Feeling in the mood for something refreshing I wandered down to the market to purchase some vegetables, fruit and limes.
I became aware that there were a lot of trotters on sale.
For some reason there were pigs with 2 heads one tail and six trotters.
Try as I could it appeared impossible to buy trotters without the head!
So we ended up with two trotters, one head and one tail.

Out of this came two stunning dishes

Firstly

Brains with Mango.

I am partial to brains, which as you know are difficult to acquire as a result of the UK food police. On bearing them home k, of course, reminded me that we had consumed Cervelles de Veau every week in Beaune. Well there are no veals here; but Cervelles de Porc will do.
This is simple as pie. Bring the brains very slowly to a simmer in some salted water. Turn off the heat and leave for 15 minutes or so. Peel two ripe yellow mangoes. Slice off the flesh into cubes and put in a bowl with some salad leaves,. Drain the brains and slice lightly; add to the salad. Make a decent dressing with lime or lemon rather than vinegar, though a touch of balsamic vinegar will be pleasant. Toss lightly. The sweet sour of the Mangoes and the creaminess of the brains is one of those marriages made beyond our world. You can buy quite decent Mangoes from Pakistan in Southall and elsewhere.

Then the Tete de Porc

I had the butcher chop the head in four-minding he did not smash the brains and keeping the tongue in one piece.
In as huge a pot as you have, put the four pieces of head together with a trotter or two, with a handful of Salt, another handful of Crushed Peppercorns, a bottle of white wine, a couple of carrots and onions, 4 Large crushed corms..nb corms not cloves of garlic, a bunch of parsley, another of coriander and one of celery…in Europe, or at least outside of Asia you will have to use some sticks of coarse celery.
Bring to the boil and simmer for maybe a couple of hours.
Remove the pieces from the liquid
When cool enough to handle-and it is jolly hot on the inside!--Remove all skin, meat, gooey bits, eyes, tongue, ears etc. from the head and other gooey bits from the trotters. Give the bones to the dogs; but in stages.
Reserve and allow to cool properly.
Strain the cooking liquid and toss away all the vegetable and other debris. Return the liquid to a pan and check the taste. It should be quite winey/lemony. Add as appropriate another bottle of wine/the juice of some limes or lemons together with a stick of lemon grass, sliced, a good 2 inches of fresh pink ginger, an inch of galingale, some more salt and peppercorns together with two 2 inch threads of green peppercorns and about 4 fresh chopped chilis. Bring this mixture back to the boil and reduce until you have about 500ml.
In the meantime separate all the meaty and gooey bits into their several categories. Take the tongue and slice lengthways into strips. Take the ears and slice into 1cm slices. Ditto the nose/snout.

Cut a red pepper into rings and get some cucumber slices. Oriental cucumbers are, of course, pathetic so yours will look better. Find a couple of handfuls of peas and a bunch of mint. Whatever as long as fresh and green.

In a decent shaped dish, (this is going to be turned out to serve) place the red pepper rings and the cucumber on the bottom. Strew over the mint and peas. Then build layers with all the meat and gooey bits. The point is, of course, to decorate the bottom and sides so that you end up with a jellied and colourful creation. You could, of course, go overboard here, but all I want is a bit of pattern and color. Not Tete de Porc Matisse after all.
When the bowl is nearly full…! Check the stock. It should be pretty formidable as it will lose flavour when cold.
Strain the stock. In fancy times you can clarify the stock with egg white etc. But I can’t be bothered
Fill the bowl of pork with stock.
Place in the fridge until set. I prefer to leave overnight.
In the morning, when you can face it, place the bowl in a pot of hot water until the jelly starts to melt at the edge. Quickly remove and put a serving plate on the top of your bowl. Invert the whole thing and make sure the Tete drops out. And voila you have some 2kg of Tete de Porc of which in a couple of days you will be heartily sick. But it keeps a while and can be fed to unwanted New Year guests with a Salad of Potatoes and anything sour, bitter or tart you fancy. I like Chicory and Piccallil! Cornichons and pickled beetroot are good too. Some decent scofa or other wholemeal bread helps.
Thais look at me as though madder than they thought I was; but I notice a lot of it has been eaten, though with the addition of a lot of ferocious Nam Priks and Nam Jims, thereby defeating the whole point of my laboriously contrived subtle flavours.!


