Bangkok Flood Photos

What can you say? Lots of water, and crocodiles. We haven't had any rain in a few days now, so hopefully, the water will start to recede now.

Bangkok Floods

People have been asking me just how badly Bangkok is flooding, well....

Thailand

I know you guys think I make a lot of this shit up, but I don't. What other country in the world, can you have a 10 ft croc taking a peek inside your front door to see if there are any goodies laying around.

New York Comic Con

The New York Comic Convention has begun! There are more comic books and comic book fans there than I could probably even imagine. I would like to go there, just to meet some of the artists to ask them questions about the "how to's" of what they do. I know it would help me improve my t-shirt designs.

This year is really special because RedBubble has a booth there. They took some of our designs to show off to promote business. You can't see all of them from these few photos, but judging from the chatter, they chose some really great designs from some of the most talented artists on the bubble.

And last, but not least is the money shot. Look at the "RedBubble.com" banner there. You see the row of designs along the bottom of it? Look closer at the first design in line. Yup! It's the rabbit. Rabbit Hand Shadow made it all the way to NYC. Not bad coverage considering he's less than a year old, and made it there all the way from Buffalo Biscuit, Thailand. My 15 minutes of fame at last! Hoot, whistle, and applaud at will!

Special thanks and a hearty handshake to OneTonShadow for getting the rabbit on the NYC Comic Con deal!

Plan 9 From Thailand

On October 11, a fleet of some 1,000 boats will help push water from the Chao Phraya River into the sea fast, Science and Technology Minister Plodprasop Suraswadi said Saturday.

At the boat project launch held at Nonthaburi's Pakkred Pier with 40 boats attending, Plodprasop said that this voluntarybase project would help drain water three times faster, from two knots to six knots, and prevent floodwater from pouring into Bangkok City. He said the 1,000boat fleet would push water down to the sea on October 11, as to help lower flood in the Chao Phraya Riverside provinces such as Sing Buri, Angthong and Ayutthaya.

* Apparently the river goddess wasn't listening, so here's Plan B. This just keeps getting better!

Thai Flood Strategy

Translation:

"Most Urgent: Memo

Office : Bangkok (Office of Permanent Secretary of Bangkok Metropolitan Authority Tel. 0 2224 xxxx or Tel. xxxx Fax. xxxx)
No.: Kor Thor 0403/1093 Date: 7th of October 2011

Subject: Invitation to the Brahman water-lowering ceremony

To Directors and Departmental Heads of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration

The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration has arranged a Brahman water-lowering ceremony on Saturday the 8th of October 2011 at 14.39 at the Bangkok City Pillar Shrine to beg to Kang Ka, the River Goddess, to lower the flood in Bangkok rapidly.

Therefore, we invite you to attend this ceremony with the agenda as follows:
14.39 hrs. Worship Ceremony (Barhma Ceremony)
15.09 hrs Chanting Ceremony

Meet at 14.00 hrs at the Bangkok City Pillar Shrine Dress Thai dress or polite dress

For your information"

This is their best idea?

English Camp 2011

Ahhhh.... Time for another Penpattana School English Camp! *GROAN!* I'm just kidding, it really isn't that bad. We just divide the kids into groups of grades 1-3 for Saturday, and 4-6 for Sunday. My team and I came up with a few games for them to play, and the rest just turns out as it will. The hardest part for me is the few minutes I have to talk to the entire group the first thing in the morning. Everyone is watching as I try to fire up 500 little monsters that can't understand a word I'm saying. I have no idea if the students really do learn any English from any of this, but they appear to have fun.

Luckily, there are always a few kids in the front row that will try anything, so I can interact with them to get a few laughs.

This game was like an alphabet tic-tac-toe game. They had to throw paper airplanes into little boxes to get letters to make words. I am trying to explain to 40 6 yr olds how to make a paper airplane.
This was the best part of the games. The losers had to do the chicken dance! They all line up, and the winning team sings one of the many silly little nonsense songs they have, while the losing team does this weird little dance to it. The words to the song are something like......

"Chicken 5 baht
Chicken 5 baht
Put it on a stick
Put it on a stick
Cook it now
Cook it now
Very very hot!
Very hot!
Very hot!"

And last but not least, my fearless team. They always give me 3 - 4 teachers to help with the games. Usually, at least one of them speaks a little English, so it goes pretty well. They do a great job of keeping the kids in line and focused. There were 9 different games, so we only had each group for about 30 minutes.

R.I.P. Thuy

One of my M-2 students was shot the other day. Thuy was a pretty average student. But, he never caused much trouble, he did his lessons, and paid attention most of the time. He seemed to be a pretty happy kid. I can't ask for much more that that here. His classmates and I will miss him.

I asked around about what had happen, but only found the normal clueless smiley face blank stares and gibberish riddled answers. Some of his classmates said that apparently, someone was angry with his mother, so a few of the local dirt bags rolled up and shot her. He was shot because he was there too. I can't imagine what she could have done to deserve that in the little one horse town of Koksaleung. And I certainly can't understand why a teenage boy had to die because of it too.

But, that is the way things are here. They can't handle any type of confrontation, or the mental stress of actually working out a solution to a problem. Just pay someone off, or pay someone to stab it in the back. If you can't cheat and win, corrupt it beyond recognition.

I know what your next question is, and the answer is "no". Of course the police haven't arrested anyone, nor do they have any suspects. That's not the way it's done here. I am sure everyone involved in this has already been paid for their effort, or their lack of effort. This will just fade away, like they always do. I'll be glad when election time is over.