Hua Hin

So we came from Bangkok to Hua Hin, a couple hours on the Upper Southern Gulf of Thailand. We got a bus, came into town and got a hostel. We decided to start the house/job hunt, and ended up with a great 3 story town house for the month of January, to base our job hunting. The house is great, near the Royal Palace and Queen's Park, in a relatively quiet and safe area, about 6 minutes on bike from the city center. We quickly found out that the jobs in Thailand really want you to work for them, but they won't hire you until the school year starts. This means that schools would love to hire us, but can't get us working until May 1st, and there is no way any of us can wait that long. Of course we found this out the day we got our townhouse, but it seems that anywhere in Thailand, for normal Thai schools, would be in a similar problem. So we have been looking all over...

We did get one job offer from Stamford International University, with their English Immersion program, but have not fully decided on that one. It would be amazing, and we could even start teaching University level intro English classes, but we feel that teaching kids would be more rewarding for us. So that is one option, if things get out of hand.

Another school really liked us, and was trying to figure out a way to pay us half time until may when we can start working for fulltime. This sounded ok, but we have started to question if Hua Hin is somewhere we would want to spend 6 months or a year, as there really isn't a young scene, or a huge backpacker scene... so we'r just conflicted and torn.

The worst part is that our Tourist Visas are coming to and end. We have to do a border run next weekend, and if we can get a 2 or 3 month tourist visa from Malaysia, we may make the trek, but if not we're planning on renewing for one more month, and then just figuring it out.

The money is going, but not horribly fast, so we're not in a GIANT rush, but the visa thing does suck a little. There is a really cool Summer Camp, which would be awsome, but it doesn't start till March, and unless we have a tourist visa that can handle it, we may have to flee the country in hopes of something else. But that's not for at least a month.

Weve been trying to see what we can of Hua Hin, which has great night markets, and some decent beaches. There is a temple at the other side of town that has monkeys running all around, so you can pay 60 cents to get bananas and feed them. Today Johanna set them down to take a picture of me, and one big monkey stole the whole bunch and ran up a tree... sneaky little...

There are some cool beaches, and when it's really hot we go for a swim and do some reading. Cooking for ourselves is also great, and putting peanuts and fresh pinapple with stir fry has really become addicting... the best pinapple.. mmm so fresh

Let's see. We rented bikes too, so we have our own transportation, and it gets great gas mileage, i think. I spent about 5 dollars and got around 200 kilometers... i tried to convert it, but didn't remember exactly what I got. Either way Ive driving all over the place in the past week and only spent about 8-10 dollars on gas... gotta love the little motorbikes...

I guess that's it for now, sorry I didn't write earlier.

Oh, Her Royal Magesty, the Princess (the King's sister) passed away a couple weeks ago, and it's interesting to see all the tv adverts for her, and lots of her pictures were put up. Also you are asked not to wear lots of bright clothing, as to respect the time of mourning...

On that note... hope all is well, and I'll post up on this once I figure out if I am going to take any of the job offers, or move to Bangkok to look for jobs, or try for that Summer Camp at the University on the other side of the gulf... Hopefully tomorrow morning will help everyone get back to my emails and we can get some productive stuff done. Also, I just might be able to call people (no promises), so watch out grandma!