Tear gassing experience!

Photo by Associated Press

Today I have a brand new experience in my life.... I've been shot by tear gas!

As I was covering the protest in front of the parliament this afternoon. I was so unlucky as I was trapped inside the protesters' side when the police started firing tear gas on protesters! I was right there where the police fired more than 30 tear gas canisters on people..... It was the longest 5 minutes in my life..... so torturing.... I couldn't breath... I couldn't see well.... I heard the bombs and they were so close that my ears had temporary ringing noise.

After that I found myself on a small street running away from the crazy scene, hopped on a motorcycle taxi and told the driver "Get out of here ASAP!"

We went to a little further street where there was no effect from tear gas when I called my boss to see where he was. He told me to come back to the scene but this time behind the police lines.... It's safer he said.

I went back there.... found my boss..... and we started working again.... The police kept firing tear gas toward protesters.... until now.

It was really safer on the police side but I still got some tear gas in my eyes and nose and throat... sometimes but hey! I've survived!!!

And that's the most importance right?

I really need a good sleep tonight.... good night everyone!

New camera, more photos!

Yeah!!!!!!!

I'm so stoked! I just bought myself a new digital camera! It's FUJIFILM Finepix S100FS!!! As you can see in the photo.



I have camera now. That means I will take more photos. More photos means more blogs about my photos.... More blogs means my blog is no longer boring... Everybody is happy!! (I hope)

The only problem is.......



I'm so broke now...... but I'm happy. I wish happiness can feed my stomach.....

It's like a song by The Eagles "Love will keep us alive"

Bookworm mode

As a little sister who is 5 years younger than my brother and 8 years younger than my sister, I grew up playing with my imaginative friends or hanging out alone but that's not my problem because I enjoyed it very much.

I have a strange ability to create my own world, so called "Jane's world" where I can spend my time there with myself. When I was in "Jane's world", I wouldn't hear anyone, anything except what I was looking or listening in my own world.

Many of my coworkers experienced me in this mode while I was at work. There was one time I remember that My coworker, Ann talked to me or tried to talk to me about our assignment. She didn't know I was in "Jane's world" at that time (you must know that when I was in my own world, I looked like normal, like I was doing a normal job, but I wasn't actually doing it!!!). She talked to me, told me her ideas, asked me questions but no response. She started waving her hand in front of my face but still no response. It's then she realized I wasn't there....

That happened to me a lot. I can shut the world outside from me. I won't hear anything or see anything except what I want to hear or see. I used to do the psychology test for personal character. My result came as "Normal schizophrenic", how it is normal I'm not sure but I know I am not "schizophrenic".

Maybe that the reason why I love spending time with myself, all alone. I can spend 3 days in my room and not going out once, if I have enough food and books to read. I did actually.

I grew up as a bookworm, I started with Japanese manga, my brother's manga. "Touch" by Mitsuru Adachi is my first book. If I didn't go out with my friends, I stayed home and read books. I liked reading detective stories, murder stories, short stories and also fantasy children books too. When I was 8 years old, Miss Jane Marple was my idol. Some of you may know that my favourite author is Roald Dahl, my all time favourite writer.

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I haven't read any book lately.... I've been lazy. It seems like I've been lazy doing everything I used to love. Well...I think everybody has had this moment in their life.... depends on how often!!!!

The good news is..... I'm not lazy doing the things I love anymore!!!! I play my games again... I take photos again (next blog will have some photos from my latest trip) and I read books again...



The book I'm reading is "Never Suck A Dead Man's Hand: Curious Adventures of a CSI" by Dana Kollmann. I love CSI, I'm not going to deny it. I"m addicted to some shows on TV: CSI, CSI NY, House.... I just love the detective show, forensic is even better! This book is perfect for "Jane's world".

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Now you know the reason why I disappeared sometimes.... the train to Jane's world is coming... I gotta go..... ...............

No camera, no blog

I know I have been absent for awhile. It's because I have been busy... working and trying to make more and more and more money!!!

Why is it so hard to make money????

And that is the reason I didn't blog much lately... (not that I am so lazy.... please don't think anything like that!), another reason is that... I don't have any new photo to share!

My boss gave my memory card to a friend in Burma, he thought it was his..... and I didn't have time to buy a new one yet. So I have the camera but there is no memory card inside.... can't take photo... it becomes a useless camera!

I also have a body of Canon EOS D30. My boss let me use it as he has got a new camera! But... but I don't have the lens yet, same reason..... no time to go shopping for memory card or lens.

