Living in Bangkok

Time to catch up on the last couple days! On Thursday we ran some errands, did some walking around Bangkok, and ate some food... We ate lunch in a hidden street food court just off Silom. I got some kind of rice paper wrapped around ground pork and vegetables (it reminded me a little of Vietnamese bánh cuốn), Roman got soup with egg noodles, pork, and wontons, and I also got us some kanon krok (little pancakes made from coconut milk and rice flour) to share. For dinner, we went to a place in the neighborhood for shrimp wonton noodle soup, and stared at each other through one of the plastic dividers that had been set up on every table. Bangkok, as well as a few other provinces, will be going into a stricter lockdown starting tomorrow—in-restaurant dining will no longer be allowed, and no one can meet in groups of more than 20 people. I do feel a little disappointed by the situation. Roman doesn't start work until May 17 and I don't start until June 1, but we can't travel any...

I got a job! I accepted the Kindergarten teacher position with Thai Christian School. After I accepted the offer yesterday, I wanted to be excited, but instead I felt ambivalent. Mostly because I made the decision a little quickly and I don’t really like doing that—it tends to lead me to second guess myself.  I had also interviewed with another school yesterday morning and liked them a lot, and I felt a little bad/anxious about turning down their offer. That position was for a primary school teacher at a private Christian school in Silom. The neighborhood was great—right next to a BTS station in a fun, lively area with lots of street food and coffee shops. And the interview was relaxed and friendly. I interviewed with the three school heads, who were all around my age and all spoke good English. I got the sense I would have a lot of freedom about what I taught, which I thought was both a benefit and a drawback—it would give me a lot of flexibility, but I wouldn't have ...

I woke up at 6:00am to get ready for a job interview at 8:30am in a different part of town. Remember those large green tapioca pearls we bought in Chinatown? Well, we soaked and cooked them, with the intention of using some in iced coffee/tea drinks, but they never really got totally jellied—the very center of each pearl remained white and a little chalky. So instead, I heated them up for breakfast, with a little sugar, coconut milk, and mango, and they became perfectly jellied. It was kind of breakfast for aliens. Lumphini station was busy at 7:00am (though the train itself was not). There were more vendors out than usual, selling pre-made packaged meals—rice with eggs, rice with stir fried chicken, sandwiches cut on the diagonal. It was the same at the MRT station where I got off the train—and lots of people were picking up their breakfasts (or lunches?) to go. After I got off the metro, I walked to a nearby bus stop. Within a few minutes, an old red bus rambled up and very briefl...