All posts by Fourbackpacks

Back Home – Done

We are home. Our trip has been amazing. Some of the things we did even more so of which a few had to have new words invented for. Our most famous one was ‘overjastic’ which it’s formal definition has been offered by Facebook is ‘a state in which you smile or laugh so much that your entire face aches’. We have seen many incredible things that are famous worldwide including the Petronas Building, the Terra Cotta Soldiers, the Great Wall, Machu Picchu, the Galápagos, and so many more. Sometimes though it was the back streets of the city that were so amazing. That is why Backstreet Academy was so great. Together, they created what can only be described as a Magical Experience.

Ayutthaya – the old Thai Capital

Ayuntthaya - temple tour

Fantastic temple complex’s (there are many). Something about heads and loosing them perhaps?  The third picture is the result of me telling the family this is formally the last temple we’ll visit…. (yes, that gets smiles!)

HeadTree HeadlessMonk LastTemplePhoto

 

Le bateau à voiles

Le bateau à voile étai superbe. Il y avait plain de place pour être coucher, assis…

AliciaLightBackdeck

 

LeendertFrontDeck

 

familyFrontDeck

bien-sûr, nous pouvons faire de la plongée en apnée.

Ce que nous mangions étai DÉLICIEUX mais trop d’épices pour moi.
Tout ça c’est superbe mais il y avait aussi une oui deux chose qui n’était pas si bien. Sur un bateau, comme tu peut attendre, il fait chaud. Tu ne pouvais pas t’endormir sans transpirer. Ceci était pas bien de tout. Mais bon, sur un bateau comme sa, au moins personne et devenu malade.

Le poisons de la plongée en apnée étai splendide.

 


Après, nous sommes aller a une grotte qui étai magnifique.

Amazing Caves Light
Il y avait des îles partout.

PanoramaNationalPark

Le bateau à voiles. SUPERBE😃

Arrived in the for last stop – Ayutthaya…

Nice hotel – and the old Capital for Thailand -with nice historic places…. somewhat a reminder of Angkor Wat

AyunTemple1

Koh Sumai

A view of the south tip of Koh Samui,.,. Obviously low tide….

IMG_0696

A house encircles the private pool…. Koh Sumai

KohSumDay

our private place, rooms slide open straight to the pool…. very nice!

Jewelry making

jewelry making

Mom and I went jewelry making. We (together) made 4 earrings, 1 bracelet and 1 necklace.
How they look:

1. Paper earrings

image
2. (3+)=1+1 Bead for each line

image
3. Square wrapped with wire

image
4. Red&round wrapped with wire

image
So yes, I named them. My “equation”, does it make ANY sense? I hope it does.
This is how we made them
1. We took a magazine and found a page with a color that we liked. As you can see, we found a beautiful dark blue. Then we cut them into triangles rolled them on a stick and glued the last part (the thinnest) down onto the bead.
2. I first chose the color. They had a whole bag, blue, green, pink, purple, orange…I chose, as you can see pink, purple and blue. Then we took the wire and bent to into a hook. We put the bead on it and closed the hook in the stud of the earring and voilà!
3. Mom took a square piece (truly it was part of a coconut shell). There were two holes, if you hold it diagonally it was on top and bottom. She put the wire through the hole and started wrapping the wire around. She did it on both sides and she was done.
4. I did the same only mine, was round and smooth. Another difference was I had to make the wire go through the middle because there were no holes on top and bottom. The rest was the same.
Bracelets:
5. Paper beads

image

How did Mom make this? Easy! I could make that faster than I can push dad underwater.

5. Same concept as the paper bead earrings. That is the beading part. The rest, you take little beads and put it in any pattern you wish. Easy right?
Necklace:
6. Square necklace

image
How in the world did we make this?
6. Actually, truth be told mom only wrapped the bottom part of the necklace, the necklace was already made.

We had a blast. The person with us was super kind and not afraid to make a mistake or ask a question. If there was trouble wrapping (there was) and she did not know how to fix it, she would simply try and try again but including us so if one figured it out we could help each other.

Alicia earrings

Learning about rice

Hier nous sommes aller fair des choses avec du riz. Plus précisément, ceci et ce que nous avons fait
Étape 1:
Séparer les graines.


Étape 2:
Prendre les graine et les planter sûre une ‘île’ de gadoue


Étape 3:
Labourer la terre


Etape 4:
Transplanter le riz

Planting Rice
Étape 5:
Contrôler l’eau   (Pas de Photo)
Étape 6:
Cultiver le riz

AlicCutting
Étape 7:
Enlever les grain des plante

Threshing
Étape 8:
Enlever la paille (les morceaux qui ce sont enlevés) avec un GROS éventail

Fanrice
Étape 9:
Ramener à la maison


Étape 10:
Polir le riz

Étape 11:
Séparer le riz en dehors de la coquille, la coquille et le riz dans le coquille

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
Étape 12:
Fabrication de la farine (si nécessaire)

Étape 13:
Cuisiner


Étape 14:
La meilleure étape de tous, tu peut le deviner? Oui (j’espère)!
L’HEURE D’ALLER MANGER.
Je doit l’avouer, ceci étai DÉLICIEUX.

Nous us nous sommes amuser à mort!


Amazing rice fields

Let me tell you an amazing story about an amazing place in an amazing city. First of all the experience was, well, amazing. Secondly, the people were, …, also amazing. Catching on yet? Thirdly, the food we had was (Don’t cheat and look at the word. Just guess. Don’t peak.) amazing. By now you should get it. The animals that were there too were amaazing. Yes they even get and extra a for their, well, being amazing. So guess what the overall rating was. Don’t look. You may count up the A’s to figure it out. The overall experience was, … >Drum Rolls<, incredible. Sorry if I let you down. I had to find a word worth more than amazing because amaaaaaaaazing is slightly longer and harder to write. Go rice farm!


Weaving

Mom and I went weaving yesterday while Leendert and dad went knife making.

When we arrived, we saw two looms outside, one beside each other, mom and I were really happy because then we would not be lonely.

First we had to pick out our colors.
There was:
• Turquoise
• Orange
• Purple
• Magenta/ Pink
• Yellow
• White
• Very light blue
• Light blue
And a few other colors. After we chose our colors (me: turquoise and magenta, mom: turquoise and white), we went to the wheel of a bike, or at least that is what it looked like, and spun the string from the big roll to little bobbinss.
It REALY burns your fingers.

Alicia bobbins

When all the little bobbinss were filled they told us one had to sit INSIDE and one OUTSIDE. I stayed outside and mom went in. Mom and I both felt lonely because there was nobody to talk to.

Towards the end, in total we got a couple of 5-10 minute ‘breaks’ and visited each other. We ended up weaving almost 1 meter of our 1.7 meter scarves.  The ladies will finish them for us and deliver them tomorrow. We asked them also to make me pillows that match my scarf to decorate my bed in Dubai.  What great souvenirs!  It was a fun afternoon.

Alicia weaving 1 Alicia weaving 2