The Adventure of Getting Pulled Over in Bangkok

Okay, so here I am minding my own business, following my GPS on my way to find the Racquet Club for a homeschool activity, and up pulls an officer on his motorbike. Apparentley, while following the directions from my GPS to go straight, I was in a bus only lane. I couldn't understand much of what the officer was saying, but he didn't seem to care that I didn't know any better. I tried acting even dumber than I really am, saying "I don't know" after almost everything he said. He finally let me know that I could take care of the "ticket" right there with him and it would only cost me 1000 baht. (Approximately $30) Which I later found out was WAAAY too much! Anyway, lesson learned. Actually, more than one lesson learned. Lesson one, no matter what your GPS says, if no other cars are going a certain way, don't go that way!!! Lesson two, now I know what to do if I get pulled over again. Too bad I didn't learn this before I got pulled over for the second time! Only 10 minutes later!!! What!?! Are you kidding me!?! Here's what I did. Once again, following my GPS, I am told to turn right after 700 yards. Well, I find out, when I see the right turn arrows, that I am in one of the right turn lanes. However, that right turn is only 90 yards away, so I need to get over. Like usual traffic, it's not moving, so I put on my left turn signal and a nice person lets me over. No one gets cut off, no problems, no big deal, right? Well, when I get to the top of the hill and the officer sees that I am white, he has me pull over. Really!?! REALLY!?! By this time I lose it. I roll my window down, hand him my International Drivers Licence, and start bawling. I know that it won't cost much, but being pulled over not 10 minutes after the first time was too much. Then there was the part of not being able to understand what he was saying (he was even harder to understand than the first officer), but the thought of "This is not fair! He only pulled me over because I am not Thai!", was going through my head and upsetting me even more. My very calm and patient daughter tries explaining that the reason I am crying hysterically is because I just got pulled over. He still didn't seem to care. So, we ask him how much this ticket will be, and once again we are fortunate to be able to pay him right there. No need to go to the police station. This one only cost me 400 baht. So, my trip to the Racquet Club for some rock climbing with homeschool friends cost me an extra 1400 baht. (Approximately $45) I am so thankful though for my homeschool friends in making me feel better. We ended up having a wonderful time, and the three oldest all enjoyed rock climbing, while the youngest had fun climbing on his own size "rocks" and jumping/falling onto the big landing cushion. After we spent about 4 hours there, we headed to our favorite area, went for some McD's, and then went to the night market before heading home for the night. A wonderful end to a not so wonderful start! Until the next adventure!

The Adventure of Getting a New Puppy

One day we go out to eat at a KFC and find a second-hand store. We decide that after we eat we’ll go and check it out. We find all sorts of neat things, but one thing caught our eyes the most and that was a Chihuahua named Honey. She was so cute we forgot about everything else and start asking questions. What’s her name, how old is she, and most important, where did you get her. It turns out that one lady spoke very good English. Her name is Nida, and she has a friend who breeds Chihuahuas. The same person they got Honey from. So, she offers to get a hold of her friend for me, gives her my e-mail to send me pictures, and then eventually meet me at the second-hand store. Finally, we meet and she brings two puppies with her, a boy and a girl. Well, we already knew from the pictures that we wanted the girl, but the kids also fell in love with the boy. Who wouldn’t!?! They were both so cute, but I had to do the grown-up thing and say no to getting both and just get the girl. And they were okay with that. Right away we start calling her Angel, and she is a little angel. We bring her home, give her a bath, clean out her ears, and start cuddling with our new baby. She slept well through the night in her little doggie bed, which I put inside a large box, covered up with her blankie. The next morning I take her outside where she does her thing and gets lots of praise. Then it’s inside we go where she eats her food and drinks some water followed by more cuddle time. Now, I had already promised the kids a trip to the zoo, so I had to find a vet that will board for the day, cut her nails, and check her out. I was so lucky to find a vet very close to home who speaks very good English that cost 150 baht to board for the day. That’s approximately $5.00. Perfect! We’ll bring her in, make sure she’s doing well, get her nails trimmed, leave her in good hands, and still get to go to the zoo. The zoo closed at 6:00pm, so there was no problem picking her up by 8:00pm. We bring her in and the vet takes her temperature, listens to her heart and whatever else he listens to, says she looks and sounds good, and takes her for the day. After a fun day at the zoo and on our way home, we go to pick her up. Now I thought, “If boarding her for the day is only 150baht it can’t be too much more to have had her nails trimmed and have her checked out.” So, I send Kirsten in with 500 baht. She comes out with 350 baht and says everything else was included in the boarding. Really!?! Wow! I know where we’ll be bringing our puppy whenever we have a day excursion and can’t bring her along. So we are very happy to know that we have a healthy 2 month old puppy Chihuahua. By the time we get home and start playing with her we have decided that Bella better suits her and us. So, we start calling her Bella. Her name is now Bella Angel Collins, and she is very much a part of this family. Everyone loves her and she loves all of us. She’s eating, drinking, peeing, and pooing just like a normal healthy puppy should. She’s also playing and napping like a normal puppy does. We are very happy with this adventure we have taken ourselves on! Until the next adventure!

