Last night around 10:00 or so Choa and I were sitting in a bar and I was starting to get bored so I suggested that we ride around a bit on the bike and see what was going on in other parts of town. As we were leaving I noticed that Choa didnt have a motorbike helmet so I said lets swing around to the room to get one.. He promptly told me “No problem, police no work after 10:00″ I told him he was Ting Tong that they work all the time. “No problem” he says again and off we go. We had done a tour around Buddha Hill, Jomtien Beach Road and on the back through the Pattaya City Park area. As is normal, for some reason, Choa has always driven when we go somewhere and I will drive when we return. As we are making the curve coming down from Pattaya City Park we hit a Police check point right past the overpass.. Guess who gets pulled over. For some reason Choa is a bit aggravated so I rub some “salt in the wound” Police not work after 10:00 I see. I got a look that could kill. The policeman was very polite but was showing no mercy this evening. I got a ticket for (1) No license (2) No motorbike papers -rental bike (3) No helmet. At this point they took my keys , gave me the ticket and said I had to go to Police station on Soi 9 to pay the fine. 1200B - 400B for each offense. We arrive at the Police station just about Midnight. I take a number from the machine to wait my turn. As I look around I notice that nobody else is waiting and there is no body behind the desk of the Fine Payment window . Choa goes up and asks the guy at Information when the clerk will return and was told about 30 minutes. Shift change. We have a seat and wait, and wait, and wait some more. Almost 30 minutes go by before and I notice bright lights coming in the front door and cameras were flashing. Seems Pattaya People News were on the way in taking photos of two people the police just busted. From what I could see , Yabba dealers. They did a pan of the room so I may be on TV this evening at the 6PM News. Its about 1:15AM now and the clerk shows up. Choa goes up to pay the ticket and the man says 1200B . Choa tells him he doesn’t have that much and that he works in a bar. Fine reduced to 400B What does surprise me is that the ticket is in my name , not his so I asked him why did the guy reduce the fine.. Choa said he didn’t read the name till after he said 400B and the fine was paid. He called me up to sign the papers and we left. We will have to pickup the bike next morning because it has been hauled off to the compound. Wonder what will happen today

It has been over a month since I have posted anything but actually absolutely nothing has been going on. I can only talk about rain and rising water so often.. It wasn’t all that interesting the first time so a repeat would be torture if you read it again

I am head to Pattaya again tomorrow and maybe something interesting enough will happen to be worth writing about.. Taking the camera too just in case.

So my apologies for not writing a single word last month but hopefully that will change this month

john

I was headed to Pattaya on the 30th for my monthly getaway when the bus was stopped by the highway police not 20Km from my home.  Usually these roadside checks just flag the buses on but this time they decided to stop and 3 officers came on bus.

They would walk up and down the aisle looking at people then they started talking to them and checking all the carry on bags.  In two of the bags they found what looked like small machetes , about 18″ long or so, wrapped in newspaper.  They made a spectacle out of removing them from the paper then holding them up in the air.  As it turned out these were knives used by what were probably contract harvesters going from farm to farm so nothing was done.

One of the officers finally got to me, they only farang on the bus, and started asking me questions..  I swear he must have been a former bar boy because he asked me,  “whats your name, where you stay,how long you stay in Thailand”

I guess my answers were enough because he just smiled and walked away. I thought  he would at least ask to see passport.  Thats the most excitement, as you can tell by my lack of posting, for over a month..  Maybe something to report in Pattaya..

john

Everything is still pretty quiet up here.  The majority of the people here are still harvesting the crops or clearing the fields to make ready for the next planting season.  Not your actual beehive of activity.  We are still getting plenty of rain around 4Pm which lasts for about an hour or so.  You can almost set  you clock by it.   With all the rain the ponds start to rise which makes an excellent tractor wash location..  That is what Id do, drive into a pond and splash that dirty water all over everything to try and get it clean..

Choa has decided that since on of his relatives hasn’t had a job in awhile that he would let her take over the Noodle business at the front of the shop.  Now he is happy, he doesn’t have to do it.  As you can see preparations are underway.  He is still keeping himself  busy at night with the limited food service and lots of beer and whiskey. 

It is off to Pattaya tomorrow and will be there for 6 or 7 days.  Maybe I can find something interesting down there to write about..  We will see

john

Here are a bunch of random shots I took during  Songkran 2008   It is just madness

john