Nice little website and forum you've got here! My name's Matthew. I'm a 31 year-old American ESOL teacher (CELTA and SIT TESOL qualified, starting an M.Ed soon, no longer just a backpacker kru
) with about 5 years of BKK teaching and living under my belt (+ almost a year teaching/and then doing tsunami relief work in Sri Lanka before I hit these shores) I've got a strong connection to PKK/BS/BSN: I'm legally married to a girl from the Baan Thammarat-Klongtoey side of BSN (signed the papes last March) and we've finally got a wedding organized at her home for this April 24th. She comes from the Cherdchoochawalit Clan - if you drive through BT-KT they're the ones with the big orange house with a little shop out on the porch (that's the flagship house, anyway). So I thought I'd introduce myself here. We plan on spending a handful of years back Stateside before moving back here (perhaps there - BSN, or nearby, or perhaps Hua Hin if we have a kid and decide to do an international school thing but still be close to the Grands etc.) Not sure.
Well...where to begin. There's a lot to ask, learn, share, people to meet. As for the upcoming wedding, we've reserved some of the last rooms at Coral for my folks and brother...we're just getting invites out so we'll soon know how many BKK friends to expect, and decide where, if anywhere, we'll put them up. I may be back on the site in the near future looking for rooms and asking tons of questions related to wedding accom. etc. etc. Of course they'll be 500 or so Thai family there, mostly sleeping on the many floors of the many family houses in the village. Which is just fine for lots of my friends as well, so...we'll see.
I've been down there maybe ten times over the last 4 years, but never really had a good chance to explore the surrounds all that much. I mean in my own way...been on lots of trips with the fam, waterfalls in the back of pickups, beach trips, errands, etc. but never just had free time to get to know the place in the meandering yet thorough way that works for me. I hope to get a chance soon, especially if I can manage to buy a car of my own at some point soonish.
Anyway...cheers to all, thanks for the site and the forum. I hope to contribute and enjoy it into the future. BTW, I've been a member of an active Thailand forum for teachers, ajarnforum.net since I started, and have been both a regular and a moderator over there. Essentially my whole Thailand life is laid bare on there if anyone's curious...as it happens, plenty of pics and even vids of trips to BSN during Songkrans and family trips etc. Perhaps in the future I'll post some links here just for giggles. I go by Matthew on there. Creative, I know.
I'll also be back with many other queries not related to weddings; schools around BSN, things the community of farangs gets up to, business opps and land/house buying among others...
ThanksMatthew
