I never thought it was possible to sustain an injury from an air-conditioning unit. Unless one fell on you. That would probably cause quite a lot of pain. Actually, that thought is comforting me somewhat as I'm sure I'd be in a far more dire situation if that was how our air-conditioner had injured me. However, it is day two and I am still in pain. Not as much as yesterday, but it hurts nonetheless and I not good with any sort of pain. On the upside, I'm sure that without The Husband's help I would be in considerably more pain than I am now. Last night he pummeled my shoulder and upper back with his thumb and fist, trying to loosen my knotted muscles. Much clicking, popping and whimpering ensued but it seems to have worked.
I think perhaps that regular massages might be in order. For the purposes of injury prevention and not because they're heavenly, of course. If we were in England I would be cajoling The Husband into doing it but, as we're in Thailand, where you're never more than a few minutes away from a salon or spa with massages that cost as much as a glass of wine in a London bar, I will be employing the skills of a professional. The question is whether I opt for a Thai massage or a gentler oil massage. Given that the last time I went for a Thai massage the therapist lifted me up into the air with his feet while pulling my arms back behind my head (amongst other positions that I never thought my body was capable of), I think I may wait until the pain has completely subsided before putting my body through that. Aromatherapy oil massage it is then. At least something good has come from all this!
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Monday, January 18, 2010
Caution: Air Conditioners May Cause Harm
I am currently sitting rather lopsidedly in front of the computer, tentatively hitting keys, waiting for yet another spasm of pain to engulf my body and cause me to stop and wait for the pain to subside. I woke early in the morning with some slight back pain but just assumed that I had slept funny on it so I changed my position and drifted off to sleep again. An hour later I woke with a dull ache on my right shoulder. Attempting to shift around, I yelled out as pain shot through the entire right side of my upper back and shoulder. I knew I had to try to move and, if possible, get out of bed, to prevent it from completely seizing up, but every slight movement was agony. Ten minutes later I had managed to shuffle to the edge of the bed but lifting my head and upper body was proving to be a problem. Every time I tried, pain coursed through my back and I shouted out in both pain and frustration. I think I invented several new swear words this morning.
Eventually, half an hour later and desperate for the toilet, I succeeded in hauling myself up from the bed and made it to the bathroom, walking with my head at a rather peculiar angle and my body leaning to the right. I soon discovered that when you can't tilt your head back, taking paracetamol is rather tricky. I managed to swallow the first one by bending my legs and forcing my whole body backwards but the second one got stuck on the roof of my mouth. I now know that paracetamol tastes disgusting. Sharp and acrid. The foul taste prompted an involuntary sudden movement which sent me into further pain.
I am now sitting, very straight, trying to remember to move my head from side to side every couple of minutes to keep my back and shoulder from seizing up. The Husband reckons we had the air conditioner on too high last night and the cold air blowing onto my body has caused my muscles to lock. Just another one of the perils of living in a tropical country I suppose!
Eventually, half an hour later and desperate for the toilet, I succeeded in hauling myself up from the bed and made it to the bathroom, walking with my head at a rather peculiar angle and my body leaning to the right. I soon discovered that when you can't tilt your head back, taking paracetamol is rather tricky. I managed to swallow the first one by bending my legs and forcing my whole body backwards but the second one got stuck on the roof of my mouth. I now know that paracetamol tastes disgusting. Sharp and acrid. The foul taste prompted an involuntary sudden movement which sent me into further pain.
I am now sitting, very straight, trying to remember to move my head from side to side every couple of minutes to keep my back and shoulder from seizing up. The Husband reckons we had the air conditioner on too high last night and the cold air blowing onto my body has caused my muscles to lock. Just another one of the perils of living in a tropical country I suppose!
Friday, January 15, 2010
The Mysterious Case of the Disappearing Pavement
Being a pedestrian in Thailand is a dangerous occupation. Not only do you have to stay alert to mopeds speeding down the pavement - apparently they have the right to go anywhere they please, including the wrong way down the highway - you actually have to keep a constant eye out for the pavement itself disappearing. I've seen many a tourist walk along, looking around them at the sights and not at their feet - rooky mistake - when suddenly the ground falls away from beneath them and they're treading air before dropping a foot onto the road (the pavements are very high here!). I did just that (more than once, I am embarrassed to say) on our first day here and very quickly learnt to keep my eyes down, scanning the ground for any obstacles. For some inexplicable reason, the pavements here often just come to an end, reappearing fifty yards or so up the road.
