Dreamworld and Torn Pants

Before I begin, I would like to inform you that this entry has LOTS of pictures, so this entry would probably be really long. If you can’t see the picture clearly, click on the picture and you’ll see the same picture, but bigger. If some of the pictures don’t load, please tell me so that I can fix them for you. Anyway, hope you enjoy reading this entry!

Well, as you all have realized, I turned 15 last Tuesday! And because it was my birthday, I had cake. Note: The cake was from ice-cream cake. When we bought the cake, the shop said that they ran out of DRY ICE, which meant that Lynn and I had to hurry home! As soon as we got to the car, we went racing through the sois in order to get home on time. The air was turned on full blast. The car was speeding and cutting through other cars. And my arms were aching from holding the cake near to the aircon. Finally, after about 10 minutes, we reached home. Surprisingly, the cake looked perfectly fine… Well, we put it into the freezer to make sure that it was ok. After a while, we came to eat it… ahh…. oreos…. vanilla….. chocolate……. WHIP CREAM! The cake was friggin good! Here’s some pictures of it…

I also received my birthday present from Rose, who mailed it to me. I really liked the present Rose! Your present arrived on my birthday right when I came back home, which was around 1 PM. Here are some pics of it…

Here is the wrapped present and the card. The black marks on the card is just my address – not that important…

Here are the presents I got from Rose! Candies from Akiko and a “frog cup” with stones and key chains in it. Really nice!

That is me hypnotized by the different Akiko candies. By the way, they ARE yummy, Rose!

A Bellefire CD I bought from B2S.

By the way, have you guys heard the new Bellefire CD? Well, in case you don’t even know who Bellefire are, they are an Irish girl band who have been taking the charts by storm. They do pop music… Anyway, they have a new album called “Spin the Wheel”. Some of you might have heard their single “Say Something Anyway” on the radio or MTV or on Channel V. Well, I got their CD (which won’t be released in Europe until August) from B2S and I have to say, this album is REALLY good! I would give it a rate of 10 out of 10. Some of my favorite songs on the album are: Say Something Anyway (1st track – sad lyrics but sounds rather happy), Damn (6th track – a damn good song), Pieces of You (7th track [not a Jewel cover but an original song] – really sad and haunting), but honestly, all of the songs are really good and you all should check it out.

Now, I was watching a bit of History Channel the other day and they had a Biography program on Anne Frank. I hope you guys know who she is… Anyway, what they were talking about reminded me of 8th grade Language Arts class when we had to act out the Anne Frank drama (I bet you remember that well, right Rose?). Anne said that she wanted to become a famous writer and that everybody around the world would know her name. Well, what Mr. Alex, our Language Arts teacher, said was quite true… He said, “Poor girl, the whole world knows her name and her story but she doesn’t know about it…” That quote was quite sad. Imagine! The whole world knows about you but you don’t know it! They also said that she died just a month or two before the people from her Concentration Camp were set free! Just a few more months and she would have survived! One quote that struck me was when she said that even though everybody in the world seem so evil, she still does believe that they are kind in the heart. Wow… It shows that even though she is suffering so much, she still believes that everybody is good. Anne, your wish did come true. You DID become a famous writer that everybody around the world knows your name.

Anyway, on Wednesday, I went to Dreamworld with a some people from Harrow. Because Mew knows Mandy and Mandy knows Mew, I decided to invite Mandy along to come to Dreamworld. And it was a fun day! So, here’s how the day went…

