Freedom

Hi,

The weather in Chiang Rai today was HOT.  It was listed as 92, with a real feel of 102.  I believe that.  It may be hotter tomorrow.

The ‘Easy Monday’ song was “The Girl From Ipanema” by Astrid Gilberto and Stan Getz.  And now, the ‘Zany Day’ song:  “I was five and he was six, we rode on horses made of sticks.  He wore black and I wore white, he would always win the fight.  __ __, (__ __ __ __), __ __, I hit the ground, __ __, that awful sound, __ __, (__ __ __ __ __).”  Hint:  Kinda the dark side of zany, written by the husband of the singer.  Title is two words, both the same.

Last night the van did something weird that seemed related to the transmission.  This morning there were no signs of the odd behavior, but we took it to Suzuki to have it checked.  They said they would reset the computer, which made sense to someone who doesn’t completely understand how a car works anymore (555).  That gave us an hour to either sit in their waiting room, or explore the changes on Bus Station Street.  We were on our way to a known coffee destination when I spotted a sign on a side street.  The place had a modern look so we checked it out.  It’s called “Sound, Brown Coffee”.  We don’t know why, maybe the words just sounded good.  The coffee was good and the sounds they played were Korean ‘K-Pop’, a very slick form of modern R&B that I like.  One of the guys who works there remembered seeing us at The Wanderer many times and referred to Lisa as Cat’s ‘Auntie’.  I guess we do get around.  We’ll be going back to SBC from time to time.  We liked the vibe.

There is a stretch of Bus Station Street that is filled with shoe and bag shops.  Lots of browsing to be done.  Since it was early in the day, most of them were empty and made it easy to get help if we needed it.  As we were leaving the last shop on the ‘row’ I noticed a new way to avoid copyright infringement.  

Neechanon hung out with us upstairs before lunch.  Now that she’s really talking, we’re trying to use English words along with the Thai words she understands.  It’s a slow process, but she is very smart and always repeats the new words.  

In the afternoon we met our friend John, and his niece Haley, for coffee at Chivit Tamma Da.  It was 2pm and the place was absolutely buzzing.  We’ve never seen it so busy.  Before we found our friends, I congratulated the co-owner, Joaquim on the Swedish teams World Cup victory over Switzerland.  He was very excited, of course and then laughed about how so many people think they are the same country.  Geography is not a big subject here.  

We found our friends and a quiet table in the air/con room.  Haley just finished her first year of college in the States, and is majoring in Computer Gaming Graphics through the art department.  Getting an understanding of what she will be doing helped us see the bigger picture of art education on some levels. There are infinite possibilities when one is prepared.

Our big adventure for this week will be tomorrow’s trip to Mae Chan, to find a hilltop Mexican restaurant called Hacienda.  We meeting our friends Susan and Noy.  Now I just have to figure out how to get there.

Have a Thrilling Thursday.

                      Peace,

                                Danny

“May we think of freedom, 

not as the right to do as we please,

but as an opportunity to do what

is right.”

~Peter Marshall