Saturday Afternoon in Bamboo Forest

In the span of two days we went from sweat to sweaters. Fall made an abrupt but welcome arrival in Bamboo Forest.

I tutored my little neighbor yesterday in English. He is so quick to learn, and he is able to practically apply his knowledge immediately. For example, I said the word "nose," and he quickly pointed to his nose. And since he was there, he decided to pick his nose! What a smarty.

In the afternoon I rode my e-bike to a tea house, and along the way I saw a young man doing a market survey with a middle-age woman. This is only odd because they were standing in the middle of the road to do the survey. I had to swerve to dodge them.

I also had to swerve to dodge a lady talking on her cell phone. At least in this country it is regarded as a nuisance and is against the law.

But I got to the tea house, sat outside, drank the best latte I've ever had in this country that wasn't made by Starbucks (yes, Chinese tea houses now also serve coffee), and read a John Grisham book for a couple of hours. I seldom have time to do this, so it was a welcome respite, a lovely day in the Middle Kingdom.

The Kingdom of Thailand

I'm in Thailand for two weeks. Here are a few random shots from Bangkok.

Most properties have a little "god" booth like this one in the corner of the land, supposedly to protect the property.

This guy is burning incense and praying at an altar set up at the hospital. This hospital is super posh. Inside it has two Starbucks, two Au Bon Pair bakeries, McDonalds, several fancy Thai restaurants, hotel rooms, interiors that look like a 5-star hotel, and cheap, world-class medical care.

I was in Bangkok for a few days, but now I am in northern Thailand. Not vacation.

Boy oh boy

This boy is my two-year-old across-the-hall neighbor and the girl is his two-year-old friend ... at the boy's house. The girl is sweet and quiet. The boy has ants in his pants.

Somehow against my will I got roped into teaching English to this boy once a week, on Saturday mornings, for 30 minutes each time. While I am trying to teach him words like nose, dog, blue, foot, this is what he is doing:

riding his police car around the house. For the entire 30 minutes the only time he looked at me was when I took his picture. The rest of the time he zoomed down the hall, colored pictures, and acted like a monkey. I was pretty excited about his inattention, because it surely meant the teaching experiment was a total failure, and after a few weeks I would be relieved on my teaching duties.

That doggone kid. At the end of the half-hour session, he knew exactly how to say nose, dog, blue, foot, and all the other words I tried to teach him.

Don't you hate it when that happens?