Oh In case you have not got the scale this IS a 30cm Dinner plate!

PS
I hear Mr Floyd is opening a restaurant in Phuket. The slurps will be a bit expensive and below par I should think!

And The Christmas Menu was:
Restaurant Kunjana/????????? ??????

Menu/????

Christmas Day 2006
???????????? 2549

Canapes Foie Gras et
Canapes Saumon Fume

Spaghetti Sauce Arrabiata

Pizza Sicilienne

Barbequed Prawns

Canard a L’Orange

Grand Aioli Pommes de Terre et Legumes

Salade Vert

Pudding Christmas

AND
as a commentary on that.............

The Pate de Foie Gras, as with other things, came from the supermarket in Siam Paragon. 3 Tubs 300g at 1GBP per tub...Sensational...mostly eaten by Elodie.
The Saumon was Norwegian..same source. 600g at 7GBP

Spaghetti has to be dry but it is Agnesi so OK. The sauce easy to make....pleasantly hot!

Pizza, too, the Sicilienne coming mainly from a large tub of anchovies..known here as Plaa Raa Falang...ie European fermented Fish. Even found some 'Real Mozzarella'

I heard there were 2 kilos of prawns..but I never saw them!!

The duck.......Best duck since the days of Whitebrook...astonishingly full of flavour....like remembering chickens, remembering ducks....frozen again from Paragon...had I known would have brought a bagfulllll..
Oh..cost of duck...fatty...but little fat..about 2.5kg+ =3.5GBP

Aioli ..Can get decent Olive Oil here

Salad too..plenty of balsamic vinegar in Foodland

Christmas pud from Waitrose...still to find an explanation of why you can buy Waitrose brands in Central!...Pretty good. Doused in half a bottle of Martell...and lit...Westerners present cried with nostalgia!

Crackers, too....Too lazy to make Mince Pies...

Drinks really the only problem. Had plenty of Gin and Campari and a bottle of Lanson, from UK, but ther rest Aussie rubbish, Heineken and doubtful rice spirits..not so good. Cost, without drink 30GBP for 10 people and a few hedge crawlers

As I write Kunjana is spieling away on her radio station about Christmas, life in England and beauty tips for the freezing weather! It is mid day...just taken my blouson off!!

We managed not to be awoken before dawn! Ballet and Angelina together with finger paints and make up are tout ce qu'il y a de chic!

Here we are beginning 'South Fork' Chiang Mai. House of 220 square metres!!

Christmas Eve
daddy has been to BKK. Traffic jams, Fires and Ferraris on sale in the Malls!
We, on the other hand, have been dancing again.


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E's school, is, of course a bit confused about how to deal with these princesses. However some suitable catholic extras have been provided for photo opportunities:

It is COLD...jackets in the morning!
We need not worry about fog...well except where the FOREX market is concerned. Thais managed to wipe 20% off the stock market in a day trying to stem the appreciation of the Baht. Decision reversed by teatime..damage done. FT not impressed.Thai Finance Minister: No-one to blame...of course not.I believe 10% is a crash...

So we sit like Romans inspecting entrails to see if there are any auguries for the future. Saw one 'Securities' outfit predicting 25B to the dollar (35 today down from 40 a few months ago)...Now that would rid Thailand of Americans!

So Christmas and New Year, 10 days in Samui, 10 days in Bali and the building of the South Fork Ranch in Chiang Mai..my we shall be busy!

You will ask: Where have you been?
Here!

Songkhran castles



We went to the hot seaside





I was 4



We went home to the seaside



And saw Granny and Grandpa



Gwynedd Council built The Great Wall of China in My Garden





My bears sleep in the Fennel



I went to School



More Crabs!



My seaside gang



Daddy found his picture

















Byron's book was published!









#














Bonfires

























Mali and I went to school in our nightdresses

















Here we are back among the orchids


















Christmas again



















And back to school..again!

So! We are in Wales...again
The sea rolls in and out. The garden is teeming with fledglings including some 24 baby pheasants which have been sitting on K's shoulders!
Plus ca change
Except the new road looks like the Great Wall and is probably viewable fom the moon, too.

More good reasons for not living in the UK!!