I first arrived at Dreamworld and spent a long time trying to locate the rest of the group. Mandy said that she was going to give me a free entrance ticket when she gets there. 10:30 AM was the time we would meet. I got there at 10:20. Finally at 11:10 AM, Mandy arrived… After trying to find Mew, Ham, and Mew’s friend, we realized that they already bought tickets for us. Joy… So much for a free ticket. Well, we entered Dreamworld and walked past various rides. When we finally arrived at the Go-Kart area where the rest of the group were playing, they were done playing. I was expecting a few people there. But when I saw the crowd, I was shocked! This was something around 25 people! A size of a classroom! Well, we bought some drinks (Andy, a Year 11 student, had beer.) and walked towards the Grand Canyon ride. First, we thought that this ride wouldn’t be that scary and that it would be a “babyish” ride. But while we were waiting in line, we saw many of the rafts come by and the people inside were all drenched. Oh great… How will we dry ourselves?! Some girls got plastic suits and began to put them on. When we finally got onto the raft/boat (8 per boat), we began the ride. Note: We weren’t even done putting on our seatbelts yet! At first, the ride seemed boring because it was quite slow. But! When we reached the first quarter, we went under a cave and it poured water! Then the ride began to get harder and faster. The people on my boat tried to turn and slow the boat down so that we wouldn’t get that wet. Sadly, it didn’t help much. After going halfway, we were half wet already. Until we reached a BIG splash. By the time we got out, we looked like we went through a rainstorm. The girls’ boat came by a few minutes later. Luckily for them, they had the plastic suits on and because of those suits, they were hardly wet. We decided to go to the Haunted House next. After locating the entrance to the house, which took a long time, we got into a line. Ham, who got inside first, began to swing a hanging shrunken head that was inside the door. This scared Ping who began screaming over and over again. Ham, enjoying this, continued to swing and it took quite awhile for Ping to calm down. When we entered, the Harrow group stood closely and walked together. Actually, nothing was that scary but then the guys were just screaming so that it would scare the girls. Finally, after stumbling over each other’s feet, we got out of the house. Here are just some pictures of the outside of the Haunted House. (They didn’t let me take pictures inside.)

The hallway of the Haunted House with the “IN” sign in three languages (English, Thai, and Chinese).

Maek found it more interesting to play cards with the dead than with us.

Maek showing his love to the bride…

Andy and Maek fight over the bride. Hmm… I wonder who will she choose… (YES, that is a cigarette in Andy’s hand.)

After the Haunted House, we went to get in line at the “Space Mountain” ride. While waiting, Praew told Mandy and I some more about Harrow. Here’s how the conversation went…

Praew: (Turns to Mandy) So, are you coming to Harrow too?
Mandy: No… but I wish!
Praew: No… You shouldn’t, you should stay at RIS…
Mandy: Why?
Praew: Well, because your accents are better there… and the teachers don’t allow you guys to speak Thai.
Me: What? No… Our teachers let us speak Thai! They don’t even stop us from speaking Thai!
Praew: Really? Why?
Me: Well, according to my teacher, they said that “students learn better when they speak with their first language”.
Praew: Oh… But you guys have more variety in nationalities there, right?
Mandy: No… It’s like 99% Thai at RIS!
Me: Yeah… there are barely any Caucasians there.
Praew: Really? But there are more Caucasians at RIS… right?
Me: No, there are barely any blondes in our school.
Mandy: There aren’t any blondes in OUR grade!
Praew: But our new Headmaster is stricter than RIS’s… He started the whole “you have to wear your boater” thing.
Mandy: (To me.) See! I told you! They got a new Headmaster! (Note: This is a long discussion Mandy and I had about Harrow having a new Headmaster from another British international school.)
Me: Dr. Hensmann, right?
Praew: Yeah…

Praew told us a few more things on their uniform and PROM before it was our turn to go on the ride. Before we went on, Mandy told me that she saw Jeeb with an “Alex Band” (The leading singer of The Calling) tatoo on her. Quite interesting because she doesn’t look like a girl that would have a tatoo! Everybody in our group took over that Space Mountain ride. The ride then began to move and it went really fast. Just a few seconds later, it had a big stop. It paused for a few seconds and began to move really, really fast. The next thing I knew, we were going really fast in circles around a large black room. Holy cow! My head almost hit a bar! A few minutes later, the ride was done. We then moved on to lunch. The best thing of all. Oh, by then, Poom (You say it with a “por-plaa”.) arrived and joined us. We ate at KFC, which was right next door from Space Mountain.

