I've moved!

Check out the new me:


http://myminimanifesto.wordpress.com/ 


Kitty 

recent reads (mark II)

Did I say I love my kindle? I love my kindle. It let me down oh so slightly on the Thailand trip due to it’s pervious-ness to sand, but aside from that we are in love. Even though it’s been delivering up a few ‘meh’s on the book front.
Which is why this isn't a top five:
1. Jayne Eyre, one of the Brontes: Period drama and not in manner of menstruation (boom-boom). It’s good, the language has gone the distance and better yet, is free (and free).
2. My Booky Wook, Russel Brand.  This is rags to riches tale of sorts...  RB starts life as a very weird, very chubby kid that nobody likes/you feel sorry for/want to beat up and goes on to have eight-somes with models and goats.  It's pretty scandalous.   He's smart and entertaining but completely lacking in humility. My negativity could be tainted by the fact I still begrudge him the two hours and twenty bucks he robbed me of when I say ‘Get him to the Greek’. Which was my own fault. 

picture credit

3. The Hare with the Amber Eyes, Edmund De Waal.  This is a book about carved little figurines.  It is a true story. Dull to the max. 
4. Home: A History of Private Life, Bill Bryson. Bookshelf worthy.  I could print this onto gloss but I'd prefer to just buy the hardcover. 
5. Ghostwritten, David Mitchell: I have a love/hate relationship with Mr Mitchell. He does this thing where each chapter is basically a short story written from one persons point of view and all the chapters in the book are inter-twined and sometimes reference other books he’s written (which is awesome and never so awesome as when it occurred in Ally McBeal/The Practice circa 1997 - [someone else liked it too]). When the person/chapter are good they’re great, but there’s a couple of duds that tend toward excruciating.  'Bat' the radio DJ ushering in the end of the world is a case in point, my God that went forever.  

Next up my ma is giving me Top Cop with Christine Nixon, whom I have a spot for (of the soft variety). 

Anyway, I'm fishing for recommendations...  See this comment for what not to write.
Kitty

@shelley's

I rarely experience food envy when eating with Carney.  This is mainly because he orders tripe and other such items that are not widely used because they are disgusting and because he’s happy to share.  (NB: I’m also happy to share/speed eat the good bits from multiple dishes.)

Anyway, new experience for me on two fronts when we visited @Shelley’s in High St Preston – not only food envy but curry envy.  Has the world gone mad?  I don’t really come at curry, but the goat was vunderbar.  He ordered with extra spinach and extra veg and roti ($1.90).  And then roti again because the roti was awesome.  I would say best curry I’ve ever had. Spicy too.  

Coincidentally, the owner/chef at Shelley is called Shelley too.  She is disarmingly friendly.  So disarming she blew my cover as  an epic food critic – I revealed all under the slightest of cross examinations.  Just like the time I dobbed Tommy J into the police for stealing bottles of wine from a 40th birthday party across the road from my house.  Sorry TJ.  I was only wearing a singlet and those police were intimidating.    


Kitty 

cheap chickens and my impressive herb garden

I went to Preston South Safeway three times this (long) weekend. Each time I did not spend $9.88 on a roast chicken.  This was despite the enormous amount of signage advertising their chicken special; chickens were $9.88 each rather than the usual $10.98.  What was perplexing about this was that the signs read:  'Don't pay $10 for a chicken'.  Seems a rather short sighted proclamation given their normal price is more than $10 which, according to the sign, one should not pay.  It also irritatingly over-states the (12 cent) difference between $9.88 and $10; if you paid $9.88 you're basically paying $10.  


Anyway, this weekend - aka 'the garden bonanza' - was not quite the garden bonanza envisaged.  My grandiose plan for paved area, planter boxes and a small jungle-enclosed bench (for reading in manner of secret garden) reduced in scale to a delightful-but-considerably-more-modest selection of herbs mounted onto the kitchen window sills:

Is magnifique, eh?  If not that practical - there's probably only a meals worth of herbs in total.  But so easy to water.  


Kitty  

yesterday's news

this is my friend meg's blog:

http://tailsalaska.blogspot.com/

it's technically out of date now having run from 2006-2009 - but as we fell out of contact during this time, it's proven the perfect way to catch up.  she lives in alska now.  meg makes me wish i was less consumerist and more of a composte-r/tree loving in general.  


thanks for saving the planet meg. 


kitty 

look at moi (II)

I said to Carney recently that I was going to use my maiden name as my writing name and my married name as my normal name.  This is for self important protective reasons - i.e. in case I become brilliant/controversial and people want to kill me aka Steig Laarson, etc., but mainly because I miss my old name.  It was a good name.


