Crossing cultural borders in a single blurb!

I was chatting online with a Thai friend recently and reminded very quickly of why I started this blog in the first place... I had intended my blog to be a Westerner's view of living in the Far East (read that as Orient).

Some of you may remember a posting I wrote way way back about "Your chest is in your pants"?

Well, did I ever tell you about having dinner and coffee and beachside bistro?

My girlfriend and I had taken a four day weekend vacation and flown down to the cozy and cool (cool as in neat, not cool as in not hot (and that's hot and in sweating like a pig, not hot as in awesome. (and that's awesome... oh you get the idea))) Island of Koh Samui. About a 1 hour flight south of Bangkok.

We'd been out wandering the island and doing things that couples do... (get your mind out of the gutter! I meant like taking pictures of each other next to various landmarks)... rented a motorbike and toodled around the roads seeing the sights. Evening came and we found this nice little cozy open air Italian place. Well, it said it was Italian, and was decorated with the red and white checked table clothes, and had the ubiquitous wicker-n-wine bottle candle holder on the table, but that's about where the stereotypical resemblance ended. Regardless, the food was yummy, and the service very good.

After dinner we ordered some coffee. When it came I realized there was no cream or sugar. So, feeling proud of my newly building skill with Thai language, I called the waitress over and asked her very clearly, and with a smile and good accent, "Nong. Khun mee nom mai khrub?"

She looked me straight in the eye, and without hesitation pointed to herself and responded, "Mee ka." with a smile and nod in the affirmative. ...? ...? umm...? She stayed where she was standing. She wasn't leaving to get the cream. What the...?

Then I heard my girlfriend giggle. I glanced at her. Glanced back at the waitress whose smile was getting broader by the second. Then the lightbulb clicked on in that dark dusty place in my head reserved for epiphanies, "duh" moments, and self-inflicted slaps to the forehead.

VERY quickly I looked to the waitress and said "nom sud! nom sud! I meant 'nom sud!' " and with a laugh and a bounce in her step she moved off and retrieved the cream service. Returning to our table, depositing the cream service with a flourish, and a jubilantly spoken "Nom sud ka!" and moved off to other less embarrassed customers.

What was all that about you ask? Well, the tricky part in Thai language (I mean, YET ANOTHER, tricky part!) is that the word for milk "nom sud" is the same as that for BOOBS "nom"!!! So what I actually asked was if she had boobs. That's what she was pointing at when she said "mee ka," which means "Have."

Maybe I should have asked her for them and seen what her response would be then! :-)
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Tough day at the office

Go Postal

Exhausted brain, head is full
Customer of china, partner of bull
Stay the course, hold the line
Boiling point, matter of time

Calm and collected, pressure cooking
Disruptive id, patience fading
Oft' disappointed, always hopeful
F*ck this sh*t, going postal


Had a bad day.... does it show? :-/

Curses! I've been Tagged!

Arrrrrgh! I've been tagged. Tags are painful, and yet... fun. No I'm not a sadist. Tags sometimes make you think about things you wouldn't otherwise well... think about. A female of passing acquaintance, good 'ol Kelly ( :-p ) tagged me. So, here goes.

The rules of the game get posted at the beginning of the post. Each player answers the questions about themselves in their post. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5-6 people and posts their names, then goes to their blogs and leaves them a comment, letting them know they’ve been tagged and asking them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.

1. What was I doing ten years ago? Ten years ago I was living in Bangkok, Thailand. I had just moved there the first week of March. My friend Thomas and I were offered assignments on contract with the US Dept. of State to support their Y2K modernization program to be based at the US Embassy in Thailand. It was 3 years of fun, amazing travels in Asia, and lots and lots of hard work in strange climates and interesting cultures. - Blizzards in Mongolia, Dust storms in India, Monsoons in Thailand, Military Coup d'etat in Pakistan (while I was there), Rioting and Deposing of Prime Minister Sujuarto in Indonesia (while I was there), and I wouldn't trade any of it for anything.

2. What are five things on my list to do today? It's 9:20 PM as I write this, so I hope I got them all done, but some of the the things that were on my list were... 1. Get the contract modification executed by my customer; 2. Conduct an orientation for a new consultant we've brought on to a contract we have; 3. Continue search for a talented SQL/.NET Developer we can bring on; 4. Discuss the project plan (milestones, actions, deliverables, personnel assignments, timeline, etc.) 5. Think really hard about exercise and diet while successfully avoiding doing anything about them. Those don't sound like much fun, but I like them... it's what I do. But the best thing of all on my list was talking to my kids on the phone and hearing them talk about chasing fireflys. That made my day!

