threesome

Sometimes there is a lot to tell, but we don't want to bother you with a new blog every day. That's why we're going to put three short pieces in one blog today.

Hurrah! Hot water!

When we moved into the cottage on the mountain near Chiang Dao on February 1, the geyser between tap and shower head had been removed. “Tuesday hot water,” said Buaban. But when we left for Lampang two months later, there was still no hot shower possible.

In our current rented house, just about everything is broken (click here for an impression). And “just about” also includes the hot water device. That was built into the cabinet under the sink, but the local wildlife has feasted on various parts and pipes. Fortunately, the cold water supply is still intact.

We didn't have to take a really cold shower, by the way. The water pipes run over, or at most a few centimeters underground. When the sun has shone on it for an hour, the water temperature is already pleasant. And on a really sunny day, showering between 3 and 6 is not possible because the cold water is way too hot.

Currently it is often cloudy during the day. And we like to shower immediately after getting up and/or before going to sleep. So we decided to buy a hot water device that we can take with us to our new house. Because we do not want to drill and the walls of the house (we are afraid that the tiles will come off the wall) the device is now suspended from a construction that is held in place with the owner's fitness dumbbells. So now I can say without lying that I worked with the dumbbells.

I don't dare touch the original power cable in the eaten-up washbasin cabinet. That's why I only put a plug on the device. A เนื้อไม้ เชือก* construction. But it does work. And easy to take with you.

*make-do

Piece lights

The traffic lights in Hang Chat are broken. Hang Chat is the main village of our amphur, say our municipality. There is one intersection with traffic lights and when we came to live here they were still partially working. Only green did on one side. On the other hand, only red from the rear light (in Thailand you usually have a traffic light before the intersection but also one behind it; useful if you prefer to wait two meters beyond the stop line), but that was not very visible because of the bundle of electricity cables that hung before. On the other side, only the timer worked. (Many traffic lights have a timer that shows you how long it takes for the light to turn green or orange. Strangely enough, that works very well. At most intersections, the 4 access roads here turn green one by one and waiting times are more than 2 minutes. no exception. Normally you would get impatient, but thanks to that timer you know where you stand and you don't get annoyed because it's not green yet.)

Anyway, with just a timer you can go a long way. If the cross traffic is moving when you arrive, just wait for the timer to jump to 0 and then it will be green. It takes some getting used to, but we've always made it across the intersection without any problems.

The traffic lights have been completely off for a few weeks now. There appears to be no money to repair them. Pots for such unexpected expenses are not self-evident here and if there is already a pot, it may just coincidentally have been used for something else that was also important or fun. Funnily enough, traffic at the intersection in Hang Chat now flows much more smoothly. With the half-functioning traffic lights we usually had to wait a while. Now we just see for ourselves whether we can get through and in practice that is almost always immediately. As far as we are concerned, repairs can be postponed for a while.

Measured

The land where we are going to build has now been officially measured. You have different types of title deeds here, of which the chanote is the most important. If there is no chanote on a piece of land, you never know for sure whether another owner or another owner will show up, with the result that you may be left empty-handed.

We had already seen the chanote of “our” land, so as far as ownership was concerned, that was fine. However, it had a green stamp on it. That is, the dimensions are approximate. If you really want to record everything properly, you need a red stamp. We wanted that, so last Friday a team from the country office came for an official measurement.

Four men, or rather, 3 men and 1 woman strong, pulled the team into the field armed with papers and prods. The neighbors were also present, the owner of the land and her husband, Pong, and of course Mieke and me. Seven spectators followed the event from under the tree. So 7 people in total, of which 18 watched as 16 apparently randomly stood poking the ground.

Something was found fairly quickly: a concrete border post that had disappeared a bit underground over time. With the tape measure added, the other posts were now also located. All distances and angles were recorded and signed for approval by the crew boss, the owner and the neighbours.

One neighbor was not there. He will have to sign later. Then it is announced in the newspaper that a red chanote will be issued for the land and any alleged interested parties can still object. If all goes well, we will have the chanote with the red stamp in two months and the land can be transferred to the new owner. By then most of the rain will have fallen and hopefully we can start building.