Sometimes you will actually come across a group of labourers fixing a part of the pavement but that is even worse. Unlike in the UK, where they would put cones out to protect pedestrians from oncoming vehicles, you just have to walk in the road and hope for the best here. And as there are normally a good number of them all working on one tiny bit of the pavement, you have to walk quite a way into the road to avoid them. What on earth happens to these pavements that they need so much work? It is a question that will probably never be answered.
Other times the pavement will be perfectly intact but a hawker has set up his stall across a good portion of it, again requiring you to walk into the road to get around him. This is a bit of a pain although not too much trouble for The Husband and I but for mums and dads with pushchairs it is a nightmare. I went to Singapore with the mother of a (at the time) twenty month old and I think the thing she most enjoyed about the trip was the flat, pothole-free, never-ending pavements (OK, maybe she liked the shopping, eating, drinking and dancing more but she did really love the pavements!). Singapore does have excellent pavements though. Sadly, yes, I do now judge a country by the state of its pavements.
Sometimes you will actually come across a group of labourers fixing a part of the pavement but that is even worse. Unlike in the UK, where they would put cones out to protect pedestrians from oncoming vehicles, you just have to walk in the road and hope for the best here. And as there are normally a good number of them all working on one tiny bit of the pavement, you have to walk quite a way into the road to avoid them. What on earth happens to these pavements that they need so much work? It is a question that will probably never be answered.
Other times the pavement will be perfectly intact but a hawker has set up his stall across a good portion of it, again requiring you to walk into the road to get around him. This is a bit of a pain although not too much trouble for The Husband and I but for mums and dads with pushchairs it is a nightmare. I went to Singapore with the mother of a (at the time) twenty month old and I think the thing she most enjoyed about the trip was the flat, pothole-free, never-ending pavements (OK, maybe she liked the shopping, eating, drinking and dancing more but she did really love the pavements!). Singapore does have excellent pavements though. Sadly, yes, I do now judge a country by the state of its pavements.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Plastic Fantastic
I went to Tesco on Monday to restock a very empty fridge after our trip to Hong Kong and, as I always do, took along my reusable fabric shopping bags. In our increasingly eco-conscious world, this is fast becoming the norm. In a last-ditch attempt to save our sickening planet, the citizens of many countries are shunning plastic bags in favour of reusable bags that won’t clog our rivers, suffocate our animals or pollute our seas. Thailand, unfortunately, is not one of those countries. The Thais have an enduring love of plastic bags and try their hardest to use them, and as many of them, as possible. They even eat and drink from them. If you buy an iced coffee or a juice from a hawker, chances are it'll be poured into a plastic bag, tied tightly at the top. Similarly, soup or indeed any other edible items bought from a street-seller will be popped into a plastic bag, twirled around and tied securely. Sometimes they will even put the plastic bag containing your food or drink into another plastic bag. Anywhere you go, whatever you buy, the shop assistants will try to put your purchase in a plastic bag. I once bought a single pen and the cashier immediately produced a large bag before I stopped her, saying that I could just put it in my handbag. As always in these situations, I was given a look which was confused yet amused at the same time. Another strange farang with their weird ways, she was probably thinking. I mean, fancy wanting to put a purchase into your own bag when you could have a brand new, shiny plastic bag completely free of charge.
I have long been bringing my own reusable bags along to the shops with me and, in England, it was easy. No-one batted an eyelid, in fact the cashiers encouraged it. In Hong Kong, previously a plastic bag nation, customers are now charged a small amount for each plastic bag they use. When I was at a supermarket while I was there I noticed that almost everyone in the queues at the check-out had their own cotton bags. In Thailand, however, they actually make it difficult for you not to use their own plastic bags. Upon entering Tesco I was ordered to leave my bags at a customer service desk, presumably to make it harder for me to steal, although they didn't seem concerned about the enormous handbag hanging from my shoulder. When I was ready to go the till to pay, I had to push my rather heavy trolly all the way down to the other end of the store to collect my bags so that I could use them to pack my shopping in.
After loading up my shopping onto the conveyor belt, I strode to the front and put my reusable bags onto the surface, next to an open plastic bag the cashier had readied. She glanced at my bags, scanned the first item and then promptly dropped it into her plastic bag. Ok, not to worry, I thought, it's meat so it should probably go into a plastic bag anyway. The yoghurts, too. Except she put each pack of yoghurts into a separate bag. That was really not necessary so I, the annoying farang, intervened. She glared at me as I took out the second pack of yoghurts and put it in the bag with the first. I know from previous experiences to be prepared so I held up my cotton bag, opened it wide and, as soon as she scanned the bag of honey pears, I motioned for her to give them to me and from then on just took everything and packed it all in myself. That is another gripe I have. The cashiers seem to think that each bag can only hold one or two items, simply adding to unnecessary number of plastic bags used. If I let them pack my bags, I would still have to use five or six plastic bags as there would only be a bag of crisps and a couple of cucumbers in each one.