The Adventure of Snakes

This next adventure I can live without, the adventure of snakes. A lot of you may not know this about me, but I have an extreme phobia of snakes. Okay, maybe it’s not extreme, but it is a phobia none the less. I can handle seeing a snake that’s inside of an aquarium, but not when it’s out. You see, when I see a snake slithering around, my heart beats faster and I have the feeling of hyperventilating.  And don’t even think of asking me to touch it, because that won’t happen. So, when my oldest daughter found a snake in her bathroom before we moved in, I was very afraid to actually move into the house. A condo was looking better and better to me. However, when security was called, it was nice to see that not just one or two guards came to catch the snake, but more like six or seven. One thing I didn’t like was hearing that it could have been a green tree viper snake. What!?! In my house!?! You’re kidding me! It wasn’t a green tree viper, but it was still a mildly poisonous snake. So I’ve been living in the house now for a little over 3 months, have not seen any more snakes inside of the house, have not even used the sink in the bathroom in my room, and have checked the toilet every time I go into the bathroom. I did, however, get a huge surprise when I opened the kitchen door to go outside and do laundry and saw a green snake slithering around my dryer. Let’s just say, the neighbors heard me scream. It scared the snake away and up into the trees that line the fence along where my washer and dryer are. And in no time at all, the snake could not be seen as it blended in with the leaves. So, now I have a ritual to scare away any snakes that might be out there every time I go out to do laundry. I bang open the double doors, take a broom and bang it on the washer and the dryer, sweep around the ground and hit the trees along the fence. If people can see me, they probably think, “Look at the crazy white lady”, but I don’t care. I just don’t want to see any snakes in or around my house. Maybe one of these days I won’t be afraid to use my own bathroom.

The Adventures of Shopping in Thailand

Shopping, now there's an adventure in it's own right! First, buying anything imported from America you can expect to pay an outrageous price for. For example, a box of Kraft Mac and Cheese costs $2.50, Kraft grated Parmesan Cheese is around $10.00, and one small bottle of barbecue sauce costs about $3.50! That's just a few items we won't be purchasing much of while we are here. Thank goodness we came prepared with plenty of Mac and Cheese, because, I am sorry to say, we won't be buying much American here. We'll just have to stock up every time we come back to America to visit. We are very lucky that my husband is going to America in the middle of the month. I am sending him with a very large list. We brought along other food and personal items, but there are some things we just can't find here. And some personal items I just can't live without! So far I haven't found an Aldi type store here, at least not yet. See, I was a little picky about what I would spend on certain items. I'm not concerned about brand name for one and Aldi mac and cheese for 39cents did us just fine. Or a huge can of Aqua Net for $1.50, hairspray here doesn't come in a large bottle and the cheapest I have found is $3.30! What?!? Are you kidding me!?! I thought everything was supposed to be cheaper here! Of course there is a lot of stuff that is cheaper like DVDs (when you can find them in English), clothes, and home goods. I just need to learn where to shop. The time will come when I do learn more and I'm sure I'll be writing about that adventure as well. But, for the time being, I'm adding to the list of food and personal items for my husband to pick up when he goes back to America. (Sorry honey, but that list gets a little longer each day.) My poor husband is going to have to go to Walmart and buy, not just one box, but 20 boxes of tampons. All I can say is bless him for that! How many men would go and buy even just one box of tampons for their woman? Oh, did I mention, there are only two brands of tampons you can get here costing about $6.00 for 18 tampons, and they aren't even the good ones!
Another adventure about shopping, trying to figure out what something is. For laundry detergent, since I can't read Thai, I have to look at the picture to figure out if it's for the washing machine or hand wash only. A lot of Thai's hand wash and hang to dry their laundry. And then try asking for something from someone who does not speak or understand English. Imagine me, looking for dish soap, asking a lady were I can find soap to wash dishes by hand and being taken to the hand lotion isle. Ok, I'll find it on my own, hopefully. I really need to find some English speaking Thai friends to take me shopping.
Oh, and they have Toys-R-Us here, but you can forget about me buying anything there! One Hot Wheels car that would cost me 85-98 cents in America, those are $3-$5 here! No Way is that purchase going to happen! And PlayDoh, let's just say I'll be making my own! You're looking at about $5-$6 for a four pack of PlayDoh. No thank you!

