Mae Sai - Trip to Dentist 04/07/2010

We are so involved with the new house that I forgot all about going to the dentist.

Five days ago, on the way back from Chiang Rai, I told Daeng that I was having some trouble with my mouth very similar with what happened in the spring. Only this time it is the other side of my mouth. Just to make this story short, CLICK HERE to read about going to the specialist.

Daeng stopped on the way at Dr. Aom. Her full name is Wanlapa Chuenmone-Oknsakul D. D. S. She took me right in and examined me. She said that I was correct, it was the same problem as my gums are starting to shrink which allows pockets for food to get into and causes infection.

She Planed the tooth, gave me five days supply of pills to fight the infection and some for pain, instructed me to come back in five days at 10:00 AM and charged me 400 THB ($12.00 USD).

I did have a little pain that night but I slept okay once I got to sleep.

On Wednesday I went back and she checked the area of my mouth and said everything looked good and to keep cleaning that area well. She looked at the rest of my teeth and said my mouth looked very good.

I asked her about the rough spot on one tooth. She smoothed out the rough spot and asked me how it felt. It was now very smooth.

She told me she would like to see me in three months. I ask if five months would be okay as we will be in California in three month. She smiled, I think, and said of course.

I asked her how much I owned her today and she told me there was no charge for today's visit.

I have no idea of what a dentist in America would charge but I'm sure it would be more that $12,00 for two visit and the pills.

Yes, it's "Amazing Thailand".

Thank you Doctor Aom!

Our New Shop House 04/06/2010

We put all the cleaning stuff in a five gallon pail and got to our new home around 9:00 AM. We opened the place and hooked up a hose to wash down the front of the first floor.

About that time Daeng's niece and nephew, Newie and Kit, arrived. they both jumped right in and helped Daeng clean the window and window shutters.

I hosed down the security doors and glass and then used newspaper to got most of the really heavy dirt off the glass.
I could see the water meter turning so I went on the what's leaking investigation. Several thing were leaking, two hose valves and the toilet on the third floor.

Daeng ran out and picked up lunch for the four of us. After we ate I jumped on the motorbike and went to Home Mart and bought new valves and parts to repair the toilet. Home Mart only had a kit for the toilet and I did not like the looks of it but that's all they had.

I bought a new toilet seat for the toilet I was woking on. My feeling about toilet seat is the same as tooth brushes. If you move into a house and find a tooth brush that was left there would you use it? Enough said!

I came back and Kit helped me do all the work. When we finished I realized that the float ball rod was to long so I had to go to Home Mart and buy a hack saw. I came back and put everything together, turned the water on to find the float valve was defective and spraying water up onto the tank lid.

Now I know what home owners, that fix stuff, have to go through. this will make the third trip to Home Mart. When we do this in we have all the part on the truck and carry good stuff so we don't have to do it twice.

Now, Daeng knows that in Thailand the stores do not want to take things back even if they are defective. As I jumped onto the motorbike she said she was going with me. When we got to Home Mart, they did not want to exchange the part We again explained I bought it today and it is defective. then the lady said it was part of a whole kit and I need to bring back the whole kit.

I walked over to the shelf and picked up a new kit, opened it and took out a new float valve and put the one that was bad back in the kit. I handed it to her and told her that this was a defective part. I asked her if she needed to do any paperwork as we were leaving.

She went into the office and came back out saying that if the new one I took doesn't work don't bring it back. As we walked out Daeng noted that this is not America and things are different here. I again explained that if someone sell me something that is defective and won't make good on it they are a thief!

We went back home, there I said it "HOME". I put the new float valve back in the toilet and guess what? You got it, this one was defective, also. The good part is I could adjust this one so it will work okay. I told Daeng we would bring some "Fluid Master 400A float valves back with us next trip.

After working all day we are beat so it's back to the guest house for showers and a good night sleep.

Back to getting the place ready to move into tomorrow.

Land Office - Mae Sai 04/05/2010

I could not get to sleep until early morning around 2:00 AM. I keep thinking about the shop house.

Daeng's telephone rang at 7:00 AM and woke us. It was Wirat saying he would like to meet at the District Land Office at 8:00 AM before they got really busy. He said he would do the transfer of title to Daeng and they we could go to the bank and give him the money.

We met them both at 8:00 AM with copies of Daeng's National Identification Card and my Passport. Everyone seem to know him and things went pretty smooth. He showed us a copy of the land title and it was the best type of title you can get in Thailand.

The government official questioned me to be sure I know that the title was going into Daeng's name as only Thai people and Thai Corporations can own land here. I said that I understood that. What we will do is record a 20 or 30 year lease to me after the land is transferred.

