23 November
Today I had lunch with Dad at the British Club in Silom. It was lovely and quiet. We swam before we ate and the water was actually quite cold! The cool season has finally arrived. It feels like a warm summer’s day back in England.
After lunch, it was time to return to my apartment and start preparing to teach my new young student Amy. For some reason, I always seem to be late when working for this company. This time I was determined not to be. I set off 90 minutes early.
I had studied my (Nelles) map of Bangkok beforehand and decided to do the first main stint of the journey by bus and then take a taxi for the final short hop. I decided to take a different route from that recommended by my company – a dangerous game to play because if I was late, I would be in trouble.
I stood in the heat and fumes of the bus stop and waited. After a while, number 137 bus came along and I boarded. I then had to wait 15 minutes while it stood stationary in the heavy traffic. At last it moved off and then, one stop down the road, turned into a high rise car park and stopped. The driver switched the engine off and everyone got out. Great.
The clock was ticking (a metaphor of course as my phone clock doesn’t tick). Nearly 30 minutes and 7 baht had been wasted on that bus. Luckily, I was close to an MRT metro station. I descended into the cool underground and rode the metro for one stop then came out again and caught another number 137 bus. This time it ran straight and true and I arrived at my destination with 15 minutes to spare.
My lesson went very well. After I had been shown into a large sitting room dominated by a 60 inch HD flat screen TV, Amy’s mother rang me to say that she was very sorry but they were running 25 minutes late. I didn’t mind in the least as I was paid for my time there rather than the time I spent actually teaching. I switched on my laptop and checked my emails while the maid brought me fresh apple juice, a big plate of exotic fruit and a glass of water.
Amy arrived with her mum. Amy turned out to be a bright kid with a pretty much photographic memory. She was a pleasure to teach. After the lesson, her mum chatted to me about the difficulties of sending her three children to a good school.
At Harrow School in Thailand, there are very few English children attending as only the very rich Thais can afford the tuition fees. So the rich Thai kids don’t get to practice their English outside the classrooms. There are cheaper and better schools with lots of English kids – but there is a big waiting list. Amy’s mum wanted to send her children to Harrow in England – but again the waiting list is decades long. Also, it would mean that she would be parted from her children.
I asked her what she did for a living and she told me that she and her husband owned a company which imported exotic European cars such as Ferrari, Aston Martin, Bentley, Porsche etc. to order. She told me that it was crazy that anyone bought such cars in Thailand as there were no roads worth driving fast on and they had to pay 200 per cent import duty tax as well. As a result, Thai millionaires had to keep in the garage a car that they’d paid two or three times the going rate for. A Mercedes SL500, for example, costs 15 million baht….
After we had talked for a while, she drove me home. I went to eat at Pi Baby’s. I was staving. The café was empty except for Pi Baby herself and a cat which was prowling hungrily about under the tiny tables.
Suddenly, there was a flash of movement and a giant centipede came racing out from the wall and straight towards me with the cat in hot pursuit. It was a horribly repulsive creature, the sort of colour that makes you feel sick just to look at. It was about a foot long and armed with big fangs.
Hastily, I lifted up my legs out of harms way as the cat pounced under my table and tried to kill it. But this was no ordinary centipede. It was more snakelike than insect. It wriggled and tried to bite with its poison fangs, it jumped and rolled and ran while all about it, the cat was a raging fury of teeth and claws, of lightning fast strikes, pounces, swipes and bites. But still it did not die.
At last, the cat managed to pick it up behind its head. It was evident that the cat wanted to eat it. It did not in any way play with it as an English cat might play with a mouse. But just then, Pi Baby hearing the commotion came out from the kitchen with a pair of big tongs. She grabbed the frantically wriggling centipede from the cat’s jaws and threw it out into the gutter where upon it promptly made its escape down a drain. The cat let out a loud and reproachful yowl. It obviously didn’t appreciate its dinner being snatched away from him.
