Monday - The Day That I Missed

Monday!

Ah Monday!

Crazy Monday!

Fun Monday!

Girls Monday!

Shopping Monday!

Monday after the big kids got trundled off to school and we were free,  Rach and I headed back downtown with our pal Anna.

I had three things on my list that I wanted to get or go to - one had been knocked off when I got my Starbucks mugs in earlier the week before.

So Monday we headed to Rahab which is an outreach for women in the "red light" district.  They have some women who have come there and now they work there and make jewelry and some other things and I always love to go and support them when I'm in Bangkok.  I figured I'd get some gifts from there.

After that we got back on the Sky Train to go back to the hotel that we had stayed at because Rach forgot a library book in the kids playroom.   When she picked it up, Anna was sleeping in the little carry thing in front of her and so Rach made some comment to the women at the front desk that the baby forgot her book, not knowing that they would incredulously believe that the baby could actually read the book!:) Americans NEVER lie - and they're NEVER sarcastic!:)

We then walked over to the really nice mall that was nearby and just enjoyed some cool air pharmacy shopping, some clothes shopping :)

and - we didn't have a chance to go The Oriental for tea, but we found a nice place in the mall and had tea!

And then we once again headed to the Sky Train to check the last thing off of my list.  A visit to the Silk Quarter in Bangkok.

There a guy who restarted the silk industry in Thailand after the Second World War, quite an interesting guy who actually disappeared and was never found.  Look him up on line and you'll be impressed.  His name is Jim Thompson and in fact, he did all the silk used in the movie The King and I.

Anyways there's a museum where his house is....

And the you walk down and across the canals ....

And you're in the section where they make the silk...

There are two basic shops and the first time I was here I bought a bunch of silk for drapes that I've never yet used so I felt the need to go and buy more silk that I'll probably never use!  But who can resist if you can buy silk straight off the looms in Bangkok!  And it's relatively cheap too - and beautiful!

Oh and by the way - this is the king of Thailand, you'll see him posted up on pictures everywhere around the city...

We then opted (ok, I did the opting because by this time I was tired of the heat and the walking and the being jostled around) to take a taxi home. 

Things we passed...

Dogs on cars...

Fire stations 

Durian (the stinky fruit you're not allowed to have in hotels here!)

And the tallest building in Bangkok 

And when we got home - we were all very very happy to be there!

The Return To Dr Bear's House

It's Wednesday, the day before I leave Thailand - and I have finally decided to follow the sage advice of a 4 year old named Sarah who, with great wisdom, has been continually telling me "Go to Dr Bear's house - they have the bandaids there!"

From the day I first arrived I've been having these disgusting red welts popping up all over my neck - they're huge and angry looking and itch and scab and I went to pharmacy where he gave me some cream and it seemed to be helping, but more have been coming up and I've been scared that all the proverbial villagers are going to start running from me!

And then today - I woke up with my right eye swollen not quite but almost completely shut.  It went down a little as the morning progressed but then again, someone who had maybe a little more :) experience then Sarah requested that I just go to the hospital and so I decided that I respected him and his opinion enough that I'd just go.  I suppose I thought somewhere in the back of my head, it could be some Thai flesh eating bacteria that only the Drs in Thailand would know about.  So thanks to Sarah and Sean - I finally decided to head their warnings and go!

First of all - I just point out that Dr Bear's hospital is technically not called that but has been renamed by clever Sarah due to the very obvious bears that encompass the hospital.  I felt much more comfortable going to Dr Bears Hospital rather than....

Whatever that name is....:)

I decided to just pay to see the eye dr and then get her opinion if I should see a dermatologist. 

We checked in and then went up to the eye clinic area.  I had weight, height and blood pressure all taken - I didn't eve know that two of those things are related to me eyes!:). And then I had to go in with this little girl and do these three crazy eye tests.

The first one you put your head in the machine - chin and forehead like at the dmv.  And then she says in Thai English "look at green light" which is at the left - but she doesn't bother to tell you that when you look at the green light then at the right, there's a red light and it shoots this crazy blast of ear and your eye and you jump a million feet.  And she does it like 5 more times and you're still silly enough to keep on jumping evey time.  

And then you have to wait for the little girl to finish at station two and they immediately tell you to sit down where she was ... It's the crazy decontamination freak in me .... Without even wiping any of the equipment off:(. So I had to grab wipes and do it myself :).  And then they more lights that she shines in and she keep "yelling" at my swollen eye "open your eye!  Open your eye!"

Argh!!!! That's why I'm here!  I can't "open my eye!" 

And then station three.  Once again - wait for girl to finish and not wipe equipment down.... I've gotta get everything I know out of my head;)

And this is the reading the letters thing where they cover one eye and you read.  Which of course, everything was blurry with my swollen eye!

We wait outside the exam rooms longer

And then I finally go in and see the dr who looks at me for about 3 minutes and then prescribes medicine.

Rach had told me that they are medicine crazy here.  They'll prescribe like 5 things for you no matter what it is...

She gave me two - drops and ointment and said its probably just an allergic reaction.

And then Rach asked if we should a dermatologist about me neck and she looked at my neck and made this seriously hilarious face like it was the grossest thing she's seen which - it very may well have been!

So then we go to the floor up to the dermatologist and I have all the same height weight things done and this time it's pretty quick they bring me in to this guy sitting behind a desk who asks a few questions and then, I think my neck is so gross that he didn't even want to touch it so he used a magnifying glass to look at it and said they're bug bites that I've had a reaction to and told me to stop using the ointment I've been using and start using a different one that he prescribed.  

So then I have to the cashier which I then wait to be called and then I go up and pay (2500 baht -- like 60 some dollars) and then I walk over to the pharmacy and get the medicines and I'm done.

And then we go down to the parking garage and get in the car and drive home!

And I get my newly washed scarf which I will use to cover my frightening neck on the flight tomorrow so people don't think I have the plague - and I pray my eye goes down so I don't look even scarier.

Oh ....

At least I didn't have to go to the Snoring Clinic.... :)

A Terribly Long Exciting Day

Saturday!  This was what we felt in the morning at all the amazingly exciting things we were going to do!  Jump up and down with overwhelming excited joy!

We started the morning with a huge breakfast buffet!

We ate a huge breakfast and then went up to the play land where we played....

Made some new friends....

And took some mighty goofy pictures of ourselves!

Then we went down to the pool - some of us watched...

While some of us swam!

We then all got dressed up to go to a play at the international school.

We got on the Sky Train 

took a little rest on the way...

and headed to school where we then ate some lunch and headed in to our seats 

We got to see the Wizard of Oz...

Fun thing - on the way back on the Sky Train, we had a little projectile baby vomitting... Just flew right out - Jonathan got the majority of it but the floor had to be cleaned a little too...

But then we got to come back and watch more tv with Burger King we picked up on the way back.

A good end to a long, fun-filled day!

This Is My Excited Face!

These are the faces that you get when you put a kid in a ball pit!

Yesterday we left the normal and the heat of home and went downtown to an air conditioned,  kids zoned, fabulous pooled, in room dinnered hotel!

After school pick ups we headed with luggage and kids to the Sky Train where we travelled downtown and to our hotel (sounds easy but it was quite long, hot and tedious... In fact, were probably just doing a taxi home!).

We excitedly explored the hotel, taking a quick peak at the pool...

spending some time in the kids room playing...

And then off to the rooftop pool!

We all got nice and tired and headed back to the tool where we ordered room service and then some of us got in the

tub and waited for the dinner arrival which we then ate while watching tv.