A short while ago our friends Gavin & Will (the Barbeque Magnates) were good enough to send us one of their new ‘balcony-sized’ BBQ models. Thanks guys!! It’s taken us this long to find a gas bottle and suitable plumbing to get it all going, but finally we’ve done it!

Christening this coincided with our first use of one of Paul’s Christmas presents, the sausage stuffing attachment for his beloved Kitchen Aid mixer. I’d managed to find this, and the skins, in Toronto when I’d been visiting there, and they’ve spent the last month hiding in the fridge wrapped up and looking mysterious.

To cut a long story short our sausage-making exercise was a great success, yummy and they can’t help but be healthier than any you’d buy. Grilled to perfection on our new barbie, I think we’ve managed to bring a bit of Aussie backyard cooking culture to Thailand!

I decided to take Pete to a place in Bangkok he hadn’t visited yet, the Grand Palace. Built in 1782, it houses the Royal residence, throne halls and the renowned Temple of the Emerald Buddha.

It’s magnificent; let the photos speak for themselves. Pete thought this was a great idea & we had a lovely day.

Well, our first international Christmas. We decided to host lunch at our place with some of our close Thai friends.

Lunch comprised roast pork, roast turkey and of course a ham - the latter took a lot of walking-around tyring to find a half-leg, not such a common thing here, but I got one! - and some of our families’ favourite traditional salads. Pete and I had also made a Christmas cake a few days before, to a recipe which is a hybrid of both of our mothers’, with a bit of local dried fruits and other touches.

Our guests for lunch were Khun Dao, who works in our building, and Khun Pae and Georges, work colleagues of Pete’s. We also had a second sitting, for dinner, for Khun Aom and Khun Poo, my Thai teachers from school. Khun Dao was the stayer who was with us for both, and then cocktails late into the night!

It was a lovely day which everyone enjoyed - it was nice to have some friends to spend the day with when our own families were so far away, which we really felt.

To all of our families and friends, we wish you all the best for a Happy Christmas and a wonderful Year 2007. We miss you loads and can’t wait to see you all again, be it here in Bangkok or back wherever home may be.

(Photos are from Pete’s new Sony DSC-T50 camera, his Christmas present from me!)

Just in case you all thought we spent all our time mucking around with foreign visitors, I thought I should share with you that we actually do do Thai cultural things from time to time also!!

Loy Krathong is a festival held in Thailand once a year which signifies a person “getting rid of all the bad things” from their lives. Each person makes a small boat, sometimes simple and some quite elaborate, and candles, incense, some money, a lock of hair and a piece of fingernail is put on board. The little boats are then set adrift on the river, washing away the negative things from your life.

Paul and I were taken down to do this by Khun Aom and Khun Poo, his Thai teachers, which was quite fun and good to see people of all ages and walks of life down by the water doing the same.

It’s a really useful thing that I went to hotel-management school - hot on the heels of Geoff and Deb (and Gavin) leaving, our next round of visitors arrives!

On Friday night, Juliana and Jon, Jon’s brother Nick, (who all live in Aus) and Richard (Aussie but living in Singapore) arrived on the midnight flight. A very exciting reunion of course and many cocktails and stories where shared. Then on Saturday, Kathleen (aka Katie Redshoes) arrives from the UK - even more excitement because it’s been absolutely ages since seeing her. So we had a full house! (Unfortunately Richard was staying at the Westin up the road since we’d run out of beds, but I know he’s on a mission collecting Starwood points, as I am, so I suspect he was glad for the excuse to get an extra two nights’ credit.)

During the day there were many shopping and massage experiences, trips to temples and the usual tourist stuff. Paul, Jules and Richard had a bit of an antiques-shopping spree, and they found some really interesting things.

Saturday night was a real highlight, as not only the seven people already mentioned but five other Aussies were in town as well - Kester (who I used to work with at SalesForce), her friends Nicky and Abi, and old friends of Jon’s, Tarn and Christine. So a major night out was on the cards! We organised dinner at Lan Na Thai, a beautiful restaurant in a old-style Thai teak house, where we had a private dining room - probably a good thing as we made a bit of racket! It was such a happy night having so many friends old and new around, it reminded me of big dinners we used to have in Melbourne from time to time.

Of course after such a fun dinner it was essential to visit the old favourite Sky Bar to show the newbies the sites of Bangkok from 80something floors up… and to squeeze in another cocktail or two…

What a fantastic night out. Of course, the fun didn’t stop there. Having so many people staying over meant that breakfast was going to be a major production anyway, so we turned it into Brunch, called it a Soiree, and got everyone to bring duty-free Champagne. This basically ended up taking the whole day and was great fun, Paul and I (especially Paul - check out the hand-made mini muffin burgers!) having made a lot of food-preparations in advance meant there was lots of yummy stuff to eat, and everyone only needed to ever venture out of the apartment for swims, last-minute massages and some last-minute shopping (by Juliana, of course).

Unfortunately all good things must come to and end, it’s only been 36 hours but we did so much talking and carrying on, it felt like days! Sunday afternoon we farewelled everyone as they headed of to Koh Samui for a week’s holidays. (Minus Richard, who like our poor selves, had to head off to work again on Monday.) Paul and I were well exhausted and collapsed happily into the couch.

ps: If anyone’s interested in the full set of photos from the weekend (only the best ones are on this page) they can be found at
http://www.tincanct.com/gallery/v/BangkokCarryon.