No money too!

What I learned from this experience is "No money, no memory"

Just the two of us

Yesterday I had a date with my husband. We went to see a movie "Juno" at a cinema near our place in the afternoon. It was shown on the platinum screen (which costs 50 baht more!!!).

After having lunch at home (to save money), we went to the cinema about 30 minutes before the show time. Queuing for less than 5 minutes to get our tickets (and 2 small bars of chocolate as giveaway gift from cinema). As we had some time left before the show time, so we walked around the mall to kill the time. First we thought we gonna play some games at the arcade, we're about to play air hockey but we didn't have coins for it (next time we will!!). We ended up killing time in a bookstore (as usual) but we didn't get anything there.

It's about 5 minutes to the show times, we went to the theatre and it's too early, we had to wait. Five minutes passed, the staff said to us that the previous round was not ending yet. Another 5 minutes passes, one man walked out of the theatre. We waited.... and waited (not for long) and finally the same staff came and said we can go in now. Hooray!

The theatre was good, leather chairs, no fungus smell and the A/C was at good temperature. We were the first group to walk into the theatre. We got the seats on the back far from the screen but when they started playing teasers and commercials, we heard the noise from the film room. We decided to move closer to the screen as there was nobody else except us there. Watching more trailers, teasers and more commercial for about 20 minutes!!! Finally, the movie started....

*Go see the movie yourself, there is no detail in here!*

It was a good movie, I really liked it! Cool! (I wish I could curse like Juno but it's obviously I can't...never mind)
This is one of the best dates I ever had! Having the whole theatre for just two of us, watching a good movie, laughing out loud, spending time with your loved one. It was a good Monday afternoon.

I love having a date on Monday afternoon!

Jane @ 30

It has become the tradition for me to post the pictures of myself on my birthday. It's to tell you how I look when I am 1 year older!

And yes! I have the photos of me at 30 years old!


*You can see that my left eye was a little swollen. Jeremy accidentally elbowed me the night before -- It's not sleep walking but sleep Thai boxing*



Now you know how I look when I turned 30.... for me I can only say that I still look young and pretty! hehehehehe....

30 is the number!

Right! I'm turning 30 tomorrow....

To be honest, I'm not so thrilled with my birthday this year. Why? Because I have to say good bye to my twenties... I will no longer be a 20 something girl! *sniff sniff*

Buddha said we can't stop birth, age, sickness and death... learn to live with it!

Turning 30 is not bad then! I've never been 30 before! It must be so cool!

What do we know about 30?

April has 30 days...
30 is the country code of International phone call for Greece!! (I always want to go to this country, it's my dream country. Who knows maybe I can visit Greece when I'm 30!)
30 is the atomic number of Zinc... what else?
I'm not really in Chemistry or any science, so that's it! but I know one thing! there are many people I know turning 30 this year... hehehe.. most of my school mates are!!!

and some already did turn 30! (I feel much better now)

It's time to go and to enjoy with 29 years old Jane before she turns 30!
Happy 30th Birthday to Jane!!!!!!! Whoooooooooooooooo.........Yeahhhhhhhhhh!!

Honeymoon trip - Chiangdao

The next morning, we got up early getting ready to go to Chiang dao. We took a local bus about 1 hour and a half to get there for 40 baht each. It was raining all the way from Chiangmai to Chiangdao and still raining when we got to our resort. We didn't do anything in that afternoon because of the rain but we did enjoy relaxing at the resort -- Malee's nature lovers bungalows


The resort area

It was about 4 pm when the rain seemed to stop. We decided to go exploring the nearest cave temple.


Not only us going to the temple that day


The way to the cave


Our destination! Up there! Keep walking!


We saw it on the half way pit stop.


Finally...we made it to the top!


The Buddha statue inside the pagoda

We were lucky that it was no rain when we went up there. The view up there was stunning, breathe taking view but hey! I'd love to breath more as the air was so clear unlike Bangkok's!!! It was worth taking long and deep breathe there.... Ahhhhh.....


The beautiful sky on the way back to our resort

510 steps... that's good enough for the evening work out! Then we went back to sleep..........zzzzzzzz

Honeymoon trip - Part II

After visiting the famous and 'must see' temple, we went back to our hotel and waited for my friend (my ex-roommate from the university), Money, to join us.

But after waiting for awhile, she hadn't shown up yet and we were hungry (again). We asked the hotel staff where to get cheap, local food nearby. He said the walkable area where we can find restaurants is on Nimmarnhemin road, so we headed there.