Going to Hua Hin

One of our adventures that we were fortunate enough to go on was going with my husband to his companies "Asia Summit" in Hua Hin, Thailand. We stayed in a Japanese style hotel on the beach with an amazing pool and a slide that even I was able to go down! I had probably the most relaxing times I've ever had! If we weren't eating with the group on the beach, we could order anything we wanted from room service. And we would spend our days at the pool and/or the beach. On the beach the boys would boogie board, my nine year old daughter  would build hermit crab sanctuaries and my oldest daughter would hunt for sea shells both in the water and on the beach. Let's just say, I never wanted to leave. My husband's company had also organized a day tour, for those of us who didn't play golf, around Hua Hin. Three vans took about twenty of us on a four stop tour. Beginning at the summer palace of the seventh king of this dynasty of Thailand, stopping next at a silk factory to learn the process of making silk, then the Hua Hin train station, and ending at the top of a mountain. Now I don't know what this mountain was named, but we called it monkey mountain. First we walked up a lot of stairs to get up to a Buddhist temple with an amazing view and a few monkeys. After descending the stairs and reaching the base, my husband took the kids to feed the monkeys. He paid a lady to feed the monkeys and then convinced her to let my oldest daughter to feed the monkeys next. Let's just say she had a blast but didn't feed them fast enough because she had a few monkeys climbing up on her to get what food they could out of the bucket. With one, even though the food was gone, remaining on her shoulder finishing up his treat. Thank goodness we had the camera ready and got it all in pictures. This is one adventure she'll and I'll remember for rest of our lives!

The Adventures of the Thai People

Thai people are a very friendly people. Every where you look you see a smiling face. Of course most of them are smiling at us, the Americans walking among them. The one adventure which my six year old really doesn't care for having, is when they touch him or his brother. Every time we walk out of our apartment with two blond haired little boys who are usually dressed alike in a country full of dark haired people the stares start and the touching begins. Now they aren't touching them in a bad way, just usually a brush or squeeze on the arm. The people always smile and, especially with the boys, want to touch the cute little blond boys. Of course when my six year old says, "I hate it when they touch me!", that's what bothers me. In my eyes he's not so cute when he does that. Of course it doesn't seem to affect the Thai people, they keep smiling and saying how cute they are. Did I mention how nice the Thai people are here?

The Adventures of taking the MRTand the BTS

A couple more adventures of living in the city are the MRT (Subway) and the BTS (Sky train). Imagine coming from a town where you drove your car everywhere, you never walked to the store, and you don't have a subway or a sky train. (Even though Kansas City really should have a sky train from the airport to and through the city! Just my opinion.) So, here we are, I am not ready to attempt driving in this city especially on the wrong side of the road sitting on the wrong side of the car, so public transportation here we come! The very first trip for the kids on a subway train was with me to head to the MBK (a seven story shopping mall with just about anything you could need at very cheap prices) to go shopping! Now to get to MBK from where we are staying you first hop on the MRT and head to where the BTS intersects, hop onto the BTS to another station that connects to the BTS station that gets you to MBK. Exciting times! For the kids and for me. Imagine taking four kids in a strange city on the subway and sky train. Once again, the kids acted like pros. You'd have thought they did this all their lives. It must have been all the movies with subway train rides in them that the kids have watched over the years, because they had never even seen one in real life until I took them. ;D So, the trip to the mall was no problem, it was the trip coming back from the mall that was not so much fun. Not only is it crowded, but I've got a sleeping 4 year old that I am carrying and a cranky 6 year old. Lesson learned, when going to the MBK, just take a taxi if there's more than 2 people. You're not only going to have a seat the whole way there, but it is actually cheaper (when you have 4 or 5 people). It only cost $3.50 and that's with a tip!
One of the next MRT rides we went on was to Lumphini Park to meet up with some families from the English speaking homeschooling group that we joined before moving to Bangkok. First, there are two MRT stations to the park, one on either end. Lumphini Station is the first one, and apparently not the one you want to get off at. Silom Station is the second one, and it takes you right to the entrance you want to go into. (I didn't know this until I had already purchased the passes, and my husband called after looking it up and said I need the next station.) So, we go to Lumphini Station, go up to the ticket booth, and buy passes to the next station. Needless to say, the lady at the counter looked at me like I was crazy, but I don't care. When we finally get to the correct station, it takes us right to the entrance of this amazing park in the middle of the city. Imagine Central Park in NYC, yet not quite as grand. There's ponds, walking trails, a street where no cars are allowed, a library, food stands, and of course playgrounds which is where we were headed. We meet up with fellow homeschoolers from all over. Everyone brings food to share, which I'll remember the next time. The kids had a blast and it was nice for me to meet and talk to some adults. We arrived at around 1:30pm where there were a descent amount of people, and stayed until about 6:30pm where there were a whole lot of people. Children had been walking through since 3:00pm in their uniforms after a full day school, men are playing a friendly game of basketball, families are enjoying the playground, couples sitting together by the pond, joggers stretching and running in the street, people doing Thai Chi in the grass, and then at 6:00pm everyone stops what they are doing, stands, and listens as the National Anthem is played through the park speakers. And, as soon as the National Anthem ends, everyone gets back to what they are doing. And then you hear more music in the background, and you turn around and see more than a hundred people doing aerobics and anyone could join in. I'll tell you what went through my head when I saw that was "Flash Mob!" It was so cool! And as we walked through the park to head to the MRT, one aerobic group finished and another began. And still yet another large group of people were doing aerobics to a different song at the entrance of the park. This is one adventure I plan on having at least once a month. And who knows, maybe someday I'll be telling you how I finally decided to join the "Flash Mob" and how much fun I had doing it. Stay tuned for that one!

Living in a Hotel with Six People, Now There's an Adventure

While trying to find "the perfect place" (which happens to be the name of the compound where we are going to be moving) we've been living in a two bedroom hotel with six people. Sure four of them are under the age of 14, but it's six people none the less. We do get a continental breakfast filled with all sorts of goodies, but then the other two meals I either need to cook or eat out. Of course there's always food by phone, but eating out is not a way to try and save money. And for someone who has never really enjoyed cooking, it's not so much fun trying to cook in such a small space. The cozy quarters aren't so bad, just another adventure. Trying to do the laundry of six people in a washer/dryer all-in-one machine that holds approximately two pairs of adult jeans or 4 pairs of kids jeans and takes about an hour to wash and partially dry (I have to hang everything up on a drying rack for them to finish drying or it would be a much longer cycle) is another adventure. Oh how I wish I would have appreciated doing my laundry when I lived in the U.S.! Thank goodness my children are home schooled and used to being together 24-7 or these living arrangements could be bad. Good thing about a small place, it's easy to clean. Of course when a maid comes in once a day to make the beds, clean the bathrooms, and sweep and mop the floors it makes it even a little easier. So, the temporary living arrangements aren't bad, just an adventure. And then we have the adventure of living in the city! Stay tuned!

The Adventure of Trying to Find a House to Rent in Bangkok

Trying to find a house to rent at a price we want to spend is one adventure of its own. We could find a condo living downtown with no problem, but we want to try and keep the culture shock on the kids as little as possible. So, we've been looking for a four bedroom house with room for homeschooling. You can find the perfect place with no problem if you want to spend the money. But our goal is to find someplace where we can start living below our means. This is our chance to a new start. A start to pay of debt, to have a savings account, and to not be living pay check to pay check. Sure, you can finda place, but there's also location to think about. The location needs to be somewhat close to the airport since my husband will still be traveling all through Asia and Australia, close to where his office in Bangkok is wherever that ends up being, close to shopping centers, and in a good compound. Sound easy? Maybe in the U.S., but try Bangkok. After looking at a lot of houses, and after switching Realtors, we have found our first house to rent. It's a little more than what we wanted to spend, but still a great deal and in an awesome compound with a lot of expats. We move in March 12th! The kids are very excited as am I. Because, even though we have enjoyed the next adventure I'll be writing about of living in a hotel for almost 2 months, the kids are ready for something bigger.

