Tamie picked her up on Wednesday afternoon and she took her to the hospital Thursday morning. She stayed with me on Thursday and slept most of the day while I worked from home. Friday, again, Tamie took her to the hospital before dropping her at Isehara with the grandparents for the day.

Saturday morning, I took Layla out rollerblading while Tamie took Julia to the hospital again to get checked out. As a result, she got checked in.

I kept Layla busy for a couple hours before I went to relieve Tamie and let her out to eat. Unfortunately, Layla (or anyone else not named Mom, Dad, BaBa or Jiji) isn’t allowed to visit Julia. I went to find Tamie and Julia while Layla had to wait and watch outside in the waiting room.

Because there was one kid in her daycare who had chicken pox, Julia is in an isolation room by herself. The small chance that she’s carrying the pox means she probably will be stuck in that isolation room for the duration of her stay. I wonder if that’s a good thing or not.

Looking at the poor kid in the bed, it’s tough to see such a small(ish) baby with so many tubes and wires hooked up to her. She’s got a tube in her nose for oxygen, an IV in her arm for meds, a monitor on her foot and another set of monitors set up on her chest. All those things are so much fun when Julia decides to pretend she’s a crocodile and death roll around on the bed. I think her favourite game right now is seeing how tangled she can become before a nurse has to help get her unstuck.

One weird thing that happened is when Tamie and Layla came back to the hospital a few hours later, Layla’s nose just started bleeding. A lot. Apparently it was a real gusher, soaking through several tissues before finally abating. A less skeptical man might think she’s having some sympathetic link with her sister who’s been complaining about the things in her nose since they taped it to her face. An even less skeptical man might look at the slight fever that Layla’s been getting since Julia checked in and think there was some kind of weird link between them. Just so long as the link doesn’t get them both checked in, a little blood and fever is fine with me… provided the daycare continue to accept her every morning!

Timing is everything, they say, and Julia’s timing (or maybe Tamie’s timing) is impeccable. Tamie was scheduled to head to India on Sunday but decided to postpone her trip for a few days while things get stable at the hospital. The first time Julia got put into the hospital because of an asthma attack was the last time Tamie went to India. Coincidence much?

Tomorrow we go back to work/daycare and see how things will go for the rest of the week. Hopefully it’ll be quick for Julia to come out of the hospital but no matter how quick it is, I’m sure this is going to be one of the longest weeks of this year.

Yesterday, we took Tamie’s Mom out for lunch with the kids at a nice Italian restaurant in Ebina and all had a good time. Went for a walk afte and found a chicken coop next to an egg vending machine… yes, wtf indeed. Only in Japan, that’s for sure. =)

After the park, we went to Vina Walk where a company called Forest Adventure had set up a small course for kids to try out their skills. If you don’t want to check the link, it’s about climbing through the treetop canopies on rope harnesses. Layla was excited to try it and so, with a little coaching on how to say she’s six, went on and had a blast. She went around the small course twice and couldn’t have been prouder.

Once we came home, Tamie and Layla made pizza and drank wine (and kid’s champagne) and had a great time. Topped the night off with a skype call to Nonni in Ottawa before sending the kids to bed.

Pictures to come. For now, I’ve posted pics from last week (still catching up after Thailand)

Happy Mother’s Day!

On Friday (April 27) we took an evening flight through Bangkok to our final destination of Krabi. We arrived in the early afternoon where we met our driver who quickly took our bags and drove us to the hotel we were staying at. On the way, the driver pointed out a giant monitor lizard that was crossing the road – just the start of our fun in Thailand, to be sure!

After a short 45 minute drive, we made it to the Amari Vogue which was to be our home for the duration of our time in Krabi. We were greeted with smiles and cold drinks before checking in and being shown our room. The hotel itself had numerous pools and a nice beach right in its backyard. Definitely a nice place to get away to.

We grabbed a late lunch and met some more of the hotel staff who were kind enough to let the kids feed the fish. The staff really took a liking to both kids, often trying to get their attention while we ate and/or drank. It wasn’t long before we were checking out the pools and the beach, none of which disappointed. We even saw another big monitor walking down the beach but he disappeared into the woods before I could snap a picture.

Sunday, we met Elizabeth and her son Noah from Andaman Camp and Cruise, the private touring company who were going to show us in and around Krabi for the next 3 days. We drove down to a beach where her longtail boat was waiting and we were off.

The first day was scheduled to be a day of island hopping around Hong Island. We stopped at the island where there was a nice beach for swimming and snorkeling. Tamie gave Layla her first of many snorkeling lessons and Julia got introduced to the deliciousness of sand. I saw my third big monitor lizard that still eluded me once I got my camera out. We spent an hour or two there hanging out and enjoying ourselves.

