NOVEMBER

Good morning; friends family; gig's, mom. dad, the goat im taking home for christmas and a SPECIAL good morning to my gorgeous Boyfriend, lets not forget my small little snackies and my precious meri-moo :)
Well well November was a fun exciting month filled with the general adventures one gets swept up by while here in the city of sin!
November started off with a Bang, and a floating pop! With Loy Krathong and my awesome annual leave at the end of november which was awesome and jam packed to the brim with sites and sounds!
As of 2morrow; I will have been living in Thailand for 12 Months.....and i look back over those 12 months and wow...its really been a life changing experiance, from day one!
Well let me fill you in on November. Loy Krathong was great; really got that feeling of community spirit and the intoxicating-nose hair decaying smells of Pattaya all in one. Then it was work work work till the 20th where I waited patiently at the airport waiting for my Knight in shining armour to arrive. Oh and when he did..... :) So off we went on our week long journey in and around Pattaya as well as being a bit more adventerous and taking some time out to explore the bigger parts of Thailand.....So hence the road trip started..... (Click here to view the road trip Pictures)
Starting from Pattaya heading north up towards some random places with names like Lom Sak; Nakhon Rachisma Etc.....sleeping on cement block (kerri will appriciate that) through an awesome forest; seeing an obsure although MASSIVE lake. Temples; further north to Sukothai; Pitsonaluk; Lopburi; and then down to fated bangkok! Then finally back home for dinner with my lovely friends and 2 days of relaxation; as well as some speed racing on saturday. Thanks to air asia's pathetic uselessness....Dustins flights were delayed by a couple of days so had another relaxing day yesterday and back to work today! (While my sexy fella gets to lounge and relax....which is something he totally deserves! )
Last night we treated ourselves to the absolutely EXQUISITE Centara Hotel dinner. Seriously....its the best meal i have had like ever! (Read More about Centara)
Im sure you have noticed i've now really spruced up my blog so take some time; watch some home movies; peruse through the pictures; and just enjoy!
(A little Bitch about Pattaya - if you can stomach the truth....not for the faint hearted...)
A couple of other things added this month:
Loy Krathong
A couple of posts for/ About things in and around Pattaya
Worth a watch is my home videos on driving in Pattaya.....

Hope you all are having a wonderful time!
Love to everyone! Nearly Christmas! YAY!
Niki

PS: DONT FORGET TO BECOME A FAN ON FACEBOOK!

WAKE ME UP......WHEN SEPTEMBER ENDS!

Well September too has come and gone......and with it the 2 year anniversary of my moms passing...so i thought as something special, to mark the occasion; i would get something special between me and her....and what did i get? I got a star! :) Well...it was an experiance all in itself. I have NEVER been in so much pain in my life!!! (all 5 minutes of it) and those of you with tattoo's.....what were you thinking??? SERIOUSLY!? You bunch of crazy gits! Well...after much screaming and biting the arm-rest of the chair (which in pattaya i dont think was to hygenic) i left with a star on my foot......my first and LAST STAR! :) So definately a day to remeber!

Mid-Month was donned by the very entertaining "Nakky-one-night-road-trip"; which lead my gorgeous friend Steph and I through the windy and rather lush roads of Kanchanaburi (or as i like to say kan-chana-chana-something-buri-something-something-acha). The purppose of this trip was for Steph to run in the International River Kwaai Marathon...which i am proud to say she came 6th (i didnt tell her; but anything after 10 and she would have to walk back from kana-something to Pattaya....hahahaha) So it was a great drive up to the registration point; we stoppped off to see the very well manicured grave yards of the Jeath Railway workers. Then stopped off for a little look at the "Bridge over the river kwaai" Ha....Which was filled with tourists!

Nakky (in our road trip name) comes from the thai word nak-tong-teea-ow which is tourists.

Although our timing was perfect; we arrived in Kana-something round 4-5pm and the sun was glinting off the water of the river and it was just the most perfect lighting....WOW! Just what an awesome sight. The histoory behind it is so facinating too.....Any-whoo....we left Kana-Something town and headed towards the marathon registration point which was in the middle of some forest.....MILLIONS of registration people.....so....me......DRIVING THE CAR; pulled a sicky......and asked to park in the paraplegic parking because of my poor poor sore and broken foot....sob sniff....haha....well needless to say; a front enterance parking and a chair while i waitd for steph was pure luxuary :) Once done we headed off to our own forest hotel which was just delightful.....the entrance had these arching tree's almost hugging you with relaxation as you drove in. Our little place was great and headed straight for the food! :) Sight seeing takes a lot out of you! Some much needed carbo loading on spagetti and sauce for Steph.....and i said she needed im-moral support so was there eating the spagetti too! Early to bed and VERY early to rise! Start was at 6am....so we were ready to blitzz at like 5:15.....Wow....so many people; and such a cool morning! It was just perfect.....Just under 2 hrs later my rocking friend came in to claim 6th position in the ladies group!! SO PROUD!   Well after that; our morning kick started forday of more sight seeing!We crammed ALOT in a day and half! We went off and saw the Erawan Falls and the very depressing; although highly interesting Hell-fire pass.....very sad....and you get these walki talkie things which tell you a story as you walk....it was hard to hold back the tears sometimes. They really chose the SADDEST most MORBID people to tell their stories of the Pisoner of war camps.....god...it was horrible. Anyway....after feeling the slump of the POW depression........we started our weary way back to Pattaya the city of sin! :) after a good 2hrs of classic Bangkok traffic we arrived home in once piece :) And thus sadly brought to an end; what i can only describe as the perfectly planned weekend!

On the netball/touch rugby/social and what-not front; foot is healing SSSSSSSSSLLLLLLLLOOOOOOWWWWWWLLLLLLYYYYYYYY and my still take some time to fully recover....which sad as it may be; has given me an excuse to stay at home and spend more time with my new friends (as well as get all the good parkings!!)

check out http://www.ppnetball.blogspot.com/ for my netball team blog!

Work has been crazy busy; but its really great learning and doing new things out of my normal spectrum.

I am just loving (and hating - mixed feelings maybe) the monsson season! I was expecting shocking down-pours and miserable weather and and and....but instead i can only equate it to summer afternoon showers in SA. Although.....fair enough.....the road at work did wash away......with tons of a drama there....but i think in reality it actually had something to do with some radio-active creature that ate the tar.....or godzilla? One can only guess......

Ghosts in my house!

So my apartment....which rocks with Nicola-ness! Has been invaded by what the managers can only describe to me as.....well..........ghosts........

It started about 2 months ago where i noticed things in my house had been moved; tv channel was always on like #11 thai (english channels are like #58 onwards).....but now its evident that someone is definately comming in....because my little "nancy drew" tactic of sticking sticky-tape over the door proved a success.....so when i explained this to the management they could not work out how someone was getting in.....until i was locked OUT of my own appartment.....TWICE! fun times. So had the locks changed and so far i seem to be "ghost free" although in reality i think someone was hopping over the balcony or something? Weird.......But at i love most about my house is the 3 views i have. 1 for the sunsets over the ocean and 2 for the sun rise....and everymorning its amazing and every evening breath taking! Pinks and yellows light up the sky! Totally my favorite time of the day.....Dusk and dawn......

On the view note; i have noticed that the forest out doors has a tree right by my window....a tree which i home to (what i can only happily assume-by this i mean pretend that i didnt kill him and chuck him over the wall :) ) is dunkins little tree squirrel family......?

Ive been itching for a run in the cool mornings and evenings but this darned ankle wont seem to let me get further than my kitchen (or is that my belly??)
On other social aspects; I have made some new friends! Wendy from perth! And as mentioned in my last month news letter Lovely Tracy who is an ex saffer...YAY!

So from left to right: Tracy; Mon; Me; Ped; Me; Steph; Wedy!

On the Buddhist side; im still learning and studying and trying to keep it all together....i shall not lie that is EXTREMELY hard work......who wants to be nice to everyone?? Its complete rubbish! HA HA HA But it has lead me to some really great temples and places to see! Learning thai has been very very very hard and even though i love languages, its really not the easiest to catch onto. None the less i thought...."Hey...why not teach everyone my nationational anthem?" And well to my suprise it seemed to catch on real fast....with the new words obviously which are "Inkhosi Sexy Lady-eee Aflika".........needless say it worked under the circumtances :) and felt i did my home country a justice (or injustice) by roping in support from the Thai Community at the bar..... :)

Ok....well thats all for now folks! Miss you all and hope you are all well!

Drop me a line sometime!

XOXOX

Niki

(This is me at my Birthday Buddha) "Seven Days Looking" (Paang Tawai Netr ), the image is standing with hands held down in front of the body. The left hand is covered by the right. This attitude represents the period after the Buddha had realized Enlightenment. He achieved the enlightened state as he sat under a Bho tree for seven days in deep meditation. It is said he then stood for a longer period in deep meditation with eyes half shut.