3. Snacks I enjoy? Just about anything chocolate; Cheese and crackers (I'm not picky, I just love cheese); Chex Mix (original); Mom's pineapple upside down cake (the best ever!!!); Grandmomma's banana bread (man that's good eatin'); Carrots and Peanut Butter

4. Things I Would Do If I Were A Billionaire? Pay off all of my family's debt out to at least the 1st Cousin level. Setup trusts for my kids education and life after school. Buy some land and build our dream-house. Take the family on a long kick-ass holiday! And finally... buy a business that's already up and running and manage that... because it's easier than starting from scratch like I'm doing now.

5. Three of my bad habits? Suffering ignorance poorly. Being less patient than I ought. Not exercising (although I'm really working on this last one... sort of).

6. Five places I have lived? 1) Germany - Born in Frankfurt am Mein. My father was stationed there with the US Army. Though, I only lived there for 6 months until my father's orders returned us to the USA. 2) Lived in Ft. Riley, Kansas when my father was there with the Army (he was in Armor and I got to ride the tanks. How cool is that?!) 3) Laguna, California: Think beaches and Disney!!! What a great location for a 10 year old! 4) Thailand. I've talked about it throughout my blog. It's a wonderful place, full of wonderful people, and a lot of really rich crooks.... uh... I mean politicians. Sad that such an interesting and friendly culture could generate such disgusting profiteers for leaders. 5) Huntsville, AL: No one in my family is a native-born Huntsvillian, but we all seem to come back to it time and time again. I've lived away from it more than I've lived in it, but no place other than my home in Thailand has ever felt so comfortable to me.

7. Five jobs I’ve had? 1) Dishwasher at Quincy's Steakhouse when I was 16. (my first real paycheck job). 2) Projectionist at the Madison Twin movie theater - fantastic job except for the haunted bathroom upstairs next to projection booth 3) Manager of Walden Software in Alexandria, VA; 4) Regional Contract Manager for General Motors Asia Pacific - fun job, loved the work, salary not so much. 5) VP at my current company where I'm also part owner... building a business from scratch... I'm gaining more grey hairs by the hour! ;-)

8. How did you name your blog? Seemed appropriate as a foreigner living in Thailand. I was culturally outside and looking in with a different perspective. Definitely in possession of a different point of view than what the locals apply.

So now I tag...
1. Nude Memphis - because he's an entertaining, and perspicacious individual

I can't tag more because all my bloggy friends have already been tagged by others. So I'm asking him to tag 4 extras on my behalf! :-D

Maybe I need more friends!
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I Kissed A Girl - Katy Perry Music Video

This is for some certain of my friends. ;-)

This is a damn hot tune!

Brainless Roaches, Mantises, and Starfish... Oh My!

I f you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee.
(Hardly seems worth it.)

If you farted consistently for 6 years and 9 months, enough gas is produced to create the energy of an atomic bomb.
(Now that's more like it !)

The human heart creates enough pressure when it pumps out to the body to squirt blood 30 feet.
(O.M.G.!)

A pig's orgasm lasts 30 minutes.
(In my next life, I want to be a pig!)

A cockroach will live nine days without its head before it starves to death.
(Creepy.)
(I'm still not over the pig.)

Banging your head against a wall uses 150 calories a hour
(Don't try this at home, maybe at work though)

The male praying mantis cannot copulate while its head is attached to its body. The female initiates sex by ripping the male's head off.
(Honey, I'm home. What the...!?!)

The flea can jump 350 times its body length. It's like a human jumping the length of a football field.
(30 minutes.. Lucky pig! Can you imagine?)

The catfish has over 27,000 taste buds.
(What could be so tasty on the bottom of a pond? Blech!)

Some lions mate over 50 times a day.
(I still want to be a pig in my next life...quality over quantity)

Butterflies taste with their feet.
(Umm... yuck!!)

The strongest muscle in the body is the tongue.
(Hmmmmmm......)

Right-handed people live, on average, nine years longer than left-handed people.
(If you're ambidextrous, do you split the difference?)

Elephants are the only animals that cannot jump.
(Okay, so I'm thinking that would be a good thing)

A cat's urine glow s under a black light.
(I wonder who was paid to figure that out?)

An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.
(I know some people like that.)

Starfish have no brains
(I know some people like that too.)

Polar bears are left-handed.
(If they switch, they'll live a lot longer)

(and God loves that pig!)
30 Minutes... WOW!!!!

So you know what all this teaches me?

That I want to be a right-handed pig-lion when I grow up!