Moving to Bangkok is such an adventure

The very first adventure was getting to Bangkok. After not being able to leave on the Tuesday morning we were scheduled to leave due to the first two of three kids getting sick, we were finally ready to leave the following Sunday. We had already said our good-byes to our family and friends and we were on our way to the airport. It took one mini-van and one truck filled with my family, my parents, eighteen checked bags, and twelve carry-ons to get us to MCI. My husband and my parents brought all of the luggage in and to the check-in counter and, thanks to my husbands preparations, everything went smoothly. With a few tips from my parents he had all of the luggage marked and tagged, and he had went to the airport the day before and 'warned' the airline of our arrival. They were ready for us. You'd have thought we were experts in flying as a family with the way we all went through security. Not bad for a family whose children have either never flown before, had their first flight only a couple of months prior, or hadn't been on an airplane since they were two years old! The hardest part was saying good-bye to my mom and dad.  Yes, here I am, 40 years old and I haven't lived further than 15 minutes away from my parents. And, I think, the longest I've ever been away from parents was about 6 weeks. Lesson learned, don't ever take for granted of what you've got. And don't ever forget to take every opportunity you have to spend time with the ones you love. So, here I am, sitting and waiting to board the first of four planes after saying good-bye and thinking of  'when's the next time I'll see my parents.' Needless to say the tears came and went until we boarded our plane to Denver. After our first plane ride went really smoothly we had a quick connection to Seattle. Once we made it to Seattle we had a little longer layover before boarding our third plane headed for Tokyo, Japan. Luckily, with all the travel my husband had done last year, we were all upgraded to business class. Business class is nothing less than AWESOME!!! Roomy seats that lay flat to about 6'2", individual 13"on-demand flat screens, and excellent "first class" service, to name a few of the things that made it awesome. The kids all did great, once again acting like pros at flying. The loudest thing I heard coming from my kids was my youngest son's DSi, which I don't think anyone else could hear. Pretty impressive! No one could believe this was their first time flying. Finally, after a twelve hour plane ride, we get to Tokyo and make it through security to go and wait for our fourth and finally flight to Bangkok. After a short layover, long enough to get through security and get the kids a little snack, we are once again in business class and on our way to Bangkok.This flight, being just a little shorter than the last flight (9 hours), went just as well as the first three flights! And as we're pulling into the gate and the flight attendant is making her announcements we were pleasantly surprised to hear "and we would like to welcome the Collins family to their new home in Bangkok!" That was the best ending, of our very long trip, ever! That, of course, is not the end of our adventure. Due to my husband's status with the airline and due to flying business class, we were able to go through a special line to enter Thailand and made it through customs in 10 minutes. Now it's off to get our checked baggage! My husband got a couple of airport workers with a very large cart to come and help us get our bags. All eighteen bags made it through and onto the cart with no problems. Needless to say we caught the attention of everyone around as we walked through customs with the six of us and all of our stuff. After fearing what customs would do and how long we would be there, they ended up only checking two of the bags we had. And then off we were to our welcoming committee with their van and truck. Finally arriving to our hotel/temporary housing at a little after one in morning. (That's about 31 hours since we left my parents home in Smithville, Mo!) Let's just say it took several people and several trips to get all of our things up to our room. You'd think we'd be worn out and just crash, but there was too much excitement of finally getting here. So, I unpacked our belongings and started to settle in. It took a few days to adjust to the time change and to get over our jet lag, but now we're all back on track. Bangkok is thirteen hours ahead of central time, so it's been pretty easy to catch our family and friends on Skyp. Thank goodness for Skyp is all I have to say. It has certainly made being away from family and friends bearable. It would be so much harder if I couldn't see and talk to them on a regular basis. Of course here we are at a hotel with shared Internet, so the only time to get a somewhat decent connection is when everyone else is sleeping. But it'll do until we move into a house and get better Internet service.
And that is where our next adventure begins. Looking for a house to rent!