with ex-non-in-laws like us, who needs a hotel?

Much to our surprise we have been the lucky recipients of a slightly late 4th of July gift: a real, live US-passport-holder is in residence at our apartment! That's right, our friend Bob is visiting us on his way from Vietnam to Burma (via Phnom Penh). I hadn't seen Bob since last easter when we were in Montreal visiting Emma. Since then he's been working in Hanoi and despite having had a rawther serious bout of typhoid seems to be very much enjoying life here in South-East Asia. [Editor's note: Bob is an ex-b.f. of Emma's, but they remain good friends and so therefore we've allowed him to stay in our guest room rather than secretly arranging to meet him in a back alley somewhere and subject him to Ji's fists of fury and laser eyes super power.]

Bob arrived on Friday night but got in late and went straight to evil Khao San Road, where he paid 120 baht (about 3 bucks US) for a room with no air con and no sheets on the bed and of course no shower. We emailed him, though, and he made a speedy getaway over to Ekkamai. Right after that, Ji subjected him to a long lecture on the various pros and cons of the CBC and BBC preschooler web sites. Bob learned alot, and is pretty damn excited to get back to his nephews and share his new-found knowledge with them. Those Pennsylvanian whipper-snappers will be thanking their lucky stars that their uncle recieved insight from such a brilliant three-and-a-half year old.

For dinner we decided to the Suan Lum night bazaar. I'm trying to check out the major tourist attractions in Bangkok in anticipation of Mum and Emma's visit in just a few short months. As you have seen chronicled here: safari world, the railway park, and chinatown, check. All else yet to visit. The night bazaar is a manufactured tourist market with a big huge beer garden on one side. It's right next to Lumpini Park in the heart of Bangkok, so it's a handy dandy spot for out of towners. As I'd expected, the prices were much more expensive than at the weekend market, but the market itself was very tidy, clean, and easy to naviagate. An excellent stop for a first-time or first-week visitor to Thailand.

Ji had fun testing out the beanbag chairs in the market. Phet has promised to buy him one for his 4th birthday, and Ji is eagerly notching off the days on the bedroom wall. Ji also conversed at length with his father over dinner about how to improve the engineering of their lego tower at home.

The meal was okay, but the beer was better:

Just in case you missed that, here are a couple more shots of the beer:

So we figger we done alright by Bob. Today we took him to the weekend market and he carried all the bags, huzzah. I picked up some goodie-goodie-goodies for the party up at the countryside house, a few vases, and a big carved wooden wall hanging thingy with elephants on it. Right now I'm too tired to figure out how to describe it properly, so perhaps I'll post a picture tomorrow. After our Thai lesson Phet and Bob went off to see War of the Worlds, and then we all went for a giant Japanese feast at the fancy mall. Now we're all wiped out. Tomorrow it's back to school and then on Tuesday I'm hosting the 2 kindergarden classes for lunch after our trip to the planetarium. I'm going all Martha Stewart and I've printed out nametags, napkin-tags, and I bought a whole bunch of space-themed stuff and purple plastic dishes, and a HUNDRED balloons, and 5 tubs of ice cream, and squeezable chocolate sauce so we can make sundaes, and maraschino cherries, and oooh a ton of loot. Photos will be posted forthwith. [Bangkok-10-July-2005]