Fed Up with crosswords and Sudoku?
Solve this one for Easter:

POST-ELECTION IMPASSE
Can we get out of this jam?

Published on April 11, 2006

Constitution experts say only way to sort out mess is to nullify April 2 result and call fresh general election in 120 days

Thai democracy is facing a logjam, and the way out may require an almost impossible decision from the Election Commission (EC) - or another very controversial ruling from the Constitution Court.

Questions have been raised over the EC's legal authority to hold the April 23 by-elections since the April 2 election had created many "illegitimate" winning MPs. The EC might also

have violated Article 157 of the Constitution by inviting candidates from other parties to stand in the by-elections in 39 constituencies, where the April 2 candidates had failed to win 20 per cent of the registered votes.

The Democrats have submitted a complaint to the Administrative Court asking it to issue an injunction on the April 23 by-elections on the grounds that the EC does not have the legal authority to accept new candidates.

The Democrats have argued that the EC should have held

the by-elections with the existing candidates until results are achieved.

Supposing this sticky problem is solved, then can Parliament convene with 499 MPs because one of the party-list members of Thai Rak Thai has resigned?

Yet another ugly prospect of the new Parliament is that it would be made up almost entirely of Thai Rak Thai members - the opposition would consist of a solitary MP.

Assuming the April 23 by-elections proceed but fail to fill the required 400 constituency seats, can Parliament be convened? These legal and constitu-tional problems require tough decisions by the EC - which has been accused of holding the by-elections in a way that favours the ruling party - and an eventual ruling by the Consti-tution Court, no matter how contentious it might be.

A former constitutional drafter said the political impasse has reached a critical point and at least two drastic steps must be seriously considered to resolve the deadlock.

Asking not to be identified, he said the first step is for the EC to swallow its pride and nullify the April 2 general election because the unfinished polls have already faced too many legal and legitimacy issues, which are beyond rescue efforts.

Second, the authorities concerned should hold a new election in 120 days to allow all three former opposition parties - as well as Thai Rak Thai and other new parties to stand.

"The 120-day postponement would remove the locks on Thai Rak Thai MP candidates joining another party to stand for the new round of elections.

"In addition, the new round of polls would take place around August after all the grand ceremonies to mark His Majesty the King's 60 years on the throne are completed," he said.

As for the April 2 election and consequent by-elections, he said: "Eventually, this whole exercise will become a complete mishap and waste of taxpayers' money. It is beyond any rescue efforts.

"The road ahead is just a dead-end because the whole election has been broken in too many areas. It's like a severely impaired person," he said.

"It's no longer possible to circumvent the laws or to misinterpret the intents of the Constitution in order to fix these problems."

"For instance, there would be at least six constituencies in southern Thailand where MP candidates will not get the minimum 20 per cent of votes required to win the still-vacant House seats.

"Second, it's illegal for the EC to allow new candidates to stand for the election re-runs in many constituencies since only the original candidates who failed to win on April 2 are qualified to run.

"Third, an MP candidate, who was disqualified for April 2, is not eligible to run [in the by-election], but she is being allowed to do so.

"Fourth, it's not possible to have a 500-MP House when the Thai Rak Thai's party-list MP candidates stand at 99, instead of the required 100, since all other contesting parties were too small and did not get enough votes to earn any party-list MP seats on April 2."

As a result, it's now highly likely that the April 2 polls and the April 23 by-elections will not yield a result to allow the opening of a new Parliament.

Given these problems, the source suggested it would be better for General Vasana Puemlarp, chairman of the EC, to consider seeking an audience with HM the King to resolve the impasse by nullifying the April 2 election and consequent polls.

That move and holding a new election in 120 days could be sought by the EC chairman under Article 7 of the Constitution.

Likhit Dhiravekhin, a Thai Rak Thai party-list candidate, said the Constitution Court might need to rule in favour of a new Parliament so that the country can move ahead.

Speaking at a seminar held at Thammasat University yesterday, Likhit said he was well aware of the legal, constitutional and legitimacy problems besetting the new Parliament but in the end the Constitution Court might have to issue a ruling against the Constitution itself.

"In the end, the way out for the country is to embrace an option that may run against the principle of the Constitution, otherwise the logjam cannot be resolved. Then we have to remind ourselves of Alexander the Great's remark that 'We have to commit a minor mistake in order to protect the greater good'. We have to do it because there is no other way out," Lihkit said.