Today I had lunch with Dad at the British Club in Silom. It was lovely and quiet. We swam before we ate and the water was actually quite cold! The cool season has finally arrived. It feels like a warm summer’s day back in England.
After lunch, it was time to return to my apartment and start preparing to teach my new young student Amy. For some reason, I always seem to be late when working for this company. This time I was determined not to be. I set off 90 minutes early.
I had studied my (Nelles) map of Bangkok beforehand and decided to do the first main stint of the journey by bus and then take a taxi for the final short hop. I decided to take a different route from that recommended by my company – a dangerous game to play because if I was late, I would be in trouble.
I stood in the heat and fumes of the bus stop and waited. After a while, number 137 bus came along and I boarded. I then had to wait 15 minutes while it stood stationary in the heavy traffic. At last it moved off and then, one stop down the road, turned into a high rise car park and stopped. The driver switched the engine off and everyone got out. Great.
The clock was ticking (a metaphor of course as my phone clock doesn’t tick). Nearly 30 minutes and 7 baht had been wasted on that bus. Luckily, I was close to an MRT metro station. I descended into the cool underground and rode the metro for one stop then came out again and caught another number 137 bus. This time it ran straight and true and I arrived at my destination with 15 minutes to spare.
My lesson went very well. After I had been shown into a large sitting room dominated by a 60 inch HD flat screen TV, Amy’s mother rang me to say that she was very sorry but they were running 25 minutes late. I didn’t mind in the least as I was paid for my time there rather than the time I spent actually teaching. I switched on my laptop and checked my emails while the maid brought me fresh apple juice, a big plate of exotic fruit and a glass of water.
Amy arrived with her mum. Amy turned out to be a bright kid with a pretty much photographic memory. She was a pleasure to teach. After the lesson, her mum chatted to me about the difficulties of sending her three children to a good school.
At Harrow School in Thailand, there are very few English children attending as only the very rich Thais can afford the tuition fees. So the rich Thai kids don’t get to practice their English outside the classrooms. There are cheaper and better schools with lots of English kids – but there is a big waiting list. Amy’s mum wanted to send her children to Harrow in England – but again the waiting list is decades long. Also, it would mean that she would be parted from her children.
I asked her what she did for a living and she told me that she and her husband owned a company which imported exotic European cars such as Ferrari, Aston Martin, Bentley, Porsche etc. to order. She told me that it was crazy that anyone bought such cars in Thailand as there were no roads worth driving fast on and they had to pay 200 per cent import duty tax as well. As a result, Thai millionaires had to keep in the garage a car that they’d paid two or three times the going rate for. A Mercedes SL500, for example, costs 15 million baht….
After we had talked for a while, she drove me home. I went to eat at Pi Baby’s. I was staving. The café was empty except for Pi Baby herself and a cat which was prowling hungrily about under the tiny tables.
Suddenly, there was a flash of movement and a giant centipede came racing out from the wall and straight towards me with the cat in hot pursuit. It was a horribly repulsive creature, the sort of colour that makes you feel sick just to look at. It was about a foot long and armed with big fangs.
Hastily, I lifted up my legs out of harms way as the cat pounced under my table and tried to kill it. But this was no ordinary centipede. It was more snakelike than insect. It wriggled and tried to bite with its poison fangs, it jumped and rolled and ran while all about it, the cat was a raging fury of teeth and claws, of lightning fast strikes, pounces, swipes and bites. But still it did not die.
At last, the cat managed to pick it up behind its head. It was evident that the cat wanted to eat it. It did not in any way play with it as an English cat might play with a mouse. But just then, Pi Baby hearing the commotion came out from the kitchen with a pair of big tongs. She grabbed the frantically wriggling centipede from the cat’s jaws and threw it out into the gutter where upon it promptly made its escape down a drain. The cat let out a loud and reproachful yowl. It obviously didn’t appreciate its dinner being snatched away from him.
“I feel sorry for the centipede,” said Pi Baby, as she returned to the kitchen. “The cat mustn’t eat it. He can eat fish instead."
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