All Quiet on the Eastern Front

Sorry that it’s been so quiet here.

When I got back to Bangkok I had a friend to stay. She’d been working in Phuket for a month and came up to see us before transferring to Bali to meet her family. She was the very first person I called after Husband dropped me the ‘I’ve been offered a promotion in Bangkok’ bombshell. She was (and continues to be) a source of great wisdom about expat life. I met her at our kids’ primary school when she returned from many years living in SE Asia and we’ve been trying and failing to meet up in Bangkok since we got here.

As she made her way to Bali, so we were on our way to Koh Samui.

That’s where we are now. Husband’s colleague said ‘Two weeks in Samui? OMG; you’ll be so bored.” But we wanted a do nothing holiday… I’ve got ten books to read and my own novel to re-write. How can I get bored?

I had planned to pelt through my reading list but the mood took me to start rewriting so that’s what I’m doing in the mornings and reading with whatever time is left over. So far I’ve enjoyed reading/am reading:

• Dad's Life by Dave Hill

• Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby

• Turning The Tide by Christine Stovell

And I’m 9% through reordering my manuscript. Happily, there isn’t nearly as much mess as I’d anticipated.

Red shirts, red toe and red with excitement

Yesterday the children and Husband worked from home (oh how the children cursed e-learning technology.) The city of Bangkok is eerily quiet and many activities have been postponed or cancelled. From yesterday the UDD, or red shirts, were accumulating in various points to march on Bangkok to try to persuade the prime minister to dissolve the government in favour of a truly democratic government.

After cutting her toe, Daughter and I had to go to the hospital yesterday afternoon for a tetanus shot. The streets were deserted and the hospital was like a ghost town. We got there and back inside an hour: unheard of.

***

So today, I have finished and sent off my last two travel articles; I have made some changes to the edited essay that my editor returned to me and sent that back too.

And.

Now.

After a three month break…

I am so excited.

I am printing off my novel.

And starting the first edit.

Oh yes.