All the papers were put into a file and Wirat said he had to go over to the bank and he would be right back. We waited for him. He was back in about 15 minute and said that he thought he could clear the 200,000 THB mortgage with Bangkok Bank at this office but the papers had to go to Chaing Mai and be returned. That would take about four days.

He said that he would give us the keys to the place and a contract today. He said to do that he would like a deposit. We told him we could do that but we would have to go to the bank. I ask him how much and he said he would like to have 100,000 THB ($3,125 USD).

Daeng and I went up to the Bangkok Bank branch, withdrew the money and drove to their home. He had a contract all ready; stating the price, the amount of deposit and as Daeng had asked, the due date at the end of the month. We have a fix account coming due on the 20th so we won't lose and interest.

He went through the dozen or more "House Books" that he had in his file and showed us the book for this shop house. A "House Book" is every Thai girls dream. Daeng lite up like a Christmas Tree.

He gave us the keys and said: "It's your home, congratulations!" Things happen fast here.

Just about that time our friends, Peter and Nok, called telling us that they wanted to see our new home. We met them and went to see it. I got the keys to work opening all the security gates and that felt good.

They liked the place and felt we got a good price. They own several pieces of land here in Thailand.

We went over to Tesco/lotus and had lunch, talked and picked up some cleaning supplies. It was almost 5:00 PM and I was beat probably because I did not get much sleep last night. We went home and called it a day.

The shop house is pretty clean but tomorrow we'll start getting it ready for Daeng and I to move in, camping out as things come together. Maybe we'll check out of the guest house and sleep on a floor mat, in the new house, this Friday.

Camping out is fun!

Was this a typical day, I think not!

Happy Easter - Mae Sai 04/04/2010 Shop House

Happy Easter! You have just been mooned by the Easter Bunny!

We did the typical stuff this morning that we have talked about in other stories. We laughed as Daeng gave me the "No sex as we have to go to church this morning." I said: "That only works if you're Buddhist!" We both laughed, more.

We got dressed and headed over to Rev. Sunit's Church for Easter Sunday service. When we arrived Daeng went into the kitchen and helped Hlong do the cooking for the meal after the service. It always reminds me of the saying: "If you feed them they will come."

This is a temporary location for the church for the next month or so. I spotted the owner of the church property and spent time talking with him. He is Thai but had a restaurant business for many years in Los Angeles and still has a house in Diamond Bar, California. We talked about the differences between Thai's and Americans.

Church was over and they feed all the kids, about 20 today. I ate with the big folks today and talked with Pastor Lota. We had not seen him since he smuggled me in and out of Burma, two weeks ago.

We then went to Akoo's laundry and waited for the rest of the family to meet us. Tun, Hlong, Kit, Meechu, (Daeng's brother, sister-in-law, nephew & Mother) Daeng and I rode on three motorbikes over to the shop house we saw yesterday.

When we arrived, Wirat, the owner, told us that his wife did not want to sell the house and he was sorry. Daeng told him he should have told us that on the telephone when see called this morning so we would not have been inconvenienced. I kiddingly told Daeng we should beat him up.

I said: "Let's go see the other house we liked." We hopped back on our motorbike and said: "Follow us!" We got a couple hundred meters away and Tun caught up on his motorbike and said come back. I guess the owner called out to him as we were leaving.

We returned and Wirat said his wife was reluctant to sell the shop house as it was a wedding gift from the family. They owned a lot of other property and talked it over again. She changed her mind and would sell it.

We looked over the place, again. Everyone loved it. We told hi: "YES" and made arrangement to do the paper work in the morning at the land office.

He would transfer the land title and pay the taxes and then we would go to our bank and give him the 1,600,000 THB. We agreed.

I will say that is a little different than California. I had read two books on Thai Law and transferring property and everything made sense.

He left with his wife but we stayed with the two cleaning ladies and rechecked over the place again. That was kind of like the "walk through" that the buyer would do in America.

Older property is sold "as is" here in Thailand. We did not see anything that we couldn't live with. The third floor toilet was shut off. I turned it back on is it worked okay which worried me a little as maybe they had had a problem with the cesspool but we could have that pumped for 300 TB ($9.00 USD) if there was a problem.

The construction of this building is all masonry. The only wood are the bedroom door & window frames, garage area roof suppot and stair treads. The wood is all teak.

We would need to do a little maintenance on the lights, like change florescent tubes and a hose valve was dripping in the rear of building. Other than that everything was operational.

We all went back to our typical lives here in Mae Sai. Daeng and I kept talking about the place and I could not get to sleep.

More on our new home, tomorrow when we do transfer.