Kittisak Prokati, a law lecturer from Thammasat University, said the EC did not possess the legal authority to hold the April 23 by-elections because it had breached the law by calling for candidates from other political parties to stand.

The EC had to hold the election with the existing candidates.

But this would depend on the Administrative Court's decision as the Democrat Party has filed a complaint with it.

If the Administrative Court were to issue an injunction to block the by-elections in the 38 constituencies, excluding Nonthaburi, they might not take place.

"If the April 23 by-elections do not take place, Parliament cannot be convened. Then the EC may ask the caretaker Cabinet to issue a royal decree to ask for a new election.

"Once we have a new election, then democracy can proceed," he said.

Trakoon Meechai, a political lecturer at Chulalongkorn University, said eventually all the 400 constituency seats would be filled. But the question was, how to fill the 100 party-list seats because Dr Premsak Piayura had resigned, he said.

If the number of MPs did not reach 500 as required for Parliament to convene, the caretaker government must submit the issue to the Constitution Court for a ruling.

Yuwarat Komolvej, a former election commissioner, said another round of by-elections could be held if the April 23 election did not produce enough MPs. But it had to be done quickly.

"If there are not enough MPs, the EC can make a case of it then send the matter to the Senate so that the Senate president can resubmit the matter to the Constitution Court for a final ruling," he said.

Political Desk

The Nation

April 2006
Sawankhalok

The holiday season, the dreaded Songkran of water drenching notoriety, approaches.
Elodie has taken to the bath on her own and with her sister!!??




Sawankhalok is brimming with people. The markets almost impassable. There are new motorbikes and pickups everywhere. The hidden wealth of this town never ceases to astonish. Two pieces of information. There is a shop for sale in the main road. This is quite unusual. K went to investigate. Emerges the whole of the main road, on both sides belongs to the State Railway of Thailand. So there are no freeholds only leases. It then emerges that all the land from the river to the main road belongs to the Water Authority….so not much freehold land in Sawankhalok. No wonder what we bought was expensive. Then. K talking to the owner of the ‘hardware stores’ which sells everything from screws to building steel..We turn over about 20m B a year ie about 300,000 GBP, which means they are taking a profit on sales of some 2500GBP or 165000 Baht a month. Average wage in Thailand? C 16000Baht a month!! At the most..that would include BKK; for the rest of the country less than 9000Baht a month.

Of all the places in the UK it reminds me of Shropshire. Fertile land explored, developed, used, industrialised over several centuries. It so happened they developed a ceramics industry here too, but I suppose Etruria was not so far from Ironbridge and Manafon, was it?

It has been a bizarre week. Both the computers broken. One sent off to Phitsanulok to be mended, the other binned. One in Phitsanulok apparently ‘stolen’ who knows in Thailand. However Acer Thailand produced a replacement in 48 hours, so here I sit!

We are having endless lorry loads of earth shipped in, at 5GBP a lorry-20 so far- to raise the height of the land above floodwater level. I call it the Canute operation. Cannot see it will work. But it might alleviate the flood damage. Alternatively it might deviate the water from its natural path into the house!
Reminds me of all those woodcuts of busy Japanese altering the face of the earth. However here we live and to avoid inundation we need to do it

Elodie has discovered glue, paper, glitter, shapes, scissors etc. So the house is awash with off cuts, sticky floors and glit!

I went down the market and got some pig’s hearts and courgettes which will make decent grilled hors d’oeuvres. Then there is more gazpacho and what is known as Pak Nam Prik ie. Boiled, steamed or grilled vegetables and a decently fiery dipping sauce.
K came back with two sheepskins which she tells me she is putting in the car-well that will help to counter the ferocious air conditioning

We have just been doing the final costings of the ‘sala’ !:

4m x 3m building 3m high
4 pillars
Steel Roof, insulated with heat repelling foil and ‘provencal’ cement tiles
Bargeboards, drainpipes and gutters
Raised 1m Cement Floor with Ceramic Duragres Tiles
Cost including all materials and labor and decorators finish and that is 3 persons for 10 days and 10 hour days too!: c 650GBP
What would that have cost in the UK? 10,000GBP? Think of the labor cost, never mind the materials-best quality cement , sand tiles and steel etc.
Oh and we did not need planning permission or to have the attentive ‘services; of ‘Building regulations officers’!
Though with the house the ‘Council’ will draw up the plans. 100GBP for full architectural drawings, elevations, specifications , and whatever other ‘permits’ might be needed,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,expected April28..and then on our way!!