The water was warm, the sand was soft and the day was great. We had lunch on the boat before checking out another lagoon and swimming some more (Julia fell asleep while swimming!) and then finally saw an area famous for birds nest soup where Thai police need to actually camp out because poachers are so prevalent in coming to collect the expensive nests.

The second day we met Elizabeth’s husband Sun, who picked us up to take around for a day trip in and around the local town. Our first stop was to ride an elephant – Julia and I took the first elephant and Tamie and Layla followed behind. Julia was not exactly comfortable and eventually forced herself to sleep, but not before dropping her hat! Luckily, the elephant was nice enough to pick it up and hand it to the driver (after a bit of prodding, that is). We rode around on the elephants for some time – I was busy trying not to drop my camera, my backpack or my sleeping baby while trying to get a half-decent shot of my wife and daughter behind me. Layla, thankfully, was more of a trooper than her younger sister, riding bravely with her Mom. When we finished the ride, we were shown a private show with a baby elephant before heading off to the next stop on the tour.

We drove a short while before meeting the man who would show us how he collects coconuts with monkeys. We followed him out to the palm tree farm where we were going to see the monkey work – he rode his scooter with his monkey and we followed behind in a truck. The monkey quickly climbed the tree and threw down several coconuts, which they broke open and let us taste. The water inside was refreshing in the heat. The meat was pretty good too – even Julia did her best to try to chew it.

Following the monkey, Sun drove us into the small village he grew up where we met a family who served us a home-cooked Thai meal of fish, rice and curry with sweet mango and pineapple for dessert. The family kids were very curious about us (especially Julia and Layla), taking our pictures and hovering around. It was amazing to see their reaction when we gave them the caramels Layla had bought in Haneda before leaving – they took such small bites of the candies Layla usually pops into her mouth whole. Quite a difference, indeed!

Finally, we ended up doing some spelunking in a nearby cave. We were given flashlights and told to have fun, and we did. We were all alone in the caves (save for the bats and lizards). The cave system was vast with lots of limestone stalactites and stalagmites growing. We didn’t have the shoes for doing much climbing (plus carrying around a big baby doesn’t make it any easier) so we didn’t venture too far into the caves, but from what we did see it was a pretty cool place to check out. Our timing was really good too as just as we were leaving two more groups of people had shown up to explore them.

Our last day in Krabi was another ocean island hopping trip with Elizabeth again, this time to Phi Phi islands and Bamboo island. The islands are much farther out so we had to leave a bit earlier, but the kids slept on the boat ride so it was all good. After ~90 minutes, we stopped just off the beach to do some snorkeling – at first Tamie went alone but eventually Layla worked up the courage to go with her Mom. They were going to swim to the beach but half-way there Layla decided she wanted to go back to the boat so once they got back to the boat we all went to the beach.

On the beach, Elizabeth explained, there were a lot of monkeys that had taken over. The monkeys were a bit aggressive and we should be careful not to get too close. She also warned us not to run along the beach as they like to chase people – apparently her son had a close encounter because he’d done nothing but run on the beach. So we went onto the beach and saw lots of people taking pictures of the monkeys. We took a few pictures and splashed around in the water for a bit. I went to take a picture of the “Beware of Monkeys” sign while Tamie and Layla played in the water with Julia standing a few feet away. In the few moments while I was taking the picture and Tamie and Layla went to play in the water, two monkeys made a bee-line for the baby standing alone. I saw them running towards my daughter and did the only thing I could think of – I ran straight at Julia yelling as loudly as I could! Those two monkeys stopped just as I reached Julia and grabbed her. When I looked up, I could see that there were four or five monkeys now coming at us (I assume a few must have started chasing me when I ran). Luckily they didn’t like getting splashed with water so I just kept kicking water at them while Tamie made sure Julia was okay — luckily, her crying was because of the big screaming white guy that scared the crap out of her and not the little monkeys that scared the crap out of him. Needless to say, we didn’t stay on that beach much longer after that. I did notice though, in the brief time we were there, that at least two adult women got attacked by monkeys before they got chased off by tour guides.

After the monkey scare, we headed to another part of the Phi Phis where snorkeling was good. We had lunch on the boat again, another nice Thai meal, before going out for a swim. I took Julia around while Tamie took Layla snorkeling again. We swam for a while before heading back to the boat. We checked out another good snorkeling spot, took a brief look at the beach the movie “The Beach” was filmed on (there were only about a hundred other tour boats here!) and then headed to Bamboo Island for our final stop of the day. The beach here wasn’t quite as nice as the other beaches (there was a lot of coral that hurt Layla’s feet, which isn’t the best thing for a tired 4 year old) but once we got into the water we had fun.