We tried to look for recommended restaurants in our guidebook but we couldn't find any, so we decided to walk into a restaurant where I saw many Thai folks hanging out there. (That should be a good sign, right?)

Here are our first dinner in Chiang mai:


The famous Northern style curry noodle called "Khao soi"


The Northern style sausages called "Sai ua"


Lemon grass spicy salad with shrimps (Not the Northern style)


Deep-fried soft shell crab with garlic and pepper (Not Northern but I liked to have it!)

Money arrived when we were having dinner, so she joined us and she was so kind to treat us that meal. Thank you Money! Kiss kiss!


Jane and Money

We were lucky to arrive there on Sunday as in Chiang mai, there is a special Sunday night market on the historical street. After dinner, Money was our guide to show us around the market.




It's great for shopping and sight seeing at the same time!

As Money had to drive about 1 hour back to her home in Lampun, so we had to split early that night. Jeremy and I had to get ready for tomorrow trip to Chiang dao too, so we went to bed early. The first day on our honeymoon was great!!! Good way to start!

Honeymoon trip - Day #1

Ahhh... Finally I have time to sit down and get all the photos out of the camera. Now it's time to talk about this honeymoon trip.

Jeremy and I decided to go to Chiang mai as Jeremy never been to the north before. We went there by sleeping train (because it's cheaper and we can sleep too!)


Jeremy on the train


Jane on iPod listening "On the train" playlist

We arrived Chiang mai at 7.30AM (On time!!!! My friend who lives in the north now said she never never experienced on time train!), we took a red mini truck to our hotel "Suan doi house"


The garden view from our front balcony

We thought we could sleep on the train but the train was too bumpy and too cold, so we didn't sleep well. The hotel allowed us to check-in early, and we crashed when we reached the bed.

Waking up from the nap, feeling hungry! Lonely Planet guidebook said the hotel we stay has a wonderful Vietnamese restaurant "Le Gong kum", we decided to try! And they're right!!! The food there was so good.... mmmm.... yummy!


Our starter... Vietnamese style Calamari


Nam neung... It's so goooood!


Vietnamese fresh spring rolls

After our first wonderful meal in Chiang mai, we headed to the famous temple on Doi Suthep. This temple is the 'must see' temple in Chiang mai, they believe that if you come to Chiang mai but didn't come to this temple, it's like you haven't come to Chiang mai yet!!!

So.... we did visit Chiang mai finally!


The most popular shot at the most famous temple

What we learned today on the first day in Chiang mai is taxi drivers in Chiang mai are cheaters! I didn't say all of them are but when they have chance to rip tourists off, they do! I was really disappointed even I've got the warning from my friend earlier but still... I expected that Northern people or Chiang mai people will be friendly and kind but the people I met on the first day are not. They cheated on the Thai people, so FOREIGNERS! BE CAREFUL EVEN MORE!!!

A glimpse of my wedding!!

I know you are waiting for this... but I don't have much time to do all this as I'm going on a honeymoon this evening. Of course I will have more photos from my honeymoon to share with you later...

Here are some of the great moments at my wedding...


Getting pretty for the Tea ceremony!


The bride and the groom!


Mama at the Tea ceremony...


Mom & Dad at the Tea ceremony...


I'm taken!!!


During lunch while Jeremy was singing me a love song and I was preparing a rose for him!


Evening reception on the cruise...


Walking among the guests...


Hmm.... I don't know what to say, I think I looked pretty here...hehehe


And now you may "kiss the bride"...
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It was great... everything went very well. I'm glad to share one of the greatest moments of my life with you all...

Now I'm off to pack for my honeymoon!!! Jeremy will bring his laptop, maybe I can update my blog when I'm away... I'm bringing BBsan's good camera with me! We'll see!

Missed you all... and see you again soon! Kisses.... and of course...hugs!

I'M BACK!!!

Hello!!!! Sawadee ka!!!!
Anybody here?

I'm baaaaaaaaaack!

Yep, I'm back. I'm here to let you know that I'm still alive... no no no... I'm not dead yet. I was just too lazy (as usual)...but I'm back!

Oh! I also come back as a new person too! I'm now Mrs. Fugal! Yes..yes.. I'm taken... I married this wonderful guy named Jeremy. I will tell you more about our wedding soon.

Here is one photo from my friend's camera...


Okay! I'm off... end of the news!