Sea Pearl Hotel Cha-am

... under the red corner. All very jolly.

Loving Hua Hin - long, blonde beach (but not very wide at high tide), fantastic restaurants on piers/jetties over the sea, and an interesting view into the lives of the girlies (who work the girlie bars) from our balcon looking down into their private lives with their kids.

... I thought I would try to engage but all the women were exposing various parts of their bodies to expose warts of different sizes, shapes and colours. AS I had no warts to share and my only scars are 4 little nicks on each knee where I had small knee ops, I just closed my eyes and wished them all well. Later in the journey when I helped an older disabled man to his seat the atmosphere softened and a couple of smiles were exchanged. BEWARE ...

... to pay more than 100 baht, since I know several people who have gotten them for 90, but the lady I bargained with wouldn't go below 112. Sometimes they start the price at 150 or 180 baht, judging you based on your white skin. I just let them go, didn't buy them. The saag paneer at the Indian restaurant was amazing. I'm still thinking about it. We also had fun wandering around the night market, and then some of us hung out at a bar for a short while before going ...

Bad things: 1. A cockroach ran over my hand when I was working on preparing the primates' breakfast yesterday. It was two inches long! I've had some bad bug experiences, but that one was gross. 2. I got grabbed again on the wrist by Zack, the leader of the teenage gibbon gang. Seriously, there are 9 teenagers all in one enclosure and they're absolutely wild to watch, but terrors to try to feed. You have to put ...

When I woke up, I met my roommates: Charlotte (20, from Wales) and Sally (19, from Australia). Nearly everyone who volunteers at the center are British! A few Australians and a few Americans (actually, one 18 year old named Catelin who is a student at UC-Santa Cruz, which is nearby to my former home San Jose), but mainly Brits. We alwasy have a 6 am wake up time and need to begin work at 6:30am. Luckily, (new volunteer ...

... up there at a hostel. We arrived pretty late in the night so I just hung out with people in the hostel and then went to bed. The next day we traveled the sky train, its like the metro link for those in STL but its above the streets, like in the sky, hints the name. So we all explored the malls and the streets of Bangkok. Craziness, that is the best way to sum it all up. So many people and the traffic and the smells. Yeah crazy smells haha.. So then I met up with the ...

... over and once again needed two chips to get on the green for double bogie. soidog 5, cowboy 1. hole number 7, 499 yards, par 5: cowboy got in a beautiful drive right down the middle and his second shot went right into the water and but his fourth shot was on. tiger-like. and then a great one-putt. par. my tee landed in a bunker from where i hit the best 4-iron out of a bunker i ever hit on my life and then a 9-iron to the green. 3-on and 2-putt for par ...

... good ones there. So wh*ts my pl*n next??? Well my d*rling *nd one of my very closest friends Jen (Jigg* Boo) is coming to visit me this frid*y. We will st*y in b*ngkok for * couple of weeks *nd then he*d to Indi* (mid-M*rch).I c*nt w*it to see you Jig, *m well f*rkin excited! Soon *fter Jen le*ves, ill be flying to London to begin my life there. look forw*rd to seeing those of you in Europe. I do miss everyone very much, *nd im not just s*ying th*t. As ...

... with fresh flowers in a vase as the maid had been there on saturday to prepare it for our arrival. a late lunch at isaan choclec restaurant with cold singha beer and a jet-lag nap were all we needed to get right back into the swing of things back home in cha-am. it is a very tall swing and it sways very very slowly. in the evening we went out to the country club for a game of squash and a swim to ...

... left to find my bus to Cha-am. At the bus station, a sassy (maybe brash would suit you better?) monk who spoke English mocked my pronunciation of Cha-am: "Say (curtly), Cha! am! No Chaaaaaaaah aaaaaaam!" His eyes rolled while he laughed and pulled out his cell phone. Upon arriving at the center, located on the grounds of a Buddhist temple, I was introduced to a dozen humans, forty seven macaques (nasty guys!!), twenty gibbons, several lorises, a few langurs, five ...