I and Yui, my Thai wife, have decided to spend most of the summer in Thailand - 2 months from June 10 - in Cha-Am, with a week or so in the beginning in her home village and a couple of days in the end. OK, it is fascinating there in a way, still - it IS more or less in the middle of the jungle and Yui is the only one speaking decent English. And my Thai is - something I have felt ashamed for a few decades. I got the first text book from a penpal there in the seventies.
Do you find Cha-Am on the map? From the center go down a little left along the coast and after 2 hours in the bus you find it. If you now go from Cha-Am to central Bangkok and continue the same line the same distance, you end up more or less at Yui's village. [The map from this link. If you click on it, it might become larger, depending on your web browser.] When you find Saraburi go a little bit up left, and you find her village, Ban Mo.
Yui's brother is no city driver but when we come we take taxi from the Suvarnabhumi airport to the big bus station at the end of Bangkok in the direction of Yui's village, that is north. The village is not far from Saraburi., so he drives and picks us up tin that bus station - worked when Yui was there alone 2 summers ago.
I still do not know what or where the village is :) last time I was there was when I learned to know Yui, 5 years ago, and then I just saw three houses at a small country road. With my bad walking - ah well I have to manage, right. Yui says they even made a new room for me in her brother's house with aircon, which is sort of good when it goes over 40°, I am not sure how hot it will be in summer as it is also rainy, which cools it down a degree or two. Suppose they are happy for that room, suppose Yui will sneak in some little money for that to get aircon there, she knows exactly how much we have, cannot really compare to a family in the country side of Thailand where everything grows and where it seems you can eat everything that grows. She has helped a bit since she came here to Sweden soon 5 years ago, but as we live two on my pension..... Once she is ready with her studies in a year, and gets a well paid job it will be different. Last visit she gave her mother a washing machine and a refrigerator - her first in her life, good to have in that heat..... Once I am gone the room will be used for sure, for the kids to sleep in, the father to work in maybe, I do not know. Before the brother has installed aircon in their bedroom, nothing like that in Yui's parents wooden house on stilts a short walk away.
And of course a problem is internet...... Some of the half-grown kids there use internet, one or two is on Facebook and sometimes say Hi to "Santa" - 1½ year ago when I was on Samui I had to choose among a WiFi in the air, but my oid laptop could seldom pick it up properly - got a better now bought recently especially for travelling, and I use it just now, 13", 2 kilos, then I also used my Nokia phone for Internet, safer but slower. It seems they use another system those playing the village but I let Yui fix that.
As I said, there I have the country road and jungle paths to walk on, neither is very good for my rotten legs, so I do not want to be in the village for more than a week or so. Then to Cha-Am.
I have never been there, just heard about it, and a friend spent a week there - of course in one of the touristy luxury hotels far from the beach that Swedish tourist agencies deliver. I want to be close to the beach - a block or so away is ok. So I have decided to pick Hotel California - book three days there or so, once I know a date, and if we like it we stay for something like 1½ month. Price is - well, high for what I am used to in Thailand but of course cheap for Sweden, 12000B for a month for a big room with balcony where you can see the sea if you look to the left, what is it in Swedish, just now around 2500 kronor. My rent here in Sweden for half a month.
I mailed them and they seemed very friendly, quick response, which gave me a good impression. American guy with Thai wife.
I try to identify why I feel so good down there. It is hard for me to travel with my walking disabilities. Still not wheel chair, only a crutch but I guess it comes. Cha-Am might be good for me, the usual place down at Samui - it is actually a bit hilly unless you stay in the center of the village at the beach, the pavements in my usual village, Lamai, is lousy for walking, so I have to walk in the village roads shared with lorries and elephants and - at night - drunk Westerners, farangs. Just when I was at the guest house last time one of the guests had driven his motor bike and killed himself and his Thai girlfriend, so monks came to collect money for the funeral. I do not know who it was so gave no money.
Nah, 5AM and a few mugs of wine, bedtime.