After eating, we head to Snowtown. Some people like Ham, Andy, Poom, Mew’s friend, and some of the girls went to the small game booths. But the rest of us bought tickets at the ticket booth. I bought Mew the ticket because he bought the entrance ticket for me. After getting our tickets, giving our tickets to the person in front, changing our shoes for boots, getting some jackets, and dressing up, we were ready. We waited in front of the entrance door into the “get-ready-room” as we watched a penguin talk to us about how to act in Snowtown. When the person came to open the door into the “get-ready-room”, we were getting in when Mandy reminded me to get the camera. Wait…. The camera’s in her bag! And her bag is on the shelf! We told Mew that we’ll be right back and we dashed towards the shelf. The shelf was behind the counter so we jumped over bags and jackets and went behind the counters. We ran to the bag and found it on the floor. (Wow, they really took care of it…) Mandy got the camera from her bag and we ran back to the door. The door was closed. In front was a sign saying, “Do not open alone.” Still, we looked around and we opened the door and ran inside. Inside was a big, cold, white room where people gathered around before they went into the actual Snowtown. We found Mew and the rest, who were all waiting in front of the other door. Then the door opened and we entered Snowtown. On our right, there were some penguin statues and in front was a big moose statue. To our left was a big cabin that looked very “Christmasy”. And right nearby to the house was the big sliding area. We all went on the big sliding area many times. After trying them out alone a few times, most of us got into groups and slid down as a line. So here are some pictures when we stayed in Snowtown. Note: We stayed in there for about an hour and thirty minutes…

I found my long lost cousin! Quite surprise he hasn’t melt in the heat of Bangkok!

Mandy poses with her new friend.

The statue of penguins. They look kind of real…

Mandy getting wild as she rules over the moose. Poor moose…

The adorable Christmas cabin. Looks yummy…

The sliding alley. This is hella big!

Harrow students (mostly) as they walk up the sliding slope.

Boom and Maek after they came down the slope.

(From left to right) Boom, Ping, and Mandy sliding down the slope.

(From left to right) Maek, Boom, and Mew posing in front of the gigantic slope.

Harrow students sliding down in a line together. Thanks for blocking the view, whoever you are…

(From left to right) Praew, Mandy, George, Boom, Maek, and Mew (Sorry that it’s kind of unclear. It’s because of the fog that was apparently there at that particular moment.).

(From left to right) Front: Mew and Praew
Middle: Mandy, Jeeb, and Ping
Back: George, Maek, Jeeb’s friend, and Boom

(From left to right) Front: Praew, Mandy, and Jeeb
Middle: Blue, A, Me, and George
Back: Boom, Maek, Ping, and half of Jeeb’s friend

Mandy and Maek taking one last picture before we leave Snowtown.

I forgot to mention one thing. While we were in Snowtown, I was trying to go over the block dividing the alley and the stairs up to the top. When I was halfway crossing, I slipped and guess what… my pants ripped… Great… Thankfully, nobody saw it… I went to a corner and looked at the damage. HOLY SH*T! It’s ripped in the middle! And the mark went all the way down to my right knee. Well… At least it’s the “inside” of the legs, not the front… Sh*t… Sh*t… Mandy walks by… I sit down on the block and try to cover the mess. I ask Mandy if I could borrow her bag to block the damage when we get out. She said yes. By the way, THANK YOU for letting me borrow your bag to block my pants, Mandy! I wouldn’t know what to do if you weren’t there. Anyway, I just sat there and just watched everybody slide down. After a while, we decided to leave. I had to walk very carefully on my way to the waiting room. As soon as Mandy got her bag, she gave it to me. It was a pretty good protection! Anyway, we changed and we went outside. The next ride we went to was the “Flying Carpet”. The line was hella long. Those who wanted to go on it went and lined up. A couple of people didn’t go on the ride, so I wasn’t lonely. Of course, people asked why I didn’t go up… I thought of an excuse saying that my legs hurt because I fell down in Snowtown, which was true… But it didn’t hurt much. After about 20 minutes, our group got onto the ride. While people sat down on the ride, I realized that everybody there, except for two girls on the very left, were all Harrow students, and of course, except for Mandy. Here are some pictures of the ride…

Now do you get what I mean when I meant that almost everybody there were all Harrow students? Here’s just a few people I can recognize from the picture… From left to right: Mew, Mew’s friend, George, Mandy, Boom, Maek, Praew, Ham, Jeeb, Ping, A, and some more people.

