A Singaporean [Quitter] in Maesai

Its another 2 and half hours flight back from Bangkok to Singapore and I had no videos in my netbook. So I have plenty of time to jote this down in Open office and post this while I'm back in SG. So it's going to be a long post for this one :)

The reason why I had no videos is because I had recently formatted my hdd in Thailand and installed Ubuntu on my netbook. Getting sick and tired of the Windows XP constants updates and slow slow slow boot time.

Installing Ubuntu Remix was on my mind for quite some time and it works well after the intial setup and updates. I dare say open source software is really getting much more mature since. True, I get less games but hey, I have tons of mame roms and linux has its own Mame emulator too!! :)

Enough of my techie stuff and want to write about my family and hobby again.. Being a seasoned photographer (ahem!) I still find it a great challenge to photograph my kids (or other kids). But once in a while you get gems like this photo of my son.

Wife says I could print these out and sell them :P Since young mothers-to-be like to adore their bedroom with cute baby photographs (this is especially so in Thailand) as they believe that by looking at cute baby photographs, they get to have cute babies too... (genes seems not to be in their equation though)..

Anyway, I think it might be a good idea too but with the current sophisticated pirates of the digital age ... I doubt I can make a fotune out of baby photos... :P

Talking about photography, these photos (click on them to see a bigger version) were way overdued. I took them once I saw them when I reached home in Maesai on the 18^th of Feb but kept on forgetting to post them. These are fruits beared on my tree. Its a family of star fruit but I have no idea what to call them in English, its called Ma Yom in Thailand. Its bloody sour though and they normally eat it with chili here. Pretty thirst quencing as it so sour that it makes you drool saliva even when start thinkin about popping one into your mouth :P. I was bloody delightful and a bit scary to see them when I saw them.. haha.. So much fruits like a mutated tree..

Our home grown chili padi is also overgrown with chilies.. But still not enough for my wife's appetite of them. No photos as all of them in wify stomach liao :P

Talking about food, my boy is officially allergic to wheat.. :S. According to our paediatrician in Chiang Rai hospital, she says its quite normal for kids below a year old to have some allergic reaction to wheat which contains a certain protein, Anyway, she adivse us to stay away from such products as boy boy's reactions to them is quite adverse. Medication was given to us to adminisiter once we see the symptoms so at least we can control the reaction. So we have been trying for a week and it seems wheat is the culprit. We fed boy boy apple, banana, strawberries and even egg yolks and he seems fine. One day we were a bit challenging and fed him some bread and immediately he start to go red again... :P so we gave him some medication and the reaction died down.. At least now we know what we cannot feed him :P

Girl girl is unusually well behaved for the time we spent here this time.. maybe its because Nai Nai (my mum) was here... hehe. She enjoys her companionship. I also spent some great time with her. Teaching her how to use her new Fuji Instanx Mini Camera and she is pretty good at the framing and composition. Will be scanning them and post them when I have the time. She also starts to like drawing and colouring (like me when I was young) So I printed some Disney characters for her to colour and she also drew some pictures.

Finally, on the day we went to Chiang Rai for boy boy's medical appointment. We drop by Amphur Mae Fa Luang again to check on wife's status. We chatted with the Pa Lat and he apologised to me and my wife that he could not keep his promise of getting my wife's citizenship on time as the Head of the Amphur has changed (the orginal one left in Decemember last year). He explained to us that since the new official has changed, he is constanly not avialable to process all the documents. He say that the queue is quite long as there are over 30,000 people currently waiting for the signature from the head. So to shorten our time, he advised us to write a letter to the head and exlpain our predicament. He had did all he could and I sincerely believe him, As I learnt from another official at the amphur office that there is a lot of pressure from other “parties” to kick this good chap out as he refuses to take bribes. (I had tried putting an envelope of money as gratitiude for his help but he rejected it outright and actually scolded my wife for doing this). Anyway I hope he stays on as the Pa Lat as I feel he is one of the rare good officials that I had ever met in Thailand. We have already wrote in and posted the letter so its waiting time again, Again and again, the Pa Lat assured us that my wife will get her citizenship since she has her birthcert. Its only a matter of time. I wonder our Singapore officials will be that assuring anot?



This actually happened this monday on the 22nd Feb.  Its Sports Day in school.  Well.. not really sports but games day.  It was supposed to be held in December last year before the end of the term but it was cancelled due to an outbreak of the flu virus in the Northern Region.  So this little games event was kind of like a "make up" for the last one.

The event started with a mini parade which the kids marched around the school block then proceed to the little field behind the school.  Plenty of games were involved.  The whole school were involved and the kids were spilt into 4 colour teams.  They were also spilt among the classes.  Girl girl was on the red team while her best pal Na Pat was on the purple team.  Below are some shots of the day. 

And ah boy was there to cheer his sister up..... more like staring at the kids though... hehe