Anyway, that was before I send this into Onya Magazine:
http://www.onyamagazine.com/lifestyle/the-year-i-became-polish/ 


Kitty x

wednesday night at the vegie bar

gen is a vegetarian that eats bacon when on first dates. she reminds me of nina from offspring but in a good way. i won't add that she's one of 12 and grew up on a dairy farm because she gets that all the time. she's a technophobe without a facebook account. this is for reasons of living in the dark ages and not fear of terrorism or bad photos; i think she uses a typewriter at work. if you google gen there is a different gen of the same name who's written 'i am gen i hate school'. this gen would prefer people didn't speak to her while she eats her breakfast.

tara 'brown eyes-blue eyes'/'five fingers' is an early adopter with a thermomix and a hair dryer purpose built for curly hair.  she gets up earlier than the sun and stole clothing as a child.  it was from her sister though, so not actually a criminal offence (just offensive from the sister's point of view).  she's got lovely skin and her teeth/mouth are not nearly so prominent as this picture suggests.  she likes to speak to people while she eats her breakfast.

last night we three went to the vegie bar on brunswick st, fitzroy and had many interesting conversations.  


kitty x

the usual, pictorial version

Refer this post.

This is what that shit looks like:

uugghhhh.  and chef nagaskai brought it out.  

Kitty

hunter gatherer-ing at the preston farmers market

Nothing feels more virtuous than rolling your calico bags, preferably with a dog in tow, to a market of a Saturday morning (except, maybe driving past Revolver on your way home and staring superiorly at people smoking while they queue to get back in).

We used to hightail it to the Vic, but now the mountain comes to Mohammad; the Preston farmers market is on at the primary school two or three streets over.  I like it - it's small but big enough and the stall holders are all chatty, genuine farming types...  The butchers are especially nice.   

Probably the best guy though is the egg and mushroom man.   

 

image credit

He's curious looking with big oogly blue eyes and is uber enthusiastic about his eggs, and so he should be - you can buy a dozen double yolk eggs for like, $6.50 and he has photographic evidence of triple yolk eggs.  I like to have the same conversation with him each month about the lack of regulation in relation to 'free range' status.  It's a pretty good conversation, definitely worth repeating - I've a few interesting facts I like to relay and he listens patiently.  Sometimes I re-imagine this conversation in my head.

The other goodie is the chai lady, I'd wager best chai in Melbourne.  She sells it hot and in tea/concentrate form.  The concentrate is as distinct from syrup and doesn't have any sugar/honey/sweetener in it.  She tells me it is easy to make too, but turns out chai isn't half as appealing when you have to make it yourself.  Bit like rice paper rolls I suppose.

Kitty   

the great wall

As promised:





I love that Sydney Olympics poster.  My mum got it for me after I volunteered in the pavilion that held the rhythmic gymnastics and basketball.  It was pretty awesome - I got to meet the US 'Dream Team' (flagrant exaggeration - saw them from afar) and rather insensitively asked a crying Romanian gymnast to let me hold her bronze medal while gushing 'You're amazing.  No seriously, I can't even touch my toes.  Can you take a photo of me?  Maybe one more?  I have a double chin...  Angle it downward'.  Fact is, I had a double chin in most of those photos and chronic camel toe on account having porked it on in the time between I got my uniform and the  Olympics actually rolled around.  They were beige pants too so it was particularly camel-y.  Unfortunate.  


Kitty 

canned goods = very good indeed

K-Dog and Bel came over on Saturday and we ate/drank/were generally merry.  The merry-ness extended to the consumption of fois gras-in-a-can Carney and I purchased on our honeymoon:  

It was delicious, you have no idea.  


Kitty

eating rawsagne, etc.: yong green food, fitzroy

When I asked my friend Geeta if she wanted to come eat raw food with me, she was all like: ‘For shiz – lets rip raw meat from the bone with our teeth’.  And I was all: ‘Nah, man –vegetarian-like’.  And she was like: ‘mmm... sounds lame’, and I was like: ‘whatever, just come watch me eat’.  And she did and it was awesome.  Not just because of my mad knife/fork skills, but because we went to Green Yong Food.