Mae Sai - Typical Day? 04/03/2010 Shop House

Today was pretty typical. We slept in and after doing the typical morning stuff Daeng ask me if I would like to go see a house for sale that her friend had told her about.

We have looked at over 200 houses for sale in the Mae Sai area already but I said sure, why not. We had talked many times over the last few years that when we find the right house we would know it.

We hopped on the motorbike and rode over to the area where route 1290 crosses route #1. When we got to the house a guy that Daeng has know from childhood was working on the house. He showed us around the property.

It has a small one bedroom house with an outside cooking area and three other rooms, a water tank, it's own well, a car port and a big lot. Daeng's friend says the man he worked for had bought it for 1,100,000 THB ($34,375 USD) and after fixing it up he wanted 1,550,000 THB ($48,437 USD).

We liked the place except for the metal roof on the three outside rooms. We figured the bedroom and bath in the little house for us. The living room in the little house would be for the rest of the family to watch TV, etc.

The three other rooms could be for Daeng's Mother and rest of family. We met the man that was doing the deal and told him we would think it over. He told us to let him know what we wanted changed and he could do it. He suggested western toilets and one air conditioning unit for the master bedroom.

Daeng and I rode around the area and came back to this property a couple of times. We agreed that it had a lot of potential. This may be the place for us with lots of room for expansion, even room for a pool.

As we were headed home we saw another "For Sale" sign on a shop house. A shop house, sometimes called a store front house, has room for a store or shop at ground level and living quarters upstairs. What the heck, at least call and see how much they want for it.

Daeng called and was told 1,600,000 THB for both sections. I ask Daeng if she was sure it wasn't for each side as it was a double shop house. She said: No, both." We talked about looking at it and she called the man back. In about 10 minutes he was there and open the place up.

This place was huge and completely finished and ready to live in. When you opened the security doors, the front and side is all glass store front with two floors of living area above.

The second floor could be partitioned off and a big bathroom added for our living quarters. The third floor already had three large rooms and a bath. There was a restroom on first floor, too. The cheapest shop house we had looked at was half this size and 2,000,000 THB.

Daeng, aways being thrifty, ask if he would discount the property a little.

He said: "No discount but he would pay all the taxes and transfer fees so we could move in for the 1,600,000 THB ($50,000 USD)". We told him we would talk about it and let him know.

We went to our guest house and looked at the pictures we had taken and talked about it more.

We both loved the place so we called him back and ask it we could bring the family to see it tomorrow, Easter Sunday, around 1:00 PM. He said yes as he would be doing some cleaning there tomorrow.

Daeng talked to the rest of the family as we were excited over this shop house.

We'll see what happens tomorrow.

Return to Mae Sai - Typical Day? 04/02/2010

We made it back to Mae Sai without incident on Friday. That is Myanmar (Burma) on the other side of the river.

We talked about going to Ban AYO on the way back as I wanted to see if we could find out the real story on Chom-nom's arrest. It is our understanding that he is in jail for two years for the controlled substance of Yaba, a methamphetamine drug.

The sentences, for first offence, seem to be about one or two months for one pill. It goes up about an month a pill until you get to the one year term. Then, I'm told, it gets into years.

There are no recovery programs in Thailand so it's not "Jails, Institutions and Death". It is "Jails or Death". Jail is not a very good place to be either as it is not "three hots and a cot". It is sleep on the floor and eat just rice or be someone's bitch for better food.

That is one of the reasons there are so many "opium orphans", as I call them. They are kids of parents that commented suicide.

Daeng talked to me about a "farang" visiting a drug house in a remote village. The police may think I'm involved in drugs, also. Then they stop and search me but don't find anything and want to save face so they plant some. I go to jail and spend all the money we have getting me back out even though I'm Innocent.

I agreed with her as it is also a big part of the recovery programs: "Stay away from slippery people and slippery places." Like my Grand-Mother Johnson always said: "You can be guilty by association, too."

I just feel sorry for the kids and everyone else that was involve in this project as his arrest stopped the completion of the children's shelter, at least for now.

We were pretty beat when we came into Mae Sai but did stop to see friends, Peter and Nok, that were at the District Land Office filing a lease. We had a little talk and headed back to our guest house.

Tomorrow is another day, maybe it will be typical.

Jack's Day 04-01-2010

It can’t be a typical day in Mae Sai as we are in Chiang Rai, about 60 kilometers south of Mae Sai.

Daeng’s cellular telephone alarm woke us at at 5:40 AM as she had set the alarm feature. She turned it off and the alarm on my phone went off five minutes later. We need to be at her sisters at 7:00 AM to follow the car that was taking everyone to the Temple. We showered and did all the typical things we do in Mae Sai every morning.

