Tuesday, March 23

Day Nine.

This morning, I watched the wildlife from my balcony. I saw little starlings, pigeons, and what I think might be great mynas (or white-vented mynas)—sweet black birds with a white spot on each wing, a tail tipped in white, and a yellow beak. So I've gotten into birds in isolation, what of it? I am way too far away to catch a picture, but here's a photo of a great myna from the internet.

Photo from Herald Sun

See how I avoided putting a picture of my breakfast first?

I also watched the street dogs down below. A white dog with black spots and a limp came walking down the alley. Then suddenly came the sound of another dog, barking loudly, and the black-and-white dog turned around and ran back the way it came. Two tannish-colored dogs were situated in the parking lot behind the restaurants—one sitting, one standing very still. As I watched, I saw a blondish dog emerge from the shadow of the 7-11. It had a curling tail with a white underside, and it was boldly following very closely behind a person walking to the street food cart (have I mentioned there are actually two carts!? One with a red roof and one with a blue roof, but they are almost never out at the same time, so I was fooled into thinking there was one). I wonder if it was the blond dog who barked, scaring off the limping black-and-white dog? I wonder if the blond dog is a bully?

Ahem. So, breakfast! Continental style. I realized I could be a dick and put most of my breakfast in quotations. “Whole wheat” toast, a “croissant” with “butter” and “strawberry jam.” Papaya and tea not in quotations, thankfully. I tried to think about all the situations I could be in where I would be grateful for this meal.

Mornings and evenings are my favorite around here. I drank my Tetley tea, then made a thermos of Rooibos tea and drank that. I published yesterday's blog and started today's, and read some articles and news stories online.

I did a yoga class, which necessitated a second shower. Lunch was #11—spicy chicken with basil:

 Roman and I met in the garden, and he gave me a list of helpful Thai phrases.

I continued to play amateur Naturalist.

I've been admiring these orange flowers growing on bushes in the garden, and I think they are ixoras, also called siantans (and boy did it take me a long time to figure that out).

We also saw the cutest little rodent running along top of the fence. It was greyish brown and long from its pointed nose to its thinly furred tail. It looked like the mongooses we saw in India, but in miniature. I'm really not sure what it was. A grey-bellied squirrel? A slender squirrel? A Low's squirrel? Hard to say. Cute, though.

Honestly, I looked at so many pictures of SE Asian rodents online that I've forgotten what
ours looked like. This one is a grey-bellied squirrel, though. Photo by John Caddick.

It was hot in the garden—my phone said 91F but “feels like” 100F; Roman's phone said “feels like 106F.” I haven't been in these kind of temperatures in a long time and no longer remember what 100F feels like versus 106F.

Our time in the garden necessitated a third shower to cool down; in the afternoon I wrote, finished the book I was reading, and hung out on the balcony (not a lot of critters out on hot afternoons, it turns out).

For dinner I got vegetarian spring rolls. I thought there was at least a 60% chance it would be a more substantial meal than it sounded like, but it was in fact just vegetarian spring rolls. With cantaloupe.

That evening, the dogs were howling away on the street below. I tried to get an audio recording (via video) for Roman, but you can't really hear the howls in the video. I tried to post it anyway, since it's a kind of nice night view from the balcony. Except the video kept posting sideways. I attempted to rotate it using several different methods, then several different types of video files, then on my phone instead of my computer, and this is what came of my efforts: