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Previous entries

Returning Home - Again

The God Illusion

Going Home

2022

A Change of Direction

Dogs and Pandemics

The Forgotten tenors

Nine Things I will Miss about Thailand

Circles

Just Do It

Ayr on a Shoestring

Oh Lonesome Me

Tipping Point

Movie Reviews

Putting Pen to Paper

A Year to Remember

A Year to Forget

10 Reasons I Cannot Go Home

China Girl

The State of Play

Veggies

Mind Your Language

New Horizons

Injustice

Honeymoon

Taxes and Death

Also-rans

Stinkhorns

Grey is the Colour

Beating Myself Up

Nothing More to Say

Better Late than Never

Staying Put

Musical Chairs

Wanderlust

A Dog's Life

A Sabbatical

A Welcome Diversion

A Guide to Business Ethics

Remembering the Austin Allegro

Our Lords and Masters

In Transit - Part 2

In Transit - Part 1

Nagging Doubts

While Bangkok Burns

An Evening to Remember

Thai Business Malpractice

The New and the Old

Christmas Lights

Groundhog Day

Singapura

Possessions

Adventure is Out There

Education

Grabbing it While You Can

A Few Ups and Many Downs

Limbo

Pack Up Your Old Kit Bag

Salmon

Bananas

Religion

Football

Grateful

Yummy

Ate Two Caesar

Swine Pie

The Thai Rollercoaster

Stuck in the Middle

There's no Regrets

Profit and Loss

Running on Empty

Getting it out Your System

National Mistrust

Bring in the Old, Out with the New

Humility

I am Reviewing, My Situation...

Wat Phrabhat Nam Poo

Today I will Mostly be Eating...

Mortality

The Thai Experience

Wat Khaowong

Reality Bites

Wat Simalais

Amazing Thailand

He Must have a Big Wand

Right Place, Wrong Time

Carousel

Tin

And it does go on

Mangos

Bring Him Home

Resurgence

Protege

Listening to my Reader.

 

Archives

Diary Archive 18.

Diary Archive 17.

Diary Archive 16.

Diary Archive 15.

Diary Archive 14.

Diary Archive 13.

Diary Archive 12.

Diary Archive 11.

Diary Archive 10.

Diary Archive 9.

Diary Archive 8.

Diary Archive 7.

Diary Archive 6.

Diary Archive 5.

Diary Archive 4.

Diary Archive 3.

Diary Archive 2.

Diary Archive 1.

 

 

Resurgence

Yesterday our new employee started work. He arrived five minutes early but as soon as he sat down at his desk his phone rang and he answered it - he could have set fire to Pinky and it would have annoyed me less. But the rest of the day went very well and he is a fast learner so in the afternoon he worked alone with only a couple of questions being asked of me. (The call was from his protective sister to check everything was OK).

On Friday we went to his school. I wanted to ask his tutors what would be a suitable project for him that would help his studies and I only had to seed the idea in Ploy's mind as a quick telephone call later we were on our way to his college. The college is closed but there are still students around doing some projects but it also meant the tutors were free to talk to us. I now have a much better idea of what they do and teach. He can remain at the college until he is 20 if he wishes in which case he will get a higher diploma. The latter years are 3 semesters long, and one of those semesters must be spent in industry. Our student is already committed to work with the Thailand electricity providers for his first semester and given the state of the electricity in Thailand he is unlikely to survive that. But we can choose another one or two (or more but we can't handle more) students next October when the industrial semester starts. If we like each other we can get them again in a year's time. We have options to sponsor their studies in which case we can contract them to work full time for us when they complete. This is very similar to day release in the UK which is how I studied, it just starts two years earlier here, but for us it produces just the type of engineer I like; practical but with some theoretical background. The college is just 15km from us and I got on with the tutors very well; they asked me to teach there part time and another asked me to help with his hobby electronics business.

However there is one small issue with our new employee. His name is Vipach but as with all Thais he has a nickname which is used instead, Dtot. Unfortunately I cannot seem to pronounce that properly so for my version I call him Dot, which means fart in Thai. So I have decided to call him Frank instead (or Flank).

And yesterday, as if our new employee is some sort of good luck charm, I was told to expect an order this week from one company whilst our old Hong Kong friend who caused us all these problems sent me a message to say he has his first customers and although he has spent a lot of time modifying my original designs, will honour our original agreement and will start sending me some license payments soon.

The evening meal was already planned, but after such a good day a small celebration seemed in order. We moved our meal to the coffee table so we could watch a DVD movie (The Last Emperor) although it has the disadvantage that it is at Pinky level. Ploy cooked larb moo for me, one of my favourites and one of the dishes she cooks better than any restaurant I know. Larb is a salad of minced meat or fish (pork in this case), with chopped spring onions, shallots, dried rice, chilli, garlic and mint leaves. It is served with raw vegetables of your choice, today cucumber and string beans. Ploy had noodles with makua yao, which are long aubergines, chopped and sauteed with oyster sauce, garlic, chilli and horlapa (Thai sweet basil). And we had some prawn crackers. And a bottle of nice Semillon/Chardonnay wine. And the movie was good. And the company was better.

 

 

 

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