I did hear a new reason to not have sex. Daeng told me we couldn’t have sex as we were going to the Buddhist Temple. When she said it the corners of her mouth curled up like it does when she is kidding. I told her that excuse didn’t make it as she is Christian. We both laughed.

We put my notebook in a safety deposit box in the lobby and walked outside to the parking lot. Just as if we had asked for it, there was a coffee/breakfast truck sitting by the parking lot. As soon as the man saw me, being a round eyed person, he started into a little singing chant about coffee, fried eggs and anything we want at Alice’s Restaurant, except Alice. We all laughed.

We did have coffee and “baht-ta-go”. "Bath-ta-go” is fried dough, kind of like a Thai donut. They even had piped in country and western music playing. We wiped off the dew on the motorbike and drove to Daeng’s sisters house.

It was just about 7:00 AM and everyone was waiting for the pick-up truck that was going to take them all, about 10 people, to the Temple. There was some conversation and a few phone calls and Daeng gave her sister and Jack’s Father the keys to the motorbike and told them to go on so they would not be late. Jack is Daeng’s nephew and the boy that is going through the ceremony.

We waited for about 20 minutes more and Daeng made another phone call. She turned to me and said the ride was not coming and she was going to hire a “song-tail” to take us. A “song-tail” is a small pick-up truck with a rack in the pick-up bed to transport people.

In a few minutes she was back with two “tuk-tuks”. A tuk-tuk is a three wheeled vehicle that can transport about four people maximum. We loaded them up, said good-bye and told them we would see them in a little while. I was very proud of Daeng for taking charge of things and making them happen.

We walked up to the main street and got another tuk-tuk to the Temple.

When we arrived things were in full swing with hundreds, of people and boys to go through this ceremony.

Lots of praying before the boy got their double edged safety razors and proceeded to a chair in the huge circle around the outside of this gigantic Temple. There must be over a hundred boys. More ceremony as different monks came by each boy and cut a small piece of hair.

The cut hair was put in a plant leaf as it was cut. Maybe 20 people came by each boy and cut a piece of his hair. It was time for the family to help him cut all the hair off his body, head, eyebrows, etc. I didn’t spend any time taking pictures of the etc. parts.

Jack sure looked different with no hair. He seemed to enjoy it as he was smiling and laughing through the process.

After the hair cutting the 100 or so boys moved to the showering area as the families followed. They were washed, dried and powered down. I might add with cold water as Jack had a case of the shivers.

They were then clothed in with white surrounds and back to the temple for more praying. We hung out to the end of the ceremony and then the boys loaded into pick-up trucks for a parade through the city.

We jumped into a pick-up and joined in with the parade.

We went through the city and then returned to the Temple for more prayers and blessings.


After that ceremony everyone tied string around the wrists of the boys. I am not sure of the meaning but I think it is tying the family and child together with a good future.

Daeng figured I was hungry so she bought me an ice cream sandwich. It was a real one with two scoops of coconut ice cream in a slice of white bread. It tasted like Wonder Bread.

Daeng said we could go and have some lunch as the ceremonies were over although the families would hang out all afternoon.

We stopped and had a little typical Thai lunch. When I say typical, it had steamed white rice, vegetables, water along with whatever you wanted like pork, chicken, etc.

We headed back to the hotel. I could tell Daeng was a little restless so I ask here if she wanted to go back to the Temple to party with the family. She asked if I would be alright. I told her not to worry as I would shower, write this story and take a nap. She took the room key so she could get back into the room without waking me.

I’m going to take a little nap, that’s pretty typical, and then we’ll go out on the town tonight in Chiang Rai.

I slept until about 5;30 PM and Daeng came back to the room. She said the family hung around until Jack graduated from a white robe to an orange one. She took a lot of pictures and jacked was smiling and looked pretty happy about everything.

Daeng said she was very tired and laid down for a rest. I got up and walked over to an Internet Café to do some emails as I have not been connected to the Internet is three days. When I walked into the Internet Café our friend, Charlie from Canada, was there.

We talked for a few minutes and agreed to have coffee at Jan’s, his girlfriend, coffee shop in the morning around 8:00.

I worked on the 107 emails that I had and did a bank transfer. I then walked over to the night bazaar and had some sushi and spring rolls. Daeng’s sister and a few family members were relaxing and drinking a little beer. They seemed happy about the day.

It was cooler now so the walk back to the hotel was nice. I walked by the golden clock tower which had the dancing lights and music for the 9:00 PM show. It is quite impressive.

Daeng was a wake watching Thai television. It was not a typical day and we will both sleep good tonight.

We plan on getting up in the morning, have coffee at Jan’s with Charlie, come back and check out of hotel and head back to our typical life in Mae Sai.

Good-night!