Full Stomach = Happy Girl

First of all, the picture above is of the boats that idle down the Klong Saen Saep, a canal that I cross over whenever I walk to or from the city center from my apartment. I'm going to get on one ASAP.

Second, because I am truly a fat kid at heart, I must take another moment to chronicle my experiences with the food here. Unlike yesterday's lunchtime fiasco, today I met great success on the cuisine scene. Lemme break it down for all of you, as I am SURE you are DYING to hear what I put into my digestive system today.

Lunch: more meat on a stick. As to avoid disaster, this time went to a different street vendor and bought pork (moo), which is the country's number one protein. All I can say is mmmmm...oo. Get it?

Dinner: Ate at the restaurant downstairs from my FABULOUS new room.
-Fresh banana-pineapple smoothie? Check.
-Piping hot shrimp fried rice? Check.
-$2.85 check? CHECK.

To our right, we see a lady street vendor. Look closely and you will notice that she is putting meat on a stick onto that grill of hers. It is a phenomenon that knows no bounds in this crazy city.

Anyway... Onto other, less important moments of the day: went to my CELTA (Certificate in English Language Teaching for Adults) orientation this afternoon. I'm the youngest one in the course, but the fourteen other people in the course seem pretty cool. They were all fairly shocked I had been in Bangkok just two days (many of them have been living in Asia for years). Oh and tomorrow is my first teaching practice session, with real students taking english at my training center. Kind of scary, considering my "teaching practice" group is first dealing with "upper intermediate level" students, meaning complicated grammar. I don't think I even speak at an "upper intermediate level" of English. So we'll see how that one goes.

Lastly, after writing yesterday's blog I had my first experience riding on a tuk-tuk (crazy open air golf-cart/taxi things that squeeze through the Bangkok traffic with utter disregard for anyone's actual safety). I had a proud moment when I bartered the driver down from 100 (neung-roy) to 80 (baht-sip) baht, letting him know that my destination was glai-glai (really close by). I think homeboy was impressed with this blondie's Thai skills, although he did not show it when he almost killed both of us by nearly plowing into a huge bus while traveling in between two traffic lanes. I'm going to try to attach a video of my ride to this blog, but I am supremely technologically challenged, so if you don't see it, it wasn't meant to be.

So the video wasn't uploading (typical), but here's a pic of a "Tuk-Tuk"! Now imagine that colliding with a city bus -- no bueno.

Off to sleep in a bit, as I have my first full day of CELTA tomorrow!

On agenda for next blog: there is some serious political sh*t happening over here. Will expand when I'm in less of a food coma.

Lah gorn for now,

-Char Char