 

Green Yong Food, located in Melbourne’s inner north, is an herbivore’s delight.  The vegetarian, vegan-friendly menu includes raw Mexican, Italian and Japanese-inspired dishes as well as cooked Korean fare.  Dispel any fear of carrot sticks because there’s an impressive gastro-sleight of hand at work; soy masquerades as beef, chicken and fish, and vegan cashew cheese, the standout of the zucchini-noodled ‘rawsagne’, tastes like it’s harvested from hand-milked grain-fed organic cows.  Top the savoury stuff off with raw, gluten free, vegan cheesecake and you will just wish you had allergies.   

Yong Green Food - 421 Brunswick St, Fitzroy 

Kitty 

yoga review: the ashtanga yoga centre of melbourne

FYI - The yard is back to normal as we don’t think Carney’s parents want to buy the house next door after all. Hopefully no amazing potential neighbours were put off by the garden being temporarily turned into a tip (see here). Maybe we’ll bake something and stand in the yard trying to look friendly/not deranged during the next inspection. That wouldn’t be weird at all.


This weekend I missed my Studio Yoga class for terribly un-zen reasons, involving cocktails and (critically) not involving dinner (unless you count cans of tuna desperately and rather unsatisfyingly inhaled at 1am ‘dinner’. I certainly do not). So Sunday morning, recovered, I went to the Ashtanga Yoga Centre of Melbourne in Fitzroy. In fact, I nearly missed the AYCoM class as well because it’s upstairs and I queued behind two girls standing, chatting at the front door. This would have been fine had they also been queuing, but I was the lone ranger on that count and consequently looked like a sort of desperate, lingering eavesdropper.


The awkwardness continued upstairs when the instructor informed me I’d managed to bowl up for a make-up class for people doing their Intro 1/Intro 2 program. This appeared to be big deal and after lecturing me on how little I’d know (nothing) relative to how much everyone else would know (everything) the instructor finally said ‘we’ll just take it easy’ in such a way so as to convey that she was doing me a favour and that she disproved of me generally. She made this point even more apparent by asking, at the start of the class, the ‘intro one’ people to put up their hands, then the ‘intro two’ people to put up their hands, and then – pointed look in my direction - ‘those who just came along’ (of which there was one) to put up their hand. Undeterred, I vowed to impress her with my downward dog (which is impressive) and generally awesome yoga skills (grossly overstated).

That said, WOW. AYCoM is awesome. For all her fastidious intro 1/intro 2-ing the instructor was fantastic. She touched me several times (tick, tick!*) but even if she hadn’t I’d still be singing her praises. There was lots of movement, no pretending to be a potato and minimal blanket work. I expect it would be a good place for advanced yoga too – their most senior class is the aptly named ‘MySore’ and runs for between 1.5 and 3 hours. Personally, I think three hours is a bit long in the tooth, but nice to know such options exist (pending achievement of respective intro courses I hasten to add).

Four and a half stars. Great workout. Polished floorboards. Slight Nazi vibe on check in.


Kitty

*In a posture adjustment way. Refer 5 star rating systems. 

a rather effective deterrent

The house next door is up for sale and Carney's parents are interested in buying it (as an investment).  In a bid to discourage others Carney has transformed the front yard:

Kitty 

top five: links

1. The $120 Food Challenge. Sandra (we got on a first name basis about 5 minutes ago) started this healthy/budget cooking blog when she was unemployed, on Centrelink and had a family to feed for $120 a fortnight. Which is $60 a week. Which is nothing; if Carney and I ate on $60 a week we'd be millionares. Now I think Sandra has a job teaching people about cooking and her blog is being made into a book. Nice story, eh? Also she has a whole section called 'make it with mince' - a cooking category most under-utilised.

2. This awesome website Do yoga with me has free online yoga and pilates workouts.  It's great - I've been doing some of Fiji McAlpine's (this and this) - but there's a heap to choose from.  You pick from level (beginner, intermediate, advanced), from intensity (relaxing, vigorous, etc.), and also type (power, vinyasa, etc.). 

3.  Food/wellbeing blogs can be a bit nauseatingly ethical/'Pollyanna'-ey, but I luhrve Sarah Wilson's. Because I lurve Sarah Wilson.  We have a one way relationship in which she  says things like 'eat organic sheeps milk yoghurt and meditate' and I talk about doing it.  She's just written and released an e-book about quitting sugar.  The 'sugar' includes fructose, which is the sugar in fruit.  Her book makes the bold and outlandish promise to make you a nicer person, so I've gifted it selectively.           

