-in-hand with their patience is their relaxed, unhurried attitude in general. They meander through the very crowded store aisles with no apparent objective in mind. This generally doesn't pose a problem for me, except when they completely stop and calmly look around immediately after getting off an escalator. I've experienced this numerous times already. You certainly have to be ready to dodge the clusters of people who simply stop at the bottom or top of escalators, so you don't plow into them and start some awful domino effect.

• This relaxed approach to life is reflected in the Thai language as well. Having had only five 90-minute lessons, I'm obviously no expert, but my tutor has confirmed something I read a couple of weeks ago: there is no punctuation in written Thai. There is no such thing as a sentence, for example. Written text just keeps right on going and going, with no indication of when you're supposed to come up for breath. In conversation, a speaker indicates the end of a thought by saying "ka," if you're a woman, or "khrab," if you're a man. I suppose it's like saying "over" in a radio transmission, to indicate it's time for the other person to jump into the conversation!

• Bangkok has a well-deserved reputation for being polluted, but it's not as bad as I thought it was going to be. It helps to be ferried around most of the time in an air-conditioned car, of course, but even when I've taken a walk along one of the main streets, I don't see rotting garbage out in the street or anything of the sort. Instead, there are food vendors practically everywhere. At every hour of the day, someone is cooking chickens, frying vegetables, cutting fruit, etc.

• ...which brings me to the large, brown rat I encountered today on the sidewalk of perhaps the best-known street in Bangkok---Sukhumvit Road---which is lined with five-star hotels, fancy restaurants, first-class shopping malls and the like. He was rather large and slow-moving. At first glance, I thought I must be seeing things. Could this be someone's large gerbil that escaped from his cage? Then I saw his very long tail. He moved slightly away from me as I approached him on the sidewalk but for the most part stood his ground. I walked a little faster as I passed him. No one else seemed to pay him any mind, so I decided not to yell something like, "Look out! A rat!" In any event, this took the shine right off my hunt for a restaurant in which to have lunch.