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Thai Humor Lessons for Those About to Visit Thailand

Every culture claims to have a passionate family structure with grandmas firmly in the kitchen cooking grand meal, aunties gossiping, and kids chasing each other around the dinner table. The Americans celebrate the family with holidays like Thanksgiving and many groups throughout the world have similar festivities, though drunken jokes around a turkey varies slightly in content depending on your location.

Thailand, too, is proud of its devotion to the family. It is a country that sees nothing wrong with grown men living with their parents, sometimes sleeping in the same room with them, until he is old enough to know better. Some stay home their whole lives, bringing a newly acquired wife into the house to share the space with mom and dad. With enough means and a large enough plot of land, some families can afford to build junior a smaller house right next to the folks, but not too far, as being physically close implies a greater care and devotion to the clan. Continue reading “Thai Humor Lessons for Those About to Visit Thailand”

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Restaurants in Doha Qatar – Perspective of an American Family

The 3rd article describing in more details part of our experience in Qatar during a Fulbright visit for 6 months.

This is one of the harder articles to write although one of the most important ones for those planning to visit Qatar. I am not an expert on restaurants, I am just merely giving our family’s experience. If I sound like I am advertising for a restaurant, I am not, we just must have just really liked it. To be frank, food is probably the most we enjoyed in Qatar.

Qatar offers a very wide variety of food choices with a wide range of cost. The first restaurant I visited in Doha was Turkey Central on Al Mirqab street, few hours after arriving in Doha. It was not very fancy looking, but I was hungry enough and not that sure about future meals, since I did not have a car at that time. The menu was mostly grilled meats and a mix of middle-eastern salads. My host, Mohammed Alsayed, an engineer at Qatar University proposed a mix of chicken and beef Kabobs and a set of mixed salads including Taboli, Hummus, green salads, yogurt salad and eggplant. The prices were very reasonable less than $6 per person. The aroma of the food as it was being delivered was amazingly delicious. The food itself looked and tasted great. Continue reading “Restaurants in Doha Qatar – Perspective of an American Family”

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More Plastic Than Plankton

I can remember growing up in the sixties in a world which was still relatively “plastic free”. Do you remember when foods were actually packaged in glass, paper and cardboard? Do you also remember when the paper and cardboard was thicker back then? I can still remember as a boy looking at one of those “foam” cups made from polystyrene and crumbling it, it was in the late sixties, wondering what the heck it was made of! The one litre soda bottle was made from glass a long time ago, for which I got twenty cents for when I collected them from the side of the road and brought them into the corner store.

Continue reading “More Plastic Than Plankton”

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Rice – A Lifelong Love Affair

Rice is loved and used all over the world. I was born in the Philippines and rice is a staple at every meal. It is a staple in Japan, China, India and pretty much all of Asia and the Pacific Islands (Hawaii, Indonesia, etc). Many meals in Spain, Central and South America use rice as either the main meal or an accompaniment to the main dish. It is also widely used in the African Continent. I have even discovered its use in Germany and France.

It can be created as the main course, or as a side dish that complements the main course. You can also create it as a desert, hot or cold, with rice as the main ingredient. It could be a great snack food that the kids will eat without realizing it is boring rice they are enjoying. When you consider the possibilities of rice – it suddenly becomes easier to make your decision. Continue reading “Rice – A Lifelong Love Affair”

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Book Summary: The Millionaire Messenger: Make a Difference and a Fortune Sharing by Brendon Burchard

I read this book sitting in a Thai food restaurant on the Oregon coast. The food was outstanding and what was very interesting was the fact that at the cash register there was a book and DVD set talking about going to college for free. The author was a young guy who graduated from Harvard. The whole book series was designed to show college students and parents how to find money to pay for college. Come to find out the author was the restaurant owner’s son. This is a classic example of the Millionaire Messenger in action.

Why is this important to me? Continue reading “Book Summary: The Millionaire Messenger: Make a Difference and a Fortune Sharing by Brendon Burchard”

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Barbados’ Top-Rated Restaurants According to Zagat – Part 1

For its Barbados restaurant rankings, Zagat compiled input from 1,520 diners to judge. The following are tops in Barbados, according to Zagat. Are they really the very, very best? Here’s what a serious foodie … with a restaurant tab to prove it … who’s eaten at these places many times has to say.

Champers: Visitors and locals alike love Champers Wine Bar & Restaurant, which is why it was named Zagat‘s “Most Popular” culinary experience in Barbados. It is, too. You know how the most popular kid in school is remembered forever? Well, I have friends who hadn’t been to Barbados in six years get off their plane from England and say, “Let’s go to Champers tonight.” Consistently terrific seafood and service at the water’s edge on the south coast of the island. Christ Church, Rockley Continue reading “Barbados’ Top-Rated Restaurants According to Zagat – Part 1”

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How to Tell If Your Thai Girlfriend Really Loves You – The Escalation Method

If you have ever wondered whether the relationship with you and your Thai girlfriend was real, there are several ways to tell. Often spoken is the saying “if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is”. When many foreign men get to Thailand and find beautiful Thai women with a magnetic attraction to them, it piques their curiosity since it is so different from what they experience at home. Here are three steps towards discovering the truth. I call this the Escalation Method as it involves a series of tests with increasingly difficult requirements to pass. After reading this, you will be able to tell if a girl really loves you or not.

First, get her to invest in you. This means you need to have her expend some time or money or effort in order to complete a task for you. It should be something minor initially. As a general rule, a five minute task is sufficient. For example, if you are at a bar, have your Thai girlfriend buy a glass of wine for you. You should provide the money, but at least have her invest the time. Continue reading “How to Tell If Your Thai Girlfriend Really Loves You – The Escalation Method”

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Stirring Up a Hornets Nest – Thai Nam Prik Dip Made With Giant Wasp Larvae

Today we turn into baby-killers, and chomp into Giant hornet larvae – the immature large wriggling babies of the black & orange wasp that lives in hives high in the treetops of North Thailand.

The wasp in question is called “dua dtor” in Thai language, and the plump wriggling babies that we are about to squash into gastronomic bliss look a bit like an Australian witchetty grub or a New Zealand huhu grub.

Similarly, they can be eaten raw, or tossed in a wok until crispy and fried salt and pepper style.

The raw grub is an OK taste. Continue reading “Stirring Up a Hornets Nest – Thai Nam Prik Dip Made With Giant Wasp Larvae”

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Expat Family Life in Bangkok

I moved to Thailand in 2003, simply because I was bored with my life in the United States. I had lived in Boston, studied in New York, and traveled the world.

Traveling was my favorite thing to do until I went to Thailand. It was like I was searching the world for something, and finally found it in Thailand. After that, I had little to no desire to travel anymore. Though I missed my family and friends back in the states, I was bored after a week of visiting them, and was homesick for Thailand every time I took a vacation to the USA. Continue reading “Expat Family Life in Bangkok”

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My Trip to Thailand to Study Muay Thai (Part 9) Thai Tummy Strikes, But Not As Hard As Kay

I have been pretty bold in what I would eat in Thailand. Being that this was my first visit to Thailand, I had gotten a lot of warnings from different people about a condition they call ‘Thai Tummy.’

I love spicy food, so I wasn’t too worried about it, and I am a firm believer that to experience a different culture, experiencing their food is a big part of that

I would try things on menus in Thailand that I never would have tried back home. I think the mistake I made, was with some of the street vendors. I could clearly see their preparation areas weren’t exactly clean, but I never expected what I had in store for me. Continue reading “My Trip to Thailand to Study Muay Thai (Part 9) Thai Tummy Strikes, But Not As Hard As Kay”