It's a bit of a battle but I emerge triumphant, having only used two plastic bags - one for meat and fish and another for the yoghurts. Let's hope I can hold my nerve on my next supermarket trip.
I have long been bringing my own reusable bags along to the shops with me and, in England, it was easy. No-one batted an eyelid, in fact the cashiers encouraged it. In Hong Kong, previously a plastic bag nation, customers are now charged a small amount for each plastic bag they use. When I was at a supermarket while I was there I noticed that almost everyone in the queues at the check-out had their own cotton bags. In Thailand, however, they actually make it difficult for you not to use their own plastic bags. Upon entering Tesco I was ordered to leave my bags at a customer service desk, presumably to make it harder for me to steal, although they didn't seem concerned about the enormous handbag hanging from my shoulder. When I was ready to go the till to pay, I had to push my rather heavy trolly all the way down to the other end of the store to collect my bags so that I could use them to pack my shopping in.
After loading up my shopping onto the conveyor belt, I strode to the front and put my reusable bags onto the surface, next to an open plastic bag the cashier had readied. She glanced at my bags, scanned the first item and then promptly dropped it into her plastic bag. Ok, not to worry, I thought, it's meat so it should probably go into a plastic bag anyway. The yoghurts, too. Except she put each pack of yoghurts into a separate bag. That was really not necessary so I, the annoying farang, intervened. She glared at me as I took out the second pack of yoghurts and put it in the bag with the first. I know from previous experiences to be prepared so I held up my cotton bag, opened it wide and, as soon as she scanned the bag of honey pears, I motioned for her to give them to me and from then on just took everything and packed it all in myself. That is another gripe I have. The cashiers seem to think that each bag can only hold one or two items, simply adding to unnecessary number of plastic bags used. If I let them pack my bags, I would still have to use five or six plastic bags as there would only be a bag of crisps and a couple of cucumbers in each one.
It's a bit of a battle but I emerge triumphant, having only used two plastic bags - one for meat and fish and another for the yoghurts. Let's hope I can hold my nerve on my next supermarket trip.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Danger! Men At Work
Health & Safety doesn't really exist in Thailand. It makes an interesting contrast to the UK, where it's getting to the stage whereby you won't be allowed to leave your house without a suit of armour to shield yourself against the myriad of possible accidents that may befall you. I was reminded just how different Thailand is in this respect on my way to the gym this morning. My usual route to the gym takes me past a construction site on which a large residential development is being built. There are hazards at every turn and yet the labourers wear just thin cotton trousers, a long sleeved shirt, flip-flops and a cloth tied round their heads to protect them from the sun. They seem less worried about protecting their heads from falling objects or from themselves falling from scaffolding which they are not attached to. They are provided with no protective clothing, work boots or hard hats whatsoever. Even more worrying is the presence of children at the weekends and after school, running around the site and playing games around welders and carpenters, dodging sparks and machinery.
As I have mentioned in previous blogs, the Thais have the same cavalier attitude to vehicle safety. It's perfectly normal for a whole family, including a baby squished in between mum and dad, and sometimes a couple of pets, to ride around on a single moped. Huge groups of construction workers squeeze into the outside part of pick-up trucks. I'm not saying that Thailand should be more like the UK when it comes to health and safety - God knows, no country need have their hand held by the state in the way that the people of the UK are subjected to - but at least give those poor workers a hard hat!
As I have mentioned in previous blogs, the Thais have the same cavalier attitude to vehicle safety. It's perfectly normal for a whole family, including a baby squished in between mum and dad, and sometimes a couple of pets, to ride around on a single moped. Huge groups of construction workers squeeze into the outside part of pick-up trucks. I'm not saying that Thailand should be more like the UK when it comes to health and safety - God knows, no country need have their hand held by the state in the way that the people of the UK are subjected to - but at least give those poor workers a hard hat!
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
The End of the Holiday
Expat Wife apologises profusely for having been such an absent blogger over the Christmas period. She was of course mainly entertaining The Husband and not at all sipping gin and tonics on the sofa in front of Gavin and Stacey and Project Runway. The Husband and I are now back in a very busy Pattaya, right in the middle of the peak holiday season. Before I return to the goings-on on these sunny shores, I must mention a few of the stand-out days and nights over the remainder of our holiday in Hong Kong.