The ride began and here they goooo!

There they go around and around……

The machine stopped in midair! I wonder how it feels to be up there!

There’s Mew in the middle waving his arms as he shouted to the controller, “Pi! Ow rang eeg! (Translation: Hey! Make it faster!)”.

This is a glimpse of Mandy on the Flying Carpet. Her hair is all messed up! If you can’t see, click on the picture and there’s a green circle circling her.

Well, when that ride ended, they were all kind of dizzy and had some scars and bruises around their arms because of holding on to the chair. After that, we went on to the Bumper Cars. But because there was a long line, we decided to go and play one of those “spinning helicopters” where little kids got on. It was quite relaxing except for the annoying star wars theme remix that kept on playing louder and louder as we spun. After the helicopters, we went back for another round at Space Mountain. When we were done with this ride, we went back to the “Bumper Cars” to see if the line was gone yet. Thankfully, the line was not as long as before and a group of us got onto the cars. I took some photos but then they came out really dark and quite bad, so there are not photos about this ride… But one thing that I can say is that we are really bad drivers! After the “Bumper Cars”, we went to check and see if the Viking ride was done being fixed yet. No. So we decided to go on a Ferris Wheel. It was really relaxing and that was when I realized that my PCT stopped working. How? I don’t know. It just wouldn’t turn on at all! Anyway, here is just a few pictures that I took from the Ferris Wheel showing the “Grand Canyon” game…

When I got off the Ferris Wheel, I decided to check and see what was wrong with my PCT. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find out why. But wait a minute… It’s 4:10 PM! I better call and check if Lynn’s here yet. So I borrowed Mandy’s cell phone and called her. She was already there. So I decided to leave because of my forsaken pants. I told Mandy that I have to borrow her bag to block my pants. So she came with me and dropped me off near to the exit. I got into the car and explained about my pants to Lynn. Then, we drove home. According to Mandy, who spoke to me the day after, she said that after she dropped me off, she and the rest of the gang went into the “Giant’s House”. They went climbing the “furnitures” when they weren’t supposed to. Mandy said that she got Andy’s help getting up to the table but she didn’t know how to get down. She said that she had to climb down and she fell onto Andy’s shoulders. After that, they went on the “Raptor”, which is a ride that will spin and bounce around madly. Apparently, before they went on the Raptor, Mandy and Jeeb (and maybe the rest of the group?) had some lemonade. So after the Raptor, they felt really bad. Luckily, Viking was already open and running. So they all went on it. But after the Viking, Jeeb was on the edge of throwing up. So they left sometime around 5 PM but Mandy told me that the guys went off to play soccer and that the guys would meet again at Emporium later that night. Wow. What a day!

Anyway, have you guys heard about the AIDS Conference in Thailand? Yeah… It had many famous people here, including: Kofi Annan, Nelson Mandela, Ashley Judd, Richard Gere, Coco Lee, Sonia Gandhi, Jennifer Hawkins, Rupert Everett, the Uganda President, the Princess from the Netherlands, and many other people. Wow… Hearing about all of these things that they talked about at the AIDS Conference and I felt really bad for those who are infected with AIDS. Here’s a picture of Ashley Judd and Coco Lee kissing an AIDS patient.

For more pictures on the AIDS Conference, check out the CNN Gallery. Well, that brings my long entry to an end. In case you were wondering what happened to my PCT, well, it got better later. First there sound came back and I was able to control things, but the screen wasn’t working. After awhile, the screen came back and everything worked like normal all over again. I guess it needed time to come back!

Hope you’ve enjoyed it and I’ll be writing my next entry soon! This entry is probably the longest of all… Well, I’m just wondering if my next entry will be as long or longer! As Rose said when I chatted with her, I don’t update often but when I do, the entry is REALLY long! Next entry should becoming some time next week…

Upcoming events

July 17 – Ray Fong returns from Taiwan.
July 19 – Whitney Houston Live in Bangkok Concert
July 26 – The Offspring Concert

CURRENT MOOD: Embarrassed and sore

Note: I’m embarrassed because I ripped my pants in public and I’m sore because my eye hurts…

Current Album Listening To: Spin the Wheel by Bellefire