So now we move in to a DE-TOXin period..though I doubt it. I should think there will be much string pulling behind the arras.
I don't think many people have really clocked that we had an election with a one party list and some 20 million people managed to get out of bed to vote NO ie anyone but the one party candidate. Can't see that happening in many 'de-mockeracies'.
Anyway it is too hot to think really. We are watching the guys starting to build the house, and are doing the 'sala' or garden room-sitting -it is just under 40 degrees in the shade so well into the 100s in the open sun-welding the roof trusses at 13.00!!
What is one to eat when its like this? Cannot buy a decent salad-no fish-no olives. I made a startlingly good gazpacho, but would not want to eat it every day. Thai food seems cloying rather than cooling or invigorating. Have tried vindaloos and biryanis, but again not entirey satis. No yogurt. Locals just munching their way through endless bowls of incredibly tedious noodles.

Life here increasingly mad
Asia Times thinks there will be another Baht Crisis as a consequence of Toxin's handling of what passes for the economy
His hired thugs are throwing chairs at Democrats in CNX
Might well be tanks on the street come Monday!!
At which point I suppose there might be divine/royal intervention
One would have thought that generally philanthropy in the national interest was not a concept too alien from 'politicians'...but clearly such an idea shows I know nothing!!

February and March 2006

The months are lost somewhere on the Acer which has failed to cope with the fluctuations of Thai electricity!
We are busy designing houses
And
With not too much bated breath we wait to see whether the appalling Toxin can be prised from office.
Even if he is bullied out and sued and asset stripped and jailed..all of which would be good..I cannot see that there is much to replace him. But one might be wrong and that what is called democracy might prevail..overnight!!??

Whatever it is probably better than what passes for democracy in the US..
I like this one:

The US Empire

The Sawankhalok house will be started at the end of March. Chiang Mai ..well when we can agree!

In the meantime it is stupidly hot..38+ and I have taken to eating Tapas. Shame there is no sherry!
Elodie has learnt to ride a bike on her own, take showers on her own and generally tell everyone she does not need them
Her school report said she was wonderful but that her fingernails were a bit grubby
It appeared they wanted her to be deprived of her friends as she could not trace Thai letters as well as them…and they been doing it for two years.
I am for closing all schools, sacking all teachers,…and a good many universities and finding some way to empower communities to educate themselves!..and I don’t mean home education!!
A propos of which TOT ie BT Thailand has come up not just with Broadband but Wireless Broadband. So we have it in the ricefields but not in the rich farmlands of Pen LLyn!!

And we went to stay in a hotel in Pai..and the wash basins were a fairly decent size

January 2006
Sawankhalok

Woken by an even more dire musical cacophony than usual. Town Council’s attempt to inspire us all with the spirit of New Year?
7/11 has provided residents with a present.. they will now only sell alcohol between 11 and 14 and 17 and 24. These mad hours were dreamed up by some ‘Revolutionary Council’ some 30+ years ago and have been lighted upon by the publicly puritanical Toxin as worth enforcing, also the bizarre situation whereby the racks that used to house packets of cigarettes are now covered with a sign in huge letters..WE SELL CIGARTETTES (sic)…well of course you do. I see the Chinese grocers have, as yet, taken no notice..but after all 7/11 belongs to a chum of Toxin’s. This nonsense has been going on for some months elsewhere but has now unfortunately reached us!

The children have stripped the Christmas Tree of tinsel and silver balls; the tinsel is being worn by E as ‘Rapunzel Hair’ for which the dog has a penchant thus reducing E to tears whenever he gets the chance to make off with a strand; the balls are, of course, being worn as earrings! So that’s Epiphany come early this year.!

I have put a piece of loin of Sanglier to marinade which should account for supper and a few other dishes. Am not feeling too enthusiastic about food..nor indeed a lot of things Thai!

