We are going to be rich men

I'm opening up a little food stall with my friend Q at the Saturday walking street.  Walking street consists of thousands and thousands of people streaming up and down about a kilometer of closed off road. 

On walking street you'll find people selling a variety of wares from handicrafts to clothes to useless shit I don't quiet understand the point of selling.  There is also plenty of Thai food but the variety has a definite limit.  On top of this, some of the food I feel skimps the buyer on value.  What I mean is that you either (in some cases) don't get enough food or the quality of the ingredients isn't all that high (more profit for the vendor).

Seeing this gap in a market (literally) I hypothesized I could make a bit of money by copycatting the model of some other businesses in Thailand that are wildly successful.  The model is this: pay the premium to use better ingredients, make better food than everyone else, sell the shit out of it.

But what to sell?  My next thought was, well, sell what you know a certain percent of the human population can't resist.  Activate the same part of the brain that cranks to 11 on black Fridays outside of Best Buys and Walmarts.  Fried food.

What else does the human brain have trouble resisting?  Sweets.

After a few more considerations I came to the conclusion that....

FRIED

FUCKING

OREOS

BECAUSE

FRIED

FUCKING

OREOS

 

The problem with fried dough I've had back in America is that while delicious, it has always been oily, heavy, and left me feeling a bit regretful.  So I set about figuring out how to make it not so.  I spent maybe 20 hours total in the kitchen working out a recipe for the batter and went through probably 100 Oreos before finally figuring out the secret ingredient.  

Introducing Black and Whites, fluffy, non-greasy little puffs of ecstasy you'll shove into your maw until you run out of money.

Throw just a dash of icing sugar on these son's-a-bitches, toss'm in a brown bag and sweet christ you've got something so good you'd crawl through knives to get to. 

Once we've reasoned we've got a good thing going I will get back to work and crank out a few more items.

I keep telling Q...we're going to be rich men. 

We open this Saturday.  Fingers crossed.

Vacation yaaayyy

After walking around Bangkok in the rain and wanting to punch every person square in the face out of frustration (yesterday) I calmed myself at the place I was staying at.

Recap...

In Bangkok I went to the train station to buy an overnight ticket for Chiang Mai, it was raining at the time and had been since the day before.

All trains suspended for the next few days.

Christ.

Lady tries to help me at the station.

Oh, you're working for a private company and trying to rip me off?

Christ.

Well I guess I better take the skytrain from here to the bus station and buy a ticket.

Get off train.

RAIN

Gain bearings

Get to bus station, buy ticket, head back to train, get on train, get back to stop nearest my hostel.

RAIN x 10

Walk for an hour in rain x 10.

Desire to punch things increasing.

Rain increasing.

Number of fucks given about how wet I have become...decreasing.

.
..
...
....
.....Rain increasing.

Get back to hostel.  They let me check out 5 hours late because of how fucked up and angry I must have looked when I got back.  Bless their hearts.  Seriously.

Gather stuff, go back to train, take train to closest stop to bus.

Notice heavy traffic.

Do some jackassing on foot.

Desire to jackass decreases.

Hire motorbike taxi.  Gets me to the bus in 5 minutes.  If you're unfamiliar with a motorbike taxi, look it up.  Then try to find videos of them on youtube. 

Fast forwarding.....

Arrive in Chiang Mai/wake up around 7am.

Rain

Rain

Rain

Realize dreams are lies and my motorcycle fantasy is dead.

Buy 3pm ticket to Chiang Rai.

Do identical Bangkok rain-jackassing around in Chiang Mai trying to get to things I never find.

Say fuck it and go to The Dukes and spend 900 baht on food.

The Dukes is a restaurant that serves "American" food and  is fantastic by any standard.  It being in Thailand makes it even more special.  Actually there are 4 or 5 in Chiang Mai alone and other cities around the world.  Every single item is stellar and you get plenty of food and feel...complete.

After the frustration I experienced during the prior 24 hours I felt justified in getting whatever the hell I wanted and that the place itself deserved all of my damn money.

I ate a lot.

They kept thinking I was done and would take the menu back.

Lol, what are you doing silly?  I only just ate a 16 inch mushroom, beef, basil, and cheese pizza to the face along with one of your "cups" (bowl) of Portuguese something or other soup and a beer.

I want another beer and a burger.

So now I'm home in Chiang Rai and say with complete sincerity,

I love this city.

Vacation vacation

Last night I realized I wasn't really into going to the island of Ko Chang. I just felt so bored and unstimulated by the thought of going.

What to do...

What to do...

Oh I know, I'll go back to Chiang Mai and rent motorcycles day after day after day.

Mmmm 650 Kawasaki Ninja

Mmmm 400 CBR

Mmmm Kawasaki ER-6

Ducatti?

My body is ready.

Drool

I'm in Bangkok and will be leaving tomorrow to spend a few days on the island of Ko Chang.  The prior few nights I spent in Chiang Mai.  So far, the highlight has been the rental of this CBR 250 in Chiang Mai:

25 USD a day.  

I drove it for probably 8 hours total during my rental period(24 hours).  Eventually I was pretty dextrious with the clutch so the hours before I had to return it were spent on the highways and at gas stations getting more gas.

They like to party in Munich

I was at David's new place last night.  His house is on the property I am on but up front.  I was headed to my house to get two decks of playing cards left there and bring back.  Tin was at his truck and so was his wife, Gai (chicken in Thai).  We exchange our smiled good-evenings and he waves me over.

In the back of his pickup truck are some boxes and bags and he's using a flashlight to look through them.  Tin mentions that he was just in Munich and it's Oktoberfest in Germany.  He rifles through one of the cloth satchels in front of him and uncovers a 5 liter keg of German Beer.  Then another.  Then his wife is standing next to me with two boxes krispy creme donuts (24 donuts).



Tin: "They like to party in Munich.

Me: "Yes, yes they do."

Tin: "Please, drink with your friends and have a party this evening."

I like Tin.

Fire Safety

Yesterday was fire safety day at school.  A firetruck came.

I was teaching English class in the morning and saw that David had his grade 2 kids out on the field watching some sort of demonstration.  Passing by my door and looking out I could see one fireman carrying a torch.  I reasoned they would be setting things on fire on the grass and putting them out, instructing the students on how to handle fires.

There were probably 20-30 minutes left to class when I hear a loud whooshing noise on the field.  It sounded like gas igniting.  I walk by the door and peer outside.  The fireman had opened the valve on a propane tank and ignited the gas, leaving it on full blast with a fire raging out the front of it.








I look back at the class and announce we will be observing the lesson on fire safety and to put away their things.  We then watched firemen ignite trays of gasoline and the propane tank again and again with a school of children sitting not 10 yards from it all.  I'm assuming they wanted 6-10 year old children to know how to put out a propane tank and trays of gasoline.

Afterwards I got to wear a fireman's jacket and helmet.





My thinking at this point was..."I wonder how good of a shield children are"