4.  My secret shame.  Links to all kinds of free tv shows.  Like America's next top model. Like Jersey Shore.  If you're into that sort of thing, which I am like, totally not. I only watch documentaries about the middle east/Palestine and other such things dripping with educational value.  


5.  The Brick House.  I wish our house looked like this. Instead our combined style orients more in this direction:

I am mostly to blame. 


Kitty 

the usual: midori, blackburn

I am a chronic repeat orderer. If I had to pick what my last meal would be chances are I would have had it the day before.  Testament to this, there are a number of places in Melbourne where I have a ‘usual’ and when I get to the counter the staff member says ‘the usual?’ and I nod and try and look like someone who is open to trying new things (but not so much so they think I am a swinger). I even had a 'usual' in Thailand and we were only there two and bit weeks.

One such place is Mitcham Thai. This started well but has unfortunately continued through a change of ownership during which the quality of their pad krapow has deteriorated significantly. The new owners know me not because I frequent the place often, but because no one else does. It is disconcerting to be embraced as a regular if you only visit every couple of months (also you probably want to avoid the seafood).

My best usual, however, is Midori in Station St, Blackburn. It’s Japanese and from the outside looks like exactly the sort of place that should be avoided. I mean that too – they have some weird ventilation problem and if it is wet outside the windows fog up and it becomes quite humid and sauna-looking. I believe it has something to do with cooking rice.

This exterior, however, belies a veritable haven of delicious-ness within. The food is ah-maz-ing, rather like this picture of an enormous sushi roll. While obviously I can only really attest to one combination of dishes (a ½ serve of #50 and ½ serve of #37), I have witnessed others reactions and they are in agreement. The food is fantastic, fresh and other non-expletative superlatives starting with f. In the same way I like to be touched by yoga teachers, the experience is maximised if the quiet-but-genuis Chef Nagasaki brings out your meal. Two very enthusiastic thumbs up/worth making a cross town trek/they shut at 7pm on Thursdays and Fridays.

Kitty


thanks for the photo 

the perils of ebay

Some people make serious cash selling items on ebay. Alas, I am not one of them. I like to buy stupid items whose dimensions I have under or over imagined - like this, which looked inexplicably affordable (and enormous) when I purchased it.  When it arrived via the post (again, baffingly affordable) it turned out to be about 15cms tall and not quite the poolroom centrepiece I had envisaged.  

Alternately, as recently transpired, I sell items (which is good) and then forget to leave them out when the buyer drives up from Bendigo to collect them (which is not so good).  But that turned out ok...  the purchase price basically covered the couriering costs.  

It did not, however, extend the purchase of a giant antique/vintage wall map that I wanted to buy and then gift to Carney in the hope that he would be guilted into putting it up in the lounge room and I not be berated for spending ridiculous amounts of money on things that we don't need.  Alas, he, the lounge room (along with Brenda from Bendigo) will have to wait.


Kitty

PS - No word from Justine Crameri.  Just to clarify, I facebooked her asking would she sell the painting... it wasn't just fan mail (what am I, a weirdo?).

be the first of your friends to like this post

I had uni today, which is ace for many reasons.  I took my camera thinking there would be something interesting to look at - I do, after all spend an inordinate of time in Nunawading - and there was.  And then it transpired that the camera battery was dead, so these are from my phone which is nokia and not really known for its epic picture quality. 

This was on the concrete lawn - it says 'be the first of your friends to like this post'. It is a good post, don't you think? 

This is a painting called Smokin' Girls by Justine Crameri.  I love it, so much so I have tried to contact Justine Crameri.  Unfortunately, she doesn't have a website so I have attempted this via facebook which could be construed as creepy ('hi justine, you don't know me but i love your work...') but if it's good enough for Nigerians needing financial assistance, it's good enough for me.    

  

The usual caveat about things looking better in real life stands.  It reminds me of being 16 and that sort of self conscious attempt at cool-ness - smoking and scantily clad in the cold.


And then as if they day wasn't interesting enough already (ex-Premier) John Brumby (not pictured) was part of a class panel discussion.  He was actually pretty good - very candid about the myki ticketing system, etc.  He's maybe not the most dynamic person you'll ever meet (i.e. I always have to think about what his name is) but the experience was quite endearing.    