I ordered seeds and potatoes for Sarn from Thompson and Morgan which told me what I was really wanting to do. I chose some Charlotte and Belle de Fontenay Potatoes and some Artichokes. I thought I would pass on the Pink Fir Apple ones this year; they did not crop that heavily last year. And then peas and beans for E who enjoys picking them, together with Sunflowers and Pumpkins for fun and some odd shaped other gourds, also a variety of Salad Mustards etc.! They are out of those Black Russian tomatoes I found in Leclerc in Chalon; but growing tomatoes in Sarn is a bit of a labour of love without a greenhouse. We might well not get there, this year, til the end of May so have to choose things that will come through quickly. Had to leave all those pumpkins the year before last and they had been 5 months a-coming, and had to leave the pumpkins and peas in Beaune. E is growing, here, Jaoying flowers ie Rapunzel flowers..I think they are Lavatera and Butternut Squash, all of which are looking better than my previous attempts with Courgettes!

E is very keen to get back to ‘my seaside/my sandy house’ too! Funny as I should have thought she thought she had more fun here with children and outdoors all day..but she tells me she misses her ‘jumping’ ie. trampoline and her prawns! But the magic of Sarn is very powerful. K of course does not want to go as she is now busy; we might therefore go a deux! Not this month, though E is quite keen, but has been dissuaded by reports of rain and cold and no going in the garden. I shall go alone for R’s birthday. We have a good party planned and dinner, probably at Chez Max for old time’s sake, though it will hardly be like Kew. Maybe we won’t try and go to Bibendum instead. Or somewhere even more a la mode? Gordon Ramsay? Zuma? Nobu? R probably happier with a 2 foot Pizza at Ask. Whatever; it will no doubt ‘cost’ me.

2006 will, of course, bring the building of the long heralded ‘Road’. This promises to be a saga. We are not sure whether we would even want to be there while it is building. But I guess we will So I am going to ‘the sandy house’ to meet the road contractors. I am not convinced this is 100% necessary but in the light of experience better to let them know you are watching! Have tried to get a ‘conservation architect’, whatever that is, to come too; but having sent them a whole load of schedules etc. they are too idle to reply. Well it was the week before Christmas.
Why is it impossible to find builders/architects etc? Reading Levitt’s Freakonomics over Christmas and his explanations of why Hookers earn more than Architects I probably found the answer to that.

I suppose it is already amazing that Sarn has been there, undisturbed, for the 40 years or so we have had it. One of its great attractions was that it was so bosky, so hidden and no-one interested in it. The worst thing that has happened, far worse than the road in itself, is the sudden ‘interest’ in it as a house, a property, a museum, the dwelling of ‘famous’ people. Please would you all just go away!? But I fear this will not happen. So it will be dragged into the encircling tentacles of conserved places. All bulldozed and reconstructed with disabled access, walks, dog loos and signage.

K continues amazed, too, we have been together for 6 years; well I am fairly amazed too! What a lot of amazement. But it has been an unusual time. I believe it is the doing of the magic child. There are those who agree and those who regard me as dotty, well dottier than ever! Quick, quick. I was reminded by A into thinking about years past. How many people I still know and talk or write to from 40 years ago! She asked me what happened to EH, the soda heiress, I don’t know about that. Went off to SOAS and then where? Married a Lebanese gent at some stage, but I think that did not last. Somewhere I have a whole bundle of her letters written in outsize writing on A1 paper. Such are the instructional results of Benenden.
A says she is freezing in Perthshire. Well! That is a good reason for me for avoiding Wales. Whatever these fading years bring I do not want to be freezing in the UK, even for E’s sake. I am sure we can do better. RS and MEE of course lived in that house, Sarn I mean, with the temperature inside at 33F and outside at 32F. With RS railing on about:
‘Love in a cottage on bread and a crust/ is, God help us, ashes, dust.’ Quite.

So the year promises architectural dreams
Not often you get the chance to build a new house, literally from scratch. No preconceptions, no stylistic or other constraints. Just money of course. I would like to build a state of the art eco-house. With everything working! Not sure you can do this in LOS. Only eco house I saw here incredibly ugly and expensive.
So we will probably end up with a 21C concrete and glass thing. At least, unless we get it wrong, the space will optimally arranged. We will have a kitchen to live in, workrooms, a bathroom to die for and terraces and open air rooms; E will have her own space; and at a cost of 30K! What would that cost in Europe? 4 times? Probably more!

