Mae Sai 04/29/2010 Got pretty Busy

It got pretty busy around here today. We had two more men in the crew which cut some more floor tile for two of the other walls.

They also chiseled the hole in the concrete floor for the toilet drain line. I was amazed as the concrete floor is about six inches thick with 3/8" re-bar rod in it. If I had known that the floor was that strong I would not have worried about putting the cinder block walls up.

I did need to have a discussion with the man putting in the piping as he wanted to run the drain for the bathroom sink with a short 90 degree elbow instead of laying put the drain at a 45 degree angle. The 90 degree elbow would have made it impossible to clean out with a snake in the future.

It was nice to have the extra two men in the crew today but two more in the crew ment two more to check on. The saying: "You get what you inspect and not what you expect." is a true statement here with the workers in the "Land of Smiles".

I will also say that the crew that has been working here the last few days now work a little cleaner and are starting to clean up after themselves. Now the two new guys are really dirty workers!

Salad, Daeng and I went to the tile distributor today and bought the tile for the bathroom floor, walls, kitchen cabinets and back splash. That cost was 6036 THB ($189 USD). The tile place will deliver tomorrow.

We will have to give Salad 10,000 THB tomorrow for the men and more materials.
We are getting into the big money now with the new kitchen, bathroom and walls:
Original Deposit 10,000 THB
Fixtures, Sinks and Toilets 9475 THB
Tile Today 6036 THB
Payment Tomorrow 10,000 THB
Total on this project 35,511 THB That is about $1,110 United States Dollars.

I have spent a few hundred Thai Baht that still hasn't been written in the expense ledger we're keeping for the new place.

Oh well, it's only money!

Mae Sai Re-Model 04/25-27/2010

Well, the re-model project is going pretty mellow with only a few minor upsets for me.

With the bathroom all laid out they cut the existing tile on the upstairs floor. That made a mess all through the place as the tile saw threw tile dust everywhere.

They removed the old floor tile and laid a cinder block walls up to the height of the doors. Then they poured the first door in place.

When I say poured that is exactly what I mean. They built a frame around the door with some steel rod in it and poured cement down from the top of the door jam sides. This morning they took off the wood frame and spent most of today getting ready for the next door as well as getting ready to start putting on tile.

The kitchen cabinets are now ready for the concrete top to be poured. After that is done they will tile everything, the cabinets, the counter top and the walls.

Daeng and I moved one of the light fixtures were the bathroom wall is going to meet the ceiling. We will move the electric plug in the new bathroom area early in the morning so we can turn off the electric to the house.

Here the electric power is 230 volts so I need to be careful and not stick my tongue on the wires.

The electrical system in this part of the world uses "delta" transformers. What that means is one wire to neutral is 230 volts and the two power wires together are still 230 volts. With a "delta Y" transformer one wire to neutral is 115 volts and two power wires together are 230 volts. As far as ground wires, what are those? :(

We did put a ground rod in for the Internet wiring system. We have lots of thunder storms here so grounding the telephone lines is pretty important. I would think that grounding the electrical equipment would be just as important but no one, including the electrician seem to worry about it. It maybe because life is not valued here as much as were I was brought up.

My only wish on this re-model is that the men could work a little cleaner but TITwBT. This is a good example of what my boss, when I was about 18, would say: "If you go to a person's home and see how they live, that is probably how they will work."

One of the things that really pissed me off was they took one of the new stools we bought last week and stood on it to pour the concrete around the door. That part was okay but look at the way they left it!

We did have an ice cream sandwich in the afternoon. When I say sandwich that is exactly what it is, a piece of white bread with ice cream in it and the bread folded over. I think it is "Wonder Bread". I'm only kidding but it does taste like Wonder Bread, that white spongy kind.

I think tomorrow is going to be busy around here as the holes have to be made in the concrete ceiling, pipes run, new cesspool dug in garage/outside cooking area with concrete rings installed and sand around them. That is just the major stuff besides the other door put in place, block walls installed to ceiling of upstairs second floor and the concrete kitchen counter top poured.

Oh, the other thing that got me today was someone wrote on my sketch of the new kitchen.

Tomorrow will definitely be a "Picture Opportunity Day".