And then I got a whole roast chicken at Coles for $2.88 (not pictured).


Yep, it was a good day.


Kitty 

dancin' in the street/at flagstaff gardens

Following on from this post, Crowdplay came to fruition for the first time yesterday. It was difficult to get footage due to the presence of actual media, but here is a rather compelling video I took that really does not do anything justice but provides evidence of J-Ma and Papa bustin' some moves. Spotto my dad (red hair, striped jumper) and spotto my mum (brown hair, purple top) and you will win a prize (the prize is glory, sorry if you were hoping for more).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mKhBEp8V5s

The were also interviewed by the ABC radio as evidenced by this photo:

They/we expect they will use the experience as a springboard. Remember you saw it here first.

Kitty

our house is a very very very fine house

Finally the decorating begins! This is the beginning of the Australiana yoga room (previously the Australiana reading room). Basically, iconic Australian images will cover the whole wall. They'll start in the top left hand corner and migrate down. I could probably have started in the middle, but this signals the intent a bit better.

Progress so far:

Hook placement is surprisingly challenging.

The next couple of pictures are being mounted, so stay tuned as the slideshow gets bigger - it's going to be awesome. I also want a big plush koala rug to set the whole thing off. Something like this: (which incidentally is sold as part of a diy kit [yes please to the finished product])

Kitty

wheely good, mark 2

Melbourne is a united nations city for literature, whatever that means. What it means, in fact is that we have the wheeler centre(whose byline - books, writing and ideas - i've lauded before).They've a new calendar of events and these are my picks:

First up - Alex Miller (october 25). Alex miller, i heart you. Even if i am not 100% mad about your books.

2. is an event with Marieke Hardy (september 30) who I am in complete denial about liking because I secretly want to be her. We are not that dissimilar though... She describes herself as 'being born on or around the set of the sullivans' and I grew up in the street where the sullivans was filmed, just a smidgeon after filming finished (maybe, like a decade). Twins, eh? She is the 'why the long face?' one though*.

Numero 3 would be Paul Keating (6 November) but the bastard is booked out. Instead I commend you Tanveer Ahmen who'se talking about Occidentalism (13 October) which is sort of the opposite of Orientalism. Only caveat is Ahmen's is a lunchtime soap box which for us poor folk stuck in the 'burbs, makes it impossible to get to of a workday.

The rest you'll have to pick yourself.
Kitty

*meaning she was a long head, most of which is forehead. My forehead is in quite good proportion (for now, anyway).

yoga review: yoga studio, ivanhoe

Remember the Land of Yoga? Disaster.

Well, pleasingly Yoga Studio in Ivanhoe was nothing like it. There was a noticeable lack of purple velvet for one and although I didn't actually go, I expect that that the metallic hindu stickers/plethora of garden gnomes would also be absent from the bathroom. This is both because Yoga Studio is based at the Ivanhoe RSL and because the Land of Yoga was, well, really, really weird.

I continue to believe there needs to be an urban spoon for yoga, but in it's absence, I've developed (another) five star rating system:

My five star rating system for yoga.

NB: It seems to be framed in the negative which is probably not very zen but useful for explanatory purposes.

- 1 star deducted for 'dead fish yoga'. Dead fish yoga involves little movement and a lot of lying still and breathing/meditating.

- 1 star deducted for use of blankets. This has a strong link with the above. Blocks, straps and bulsters are a-ok.

- 1 star deducted if someone does or there is a liklihood that someone will drip their sweat onto your mat. You can deduct an additional star if the sweat actually falls onto your person.

- Add 1 star if the instructor touches you - it's very exciting in yoga when the instructor tweaks your posture. Even if it the excitement feels like acute pain.

- Discretionary star for ambience - judgement may/may not involve aforementioned garden gnomes.

Based on this rigorous analysis Ivanhoe is four and a half stars. The RSL-location is possibly the only drawback, much as I want to be community minded. This is due to lack of showering facilities and proximity to my house (which is the centre of the universe).

Kitty

big reveal: the new avocado (which was the new bacon)

Is... Anchovies. They are the shiz. I love them. I want to spoon them and have their babies.

















