2 halos and a backpack.

The stranded police boat featured in the October 10 entry has become a symbol of the tsunami, and today it was the focus of the local memorial. On arrival, flowers were handed out to be placed on a large centerpiece by the boat itself. Later, following a one minute silence to remember those that were lost, a public address drew attention to the remarkable strength of the community and the huge efforts towards recovery that has gathered people from all over the world.

Despite all this taking place under a brutal sun, within 2 hrs we have been treated to yet another tropical downpour…

Seeing as they have no real interest in Christmas, the group of Burmese settlers that live nearby thought that today would be the perfect day to begin a small construction project from around 7 a.m. It was soon clear that hiding heads under pillows was ineffective against shouting, hammering and sawing. Despite this abrupt start to the day, much fun was had opening presents, fetching coffee and banana bread from Ms Coffea (the local fresh coffee lady) and marvelling at the yellow circular thing in the sky, which apparently is know as 'the sun'.

Later, an enormous and very tasty breakfast was cooked by Sabrina and Wendy for around 9 people, which was a considerable achievement on just one burner and a hotplate. Jamie pitched in by getting in the way a bit and fetching juice.

Even later, almost the entire volunteer community were joined in getting drunk at an open-air party.

Due to a number of factors (Jamie's Apple Mac breaking down being a major one) you may have noticed a bit of a yawning gap in the entries. The Mac is not yet fixed but efforts will be made to keep on track. Unfortunately images will not be returning as they are trapped for the moment on the camera.

Being concious of the fact that it's unlikely anyone (quite rightly) will trawl backwards, there will now follow a rough guide to the last fortnight-or-so...

 ... sabrina has been instrumental in setting up a emotional support service for volunteers ... it's rained way more than it's been sunny ... at 5.30 every evening there is a deafening screeching from some unecessarily large crickets in the jungle ... one 'visa run' has been endured that included a 6 hr bus ride, a soggy croissant, a soggier boat ride, a fine for running over our alloted time, a man chewing cocoa leaves with bleeding gums offering viagra and a cheese sandwich in Burma that turned out to be ham ... many large dumb flying have headbutted the new bungalow ... a trip to Phuket (pronounce it how you like) occurred that was pretty depressing and featured a 75p 3.5 hr bus ride home accompanied by a truly hideous video of a live thai band played at a volume that could be heard for a 300m radius ... someone in bangkok 'pressed the wrong button' and unwittingly triggered a tsunami evacuation ... tans have faded alarmingly ...