What are the nicest houses I have been in?
Probably the Merricks’ Beach House at Pett Level, just a huge room and kitchen with panoramic views of the English Channel and small bedrooms underneath; the whole thing on stilts ..like a Thai House!!
The Blue House in Phuket, just one room and a huge covered terrace gazing out over the foliage and the Andaman Sea. If it had been permanent one would have spent a bit of money on a kitchen…no more. So many houses gathering their charm and viability from location.
Sarn. A hopeless house of small dark rooms and odd levels but made nearly priceless by its location.
PT’s house near Bedford: a huge hexagonal living space with a corridor round it and bedrooms off..most odd in that part of the world.
A’s beautiful long room and angled kitchen.

I don’ t think I was ever in an old house I wanted to live in. Charming from the outside, but useless for living inside. Look at the houses we have lived in. Manafon. Beautiful place, freezing house. Eglwys Fach, horrible little villa, Aberdaron, again a beautiful place but really just 2 up 2 down, Sarn!, Middle Barton.. useless collection of rooms, Whitebrook, 2 up one down and no sun all winter stuck on the edge of a hill, Kew, nasty little end of terrace with no room to move-now presumably £600K
Liked the T house near Hastings..rambling on slightly different levels.
All I want is a large drawing room, a large kitchen..that was the failing of PT’s house but the she did not want to cook! Some small rooms to work in..computers, offices, libraries, studios, A big bathroom with plants and spas, a bedroom with a balcony, some open spaces upstairs for the breeze and downstairs the same..well I have already ruled out cold climates!

And for E?
Well we will stick with the little school here for a while, go to ‘my sandy house’ for the summer, come back, and then eventually move to Chiang Mai. It seems the best solution. We ruled out BKK for its pollution. No place for a 4 year old. CNX is not much better but we have got away from it to the East. I looked long at Phuket; after all I love the sea; but I could not see how we were all going to manage there. No roots, nothing. One good school but then what? Probably a good idea for property speculation. Too many foreigners in too small a space. You tend to forget how small Phuket is about 50 x 30 kilometres. Look at the size of Corsica, by comparison. And the whole Eastern seaboard a swamp. Just the beaches from Nai Yang to Nai Harn. Woud have to live in Phuket Town. Anywhere decent by the sea, just ageing oldies in expensive apartments, large Islam population and charabancs full of Taiwanese tourists. No thanks. Samui small, too, and a rat race of speculation. No schools. I think neither of us are interested in living in a holiday resort! Just go for fun and sea and sand like normal holidays.
At least CNX is only 35 minutes on the plane or 3 hours drive from Sawankhalok. And outside the city acres of mountains and waterfalls, valleys and forests. Might even manage to get into that valley I found above SanKhampaeng! Got to be better.?! I hope so. Though plenty of tourists there is enough room to avoid them.

It is really a matter of ‘facilities’. If I want E to play the piano, go swimming and to gymnastics, have a crowd to grow up with, hang out with…That was why we were looking at France and then Spain. If pressed I would probably still go for that; certainly if I was alone; but I am very keen not to take away her other half. I meet half kids who can’t speak a European Language and half kids who can’t speak Thai. Its crazy.
So we have to find an infant school and a further school-at least that seems to exist. There is a very clear philosophy, however misguided!
Must live and learn with Thai kids of all income levels. Once you have learnt to deal with that we can move on to a place where, though the children may come from all over the world and be rich you can learn what is needed to pass the exams go to University and on into the world. That is not going to happen via Thai secondary school nor a Thai University! It will cost; so the padlocks are on the coffers already. If it happens here! In Europe? Well as always where? That I like Galicia and the Peloponnese is hardly any reason to go and live there. Though I should think nothing wrong with life in Vigo. As I have reflected on our European adventures it looked like the best of all the places we went to. Sure a bit far from anywhere, but better than Wales, Brittany, Galway by a long shot. Probably a lot better than Sicily and Venice too. I speak English, Spanish Chinese and Thai. I can read music and write XHTML and C. I am confident, pretty and have plenty of friends. That would do! Well, no doubt, until it comes to boys.
01/01/06