Now, I appreciate that I'm writing this entry a week late, but suspend the fact that you KNOW it's after Christmas, and IMAGINE that it's December 22nd. It's not a great entry, cos it was AGES ago now, but I like to be COMPLETE.
OK?
Here are your bullet points:
- I am now a brilliant chef, but a complete chilli wuss
- I could have been brilliant on the Krypton Factor
- I clearly look like I would like to go to 'Ping Pong shooow' in a 'tuk tuuuuuuuuuk'
My Thai cookery course was excellent - there were 9 of us in the class - 5 Aussie girls who've just finished Uni, a lady from New Zealand, a Dutch couple & me.
First off we head to the Market where our teacher talks us through all the merchandise. I steered well clear of the fish & seafood, natch. I was made to sniff the shrimp paste which nearly made me gag. Ick.
I made 6 dishes: Chicken & Cashew Nuts, Spring Rolls, Tom Kar Gai (Chicken & coconut milk soup), Green curry paste, Green curry & Mango & Sticky rice for desert. Yum.
It all tasted amazingly brilliant (obviously), but unfortunately I only ate my first 2 dishes cos I was then too full!!
Sunday I was up ridiculously early to go to Flight of the Gibbon, which is a series of zip wires through the jungle. I'd always wanted to go on the zip wire on the Krypton Factor when I was a kid, so the opportunity to go on ELEVEN was too good to miss. I was joined on the trip by Dave & Suan from Singapore & their kids Dan & Sam, and Eamon and Becky who live in India. We travelled up into the hills above Chiang Mai which were FREEZING, got strapped into very fetching safety harnesses and off we went. It was such fun, flying through the trees, using what looked like a bamboo water diviner as a brake. The last drop was about 50 foot of abseiling straight down. Brilliant. I am so turning into Xtreme Sports Claire. Instead of my usual Pathetic Wuss Claire.
I then had an extremely strenuous afternoon of sunbathing, massage, sleeping and shopping. My life is so difficult at the moment :-)
On the Monday, I took a flight down to Bangkok, then headed off to Julie & Chris's for pre-christmas excitement. And ice-creams. I also collected my parcel, in which was the fantastic advent calendar of messages that Jules had collected for me. I was so so touched. The kids all helped me open the messages and eat the chocolates.
I then headed to Khao San Road in Bangkok for my first taste of true Backpacking Bangkok as opposed to Ex-Pat Bangkok.
Roxane had booked me into a guesthouse at a bargain price of 150 baht (about 3 quid), and I met up with her and the others for dinner and to make our plans for Christmas in Cambodia.
So, here are the cast of characters for the next part of the journey:
Roxane - who you've met before in the Ko Lanta entry - she's 24 and is Australian/British/American. She lives in Canterbury most of the time though and is an aspiring writer. Oooh.
Kathryn - from Surrey is 25 and used to work for Merrill Lynch. She would very much like to adopt a squillion street children.
Ollie - from Leamington Spa, is 29 and used to work at Prodrive, where Mazda do the RX8 track days (for those who don't know me THAT well, I used to have one)
Ben - from Cornwall is 21 and has just graduated in genetics from Portsmouth Uni. His friendliness is the reason we're all TOGETHER.
And I shall leave you in suspense for the next excting installment :-)
MERRY CHRISTMAS :-)
