Impulse buy

After I finished my last post I went for a walk down to get some clothes and some teacherly supplies (glue stick, red pen, etc) On my way back I ran into Ryan who was on his way to pick up a birthday gift for Josh. I know I'm dropping names of all over the place so I'll give you a who's who of Languagecorps Thailand. In my program there is Alex, who is the one also teaching at the railway school with me, Ryan, who has a personality very similar to mine, Josh, who is almost done here and moving to teach in South Korea, Molly and Lannie, the lovely ladies, Rick Jam and Indy, the ones teaching us how to teach, Kat, a girl who got here before us and now teaches in Pattaya and works for Languagecorps, and Kate, who also got here earlier and is the one who got a job in Bangkok.

Alright. So Ryan and I are heading to the only bookstore we know of to get a Lonely Planet guide to Korea for Josh when I stop to look at prices of custom made suits. Before I can go in, the tailor nextdoor comes out and beckons us into his shop. Sidenote: every store here is surrounded by identical stores. 'Where can I find a good dentist?' 'Just walk up and down Soi Dthai, they're everywhere!'. There's actually an entire floor of the electronics center that sells just cell phones. Flea market style. It's something that still puzzles me.

So we go into this tailor and before we know it we've bargained our way down to the point where we got a custom suit, two shirts, and a tie for 4400 baht (like $125). I thought that was an amazing deal but apparently we overpaid(!). I'm sure we could have saved a few bucks by going somewhere else but these guys were very professional and I would rather pay a little extra if it meant higher quality. I went back this afternoon for a fitting and it looks like I'm gonna be looking pretty snazzy.

That's about all that happened since last time. I didn't have to teach today, just go to Thai class where we practiced foods and ordering at a restaurant. I've been trying to use my Thai around the city as much as possible and the people love it. I counted out my laundry piece by piece the other day and I ask how much things are, even if I'm not really interested.

Sawasdee krup!
james