A few days after Christmas the Husband and I, plus our friends Jenni and Adam, went to Disneyland. This latest addition to the Disney empire has in fact been up and running for over four years but, as a loyal Ocean Park girl, I hadn't yet been. I did actually feel a tad guilty as we boarded the Disney train, complete with Mickey-shaped windows and strap-hangers and bronze statues of Disney characters in display cases - there was no mistaking where we were going - as I felt I had sold out to the Disney machine. I silently promised I would return to my beloved Ocean Park, a marine-focused theme park by the sea that has been in Hong Kong longer than I have been alive. It was a fun day out, with the highlights being the parade, the Lion King show, Space Mountain and the teacups (yes, the teacups can be fun, you just have to spin them really fast!), however it doesn't compare to Ocean Park. It's more expensive yet far smaller, with fewer rides and attractions. There are, however, many more shops. Disney has done exceptionally well to provide as many opportunities as possible for visitors to part with as much cash as possible - there's even a top jewellers - but not enough to give us value for the money we paid at the ticket booth. Then again, the Chinese love spending money so maybe that is just what they want to do all day.
As we do on most trips to Hong Kong, we took the ferry over to Lamma Island to hike, play games on a deserted beach, and eat a deliciously fresh seafood lunch. We also drove to Stanley, on Hong Kong Island, where we shopped till we dropped in the market, followed by a well-deserved beer in a bar by the sea. New Year's Eve was a rather drunken affair. I have now discovered that all-you-can-drink deals and me don't go well together. Enough said.
The stand-out event of the latter part of the holiday was certainly the Hong Kong Tennis Classic and the players' party which preceded it. The Brother works for the company that organises the tournament and The Mother runs the Player Services department so they arranged tickets to the party for us where we drank Champagne and nibbled on canapes with the likes of Maria Sharapova and Venus Williams. The Mother and Brother also managed to score free tickets for us in a box for the opening night of the tournament. It was a great line-up, featuring some of the world's best players, though the closeness of of one of the matches meant the evening's matches didn't finish till after midnight. After eight hours of tennis viewing, coupled with the chilly weather, I was more than ready for my bed by the end of it, but it was a great night.
The evening we arrived back in Thailand coincided with two of my cousins' last couple of days in the country so I met up with them in Bangkok for some eating, drinking, sunbathing and shopping. I had my first experience of Chatachuk Weekend Market and what an experience it was. It was vast, hot and slightly suffocating, especially in the warren of lanes in which you could so easily get lost, never to emerge into the light again. Katie bought so much she had to buy a large shopping bag which she then had to lug around Bangkok. Her suncream also exploded in her bag, all over her wallet, i-pod and mobile but we won't mention that.
I eventually made it back to Pattaya on Saturday night when The Husband very kindly picked me up from the airport after saying goodbye to the cousins. So it's back to reality now. At least reality here is sun, swimming pools and seafood and not snow, scarves and sandwiches. I think I can handle this reality.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Gorillas (or was it just a wild cow?) in the Mist
Farewell 2009, hello 2010 and the start of a new decade! This is a tad late perhaps but I am only just feeling up to blogging. I said goodbye to 2009 by having one (ok, perhaps rather more than one) too many drinks and could barely make it out of bed on New Year's Day. I only hope that the saying that the way you spend the first day of the year is a sign of things to come for the rest of the year is not true. The second day of 2010 was rather more active, with a walk around the streets of Kowloon followed by a couple of hours of tennis.
Today we embarked on a hike up, around and down the highest mountain in Hong Kong, Tai Mo Shan. The walk promised fantastic views, however as we spent most of it in cloud, we could barely see ten feet in front of us, let alone the sweeping vista of Kowloon and across the harbour to Hong Kong Island. With the cloud lying low over the dense forest, it was very Gorillas in the Mist. The Husband thought it was incredibly amusing to race on ahead of us and then pop out from behind a tree/bush/boulder, thumping his chest like a primate. We did not. Lush valleys, babbling brooks, verdant hillsides, a wild cow or two, and stunning waterfalls made for a wonderful if rather exhausting walk. I'm now off to collapse on the sofa with a G&T.
Today we embarked on a hike up, around and down the highest mountain in Hong Kong, Tai Mo Shan. The walk promised fantastic views, however as we spent most of it in cloud, we could barely see ten feet in front of us, let alone the sweeping vista of Kowloon and across the harbour to Hong Kong Island. With the cloud lying low over the dense forest, it was very Gorillas in the Mist. The Husband thought it was incredibly amusing to race on ahead of us and then pop out from behind a tree/bush/boulder, thumping his chest like a primate. We did not. Lush valleys, babbling brooks, verdant hillsides, a wild cow or two, and stunning waterfalls made for a wonderful if rather exhausting walk. I'm now off to collapse on the sofa with a G&T.
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