This morning I rose fairly early and went to the Botanic Garden to meet someone from Metafilter. It’s always odd meeting someone one has only ever seen online, at least partly as one can’t really judge their size. One person I mey last year, whom I’d known for years but only online, turned out to […]
Too much snacking
Another very pleasant day, albeit another one in which I didn’t do nearly as much work as I needed to. In the morning, the Bodhisattva and I went off for kaya toast and soft boiled egg, followed by coffee. All extremely nice. The cafe was one the GF and I had been to on our […]
The past
This morning, or rather early afternoon, we rented a car to take us to a pepper farm. In the morning I woke up early as usual, bought some rice and assorted meats from the breakfast woman along with a steamed dumping containing coconut. and then read for a couple of hours. At some point the […]
No frogs
No frogs today, is the plague over? Though there was a small rodent in the bath. Not a rat as it barely had a tail, and it clearly hadn’t been there long. The GF’s mother arrived this evening, somewhat wobbly after her journeys but in good spirits and certainly better health than her last visit, […]
Breakfasts
I like settling into new breakfasts wherever I go, maybe because it’s the one meal that feels like it can be on my terms. Here, in Kep, there is the morning stroll to get pastries and baguettes, plus a little pot of rillettes or other such private addition to breakfast. Today as I stepped out […]
Frogs
Yesterday, Sunday, was a working day in Iraq so I was also working, albeit desultorily. In the mornings, as I mentioned before, I’ve taken to walking down to the Deli, a French bakery, for freshly baked pastries and baguettes. It’s both a good little morning activity and averts breakfast crises. The handful of gravel has […]
Rabbit island
We took a boat to Koh Tonsay, Rabbit Island, today. It’s supposed to have the prettiest beaches, and we were a bit worried about the GF’s mother coming all the way across the world to mediocre beaches, so went to inspect. It was a very easy journey. The boat prices are high but fixed, we […]
Christmas in Bangkok
In Bangkok the cafes and shops are in full Christmas mode, with carols playing over speakers, plastic Christmas trees with piles of wrapped presents, tinsel, and giant electric snow globes showering styrofoam snow which looks very out of place in semi-tropical heat. In Ambon, where we were only last week, they went in for far […]
Small things
A day of small things yesterday. Well, one big thing, which is a book I have been struggling to edit and is going very slowly and I would very much like to finish it and never think about it again. Then, an approach from an organization I’d worked for in the past for a small […]
Faltering attempt
Made a faltering attempt to introduce a vegetable to my father’s diet today. Since I arrived he has eaten only parathas, roti, naan, rice, daal and red meat, plus a seemingly endless supply of crisps and nimko between meals. Today I ordered one of the few vegetables he will eat, i.e. peas, and he didn’t […]