Kitty

and another thing

This is like the yoga I was doing on Koh Tao:

http://www.thesaladgirl.com/2009/01/07/power-yoga-sequence-routine/

Power yoga is a sort of a dynamic, flowing yoga and it's fantastic - not the dead fish variety at all. You feel stronger, more flexible, calmer and like you've worked hard. I tried this video at the hotel in Bangkok. It seemed quite good, but then kept cutting out. Quite difficult to find videos on youtube that have a full workout, most are only 8 or ten mins. Why is that I wonder? Tomorrow I'd trying Studio Yoga in Ivonhoe. I think it should be similar.

I'm turning the Australiana themed reading room into an Australiana-themed reading and yoga room. In exchange for this Carney has decorating rights over the lounge room.

Kitty

thai top five

I'm back! Sad face mixed with happy face... All good things must come to an end/ nothing like your own bed/other things you say when you get back from a holiday ('I can't wait to make my own food').

Here are my highlights, no particular order.

1. 'Honeymooners'. Before we hit Bangkok for some serious shopping, we spent a last night at our Koh Samui mansion - heaven. Heaven+ because they put us in the honeymoon suite! Ooh la la! Towels sculpted into swans, rose petals on the bed and many wishes for a 'happy honeymoon' from passing staff... One couldn't help but think some poor newlyweds in a nearby room were really missing out.

2. Samui Spa. On a recommendation from Tessa - who's blog is Carney's quintessential guide to Thailand - we went for dinner at the Samui Spa. This is a sort of luxury health retreat where people go to eat vegan/ raw/ gluten free/ candida-appropriate food and have massages and do yoga and go for walks, etc. It is extremely virtuous (colonic irrigation anyone?) and I would LOVE to spend a week or two there. Anyway, the food was AH.MAZ.ING. We distinguished ourselves by eating a ridiculous amount and feeling Christmas-full, which was actually a little unpleasant (and ironic given it was a fat farm). Anyway, I bought a DVD of recipes and now covet a dehydrator to re-create their amazing raw apple pie, which is one of my top five best desserts EVER. They also had a raw vegan pizza that kicked ass. I have no idea what it was made of. I think there were some flaxseeds in there.

3. Yoga on Koh Tao. Wake up, eat, read, yoga, that order, daily. Superlative, superlative. Could be life-changing.

4. Fish. Carney caught some big fish. One was a marlin. If you don't know about fish, this is impressive. If you are an anti-fishing-ite, block your eyes.  (Bad face photo for Carney but it shows the fish and i can't edit everything).

And then we ate it - five different ways.

5. Fireworks. Carney got some fireworks and the restaurant set them off for us while I made noises about it being dangerous and someone having their eye out. Glad no one listened to me, it was cool and no eyes were lost.

You will notice a glaring omission - where is the boozooka-firing-at-a-used-car? Well, we must have gone out of season because bazookas were uncommonly rare on Koh Tao. We did, however, find a shooting range. I would call their approach to security lax at best. The range consisted of a teenager, a desk and about eight massive guns sitting on the desk. I considered saying they should put them away - someone could have their eye out - but didn't, not wanting to offend being something of a consideration.

Kitty x

the art of relaxation

The holiday continues... We in Koh Tao, a small island near Koh Samui/Koh Phangan. There are three type of people here: 1) Thais 2) beautiful tanned Scandanavians/exotic types and 3) us. I have chosen to exaggerate the gap between the beautiful people and us (by which I mean me) by breaking out in hives EVERYWHERE and wearing runners constantly on account of rubber thong-induced blisters. Nothing says 'out-of-towner' like runners and socks on a tropical island. Except maybe being covered in red spots. Oh wait...

Today Carney and I went for massages. Incidentally, they were naked massages, which was a surprise for everyone involved. I spent a good deal of time wondering if my masseuse would be touching my boobs. And she did. And I endeavored to appear very relaxed about this by not tensing my body or opening my eyes and thereby having our eyes meet and having a 'moment'. Possibly this serves to further demonstrate my lack of Scandanavian-ness.

When the massage was over, my friend the masseuse attempted to braid my unkempt hair elegantly. This was a mistake, after about three knotty and rather painful plaits I ran out of hair. She patted my on the head and generously pronounced me 'beautiful' which made me like her a lot. Probably more than the boob-touching.

Oh, and this is where we stayed in Koh Samui - it was fancy pants and has ruined me for budget accommodation (hopefully, anyway).

Kitty