As I type all this out, it sounds like all we did was boat around, snorkel, swim and hang out on beaches on the two island hopping days and that is all we did. And it was so much fun I wish we could have done it more. Both Layla and Julia improved a lot as they got more comfortable floating around in their life jackets and I’m sure a few more days of it we’d have been having even more fun snorkeling together. But alas, as with all good things, our time in Krabi had to come to an end…

We flew to Bangkok Wednesday afternoon and got to our hotel in the evening. We grabbed dinner at the hotel restaurant before turning in for the night. The next morning, we talked to the concierge about what was interesting to do and he recommended a guided tour through safari park, as it was a popular thing for the kids. We took him up on the offer and he arranged everything for the low price of 8000 Baht. Within 30 minutes, we had a driver waiting for us and we were on our way.

When we arrived at the park, the driver told me to take the paper the concierge gave me to the information window and we’d be all set. He said he’d be back at 5 to pick us up and he bid us farewell. The guy in the information window gave me tickets to get into the zoo portion and another to take a drive through the safari park, plus a voucher for lunch. We wandered through the zoo and caught a couple shows between looking at animals. The highlights of the place, though, were the tiger cub we held for 400 Baht (~12 bucks) and feeding giraffes with the kids. Driving through the safari park on the bus was also interesting, as there were so many of each animal, although it was obvious they weren’t the best cared for.

We finished the day a lot earlier than expected because there weren’t as many shows as the driver had led us to believe. At ~3:30, we called him and he said he’d be there in 20 minutes. At 4, he said he’d be there in 10 more minutes. At 4:20, some other guy in a different taxi showed up and said his friend had sent him to pick us up and that we should get into his car. The only reason I did was because he knew the name of the hotel we were staying at. He did take us back without a problem but the concierge was surprised that we showed up in a taxi. He was even more surprised to hear that we didn’t have a guide, as promised. The travel agency he arranged things through told me the driver was supposed to be the guide but he had some stomach issues that day and they were sorry. When I asked for a refund, they asked to talk with the concierge instead of me and then eventually we got 1000 Baht back, apparently the cost of a guide. Tip for anyone visiting Bangkok – forget the tours offered by the hotels – get the information and then call a cab. You’ll save a ton of money.

That night, we ended up taking a tuk-tuk and going to one of the many shopping centers in Bangkok where we took a look around at some of the shops and found something to eat. We walked back to the hotel and turned in for the night.

The next day, we walked to a different shopping center that housed an “Olympic-sized” skating rink. I guess the Thai Winter Olympics have smaller rinks than the Canadian ones because the rink we saw was definitely not regulation sized. We did some brief shopping before we had to head back to the hotel to collect our bags and head off to the airport to catch our flight home.

Although we had a few snags along the way, the vacation went smoothly and we all enjoyed our time in Thailand. So it was of little surprise when our flight home was delayed because the aircraft was late and then delayed again when we were all on board and had to wait while the ground crew fixed one of the toilets. Our scheduled flight time of 14:20 turned into a departure at ~17:30 and our perfectly timed arrival to catch our limousine bus home instead turned into a 1AM arrival and expensive cab ride home.

Despite the minor SNAFU at the end, the memories of Thailand will be of sun, swimming and smiles all around.

Click here for pictures of the entire trip.

I’m hoping to get back into a more regular schedule of posts again now that I have a working PC. Stay tuned.

Once I get a new application written to update the gallery, I’ll post some pics. In the meantime… see you on Facebook. =)

As an aside, if anyone knows how to use RAW images vs regular JPG images, I’m curious to hear about it. I’m starting to read about the advantages of RAW, but it sounds like a lot more work too. Any thoughts?

When we got to the park, it was much smaller than expected. Having said that, it was dirt cheap to get in and worth the price of admission.

Upon entering, there were a few animals in cages that you could feed (surprisingly, not squirrels!). Guinea pigs and rabbits ran in cages around while kids fed them lettuce and carrots. There was another section where you could pay a few yen to hold an animal too. The crown jewel of the park, though, was definitely the squirrel enclosure. We went through the double-doors and got to share space with squirrels!

We found there was an additional bonus inside the squirrel area – for a small price you could buy sunflower seeds and feed the squirrels. There was even an oven mitt to protect your hand from the dirty little rodents. We thought Layla would love the idea of personally feeding her bushy-tailed friends – she did, in fact, like the idea. She didn’t, however, like the realization of that idea.

Tamie was in her glory as she dawned the oven mitt and let squirrels jump all over her. Layla watched in silent horror as her Mom laughed as she was assaulted by the bushy-tails. Julia, too, watched but was more curious than scared. At one point she even tried to touch one of the squirrels!

Pictures here

This weekend was cold and rainy so we stayed mostly indoors. We took the kids to the fantasy world that is on the 3rd floor of a nearby shopping center and Layla enjoyed. Julia also seemed to have a good time but she was a bit small for most of it. Soon enough, though, those two are going to be running around together having fun and making trouble.

Check out the pics in the gallery.

Merry Christmas from Japan, and soon to be Canada.