Crunchy Frog

So, as you might guess, I have been trying to find the most interesting and tasty food to consume in Thailand. This is not easy since you have to avoid the usual tourist places that have signs and menus in English.

So on our second day, Caroline and I went to the Bangkok weekend market (where we got a ton of fantastic stuff for about $80, only to find out that it would cost $200 to send home by UPS). I ordered papaya salad with crab for lunch. Now I had seen these crabs before, and they looked just like soft shell crabs you get in sushi or at Asian stores. They're about four inches wide, leg to leg, and dark colored, almost black. So my Som-Tom with crab arrived and I picked up a half a black crab in my spoon and big into it. Crunch! Not so soft shelled after all. So I weighed my options. Obviously you are not meant to pick out the meat out of those tiny little legs. You must be supposed to eat it whole as it is. So I did. Still very tasty, but it made me wonder if the shell pieces would end up in my appendix (or someplace worse). I tried to chew well.

The evening of the same day, obviously having learned nothing, I ordered frog. I was I little frightened of what would come since I had just seen whole frog on a street vendor's cart and it did not look like it had even been cleaned before being roasted over a charcoal fire. Parts is parts. I hoped that this was a pretty good restaurant and what would come would be some of the better examples of prepared frog in Thailand. What did come was what I expect to be the result of cleaning a frog (thank God), laying it whole on a cutting board, chopping it into bite size pieces starting at the toes and working up to the head, discarding the head (again, thank God), and finally battering and frying it all in a wok. I put a piece in my mouth and chomped down on frog leg bone that made the crab shell seem like crisp lettuce. The experience with the crab instilled in me a courage to boldly try to chew my way through anything. The frog, however, instilled a new wisdom to spit out bones that you have no hope of chewing up. Sadly, I also learned that I probably don't care for Thai prepared frog.

Those little seeds in watermelons that up until now I could never stand to swallow had better start worrying when they see me next.

Arrived at BKK

Flight arrived at midnight, got to hotel about 2:00 a.m. Woke up about 8:00a.m. and just finished breakfast. All is well.

On a jet plane

We are leaving for the airport! Hopefully to get there by 10:30, the time required by international law.

25 JAN 07 12:25P - Leave PDX on Northwest Air flight 5. Arrive
Yokyo/Narita after 10 hour flight
26 JAN 07 - Leave Narita Northwest Air flight 27. Arrive Bangkok at
11:55 p.m. local time, 7.5 hour flight

Staying in Phra Athit Mansion 1-2 days:
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g293916-d450979-Reviews-Phra_Athit_Mansion-Bangkok.html

Aprox Sunday Jan 28, traveling to Kanchanaburi.

Aprox Friday Feb 2, traveling to Kok Lak, staying in Poseidon
Bungalows: http://www.similantour.com/similan.html


Thursday, Feb 8, returning to Bangkok, staying at Shangra La Bangkok:
http://www.shangri-la.com/bangkok/shangri-la/en/index.aspx

Saturday, Feb 10th, 6:00 a.m. Leave Bangkok on Northwest Air Flight 28
to Tokyo/Narita, 6 hour flight. Leave Tokyo/Narita 3:05 pm on
Northwest Air Flight 6 to PDX, arriving at 7:00 a.m. Feb 10th (same
day).

Be careful what search words you use

Wow, this guy is a winner.

Obligatory link

Here is blog from a friend who inspires me in their blogitude:

http://ferociousreader.blogspot.com/

Welcome

I have been thinking recently that I need to start a blog. Like so many other things in my life I have left doing so until the last minute. My new wife, Caroline, and I are leaving on a honeymoon to Thailand in 3 days. Last time we were in Thailand we populated blogs on a friends server that is no longer running blog software. Our postings are probably now very hard to recover (the responsible party can not be bribed with bottles of alcohol).

So it seemed like a good plan to start a new one on blogspot. Google archives everything. Now that is both a comforting and scarey thought. 20 years from now will people be able to search for keywords that point to this page? I suspect so. What will they be?

OK, the name. Those that know me know I use this handle for my online presence. I won't go into how I came up with it (it makes me sound childish, not that it bothers me) but I will give a guide to the proper pronuciation. Its a long 'u' like flute, or dispute without the 'di'. I added the umlaut as a hint. Think of the 1960 Stanley Kubrick movie.

Now I must go pack.